A generation of youngsters may be developing a skewed view of sex from pornography, a court has heard, after a 12-year-old schoolboy raped and sexually assaulted a younger girl after copying a hardcore film he watched on the internet.
And of course we hear that this is just the tip of the iceberg, this is happening all the time and no one reports it and absolutely we must have an opt in system to be allowed to watch porno on the web.
The two problems being: OK, where is that iceberg? And, please show us the evidence that underage sex (whether assaults or consensual) is more prevalent now than it was before internet pron.
After all, imposing limits on free specch (and yes, that is what this is) is a serious matter and worthy of serious consideration and serious evidence.
Which standard references to icebergs and everyone\’s doing it extrapolated from one single case might not quite meet.
Far more likely, as in most “VIDEO GAME MURDER” cases, that the 12-year-old raped the girl for reasons that had nowt to do with the porn film if he’d even seen it, but that the defence followed the traditional defence strategy of “blame it on everything you can think of which isn’t the client being a scumbag”.
note that the boy ‘was allowed “unfettered” access to the Internet’. The arguments for statutory restrictions on the Internet, films and videogames are equally – if not more so – arguments against parents using the TV or computer or games console as a nanny.
As Chris Rock put it, ‘whatever happened to ‘crazy’?’
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IOmb3Rp1pcU
ukliberty,
The arguments for statutory restrictions on the Internet, films and videogames are equally – if not more so – arguments against parents using the TV or computer or games console as a nanny.
The main thing is that parents have to take some responsibility and the government has to remember that. I will decide when I think it’s appropriate for my kids to have a glass of wine and which 12A films they can go and see. Parents who whine that they want the state to protect their kids as the internet is too complicated can go to hell. It’s like arguing that the state should fit baby gates in every home because you don’t know how to fit one yourself.
Age restrictions have their place – for when parents aren’t around. We want to give young teenagers some freedom to go out and see the world, such as going into town on their own, but we also want them to be protected from say, buying booze and fags, so society acts as a look out.