Though I believe Amber Facer's desire "to do something good for her children" was overzealous as was Hayden City Council's rush to acquiesces, I'm more concerned by the comments made by JoAnn Hibbert Hamilton president of the Utah based "Citizens for Families". I went to the website here and found the following.Prevention Plan: A ParentÂ’s Checklist
“Guard your homes. How foolish it seems to install bars and bolts and electronic devices
against thieves and molesters while more insidious intruders stealthily enter and despoil.”
(President Gordon B. Hinckley, “Overpowering the Goliaths in our Lives,” Ensign Jan.
2002, p. 6.)
1. Keep all forms of inappropriate material out of your home.
2. Place the computer in an open, supervised area of your home.
3. Install a filter on your Internet.
4. Learn enough about your computer so you can see what sites have been visited.
5. Check your filterÂ’s history every day.
6. Go to www.strengthenthefamily.net to know today if anyone, perhaps a friend of your children,
has pulled up pornography on your computer and perhaps shown it to your children. Click on
Content Watch and then click on Content Audit. This will give you a list of everything that has
ever been on your computer.
7. “Ask” your children what they have seen.
8. Check out every disk that comes into your home.
9. Free disks with free hours of usage makes it so there is no filter on your computer.
10. Teach children to “crash and tell,” i.e., immediately turn the computer off and then tell the teacher
as well as a parent.
11. Talk to your child about the guilt he/she will feel if they accidentally pull up a porn site.
12. Avoid sleepovers.
13. Monitor movies, television and videos that you or your children see. Repeated exposure to “one
bad scene” accumulates and desensitizes.
14. Role play with children as young as six about how to act when they are approached with
the bad story, the bad picture or the bad joke.
15. Prepare older children for teenage feelings. Teach them the quickness of addiction, the
beauty of true intimacy, the things they will lose if they get involved with pornography.
16. Warn children to stay out of chat rooms, out of newsgroups, and off instant messages.
17. Recognize that girls as well as guys are getting involved with pornography.
18. Have rules.
19. Maintain a good relationship with your children and teens so you can openly talk.
20. Have an emotional, verbal and physical (hugs) closeness with each child.
21. Teach them that pornography is a temporary fix.
22. Teach children/youth the deceptiveness of advertising.
23. Teach children/youth that they cannot believe everything the magazines say.
24. Take time to talk to your child about what heÂ’s hearing in school.
25. Take one-on-one time with each child.
26. Know that once your child is protected in your home, he is not protected in the
community.
27. Be an example of clean living in your own home. Your choice of recreation, and the way
you treat one another as a couple will influence your children.
28. Know that politely speaking up at the service desk whenever you see something in a
store that offends you DOES make a difference. Silence means acceptance.
Furnished by Citizens for Families – Coalition for Community Standards – www.strengthenthefamily.net
Compiled by JoAnn Hibbert Hamilton
This seems to be a well thought out and sensible guide. However, I'm led to question if there is an ulterior motive when Ms. Hamilton's rhetoric blames Ms. Facer's honesty for her troubles and "I feel bad about the crucifixion of that lady". At the very least these are inflammatory words, much as some of the extreme Christian right doctrine that mandates their way is the ONLY way.
The Mormons, especially because of their strength in Utah, have at times been described as the American Taliban. We need to beware all institutions, be they religious, political or social that would seek to eliminate our freedom of choice in order to force upon us their beliefs. If we don't the cartoons may not appear so amusing.
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