Posted on 05/14/2014 10:36:31 AM PDT by Kaslin
Thirty years ago Congress passed protective measures regarding pornography. On May 21, 1984, President Ronald Reagan signed into law the Child Protection Act, which was supposed to protect persons younger than 18 from exploitation by pornographers. (Other measures were designed to keep those under 18 from accessing pornography.) Two months later President Reagan signed into law the National Minimum Drinking Age Act, designed to keep persons below age 21 from purchasing alcoholic beverages.
Now, visualize this scene: Herbie, 13, walks into his local tavern and asks for a vodka martini—shaken, not stirred. Tex the barkeep asks, “Are you at least 21 years old?” Herbie says, “Sure.” Tex serves him. As he sips, Herbie pulls out his iPhone and watches a pornographic scene. I suspect most of you know what’s wrong with that picture: In all 50 states Herbie would not get his martini. Tex or anyone else would card him, demanding a driver’s license or other official proof that Herbie is at least 21. But the porn? No one would interfere.
The poet Ogden Nash (1902-1971) wrote, “Candy is dandy but liquor is quicker.” Today, I’d add another line with a different rhyme scheme: “Porn’s even faster but it leaves you forlorn.” I won’t go into detail here, but relatively few porn sites electronically card users. Some require use of a credit card to access much of their content, but even they are like bars at which persons of any age can get drunk.
And yet, pornography is a huge problem not only among adults but among children and teenagers as well. If you’re sending your very well-mannered children to college and the dorm Wi-Fi has no filtering mechanism, they are likely to be exposed early and often to hard-core porn—and some become addicted. Even if it does have a filter, your son and perhaps your daughter will probably see porn at some point.
Why the difference between alcohol and pornography, both products that sideswipe many teens? Thirty years ago President Reagan at the signing ceremony said he would appoint a commission to investigate pornography, and he did. Attorney General Ed Meese headed it up, citizens including James Dobson served on it—and the press ridiculed its serious conclusions. The U.S. Supreme Court also failed to take pornography seriously enough to change the almost-anything-goes attitude it had pioneered during the 1960s.
Now, as the group Enough Is Enough reports, porn makes up more than one-third of the internet industry and earns its purveyors more than $3,000 per second. Porn sites get more visitors each month than Twitter, Netflix, and Amazon combined. Most teens view pornography online, and one survey of 16- to 20-year-olds found nearly one out of four young men and one out of 10 young women admitting they tried to kick the habit but could not. Many young men expect dates and wives to perform as do actresses in the 11,000 porn films shot each year.
Need other dire stats? Witherspoon Institute conference research (proceedings published as “The Social Costs of Pornography”) showed that two-thirds of 18-to-34-year-old men visit porn sites regularly. (My hunch is that many of them go to church less often in part because they marry less often, and they marry less often in part because they access pornography more often.) Many men find it harder to relate to real women. Most divorces involve one partner compulsively using pornography.
Does this evidence mean legislators should act? Here’s the problem: A push to restrict pornography can play into the hands of those who hate Christian truth-telling. Now that influential atheists and secularists hope to restrict evangelistic efforts, our legal protection is the First Amendment proclamation of freedom for religion, speech, and the press—but since pornographers also rely on that amendment (as mistakenly interpreted), limits on it will rain on the innocent as well as the guilty.
A hard truth: Christians are a minority in America, and minorities should oppose increases in majoritarian power. A hard question: If we now should be quiescent on one issue to lessen the likelihood of a spillover to another, what hope do we have for constructive change? Not much, except what Christians have learned throughout the ages: Our hope is in the Lord, the maker of heaven and earth. He changes hearts and viewing patterns.
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Kids using porn can lead to things like this:
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/3156045/posts
Oh come on, you are smart enough to know I didn’t say that.
I could be silly too and say your definition would make it a crime for any actor to be naked or half-naked in a soft core or basic sex scene they put in PG-13 and R movie
People who think porn doesn’t hurt children probably would think it would be okay for a 13 year old to get an abortion, too.
You think she doesn’t make mistakes? There’s not a person alive that can make that claim, and the biggest ones usually start with believing you can’t be wrong.
That’s why you need to read and comprehend the comments in their entirety. Perhaps if you took the time to ask for clarification, you wouldn’t be wrong so often. People don’t write their comments just for you.
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Probably think it should be a crime to deprive them of sex.
I’m not interested in your straw man.
If it was up to me, I wouldn’t make any blurry lines. Speech is something you say or write down, not something you do. When you market sex it’s a commodity, not speech. I would certainly agree as I’m sure you do that nudity and even sex can be viewed as art or something on an intellectual plane, but not something for mass entertainment. However blurry that thin line has become, we have crossed way beyond it into something that’s clearly immoral.
Hubris.
I don’t think little jeremiah is wrong even if “children” refers to well mannered college students (although I wouldn’t call them children). Being well mannered probably has nothing to do with viewing porn. Additionally, it doesn’t have to harm all college students for the statement “porn causes harm” to be true. If it even harms some, then the statement stands.
I think it’s incredibly naive to say porn does no harm (if that was your point). Maybe it has no effect on you, assuming you like to peruse it (forgive me if I’m wrong), but the fact that so many young people are drawn to it kind of indicates that it’s doing something for them. I personally know people who claim porn causes trouble for them. Are they lying to me?
“The “Puritans” or whatever you know thought sex was supposed to be happening in marriage.”
Marital sex isn’t just good. It’s actually endorsed by God.
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A lot of problems between men and women are because of expectations from and comparisons with porn.
The poster did not say what is being claimed they said.
With all due respect to the family and supporters of the late President Ronald Reagan, the National Minimum Drinking Age Act is another federal law which Reagan should have vetoed. He should have vetoed it because, regardless that Constitution-ignoring FDR's actvist justices argued that the Commerce Clause powers gave Congress wide powers, Justice John Marshall had previously officially clarified that Congress has no power to regulate intrastate commerce, a reasonable interpretation of the Constitution's Commerce Clause, Clause 3 of Section 8 of Article I.
”State inspection laws, health laws, and laws for regulating the internal commerce of a State, and those which respect turnpike roads, ferries, &c. are not within the power granted to Congress. [emphases added]” —Gibbons v. Ogden, 1824.
In fact the 18th Amendment is an example of the states delegating such power to Congress, that amendment prohibiting the intrastate manufacture and intrastate sale of intoxicating liquors. Note that the states later repealed the 18th Amendment with the 21st Amendment.
"On May 21, 1984, President Ronald Reagan signed into law the Child Protection Act, which was supposed to protect persons younger than 18 from exploitation by pornographers."
There may be a problem with respect to the author's reference to the Child Protection Act of 1984, possibly wrong year or title. I cannot reference it.
Child Protection Act of 1984
Otherwise, if the Child Protection Act likewise regulates intrastate commerce, then Reagan shouldn't have signed that one either. Again, only the states can regulate intrastate commerce unless they amend the Constitution to grant Congress the power to regulate a specific aspect of intrastate commerce.
Getting back to possible problems with the so-called CPA of 1984, where did I left-click when I should have right-clicked?
As a side note to the Reagan presidency, please consider the following. Although his intentions were undoubtedly good, Reagan is an example, imo, that even conservative presidents have not necessarily been taught the federal government's constitutionally limited powers as the Founding States had intented for those powers to be understood.
Since you are now saying that “well mannered children” means “college age”, what’s the cut off age where it is harmful? Many go to college at age 17. Is porn harmless for them? What’s the magic age at which porn is not harmful? I wonder why you think ill mannered children in college might be harmed by porn, or would you disagree with that statement?
Or do you agree with Drew68, that even a 4 year old can see porn without any harm?
So Drew’s comment that porn won’t harm his 4 year old is gone, but he’s still here on FR.
Sick.
Fact.
I cannot imagine any sane parent who thinks a child, especially that young, is going to be okay watching porn
Are you referring to post #33 by redhawk.44mag?
redhawk.44mag: “I agree it’s not ok, but I also do not think it will ruin well-mannered college kids.”
I reread the thread and that’s the closest I can find that says kids aren’t harmed by porn. Was that it? If so, I agree the poster wasn’t talking about children. College “kids” aren’t children.
On the other hand, I don’t agree with the post. As I wrote previously, being well mannered probably has nothing to do with one becoming addicted to porn or having unrealistic expectations created by porn. If the latter is true—and I think it is—it might make real sex less fulfilling for that person.
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