Online porn block for England

Blisterman wrote: »

It sets a very dangerous precedent in my opinion.

First it'll be porn. Then it'll be "extremist websites" i.e. Stormfront, BNP. Then we can look forward to the definition of extremist websites becoming ever increasingly broad, just as it has done for incitement to hatred laws.

I'm far from a conspiracy theorist, but I've been to China and I've seen how it works there. All under the guise of protecting people.

It's already started through Facebook and Twitter being more controlled and monitored social media than what we had previously. People embraced those more corporate platforms in their masses so maybe they'll be able to be coaxed to believe all this is a good thing for them as well.

There's a school of thought that the human masses needs that sort of control under the guise of freedom to be truly happy. I don't like it and I won't follow suit but I'm very aware that 9 out of 10 people will always follow the "think of the children" sentimentality over serious thought on the wide reaching potential implications.
If we were smart and thoughtful enough as a people to rise above things like this veiled behind emotion and propaganda we'd have been smart and thoughtful enough to not elect the kind of morons into government who'd propose something so ridiculous like Sherlock, Riley, Shatter, Cameron, Bush etc.

The thing you have to remember is that underage kids aren't interested in porn until they hit puberty anyway and by then where's the harm?
When I was fourteen I found a hardcore porno mag that showed 2 girls sucking and fcuking a guy. That mag was responsible for me milking myself dry everyday for years. If I was 10 when I found it I probably would have had a look, thought to myself "eeew, weird" and that was it. Kids on the internet are going to seek out things they're interested in.
In Amsterdam there is nudity on telly in the early evening. There are racy commercials on bust stops and there are women sunbathing topless in the parks as kids walk by and play. Nobody bats an eyelid. Yet in prudish countries like Ireland, England, America this would cause riots in the streets.
When I was younger than 14 I used to love going round to my mates house on Sunday as his folks always had the full gamut of tabloids. So it was a case of ogling Samantha Fox or Maria Whittaker or Linda Lusardi on page 3. I could only ever fantasise about touching those boobs. The thought of sex never entered my head as the concept was completely alien to me. Then we'd just go out and do what interested us like kicking a ball or listening to Madness.

old_nick wrote: »

porn is very destructive , im guilty of watching it every once in a while and due to only getting the interent as late as 1999 , was twenty before I ever saw hardcore , cant really say its done me any good tbh

I would see it as incredibly harmfull to young teenagers , im with the uk government on this one

Why? Do you consider parents incapable of preventing their children accessing something destructive despite all the filters out there?

I've had the internet since I was 12 and grew up with Porn, it's hard to say if its harmful or not but I'd view it as something every teenager engages with. My brother is 8 years older than me and would have gone through his teenage years without the internet, I recall finding his shoebox under the bed some years later filled with cutouts from page 3's in newspapers and playboys.
I remember as an 8 or 9 year old being invited to a friends house in the neighbourhood when his parents were away for the afternoon to watch the porn vhs tapes he found in his dads wardrobe.
I was just under the impression that lads have been accessing porn with or without the internet.

Smudge_pot wrote: »

I've been following this story for a while now in the Sunday Times, who are actively campaigning for this block. Some of the stories about how online porn affects teenagers' perception of sex, and what is acceptable and what is not, are horrific. I see this block only as a good thing. Yes, people here complain that parents' should take responsibility for their children and install these blocks themselves - but many parents won't, and what are you supposed to say about their children who could end up with a distorted view of sex and relationships? 'It's their own fault because their parents didn't regulate their internet usage'? A lot of use that will do them.

This is the same for everything that kids shouldn't have access to then, surely? Total ban on alcohol and tobacco because some parents buy them for their teenagers. What are you supposed to say about children who could end up with destructive relationships with alcohol when they get older because their parents didn't regulate their alcohol intake? Alternatively, we could encourage parents to act responsibly and parent their kids and not ban everything for everyone because some people may fall foul of it.

kylith wrote: »

For the people who are saying that parents won't know how to install firewalls what about these options:

1) Contact a computer repair shop. Say "Can ye help me to set up a porn blocker on my computer please?"

2) Sit in the room while your child is online. Not close enough to read the screen, but just close enough to make sure they're not looking at boobies.

Problem solved, no?

Until they go down the road to their friend Johnny's house, whose parents are idiots. And they are exposed to the full spectrum of hardcore stuff.

BurnsCarpenter wrote: »

But they're not talking about a total ban - it's just a simple opt-in system.

Do you really fancy calling Eircom and asking them to connect your porn?

BurnsCarpenter wrote: »

Until they go down the road to their friend Johnny's house, whose parents are idiots. And they are exposed to the full spectrum of hardcore stuff.

How would this stop that? If Johnny's parents opt in then they'll still be exposed to the hardcore stuff.

Sure you can, metaphorically speaking, keep all your booze locked in a strong box in the attic, but every time they go round to Johnny's house he could be feeding them vodka from the stash his folks keep beside the sofa.

Immediate fail. Download from a torrent site will sort it.

Its the equivalent of deleting a shortcut to uninstall a program. Its harder to access but its still there.

And its very hard to find CP on Google since they actively combat this.
The internet works a bit more like this and the people who access databases of this stuff arnt stupid.

BurnsCarpenter wrote: »

But they're not talking about a total ban - it's just a simple opt-in system.

Hmm, maybe I should have made myself clearer. This is already in place. Most ISPs will provide a system where you can block all sites deemed to be not suitable for kids. My parents had a system like that for a while recently and didn't even notice it until it was mentioned to them when upgrading their wifi deal.

My worry is that by having the government involved in making policy for stuff like this will lead to far stricter control and bans. It starts out as an opt-in system that's accepted and gets stricter over time. It sets a precedent for government intervention in how we use the internet that I'm not comfortable with.