Adult TV for kids=earlier sex for teens

"Fix these words of mine in your hearts and minds; tie them as symbols on your hands and bind them on your foreheads. Teach them to your children, talking about them when you sit at home and when you walk along the road, when you lie down and when you get up."  Deuteronomy 11:18-19

A new study by Children's Hospital in Boston shows children exposed to adult-themed movies and TV shows are likely to have sex earlier in their teen years than their peers who were not similarly exposed.  I doubt any of us find that too surprising.  

Examiner.com article   

I remember volunteering in my daughter's second grade classroom and hearing one little boy tell me about an R-rated movie he had watched.  I asked him if his parents knew he had watched it, and he said his father had rented the movie for him.  

This permissiveness does not just exist outside the church.  I've also listened to middle school students at church share their favorite movies with me, and sometimes the choices are pretty shocking.  Of course, I'm always told they are watching with parental permission, which may or may not be true.  

Still, I think way too often we are allowing the media to direct our children's sexual education. Kids exposed to such programs already have false expectations of sexuality, and it's no wonder both parents and educators have a difficult time getting their message across.  

What can be done?  Sure, we can monitor our family's media use more carefully.  But even that is becoming more difficult.  Recently, we were watching an episode of the Andy Griffith show on TV Land.  Innocent enough, right?  Sure!  It's a G rated show...but the commercials were PG-13.  You can't even watch a sporting event without viewing half naked women during a commercial break.  

Can we boycott?  Well, yes, I believe to a certain degree, we could probably turn off the TV a lot more.  I speak for myself there as well.  

Can we hold Hollywood accountable?  That's difficult too, but we can do our part.  We can choose to only support movies and programs that are wholesome.  We can get in the faces of our local, state and national representatives, armed with studies such as the one above, and demand that America cleans up its act.  

In the end, though, we have to come to some form of acceptance that this will always be an issue.  We live in a sinful world, after all.  The best thing we can do when our kids are exposed to adult material is to talk about it.  Don't ignore it or be embarrassed by it.  Express your feelings about it, explain in language they will understand, and let them ask questions.  You can never go wrong being open and honest with your kids.  

Believe it or not, they will listen.