Thursday, April 22, 2004
Pornography Accessibility
Pornography has been around for quite a while. As of lately, however, pornography has become more available then ever, a great deal if which is due to the millions of websites featuring porn ranging from naked pictures to fetishes. All of these websites serve to make the general public immune to porn and acts of pornography. Thus, while surfing the web, when we come across porn we tend to simply ignore it. Why are we at the point where viewing pornography doesn't shock us as much as it would have 25 years ago? Because as a nation, we are addicted to porn. For example, 17% of women struggle with a pornography addiction. Check out these other statistics:
Pornography Statistics
34 million visited porn sites in August -- about one in four Internet users in the United States
The average user is looking at 121 pages, going back six times and spending an hour and seven minutes every month looking at adult-related material.
Approximately 1.3 million porn sites existed back in December of 2003 with over 260 million web pages
The American porn industry in general generates approximately $12 billion annually compared to $57 billion internationally; $2.5 billion of the worldwide porn market comes from the Internet
25% of all search engines are porn-related, and the top search is "sex"
8% of all emails are porn-related, and the average Internet user receives 4.5 porn emails a day
the largest consumer of internet pornography is the 12-17 age group
100,000 websites offer illegal child pornography, generating $3 billion annually
90% of 8-16 year olds have viewed pornography online, most while doing homework
The average age of first internet exposure to pornography is 11 years old
70% of all Internet porn traffic occurs during the 9-to-5 workday. On a related note, 1 out of 3 companies has terminated an employee for inappropriate web use
women comprise 28% of the online porn-viewing population
And yet, even with these astounding statistics, porn is no match for God. An AltaVista search returned the following number of hits (according to CNN):
God - 6,396,150
porn - 4,794,806
angels - 1,292,520
Satan - 295,390
How can we cut down on porn or, at least, slow down porn's abnormal growth rate? Since the largest consumer of Internet pornography consists of minors, we can begin by guaranteeing that only people aged 18 or older can access porn; the current system allows a surfer in by simply clicking on a button. Furthermore, we can ensure that underage children do not gain access to porn by restricting the websites that are available to them. We can also do our part by reporting illegal or extremely offensive websites to the appropriate authorities (for example, child pornography websites can be reported to http://www.ASACP.com). Beyond this, one must use one's knowledge and discression; by going on the Internet, one must acknowledge that he or she may be exposed to porn. Even though we cannot stop porn, we certainly can do our best to avoid it.
Pornography Statistics
34 million visited porn sites in August -- about one in four Internet users in the United States
The average user is looking at 121 pages, going back six times and spending an hour and seven minutes every month looking at adult-related material.
Approximately 1.3 million porn sites existed back in December of 2003 with over 260 million web pages
The American porn industry in general generates approximately $12 billion annually compared to $57 billion internationally; $2.5 billion of the worldwide porn market comes from the Internet
25% of all search engines are porn-related, and the top search is "sex"
8% of all emails are porn-related, and the average Internet user receives 4.5 porn emails a day
the largest consumer of internet pornography is the 12-17 age group
100,000 websites offer illegal child pornography, generating $3 billion annually
90% of 8-16 year olds have viewed pornography online, most while doing homework
The average age of first internet exposure to pornography is 11 years old
70% of all Internet porn traffic occurs during the 9-to-5 workday. On a related note, 1 out of 3 companies has terminated an employee for inappropriate web use
women comprise 28% of the online porn-viewing population
And yet, even with these astounding statistics, porn is no match for God. An AltaVista search returned the following number of hits (according to CNN):
God - 6,396,150
porn - 4,794,806
angels - 1,292,520
Satan - 295,390
How can we cut down on porn or, at least, slow down porn's abnormal growth rate? Since the largest consumer of Internet pornography consists of minors, we can begin by guaranteeing that only people aged 18 or older can access porn; the current system allows a surfer in by simply clicking on a button. Furthermore, we can ensure that underage children do not gain access to porn by restricting the websites that are available to them. We can also do our part by reporting illegal or extremely offensive websites to the appropriate authorities (for example, child pornography websites can be reported to http://www.ASACP.com). Beyond this, one must use one's knowledge and discression; by going on the Internet, one must acknowledge that he or she may be exposed to porn. Even though we cannot stop porn, we certainly can do our best to avoid it.
