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What's Happening Next Door?
Establishing Internet Rules for Home and Away
By Laura Paul
Although she is working to get child pornography laws enforced, it's hard to keep her nose above water. Frankly, there are still 20,000 new child porn pictures appearing every single month. There are 1.3 million porn sites. Nine in 10 kids have accidentally come across porn, she says. One in five children have been solicited online usually in chat rooms or by instant messages. "Your kids are fair game to the criminal element and the black market side of porn," she says. "Your kids can see things online that you, as an adult, could not buy in a triple X-rated bookstore. That's pretty astounding."
Exposure to pornography shapes children's values and attitudes in life. Hughes says studies have shown males exposed to pornography develop an increased callousness toward women, begin to trivialize rape and develop an appetite for deviant, bizarre and violent sex.
Parents need to be aware of the dangers when children begin to act out and experiment with what they have seen. "The incidents of sexual abuse is going up with children abusing other children, practicing what they have seen," she says. While it takes some people a crisis to get their attention, it's better to be proactive. Parents who are not Internet or computer savvy need to get savvy, she says.
What do you do when your child comes home from a friend's house and says they saw artoons having sex on the Internet? Experts say be grateful the child feels comfortable enough to open up about it. Get the facts and details in a calm manner. Don't punish the child but make plans to talk to the friends' parents.
