Macedonia Children become victims of pornography

January 1, 2006

Comment: The article presents a deep analysis of children access to pornographic content through internet sites and movies. The author succesfully communicated the alarming message to the audience: children are becoming victims of pornography in Macedonia. An innocent game on personal computers can easily turn into a serious ill-deed involving far-reaching negative effects. The author is warning the parents that though young, children today are very skilled in browsing the Web pages, so that they come across sites featuring pornographic contents very often. His message to all parents is more than clear: they ought to always control their children’s activities on the computer.

The author further analyzes the problem of pornography in movies aired by the cable operators. The reporter successfully contrasts the stances of the parents and the cable operator managers, who claim they show such movies only after midnight. Hence, operators shift back the responsibility to parents arguing that the reason for children access to such films is the lack of parental care and parents’ their inability to set up a functioning order for their children: when to play, study, watch television, sleep etc.

Consequences of the phenomenon are also discussed in the article. The experiences gathered from movies or films affect each child differently. Latest cases of sexual assault among children of different ages might be linked to such an experinces. The author refers to a recent case to support his argument when a child sexually abuse a younger one to try out what he had seen on TV. The author seeks for the answer to the rising teenager delinquency problem interviewing one non-government organization, though, the response of the respective authorities, e.g. the Ministry of Education, the Broadcasting Council, the Ministry of Labor and Social Policy is missing.

The illustration of the article, a boy and a girl looking at the screen, is in accordance of the ethical standards: faces of the children are covered on the picture.

(This Press review is under the framework of EIDHR funded project, implemented jointly with La Strada OG, Macedonia)