What about the children?!

Would-be censors often justify themselves by claiming that certain kinds of material are harmful to children, and so must be kept out of public sight. It’s worth thinking about this before we simply accept it at face value.

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Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address)  on  01/08  at  06:15 PM

An excellent article but there is another side to the coin. Much censorship encourages attitudes which are known to be harmful to children. Try comparing the teenage pregnancy rates, abortion rates, STI rates and such like for countries with liberal attitudes towards the human body with those for prudish countries. The differences are enormous. Compared to liberal countries such as Denmark or The Netherlands teenagers in the USA and Scotland become sexually active younger, they are less likely to use protection or contraception and they are more likely to be promiscuous. The results are predictable. About ten times more likely to become pregnant or to have an abortion and the differences for STIs are absolutely appalling. That pattern repeats time and again across the Western World. Australia is intermediate in attitudes and what a surprise, it is also mediocre for outcomes.

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