The behavior of children on the Internet is difficult, almost impossible to control. What if a child accidentally visits a porn site? Sexologist Irina Panyukova helps adults understand their children.
Your five-year-old daughter arranged a striptease in the kindergarten; a first-grader son suddenly called a familiar girl a “whore” … Puzzled by the child’s behavior, you arrange an interrogation with passion and discover that the reason for this is the porn you saw on the Internet.
Ask questions without blaming. “Today, a child of any age can accidentally go to a porn site, but children over 5–6 years old are able to perceive the essence of what is happening in the video: it is at this age that they begin to be interested in the relationship between a man and a woman, the differences between the sexes,” explains Irina Panyukova. – The first acquaintance with pornography most often causes a feeling of shame and embarrassment in children. Curiosity is shown by those of them who are looking for an answer to intimate questions, but cannot discuss them with their parents or peers. The stormy, sharply negative reaction of adults to natural curiosity (“Are you crazy, to watch such nasty things?”) is unacceptable here: it will either consolidate interest in porn or form a child’s attitude to the sexual side of life as something shameful.
Pretending that nothing happened is a mistake. The child’s inappropriate actions and rude words are an SOS signal, and parents will have to help him comprehend what he saw. Calmly and kindly ask the child where, when and with whom he watched this video, what did he understand, was he shocked or frightened? It is important to understand whether this was accidental, or if someone he knew introduced him to pornography (the latter, of course, is violence, and it must be stopped).
Reassure and explain. “A one-time encounter with pornography is not dangerous for a preschooler, but frequent viewing can distort his sexual development,” Irina Panyukova is convinced. – After all, porn reproduces scenes of sexual life in a naturalistic way, there is a lot of humiliation and aggression in it, and feelings are completely ignored. The child is unable to independently separate film fantasy from reality. But he can firmly connect sexuality with cruelty and see in such a mechanistic approach the standard of intimate relationships to which one should strive. Explain to the child that these stories are made with the participation of actors and are far from genuine relationships, which include love, tenderness, fantasy and respect for a partner.
Prepare for the encounter with porn. Your son or daughter may one day be exposed to sexual images, so it’s important to find a reason ahead of time and talk to him about it. Also, even before the child goes to school, it is worth telling him about where children come from and how men and women differ from each other. Warn that it is necessary to avoid contact with people who offer to see pictures of “interesting” content. Finally, let him explore his body in complete privacy: this is a natural way to discover sexuality and avoid the influence of pornography. However, children with whom adults have spoken in time stop thinking about it – at least until adolescence.
Irina Panyukova, psychotherapist, candidate of medical sciences.