For Kids, No Escape from Porn Culture

Here's the opening paragraph to an article in Newsweek magazine dealing with pornography and it's affects on children:

The idea for a book about porn culture came to Kevin Scott the day his daughter decided she absolutely had to have a Bratz-doll pony. For months, the 5-year-old had begged him for a Bratz doll—clad in spike heels, fishnets and miniskirt, enormous puppy-dog eyes protruding from her oversized head. Her sexy look seemed a little too sexy for a preschooler, so he and his wife bought her a different doll, which she was happy with. Except that a few months later, Bratz came out with Bratz Babyz. "If Bratz had looked like Barbie hookers, these looked like baby hookers," Scott says. Again, he convinced his daughter that My Little Pony was just as cool—and for a moment, the conversation ended. Until, of course, the Bratz came out with Bratz Ponyz. And then, says Scott, an English professor at a small college in Georgia, "I realized porn culture and I were in a death match for my daughter's soul."

Parents, if you aren't careful you may find yourself behind the eight-ball in teaching your kids about a Godly view of sexuality even at the age of five. And if you believe you can wait until your kids are 10, 11, 12, or 13 to talk to them about sex then you may as well just forget it. By then you will be only doing damage control.

In talking to young children about sex it's important to take the initiative to start the conversation and appropriately give them the information they ask for regarding sex and sexuality. If you can do that then you will be ahead of the game with your kids because they will trust your word and be more likely to share with you their questions and curiosities as they get older.

With regard to pornography, hats off to Wake Forest for hosting a "Porn Wars' Symposium" in hopes of getting students to take a serious look at how this $20 billion industry is affecting men, women, and children in this country. I will keep an eye out for any podcasts from the symposium on Wake Forests iTunesU page.