Pornography And Sexual Explicit Shows Violate Our Right To Life

According to the Declaration of Independence the Government has a duty to insure the right to life of it's People. The United States Constitution agrees with the phrase "promote the general welfare" in the Preamble. So the government has the duty to act against significant mental and physical health dangers one of which is the rate at which it is pressed on television and the internet.

In an Associated Press article by reporter Jennifer C. Kerr she mentions that sex on television has doubled in the last seven years. Below is some excerpts from the article.

The study examined a sample of a week's worth of programming on ABC, CBS, NBC, Fox, WB, PBS, Lifetime, TNT, USA Network and HBO. Sexual content, as defined in the study, could be anything from discussions about sex to scenes involving everything from kissing to intercourse.

The study found that 70 percent of all shows included some sexual content, averaging about five sex scenes per hour. That's up from about three scenes per hour in 1998, and from nearly 4.5 scenes an hour three years ago.

This is the known effect on children.

`Kids who have repeated exposure to sexual content become sexually active at an earlier age. The research is absolutely there,'' said Tim Winter, executive director of the Parents Television Council.

This is the suggested solution.

But an advocacy group funded in part by the entertainment industry says the V-chip and other tools can help parents screen the shows their kids watch.

Weaknesses I find in the solution are that not all parents are responsible and those that are still want help. Also children have the right to watch television and parents like to watch mature shows with their children under their supervision or are they going to have a baby sitter take over every time they want to sit and watch television.

Here is a complaint about government regulation.

``Some activists will only see another opportunity to push government as parent, but parents make the best decisions about what is appropriate for their family to watch and have the tools to enforce those decisions,'' said Jim Dyke, executive director of TV Watch.

Please! The government has an interest in the mental and physical health of its people that goes beyond the authority of parents and not even the Supreme Court debates that. Responsible parents are grateful for all the help they can get. They do not want government interference as happened in the Ninth Circuit Court when teachers could override parental consent on sex in school questions and when this years proposition 73 which denied parental consent on their minor child’s abortion decision was voted down in California.

Then there is a report by a progressive think tank that proves that minors between the age of 12 and 17 are the largest users of pornographic sites on the internet. It also proves that porn sites target children with domain names that are misspelled versions of those commonly visited by children.

Here is a report about internet addiction

Greenfield has conducted one of the largest surveys on the topic to date: a 1998 study of 18,000 Internet users who logged onto the ABC News Web site, abcnews.com. He found that 5.7 percent of his sample met the criteria for compulsive Internet use. Those findings square with figures from smaller studies done by others, which range from 6 percent to 14 percent. Study participants who met Greenfield's criteria (adapted from criteria for compulsive gambling) were particularly hooked on chat rooms, pornography, online shopping and e-mail, he found. About a third said they use the Internet as a form of escape or to alter their mood on a regular basis.

And some of the results

Meanwhile, 75 percent of "addicts" said they had gained "feelings of intimacy" for someone they'd met online, compared to 38 percent of "nonaddicts." Of those who met Greenfield's criteria for Internet addiction, 62 percent said they regularly logged on to pornography sites, spending an average of four hours a week viewing the material. And 37.5 percent of that group masturbated while online, they said.

Here is a definition of sexual addiction whose existence is not in doubt according to this report.

Sexual addiction is best described as a progressive intimacy disorder characterized by compulsive sexual thoughts and acts. Like all addictions, its negative impact on the addict and on family members increases as the disorder progresses. Over time, the addict usually has to intensify the addictive behavior to achieve the same results.

Here is a cite of The National Council on Sexual Addiction and Compulsivity where is defines sexual addiction.

The National Council on Sexual Addiction and Compulsivity has defined sexual addiction as "engaging in persistent and escalating patterns of sexual behavior acted out despite increasing negative consequences to self and others." In other words, a sex addict will continue to engage in certain sexual behaviors despite facing potential health risks, financial problems, shattered relationships or even arrest.

I do not have the space here to go into depth on the known harm to our society from sex outside of marriage and divorce.

In conclusion pornography and sexual content are indeed harmful to both children and adults and because of this it is not only the government's right but also its obligation to act to protect society.