Safety settings

I remember well my first exposure to pornography. A group of teenage boys, we would go on dump raids now and then. A short hike took us to the town landfill, closed on Sundays in those years, and trivially easy to break into. A landscape of riches, it never disappointed, and on one foray we found a real treasure chest: a box of discarded porno in the recycling truck. Dozens of Penthouse, Playboy, and issues of another title or two, I can't remember. Nor can I recall the pictures therein, though a quick search for "80s porn" will turn up the body hair, camp expressions, and bad 'dos I and my companions must have wondered at. Nothing scary there, nothing scarring for even the country boys we were. Had we wanted more of the same we'd have had to go to a store, avoid eye contact, put money on a counter, barriers enough between us and titillation somewhat less powerful than that provided by the choice sections of the Jackie Collins novels (God rest her) found on all our parents' bookshelves.

Today, pornography is an inescapable part of the nearly ubiquitous online world we all share, with each other, and with our children (which is what this post is about, if you're wondering). The body hair's gone from modern porn, but a whole lot has been added, much of which I can't help but characterize, after careful perusal, as "unhealthy." I don't want my kids seeing this stuff, but, inevitably, they will. And there's a lot else out there I'd rather they didn't discover but can't pretend they won't, up to and including the current Republican debates. Things that will give them bad ideas or, worse, bad dreams.

But mine isn't the only computer, and surprisingly there isn't a Trump blocker add-in for Firefox, so sooner or later they'll see material that I, and maybe they, will wish they hadn't. They'll see it in places where I can't monitor them and so it may happen without my even knowing. How do I prepare them, and when, and for what exactly? I tell the older one this, and I do it now:

You know when you're doing something you shouldn't be doing. You can feel it, maybe a sense of doubt, maybe a sense of shame, but you know. You should always listen to those feelings, but on the Internet you have to pay very close attention to those voices inside you, for two really important reasons:

• The bad guys: If it makes you feel ashamed then you might not be able to tell adults about it without getting in trouble. Bad guys know that, so they hide behind pages populated with things you can't talk about. Why? Because then when they do something bad, you can't tell on them without admitting where you were and what you were looking at. What do the bad guys do on those pages? They infect your computer, steal your baby photos, worm their way into your parents' bank account and leave us without any money for birthday gifts. So sad.

• The "good" guys: Whatever you do on our computers at home I see. I know the games you played, the videos you watched, the places you surfed. And not only do I know it, the people on the other end of the wire know it, too. What wire? That wire. They know it here, they know it at school, they know it at your friends' houses. You are never in private on a computer, so don't ever do something with one you wouldn't want everybody to see.

The Internet is a dangerous, freaky place, and increasingly, so is the rest of the world. You live in a bubble, and that's by design. One day you'll leave it, and long before then we'll start stepping out of it together now and again, That's a process, and not one that needs to be rushed.

And later on I'll point out to him that if he feels the process is going too slow, he can take another look at Daddy's record collection, or the top shelf in my library. There's inspiration enough there, and a boy's imagination will go farther on a little fuel than a lot.