Kids today have unlimited access to sexual content on the Internet, much of which isn’t healthy. Kristie Vosper offers tips to help parents navigate teaching healthy sexuality.
I distinctly remember my elementary school library, it doubled as our cafeteria. Connected to it was a giant covered lunch shelter where we who brought our lunches from home would eat outside at fiberglass, graffiti-carved, picnic tables.
One day after I’d eaten my lunch I found the dictionary in the cafeteria-library. Curious about the changes happening to my body, as well as the whole lot of information that had recently been revealed to me, I opened to the word I was most curious about. You guessed it:
Sex.
I found a stale and clinical definition. There weren’t pictures, stories, descriptions…no salacious details to tantalize my pre-adolescent curiosities. I wanted more. I didn’t want to have sex, I just wanted to make sure I was informed. I felt left in the dark along with the details of the charade I’d also recently uncovered: Santa, the Easter Bunny, the Tooth Fairy. I’d recently learned that babies came because of something called “sex.” Penises somehow fit inside of vaginas like puzzle pieces. As I referred to them back then: “pee pee things” entered “down there” in a strange human mating ritual. “Who would ever want to do that!!!?” I secretly mused. My childhood was coming to an abrupt close as I was thrust into a world of bras, deodorant and maxi pads.
I was disgusted and curious. Fascinated and thirsty for more information than the 10 page “You’re Going to Get Your Period” pamphlet offered me.
When a 4th grader in 2013 goes searching for these details, will they even barely pause to look at a dictionary and its stale description? Google will guide them to the kind of enticing info I was curious and searching for at Jefferson Elementary School back in 1990.
They’ll all google “sex”…and a much different set of details will be theirs to explore. Wouldn’t you? I mean…come on…you searched the library books too, didn’t you? It’s a part of growing up to discover and learn about sex and menstruation and where some new hair is about to start growing (weird!).
I implore you to consider with me how wide the impact of modern media will be to the lives of our pre and post adolescent children.
I believe that the problem is much deeper than we can even begin to measure. We simply don’t have the long term research for how the privacy of an iphone or ipad will impact child development norms.
I am extremely concerned for the impact explicit material has on children who do not have the developmental capacity to filter, understand and sort out graphic content.
Sexual abuse is broadly defined to include exposure to explicit digital content. Will our children unintentionally find themselves exposed to the kind of content that hinders healthy sexual development? I believe that this is not a question but a reality we are faced with as child advocates. How do we protect our children from an invading media culture, intruding upon the childhoods happening all around us?
Pornography threatens normal childhood from remaining innocent and developmentally appropriate. How do we respond and react? How do we find our way into a healthier sexual culture rather than an over-indulged, sex- obsessed one that robs our children of the necessary and appropriate slower pace of discovery?
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Here are some pileminary steps towards keeping children safe and unhindered in their sexual development:
1. Monitor online activity closely. Create a family rule that tech lives in public spaces. Let the children know that their online world is not private and is something you will daily monitor. Install appropriate and helpful filters that keep your children away from sites they shouldn’t be exploring.
2. Talk About Pornography. Ask curious questions that won’t shame your kids. The goal is to provide an open dialogue, not a lecture. You’ll earn the right to be heard when you listen well. Be willing to hear what your children think about pornography. Some conversation starters could be: “What do you think is normal?”, “Have you ever looked at pornography? Is this something you talk about with your friends?”, “Does it make you uncomfortable?”, “Do you think the people are nice to look at?”, “What do you think happens to us if we look at it?”
Because pornography is so easy to access, use of it and addiction to it is on the rise between men and women. It is my opinion that if you don’t have explicit content on your devices, the chances your child will find it goes down. Model with your behavior the ways you hope your children will treat porn. Sure porn stars might be inviting your gaze by their participation in the industry, but we must remember that each person on the screen has a story and is a human being worthy of being valued, not only objectified.
3. Provide Open Communication. Allow your kids the space to ask questions about sex and their changing adolescent bodies. The more you create a normal enviornment for your kids to approach you with their curiousities you will decrease their need to go elsewhere for this detail. Don’t have one “sex talk,” have an ongoing dialogue with your children about these important issues. Educate yourself on an ongoing basis so that you aren’t surprised by the world they are living filled with sexting, instagram, porn and “likes.”
4. Create Community You Trust. Do your best to cultivate a community of trusted, like-minded families who share your values. This will help you monitor your child’s exposure to content even when they aren’t with you. Share articles like this one with other parents you know so that you can have a common language and understanding together.
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According to a study conducted by Emory University, 37% of child sexual abuse is conducted by a peer, usually an older peer who has been abused (keep in mind that abuse encompasses exposure to explicit photos and online content). If exposure to explicit content continues to grow, we can infer that the incidence of peer-to-peer abuse will rise. This is safe to assume because children sometimes act out what they have seen on the screen and attempt to process disturbing images in real life.
When your child goes hunting for information, how will we keep them safe from harm? How will we create an environment to help them develop a healthy and whole understanding of human sexuality?
This is likely the beginning of a long conversation that we’ll have over the course of many blog posts. What are your thoughts? Are you concerned? What are you doing to provide a safe online environment for your children?
Originally appeared at KristieVosper.com
Photo: Flickr/greeblie
I think what would be ideal is if we were less weird about sex as a whole, there should be easily accessible wholesome porn for anyone who wants it. I can imagine a nice television series about say a married detective couple who are affectionate and loving and you just throw an explicit sex scene in every episode, because sex should be portrayed as loving and fun for everyone not as something men do to women, Obviously it wouldn’t be for small children, but I feel that that would be a much nicer introduction to sex than say, tentacle porn.
Why pick on sex? Everything a child experiences, influence them. I see no complaints about animal abuse kids see in Tom and Jerry. No complains about the daily does of crime dramas, and nothing about boys being sold toy guns, and watching the A-Team using violence to save the day. Then there are the parents who drink and smoke in front of their kids, activities that kill tens of thousands of people every day. Not all sex is bad, but we treat it all as if it were.
Sex needs to be an ongoing discussion between parents and kids. As much as it’s always an ongoing discussion between adults and adults. I do think more parents need to be honest and open about talking about the role of pornography. Fatherss and mothers should both talk to son’s and daughters about it. I also think that Fathers should think about what they would say to their daughters about porn as much as what they would say to their son and mothers should do the same. Would the conversation stay the same? Would you have the same concerns for your… Read more »
“Pornography threatens normal childhood from remaining innocent”
Children are NOT innocent; they have never been.
Besides, shielding children from world’s dangers will never work. Hence, open communication with them is the only good way to prepare them to face real life’s complexity.
Do not think you can close the world outside your home (how naive!); talk with your children about anything. Do not restrain their curiosity (how vain!): feed it with smart and meaningful information.
Thank you so much for your well-written and informative article. ‘I am extremely concerned for the impact explicit material has on children who do not have the developmental capacity to filter, understand and sort out graphic content.’ I too am extremely concerned. It so important ‘body safety’ becomes a normal part of our parenting conversation from as young as 2.5 years. I am an advocate for sexual abuse prevention education which goes hand in hand with your key points above, but I also advocate we start to talk to our kids about their rights in relation to their body from… Read more »
I had to check this story to see if it was an old post. Google has been around for, what, 15 years? The 9 YO kids the author worries about in 2013 aren’t alone or unique: there is literally almost a generation of them now. The original 9 YO kids exposed to Google searches are mid-20s college grads now. Nor are today’s 9 YOs the first to really be faced with the “problem” in the article. Today’s college students are all tech savvy enough to have used Google at 9YO. The author essentially worries about a potential issue that is… Read more »
I agree that every generation has a new threat, and one people clutch pearls over. But Kristie is talking to parents who didn’t grow up with Google about kids who ARE growing up with Google. That’s what she’s talking about. For those of us in our 30s with small kids, this IS a new thing and we need to be aware and conscious of the fact that our 12 year olds could very easily google “sex” and fine BDSM scenes that they are far from understanding, in a way that we absolutely could not have. Not that I”m condemning BDSM… Read more »
Yes, but today its “fetish porn,” yesterday it was Elvis’ hips. After all, the parent raising a child during that time had no experience with TV or this new fangled rock-and-roll music their kids were experiencing. My kids aren’t quite to the age where this is relevant yet, but I think about it. I’ve viewed porn online, and I dont think kids are as likely to stumble upon BDSM as you think or to be as confused as you think. As for kids being overwhelmed… the whole world is new and scary for them. While this may be more over… Read more »
Just because you may think that kids are more prepared than we think they are doesn’t mean that parents don’t need help or advice on the subject.
This all-or-nothing approach of “don’t overreact” becoming, “don’t worry about it” isn’t helpful.
It IS important to talk to kids and prepare them for the real world, as it stands. It can be done wihout overreaction, but it DOES require *reaction*.
I totally agree with your Joanna. And kids DO find porn and are quite traumatised by what they see. And I am talking very young children. In fact, a co-advocate for sexual abuse prevention education has been called to implement an emergency education program where young children in a community are acting out sexual acts they have viewed and obviously have no comprehension of on other children. And on another point, Bryan, when your children do stumble on porn be it on their own or with their peers, they will very likely be traumatised by it as it may well… Read more »
What a thoughtful article— my 12 yo son has tons of great and up to date information at a click of a mouse…but he also has mind-numbing stuff he can watch, too… I try to listen and talk with him when he watches his faves, like Ryan Higa, Ray William Johnson, Tobuscus, and Smosh…. Sometimes the words and situations are a little gross and foul… And sometimes we laugh together over the same silly things…weirdly enough it does provide an opportunity for us to talk about various topics, like gun violence, swearing, bullying, inappropriate sexual behavior, drinking antics, etc. ….I… Read more »
I am very pleased to come across this website and these articles. I am a single mother of one young pre-teen boy. I am very open generally in my communication and liberal in my beliefs, however the “sex talk” just never happened until I saw on his computer at age 10 he had been Googling sex. We had “the talk”, which I always assumed I would find easy, and found it surprisingly hard. I of course put a block on his computer, but with mobile phones these days everything is available. It is a worry how readily available pornography is… Read more »
I’m so glad it was helpful, Holly. I think it’s absolutely natural to go into lecture mode. That’s the way I can tend too. It’s that mama bear protector coming out…but open conversation always wins.