or rather videotaped sex. In other words porn.
Like most parents I've been aware of the debate surrounding how to protect children from porn on the internet. Should Internet Service Providers block access to all porn unless an adult chooses to opt in, or would such an action be a form of censorship, an infringement of freedom of speech?
I'm not sure that they are having the right debate. Whatever controls we put in place will not be sufficient to stop young people accessing porn. I don't even start to understand the technology behind phones, internet TVs and whatever else they come up with in the next few years but I am pretty confident that my boys will, if they are so minded, be able to work out a way around them. I can put all the controls I like in place in our house, but I can't control what they can see at other peoples houses. They will find a way to see it, whatever we do. It has always been like that, it will always be like that.
Which makes me think that the actual debate we should be having is not so much about accessing porn (although it is a relevent debate, don't think for a moment that I think it is ok for 11 year olds to be watching porn) but about what is acceptable porn. What I'm wondering is should we accept that there are an awful lot of people who do watch porn and therefore we should be making porn more mainstream? Because if we do that then we have a fighting chance of controlling what our children are watching. Whilst I'm not at all ok with the possibility of my boys aged 12 watching people having sex, I'd much rather that if they did then they watched people having good sex, enjoyable sex, respectful sex. Sex where the women are an equal partner, sex where women are genuinely enjoying themselves. Not sex that seems like rape, sex where violence is acceptable, sex where women are the there for the sole reason of servicing the male. Because if they see that kind of sex at an impressionable age then they might think that it was normal. And that is going to lead to all sorts of problems when they start to have their own relationships. If they see the ridiculous porn sex and think that is how sex is, they will be in for a shock when they encounter a real life girl.
Surely then we, as adults who can recognise fantasy sex as being just that, have a responsibility to engage with the porn industry to try and push the more risque porn to the margins of the industry and to make the bulk of porn more realistic. Then when our children work out a way around the parental controls at least they'll be learning to view women as equal partners.