• Olhonestjim@lemmy.world
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    9 months ago

    I saw printed and video porn right around the time I hit puberty, decades ago, before there was internet in every home. And my parents didn’t have a scrap of it in the house. You think you can stuff that cat back in the bag? You wanna know what actually messed me up though? All the adults in my life absolutely losing their minds at the thought that I might be having sexual thoughts as a young teen. The guilt, shame, and denial of information is what messes up kids, because if they never told us anything, and made us feel horrible about it, surely we’d never have sex before marriage! Be careful, that can backfire on you.

    Your kids are gonna see naked people doing it. You need to come to terms with that inevitability, and become the kinds of parents they can feel comfortable asking questions. Of course, growth is hard, and way too many parents delude themselves into believing that bringing some poor kid into this world bestows them divine wisdom and ultimate authority over what’s best for that kid, and never learning another damned thing again. It doesn’t. Parenting is a responsibility and a journey, not a coronation. Growing up doesn’t stop when you have kids. You cannot shield them from reality. It’s your job to guide them through it; to raise them into adults, not to keep them children forever.

    You certainly have no right, or even ability, to legislate the nature of reality for others until you feel safe. That deluded fantasy is far more poisonous to society than people having sex on camera. It simply does not matter if you’re uncomfortable with an aspect of parenting. The world does not give a fuck. Nobody ever said parenting was comfortable. Accept what you cannot change, and help your kids become functional adults. You cannot imagine how much I wish my parents had.

      • Olhonestjim@lemmy.world
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        9 months ago

        Looks like you didn’t read or understand anything I said.

        It doesn’t matter whether any of us are okay with them seeing porn or not. They are going to see it. Do you think you can put that cat back in the bag? Do you think it matters whether your kids can come to you with questions WHEN, not if, they have questions about sex? The actions I think need to be taken are people like you growing up and learning how to actually parent.

        You might as well ask whether we should be ok with them finding out about extinctions.

      • Jiggle_Physics@lemmy.world
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        9 months ago

        Children seeing porn is the lesser evil in a choice of that or authoritarianism. The police are not allowed to just come onto property and demand everyone there prove they have the right to be. Does that mean that lots, and lots, and lots, of people enter property when they aren’t allowed? Yes, does this mean that sometimes people get away with serious crimes? Again, yes. However the downsides of the 4th amendment are lesser than having cops forcing everyone they don’t know to prove their identity and that they aren’t doing anything wrong.

        The 1st amendment means that people will be exposed to things, considered speech for legal purposes, that are not good for them. This is less bad than the government getting ever more control over speech. In order to to have freedom you will have to accept that bad things will arise from it.