A Less Examined Crisis of Children Growing up with Technology

The video was part of a virtual “tour” by Culture Reframed, an educational organization that calls hyper-sexualized media and pornography the “public health crisis of the digital age”—one that poses a substantial threat to child development and well-being. A trusted friend had invited me to join the Zoom tour, and I agreed, partly because I knew little about the issue. The TedTalk Growing Up in a Pornified Culture given by Gail Dines, professor emerita of sociology and women’s studies at Wheelock College in Boston, Massachusetts and Founder & President of Culture Reframed was central to this tour. Often, I wanted to pause, rewind and talk about what I was learning. I was stunned, then disbelief set in, while I continued to listen to the Q&A and closing remarks. I imagined my young grandnieces and felt fury. One question came to mind: does research support the claims and assumptions made in the talk and posted on their webpage? Though the website provides the reader with a well-organized list of facts about “the porn crisis,” I wanted other sources of information to corroborate the same claim. A quick Internet quest revealed articles and books about the effects of children’s exposure to pornography. I returned to the Culture Reframed Academic Library and searched. This library can be accessed from the webpage and provides “peer-reviewed journal articles and selected reports from the last twenty years.” What I learned from watching the talk and reading articles was a revelation. I surmised that many mental and spiritual health professionals, like myself, might lack sufficient knowledge about this pervasive and systemic danger to our youth’s physical, mental, and emotional safety. All attendees at Culture Reframed Tour were asked to provide feedback on the tour and names of others who might connect with their work. When asked for a response to the tour and the TedTalk by the Development Coordinator, I was surprised by a deeper awareness of my harmful ignorance. I realized that my initial expectation was to learn about an issue that I knew little about. I was not prepared to experience the problem of pornography and youth so personally. I found this awareness heartbreaking and deeply disturbing. In hindsight, I was not prepared to have distressing feelings, to feel assaulted by the force of my protective response for my family. I preferred to remain at the periphery and to control everything from approaching my heart. I call that response denial—a strategy that protects me from awareness and in doing so, perpetuates injustice. When three-month-old Raleigh arrived, I received photos on a regular basis. None so thrilled me than the photo of her in a onesie, bright yellow, green-leafed lemons on the vine. She wears a yellow bow on the top of her head. Her arms are outstretched. Her hands are gently clenched as she stares directly at the camera. The photo of Olivia (Livi), the older of the two, sparked my safeguarding instincts. Sitting, confidently in a straddled position, her feet placed squarely on the rock, arms around bent knees, a face mask resting beneath her, she smiles. She wears her favorite black leggings with a colorful rainbow print, a pale blue T-shirt, and a pink barrette holding her hair in place. A Peppa Pig Band-Aid on the uppermost part of her arm. In the context of this presentation, seeing Livi’s band-aid, and