I have never been a porn fan, I am not against it, but I dont watch it for pleasure.  This class really taught me quite a bit more about the whole buisness, the good the bad and the ugly. It also really opened my eyes on a lot of issues, like child pornography, sex trafficing etc.  I enjoyed the lectures, and I especially enjoyed the special little things, like articles, interviews, video snippets, date line specials.  I was very interested in all that we talked about.  I also found it easy to relate what was going on around me in my everyday life to the course.  Whether I watched something on Oprah, or when I was at work (as a nanny) I would often think of things to write about the importance of protecting kids from any sort of porn, and also protecting them from not seeing indecent images on the web or tv.

My favorite part of this class by far was telling people I was in this class.  You wouldnt believe the conversation starter/shocker it is to say you are taking a porn class this semester.  I was shocked how much someone and myself could talk about the subject of porn after I dropped my current class.

I have really enjoyed all aspects of this course, and I am glad my eyes and mind were opened to another world that they were basically closed too.  I am graduating this May but I will always remember my first indepth porn class!

Thanks

It almost seems silly and a bit behind that we havent incorporated a system like this already.  When looking at how much technology has developed and how advanced computers and the internet is I think a rating system is past due.  I also believe that something like a rating system needs to be started ASAP, before its too late. 

A system like this would also create new jobs.  For people to come up with the technology, install and maintain it.  Also people to look for websites that havent been rated yet, or catching websites that arent properly rated.  All in all some body better get their butt in gear and start working on this!

The blog from Dec 14.

 What I especially liked about this post was that the author talked about girls who were sexualyl abused as children and now a sex machines at clubs, strippers or dancers or may even star in a porn movie all because of there early and unhealthy exposure to sex.  These kids in videos are in for a lifetime of mental and physical tourment.  Young children are not meant to be sexual objects.  It is disgusting that anyone can look at them in a way that is sexual or erotic.

I was especially interested in the April 13th post that was against a pimp and ho party. It reminded me of the special we watched about sex trafficing and how terrible the business is.  This author talks about prostituion as a whole not really sex trafficing but I think she has some really great points.  I also dont think that she is writing like this just because she is a feminist, I am a girl and I am also against prostituion.  I know that for some people it is their living and its what they need to do to survive.  However it all leads to negative portrayals of women in our society and many others.  It also puts a backwards spin on how far women as a culture have come since the days when men dominated everything.  Although some women may see giving sex to men as a power they have, however, in prostituion I think they are left pretty powerless, and often under complete control of their pimp or customers. It is not up to me to support or not support this profession.  I dont agree with it, but itsnot my choice it is the women or girl who enters the position.  We can only hope that women and girls who want to be out of the profession can get out safely.

I enjoyed this Blog that I found and encourage you to read some of the other posts.

2)What is your favorite part about your job?

As a person who has worked with young children my whole life at boys and girls clubs, babysitting, and teaching dance I realize the importance of keeping kids innocent and also keeping them kids.

There are some services out there that are supposed to protect your children from seeing sex or extreme violence on TV and the internet but there are always loop holes.  Many kids know how to work certain technologies in their homes better then their parents, so if they wanted to DVR a late night special and watch it the next day when the parents are still at work they could do this very easily.  Also there are many homes where parents simply do not have the time, energy or money to completly safe guard their technological homes for their children.  Many kids just like to look things up on the internet and there are so many hot words that can bring up any number of indicent photos or videos. 

I think something big needs to be done by te government or some other powerful company before things get worse then they already are.  I think a completely new safeguard system for the internet and cable TV is a really important issue.  This is because problems similar to this will keep being created along with new technology, so we should try to nip it in the butt before the problem is so big no one can do anything about it.

 If a child accidently comes across a porn video, website or image on a website or while searching the internet they immediatly start to wonder.  What is this, whats happening etc. An older child might have some idea of whats going on. Howeverm, if when I was in K-4 if I would have come across porn I would have been like what is this????  Porn is modeling an unhealthy sexual relationship to children who have no idea what sex or a sexual relationship is.  This same problem comes from much of the media right now, many companies advertise with sexy images, many TV shows and movies portray sex in sometimes unhealthy ways and children are exposed to these images and their blank sexual thought canvas now has these sometimes violent and non realistic sexual images on it.  It can lead to kids having werid sexual desires or even problems.  Sexual education I think begins in 5th grade at the earliest, and by this point I would say more then 50% of students probably have some sort of idea of what sex is, either a real thought or a not so real thought. 

I was never searching the internet when I was very little so I dont ever remember coming across anything that really shocked me.  I am sure today that is completly differant many children in grades k-4 have their own computers in their bedrooms.  It is hard to say what the effects of these early sexual examples will do to this generation of early internet users.

In the begining of the course I remember we were learning about how hard it was to classify something as porn, what it would be rated and various other issues that have occured through the history of Pornography.  The Laws on Obscenity seem to be just about as vague as everything else we have discovered when it comes to rating and defining porn.

To be difined as Obscenity or obscene it has to go through a few differant tests which are listed and explained on the link above.  One of the big things though is the "Corruption of Morals" which alone is an open ended statement. This is because not everyone has the same morals, morals are a very open ended thing, some religions, races and even genders all have their own strict beliefs on morals.  So it is hard for me to believe the government could really say much on that.  However as you read through the differant tests it starts to make sense.  They look at whatever the case is in a few differant ways, including what target this thing (picture, film, website) was intended for.  If it was intended for the gay community rather then a group of children the decisions would definatly be differant.  So after reading all about the differant tests and loop holes the court would go through to call or classify something as obscence it made some more sense, and made me feel like they ( law) had come up with a pretty effective system for judging differant materials.

Interactive porn is nothing that I know of truly exsisting yet.  Who knows whats really out there but besides like two people on cameras wacthing eachother live, I dont know if there exsists a program where the girl or boy just does random sexual acts.

I would be fine if my significant other looked at porn on the internet, I dont have a problem with that.  I would however, have a huge problem with my significant other participating in cyber sex with a camera with another person, or a truly interactive porn chat with someone.  Looking at images or videos on the internet or even in your home is one thing, but having sexual conversations and masterbating to that might make a signifcant other a bit upset.  Although I guess some people might be mad if they even saw a sicnifcant other looking at a porn magazine.  Its all the persons opinion and a lot of it has to do with each particular relationship. Personally I would be against my signifcant other doing some sort of back and forth with another person over the internet.  One day who knows what will be out there, whole interactive cyber sex chambers it seems like, people are really going to have to establish some bounderies in realtionships when all of there new technologies come out, and I am sure in all of our lifetimes they will.

Unless you are the only expert in a special field I dont think there is any way to say that you are completly right or wrong about something.  Sure a meterologist may know a lot about the weather and the climate, but are they always right, no!  There are some experts out there who know a lot obout porn, but just like with a doctor we get a second opinion, because everyone seems to have one.  So you can believe and think what you want to, but remember that an opinion is just one persons thinking on a particular subject.  More common opinions dont definatly mean that they are true, just more widely believed.