The Evil of the Internets

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First of all, you're being "EVERYONE KNOWS" again, with no proof to back you up. It's a bad tendency.

Second of all, I don't consider slash porn to be an unhealthy tendency. It's far more popular than you'd think.

Third of all, sexual preferences and tendencies DO adjust over time and over experience. And most importantly, through interaction.

I also don't have a problem with promiscuity. I guess our worldviews just differ - a lot - and calling me irresponsible because I'd prefer people to learn to take care of themselves isn't appreciated.

 

YOU are responsible for your children, both morally and legally. Children don't "take care of themselves," parents take care of them. That's really basic. No decent parent would throw his child, or allow them to fall down the stairs and say, "He's resilient; he'll heal and get better in time." The job of a parent is to PREVENT damage, not allow it to happen in the hopes that they will get better. Nevertheless, I'm thinking that it not what you meant to say, but that's what it seems as if you are indicating. If I am misunderstanding you, Taza, then apologies in advance.

 

Any restriction you cannot justify with reason to your child is only going to cause more harm in the long run.

If you ever say the words "Believe me because I'm an adult" - you've taken the first step on the road towards failing as a parent.

The job of a parent isn't to prevent damage - the job of a parent is to prepare his or her children for a time when the parent is no longer there.

And if there's a way that is 100% physically safe to teach the children to both question the people around him and to protect himself - I'd be a fool not to utilize it.

 

Dude, you have no idea. Have you ever spent ANY time with a baby or a small child? Are you for real?

 

*sigh* Nice ad hominem.

Anyway, yes. I've spent plenty of time around small children - usually unwillingly, but me being known for being reliable I occasionally end up having to take care of them.

And pretty much the only thing worrying me then is that they'll break something of mine.

Kids ain't as dumb as you might think and coddling them will just result in them being confused and unprepared adults.

And from my viewpoint the internet *is* mostly safe. Very few things online are ones the close button won't get away from.

 

Except that a child's first reflex will not be to click the close button. Curiosity will push them to keep going until they see something potentially damaging, and by then it'll be too late.

 

And I see absolutely nothing wrong with both satisfying that natural curiosity and learning a lesson about knowing too much the hard way.

"Potentially damaging" is exactly the thing I'm seeking to counter with the "kids are resilient" argument.

 

And here I was thinking that you were the one who thought kids were "so dumb." I have three kids and they all seem pretty smart to me. Yet, I still don't recall commenting on the quality of intelligence regarding kids in any general sense. One can't really blame the kids for the quality of the parenting they receive, since they really don't have much choice in the matter. But, it could be that one of us dreamt the whole concept of what's "dumb" or "intelligent" somewhere within this dialogue. Feel free to cut and paste any remark that may have indicated that I believed that kids were "dumb."

Yet, I can't say I've encountered any dumb kids. But I wish I could make that comment for some adults I've encountered. The only point I cared to make to you is that it's a pretty basic concept that parents CARE for their kids. It's called "parenting" by some. You may want to research the topic in the event you decide to give it a try one day.

Nevertheless, you still have not explained this comment, which was the only part of your rant that seemed to lack clarity. Who are the "people" you refer to in this remark?

 

What, precisely, is so evil about slash? It's not my cup of tea, but everyone's allowed to fantasize. 12-year olds producing/receiving porn is obviously bad, but I don't see how it's an especially bad influence on sexual preference/tendencies.

And I suspect it wouldn't be that hard for 12-year olds to get their paws on porn magazines even if they didn't have access to the internet.

 

I'm pretty much with Chandos on this. While I don't wish to see the internet regulated by an outside source and would prefer libraries to abstain from monitoring internet use, the idea that a kid isn't going to be deeply disturbed by some of the more depraved content on the internet is quite frankly ridiculous.

There are some things that a kid simply isn't equipped to deal with. There are some things that, if seen without being properly equipped to understand and interpret what he sees, can cause a child great psychological harm. To be truthful, though, I would be far more concerned about my child visiting a hate site than a porn site. I don't think seeing slash porn once or twice is going to do any irreparable damage to my son and I agree that he'll ultimately get over it, but hate speech is much more insidious and can do much greater harm than a pair of boobies or two dudes kissing ever will.

 

DM - Actually in the US just about any porn regarding a 12-year old is more than bad, it is illegal. If you are an adult and knowingly allow a 12-year old to view porn in your home, or in your presence, they can come and take you away to a dark place somewhere.

 

So you saying if you had a child, say age 2 and it was running around playing, you'd be more worried about it knocking over an object and breaking it rather than it tripping over and hurting itself? And if it did hurt itself and social services questioned you about it, would you tell them that the kid should have been more careful and actually broke this said object on purpose?

 

Well, it's good to know, should the occasion come that these are deemed necessary, then I'd know to recommend this type of software, knowing that they're not that bad.

The blocking of unwanted sites not working properly isn't the problem why many libraries have chosen not to use this type of software, it's the blocking of many wanted, useful and unoffencive sites which is what many filters do, which was mentioned before, in the case of medical data in general and specifically in the case of STD's, or even more specifically sexology...

But like I said, if my workplace would want to have nannyware, I'd probably know to recommend some fairly decent programs by then. Usually, if possible, kids have different computers for their net perusing than the adults if the library's big enough, and in those computers there's filters in place if nothing else.

 

Certain things are not appropriate for all ages. I feel like one of Scott Adams' "Masters of the Obvious" just writing that. You don't show porn or graphic violence to young children. They do not have the emotional or cognitive ability to deal with such images and concepts. As they get older, they will become curious, and open, frank and appropriate *discussions of both the facts AND parental expectations are necessary.

Permitting a 12 year old to access porn is not appropriate*, to say the least. He might get his hands on it, but he also might get his hands on alcohol, but that fact does not excuse a parent providing the stuff. I mean, hell, if you follow that logic (slippery slope, I know) then parents might as well just do the nasty on the front room floor right in front of the kids so the kids can "see firsthand what sex is all about." Most people I know would consider that inappropriate.*

Good parenting is all about finding the right balance between letting a child find out things for himself, letting him make his own mistakes, and such, and also protecting him from mistakes that could have drastic, long term consequences.

I remember an ad campaign a while back, it was something along the lines of "let kids be kids" and at one point it had a little girl saying "I'm 6 years old, I don't need to know what rape means yet". A discussion of "bad touching" might be in order, but some balance and proportion must also be included.

None of this implies that kids are stupid, any more than acknowledging that a 6 year old cannot bench press a 150 pound weight. Does that mean the kid is "weak"? Of course not. It means that developmentally he is not ready to do something that later he will be able to do. I classify the appropriate use of porn as an adult concept, one that a responsible parent will educate his children about rather than letting the kid "roam free" to learn on his own.

*I use the term "appropriate" here but it is much too weak for such a discussion on such a topic. However, it is less inflammatory than some I thought of using.

 

Do I really need to say anything to counter that?

Anyway, Chandos, I fear I've been a tad too aggressive. I'm not against parents caring for their children - anything but - but I feel it's more important that the kids aren't thrown out to the world unprepared, and I have yet to see anything on the internet that would permanently damage someone. You might think so from things such as zippocat and pain series (don't Google those if you don't know), but overall the internet is relatively safe - excepting possible real-world meetings arranged through it or trying to apply some dubious knowledge acquired through it, obviously.

A few bruises - or well, a lot of bruises - are a normal part of childhood, and I think you're doing more harm than good trying to protect your child from everything.

However, permanent damage is one of those things I'd generally protect children from.

 

Iku makes some really good points. When I had first thought about software to block access from certian sites, it did not occur to me that libraries would use such software in a much different manner that most businesses. Most businesses that use such software (including the company I work for) need software that blocks nearly all sites with questionable content, and they don't really care if there is collateral damage of having unoffensive sites blocked. Afterall, you're at work, and while they don't mind you using the internet for personal use, they are under no obligation to make sure you can access any and as many sites as you want, regardless of what the content of those sites are.

By contrast, libraries need to software to do the exact opposite - they need sotware that only filters very specific content and allow access to everything else. I imagine that's harder to accomplish, although I'm not an IT guy, so I'm not so sure. It seems like a shotgun method in the first case would be easier to implement that a very precise system the libraries would prefer to use.

 

That's the kicker -- if the library staff has authorization and training to whitelist a site that a piece of nanny software is blocking, then it's a non-issue - -all the researcher has to do is say "lookit, this site is on asexual reproduction amongst tree frogs in New Guinea, could you unblock it for me, please?"

That example comes from about 8 years ago or so when I was working in a high school. The bio teacher was frustrated when any site that had the 3 characters S E X together was blocked. It put a crimp in any research the kids could do.

If the software cannot be tweaked, then you have a problem, but as a parent I would want to know that the public library was at least making an effort to keep my kids away from "Farm Sex -- bestiality country style!" types of sites.

 

Hopefully, of course, the program being used would be well enough designed to allow that sort of thing without unblocking sites becoming a full-time job. I, for one, feel that libraries absolutely need to apply filters to the computers that young kids would use, but also feel that it might be more prudent, easier, and a heck of a lot cheaper to simply allow adult users to bypass such filters rather than cause some researcher to bother the attendant every 2 and a half minutes to unblock yet another erroneously blocked site -- a colossal waste of time for both the researcher and the attendant, if you ask me.