One Month & One Week

The title refers to how long I've been unemployed. But I'm back baby! Let's kick off my return to the Federal Government with a little morning blogging!

It's funny that this new story came out today about how there are apparently a lot of kids (ages 10-17) who are being unwillingly exposed to pornographic images online. Funny because Wook and I were recently talking about how in the last few years you rarely ever come across unwanted porn online anymore. In fact, sitting here now, I can't even remember the last time I got some HOT4U pop up or anything like that.

This particular article is about a survey conducted by the University of New Hampshire. They say that 42% of the 1,500 Internet users they asked saw some form of human nudity online in the past 12 months, and of that group, 66% said that they had not sought it out.

Of course these phone interviews took place with the permission of a parent (who might have been near the young person being asked the questions). So how many teens do you think sat in front of their parents and admitted that they had searched for the porn they were 'exposed' to. How many do you think cried innocent? Yeah. Exactly.

Even if sitting alone to answer the poll, self-reporting is notoriously unreliable because people are inclined to try and give an answer that the questioner is looking for, or they just want to lie for personal reasons.

Oh well, at the very least, you have to love the alarmist cry in the name of kids. What does Rev. Lovejoy's wife always wail on The Simpsons? "Won't anyone please think of the children?!" Several paragraphs are devoted to how accidentally viewing porn is so traumatic for teenagers - and sums up with "Still, many survey participants said they were not disturbed by what they saw". Of course.

But really, my point is, based on how during what I would call my many hours every week of 'normal' Internet use I never stumble across surprise porn, I hardly believe that this is headline newsworthy. It just seems like another attention getting issue of the moment based in hearsay. Another attempt to change something about the world the adults don't like by using the guise of protecting children. Or is my Internet experience not at all what others encounter? Or am I wrong to think that a 16 year old has probably seen a naked boobie before? And if by 17 still hasn't, just might do a little online search?

~