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Last week's topic: safety on line.

We asked if you thought that filters were a good solution to online pornography.

Here's what some of you had to say...

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What kind of society even discusses whether it is good or not to protect those who are at risk?

Anything, taken to the extreme, can be destructive...especially free speech. And it's a measure of just how diminished this society is that something as immediate as the safety of children is sacrificed at the altar of the all-important free speech.

Fie on all who even entertain the thought that free speech comes before child safety. Let's see how they feel when free speech harms them. Sycophants, all.

Mike Pica.

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I would be prepared to sacrifice some free speech rights to protect children if I felt that the laws would do any good. However, the Internet extends all around the world and it's as easy for a pornographer to set up in (say) Denmark or Sweden as it is to work from a US site. I can't conceive of a US law that would work well enough to let my child roam free on the net.

I'm afraid that parents have to realise that the Internet is not some vast free library. It's more like a busy city street - a busy city street in a foreign country in fact. If you'd let your kid into a place like that by himself, then fine - if not then you'll have to escort your child. That's what I do - and it's a great source of 'quality time' for us both.

Steve Baker

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Yes, but I was dismayed that I had to block in coming mail from pornographic sites! Numerous items were mailed to my 12 year old son, who has his own screen name on AOL but is set up with child access. The child access limits his ability to go into areas of the net, but unless I blocked everyone except specific email id's the, pornographic mail kept coming. The material sent was very graphic and had extremely lued sex acts pitcured. I believe mailing to someone that has not requested it should be illegal.

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Of course, they are ONE answer to protecting kids from all the filth online. Filters will get better with time and thank god for them. And I'm not religious. Anybody against filters are sickos. Kids don't need to see net filth. It's harmful.

Ken

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No, parents are responsible for this, ultimately. filters can help, but cannot be relied on for the whole job.

Chuck Raymond

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Donald Burkholder

parents must be responsible to teach their children according to their own constructs; no filters for me, please.

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Filtering programs are an abdication of more than responsibility; they are an abdication of basic parenting. If you want your child protected from the seamier side of on-line life, then spend enough time with him to know where they are going and what they are doing. A child raised with values that differentiate between right and wrong won't give in to whatever inappropriate temptations might be available to him in cyberspace.

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