How to Talk to Your Kids About Porn
Pornography is everywhere. We're past the relative innocence of boys discovering Dad's stash of Playboy in the back of the closet. Even hardcore porn has become ubiquitous. TIME's April 11 cover story is about young men who are reporting serious consequences from watching a lot of pornography in their youth. It's important to let your kids know that you are aware that explicit videos are almost unavoidable, and that you're comfortable talking about iteven if you don't feel so comfortable. Interest in sex and sexual imagery is completely normal, so the biggest thing for parents to remember is to approach the issue in a non-judgmental way. You should offer to answer any question, however embarrassing. You don't want them to be ashamed of their curiosity, or to feel so guilty it interferes with developing a healthy sexual identity. However! Porn is often so unrealistica literal "perversion" of real human interactionsthat it can endanger kids' ability to have a healthy relationship with their body and with sexual partners. Parents need to be the reality check. Here are some points for "the talk.", Young men who've become obsessed with porn report serious problems with their romantic lives. If what turns them on becomes divorced from what is available in the real world, they can find themselves in trouble  as can their partners. And emerging research into the biological effects of heavy pornography use suggest it may be tied to brain changes associated with impulsivity and an inability to delay gratification  alarmingly similar to what happens in drug addiction. Daughters, who typically consume less porn but are just as affected by its prevalence, might need some specific information. You need to let them know that an interest in pornography is natural, but that the greater enjoyment will be good sex and healthy relationships in the real world. We're fortunate that we don't live in the days when seeking out pornography was a seedy, if not dangerous, thing to do. But now that porn is coming into our homes, parents need to be responsible for educating their sons and daughters in parallel to this influence. Porn makes sex a fantasy, which can be O.K. You need to teach your son that sex is also normal, real, and it takes some work. And that's what makes it special.