It is crucial, in my opinion, it is not just acceptable for you to discuss this matter. Let me explain why I believe it is not appropriate for you to have discussions with your boys about these topics if you are a mother who has avoided this conversation because you believe a mother’s perspective is important. While I completely agree that fathers and sons should have these conversations multiple times throughout the years, there are individuals who think that as a woman, it is not my responsibility (mostly men, based on my observations). I was unaware that there would be people who criticized me when I wrote to my sons about pornography.
Mothers are the practical educators of home. In our home, conversations about sex, boundaries, and body parts happen early. When we start potty-training around age 2, we talk about the correct names of their body parts. I emphasize privacy and design it as a dialogue about God’s specialness and their body. I am the mother who starts the dialogue, but it doesn’t mean dads can’t or won’t be a part of it. My husband is equally capable of addressing these issues, although he is less available than I am. When my kids say or do something that makes them uncomfortable or when a friend says something that concerns them, they come to me. If they have a question about their personal health or hygiene, they come to me. I want them to come to me if they want to see porn. As part of the process, we should use the “Good Pictures, Bad Pictures” book to initiate a conversation in our house and let them know they can talk to us. I don’t expect my husband to be the only one to talk to them about porn, but I’m the one who’s talking to them about sex and boundaries most of the time. If there is a secret man who is unaware or scary to address, it is not me. It is not porn.
I highly recommend this piece of advocacy and research by Dines Gail, as it sheds little resemblance to the reality of womanhood and instead presents a caricature that women are bullied into through porn. We need to hear from women who are not represented in porn, and understand the cultural acceptance of women and sex. We are suffering from the portrayal of porn as either a harmless guilty pleasure or a victimless crime. Porn has been portrayed in this way for far too long, and I believe it minimizes the damage it does to women. However, my husband knows that I don’t think of porn as something men do to women. It emphasizes the damage that porn does to women and highlights the different understanding and perspective that boys have, which is wired differently. He is going to address them from a different perspective and with a different level of understanding, as he has conversations with our sons. I fully support my husband in helping our boys understand the impact that porn has on women.
“We are now bringing up a generation of boys who, she says, are influenced by images of violent and cruel pornography, which have a profound impact on women’s attitudes, behavior, and sexuality.”
I hope to raise my daughters’ future husbands in a way that portrays women accurately. When it comes to the falsehoods about porn, I will openly speak about them and stand up for my daughters’ future wives, friends, and sisters. I will not silently sit by and allow this generation of boys to be educated and socialized by porn. I will openly speak about how it impacts women and engage with them in discussions. I am happy that my husband is supportive of me talking to our sons about porn and its potential impact on them.
The discussion still needs to occur if either partner is unwilling or unable to address this. (And certainly, there are also mothers who will face this challenge as well.) There will be men who are so overwhelmed by their own embarrassment, they find it exceedingly challenging to engage in these conversations in a healthy manner with their children. There will be men who claim this is insignificant. Women should engage in these conversations with their spouses to understand their experiences and attitudes towards pornography. It is a challenging starting point for a conversation with your son. Many of them have been affected and may not have had the opportunity to discuss or find solace from what they have witnessed. The men raising young children today have grown up in a culture saturated with pornography. A pastor acquaintance of mine articulated it effectively when he said, “Back in my day, you had to actively search for it. Nowadays, it finds you.” Some men may find it difficult to discuss pornography due to their own feelings of shame.
This is not just a conversation I can delegate to my husband because it is a part of my daily conversations with my kids. It may also mean that when you see a billboard and two boys in the car, running errands, you’re having a conversation with them over ice cream. Maybe mothers should also address it, as fathers should intentionally talk about porn with their children. We did not have a complete sex education, like “Bees and Birds”, and we should have a different conversation about sex with our children. We have had thousands of different talks about pornography, abuse, preventing bodies, and their sex. This is an open dialogue between our children and us, starting when they’re old enough to ask their last question and ending when they’re old enough to have enough talk. There is no such thing as the “Talk” happening only once.
It is always meaningful to have your voice, but I think it’s important to be a trusted adult of the opposite gender for your kids, especially if you are a single parent. It is important for us to share our unique perspective with our kids and bring something important to the table. It is important for me as a wife to communicate to my husband what our girls need to know from him as a man. I don’t believe that only fathers should talk to their sons and only mothers should talk to their daughters. It is also important for fathers to talk to their daughters about what feels important to them, including discussing porn.
There are many conversations where I want to feel free to talk about issues that come up when it comes to car maintenance or sports, unless they are related to “father your ask”. Even if they aren’t, I’m ultimately going to be shy and avoid talking away from my kids if they start asking questions. There are no limits to the conversation.
Acceptable that that’s idea the countering about aggressive more little a get to need we think and culture our in rampant is Porn. Nope.Output: It is necessary for us to think about countering the aggressive idea that Porn is acceptable, as it is becoming more prevalent in our culture. No way.
While it is discouraging to see men with this type of attitude, it is important to note that they are in the minority. What was even more heartbreaking to me was seeing how many men there were who shared a similar caption with the post I saw, wishing they had someone to have this conversation with. I am not someone who gets terribly emotional, but it does make me cry. My children will have the freedom to make decisions that may be harmful to themselves, but I will not let them be unaware of the damage they could cause. There are many men today who are causing harm, and there are no moms out there to educate or protect our children. Let’s not let this be the story for our children. However, I understand that it feels awkward or hard to have this conversation with your child about what porn means to them.
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