Internet Pornography and the Need for Increased Censorship

You hit enter, waiting patiently for some information about the White House to come up so you can begin your report for Social Studies. The next thing that comes up isn't exactly what you're looking for. Naked women, horses, whips, and other devices commonly used for sexual acts of dominion and bestiality pop up on your screen. You know your not supposed to see that, but there's just a little bit of curiosity that makes you look around to see if anyone is watching. You continue on to see what else is behind that screen. This is a commonly found scenario of Internet Pornography.

Pornography is defined in the Encarta Encyclopedia as films, magazines, writing, photographs, or other materials that are sexually explicit and intended to arouse sexual excitement in their audience. Deriving from the Greek words porne ("prostitute") and graphein "(to write"), the word pornography originally referred to any work of art or literature dealing with sex and sexual themes, or meaning "depictions of the activities of whores." Pornography is one of the most controversial forms of expression.

The history of pornography goes back as early as the 1950's with Playboy. "By the 1970's, hard-core pornographic movie theaters emerged. In the 1980's, pornography was moving to the privacy of one's own home by technological advances such as video cassette recorders and cable television" ("Effects..."). This has now become available on the fastest, largest technological advance of the century: the Internet.

A clinical psychologist found that the first thing that happened after viewing pornography was an addiction-effect ("Effects..."). Once involved, they keep going back for more. These addictions often cause many negative consequences such as divor...

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...s much less.

With unlimited access to the technology now, there needs to be a regulation on what is allowed. Using software on public access computers, or in one's own home that prevented pornography to be accessed without a credit card, or using a PIN , could still allow pornography to be entered, but would stop underage children. If it was required that every porn site ha a program that id automatic background checks and could prevent pedophiles and sex offenders from making or accessing child pornography, there wuld be less pornography degrading children. This would help promote pornography that didn't encourage violence, sexual molestation, ect.

With some sort of screen on the Internet to only make it accessible for legal adults who are looking for pornography, maybe next time you hit enter for that search result, you won't be taken back by what you see.