Pornography and New Media
April 12, 2010
In posting to various forums over that past couple years I have noticed a trend. Young people are getting addicted to porn earlier and with greater ease than ever before. New media makes porn as easy to get for kids as soda pop. This trend night be obvious but interesting none the less. I find it amazing how many young people are looking for help for porn addiction all over the web as well. Part of this trend could do with younger people being more willing to communicate and being more into social networking; however, these are just factors regarding a bigger issue.
How many parents let their youth have access to File Sharing sites? The top 2 downloads on these peer-to-peer/file sharing sites are Music and Porn.
Also, about every teen out there has a cel phone with internet access. (More and more pre-teens have phones as well). Most new phones and PDA’s have followed the trend of easy and quick access to internet and applications. Ever been to an app store? Well, your kid has if he has an i-phone, droid, palm, etc…etc… Porn is beginning to dominate the applications available. I won’t go into “sexting” in this post…that is a whole other issue to discuss.
Most kids, at first, are messing around with their friends or think its funny to download and share porn. They joke about it openly. Porn to teenagers has become a norm amongst friends and peers. It’s no longer finding a magazine or getting access to a video tape. Most youth would laugh at that notion. They would say…”Uhhh…I just flip open the phone and click…Duh!” When it comes to laptop and PC access, porn is insanely easy to get. Clicking around and getting images and videos is as easy as pouring a glass of water. The issues is, water gets boring, or in other words…simply getting porn here and there gets “boring.”
Youth quickly begin looking and hunting for something more potent. File sharing on peer-to-peer networks is the craze now, getting unlimited access to whatever they want for free. Sure, they download a song or 2, then they download a porn video or 2 along with it. Hardcore material becomes easy to access. This is powerful and exciting stuff at such a young age with puberty just setting in. Addiction sets in quickly and a path for life has been set. Relationships, communication, productivity, and many other aspects of life become affected with addiction. Parents need to be aware of EVERYTHING their kids are doing on phones, computers, and yes, they can get porn on their X-Box and Play-Station 3 as well.
Get your youth help if they are on the path of addiction. Even more important, be the example. If you are addicted, take care of yourself so that you can walk the walk of recovery. About 1 in 4 adults regularly views porn. There is a lot of help out there…take the steps.
