Читать книгу Your Child Is One Click Away From Pornography - Elena Laguarda Ruiz - Страница 6

During the course of more than 15 years, since we began to teach sexuality workshops to girls, boys and adolescents, we have noticed a transformation in minors’ views on the subject. The students’ needs and concerns are changing. Much is due to the information to which they now have access through the media and new technology. However, nothing had prepared us for the shock that we experienced one particular morning with a group of 11-year-old boys and girls. It was our first time working with them. We were just beginning to introduce ourselves and explain that we would lead a sexuality workshop when the barrage of uncomfortable questions began: How are women turned on? What is the vibrating ring? What sex toys exist? What is a blow job? Are you a virgin? Did you have relations before you married? What is your favorite position? Do you like oral sex? Have you ever sexted?

While we had been asked similar questions before, they had come out of the mouths of high school students. Now the questions were being asked by children who let us know, with their words, that pornography was already present in their lives. From then on these types of questions became more and more frequent. We visited classrooms in which girls complained that their male classmates interpreted everything with a dirty mentality and used vulgar and foul language: “Teacher, I’m tired of my classmate telling me all the time I want to shove it inside you.” We had to start approaching the subject of pornography at an earlier age, devising prevention and intervention messages with children and families. To our surprise, one of the most recent interventions we had was with 8-year-old girls who, upon learning that we would soon discuss the topic of sexuality, quickly showed unease. When we started the workshops talking to them about babies and pregnancy, they began to cover their eyes and ears as if we would teach them something inappropriate, dirty. They had a strong aversion to any reference to the subject. Later, when they managed to verbalize their fears, we were able to help them: “Why do men put their penis in the vagina?” “How is it that such a large penis fits in such a small hole?” Unfortunately, in this case we realized these young girls had been in constant contact with hard pornography that not only had displayed a distorted view of sexuality at their tender age, but had made them witnesses of child sexual abuse, through the screen of a computer.

There is no doubt that technology coupled with the massive pornographic industry that makes this type of material increasingly more accessible to children at an earlier age is winning the game. This book is an effort to close ranks and open our eyes to an issue that impacts the lives of boys and girls. It is an effort to provide tools to parents to ensure that their children’s approach to sexuality is lived naturally, free from coercion and violence. Ultimately, the responsibility for this rests with us.