Child Pornography: Child Sexual Exploitation

Technological advances have made it possible for commercial sexual exploitation of children to be exposed worldwide. Anyone can now use the internet to promote and arrange sexual encounters with children. This puts children at risk because the internet makes it possible for pimps to traffic children. Due to the advancement of technologies of the internet, children become easy victims of child prostitution and pornography. As a result, it increases the chance of children being physically, psychologically, and sexually harmed. There are federal laws and organizations that can help protect children from being sexually exploited. According to the United States Department of Justice, child prostitution is sexual exploitation that uses children for sexual activities in exchange for money or other compensations, such as food and clothing. These children are brought into prostitution to work in areas such as, bars, streets and brothels. Child pornography is also a type of child sexual exploitation (The United States Department of Justice, n.d). This paper will focus on the nature on child prostitution and pornography, in term of the victims and predators along with, what is being done with law enforcement to prevent the use of the internet to promote human trafficking also, private individuals attempting to the abusive acts.

The Michael Dean Ross case resulted from a man who used technology to sexually exploit and abuse children. Ross used Facebook to create a fake account here he posed as a 25-year-old businessman who was new and looking for friends (Montgomery). Ross then befriended a 14-year-old girl and began grooming her and attempting to sexually exploit her. This was done by Ross having sexually based conversations, giving her gifts, and sending her graphic images of his genitals and convincing her to reciprocate (Montgomery). Ross also used technology in other ways to sexually exploit children as he posed sexually charged comments on images of child erotica, have conversations with like-minded people, and created and distributed child pornography (Montgomery).

Currently, there are laws in place against minors sexting and sexting to minors and they fall under the child pornography category. While the laws are intended to protect minors from sexual predators, what most minors do not understand is that they are subject to them as well. This means that, if fifteen-year-old Timmy decides to sext his fifteen-year-old girlfriend, Sarah, a naked picture of himself, both Timmy and Sarah could be tried in court with charges of disseminating child pornography and possessing child pornography. These serious charges can result in having to register as a sex offender for several years, although the message may have been sent and received consensually by both parties. This...

Internet Pornography Material that is reserved for adult use has been widely available to everyone via the Internet. Without any regulation the Internet has remained untouched until a few days ago when the president passed the Communications Decency Act. This law was put into effect to put an end to the problems that have derived from the Internet. The CDA makes it a crime to knowingly send "indecent" material that could be viewed by a minor over a computer online service or on the Internet computer network. To those people who are found guilty of this crime could face up to two years in prison and fines of as much as $250,000.

Children abuse is a form of abuse in which an adult or older person uses a child

There is no doubt that children are like sponges. They soak up the information shown to them though television and the media on a daily basis, and copy it in the real world. In a matter of seconds, children can mimic a popular character; sing a song used in a beer advertisement, or even strike a “sexy” pose. All children have to do is put a DVD into the player, open a magazine, watch TV, or click on a web site to see these types of messages. The media offers us information on the world such as news, sports, and education; but what about the negative things it offers such as advertisements depicting young teenagers and children in scantily clad outfits, or impossible ideals that can almost never be lived up to such as “Victoria’s Angels” for females or Hollister models for males. Children are exposed to these on a daily basis, and are often unaware that they are being exploited. Television stations such as Disney and Nickelodeon depict children and teenagers in adult situations, and the media projects can lead unhealthy consequences in both males and females.

Child pornography is the blueprint for predators to execute sexual assault (Winder and Gough). Child pornography is not only a problem but is illegal. Sexual assault is only one of the end results that child pornography can lead into. Most of the photos that these pedophiles are viewing are more than likely staged enjoyment at the expense of these innocent children since most of them are being sexual abused. Sexual offenders all have “sexual fantasies”, just like Tom Carroll, a self-confessed pedophile, who has stated “and of course, having seen photographs of adults engaged in sexual acts with children, in which the latter definitely appeared to have been enjoying the experience, I was sustained by a hope that one day I might do such things myself” (Winder and Gou...

In today’s society, you can find just about anything using internet search engines such as Google, Firefox, Internet Explorer, etc. There tend to be many hidden illegal sites that consist from anything of piracy, child pornography, drug trafficking or even human trafficking. Although, when most of these sites are found, they are immediately taken down, but these sites are constantly being put up that it is difficult to take down every single site.

It used to be almost impossible for children to get pornography. Comer stores would place adult magazines such as playboy on the top rack behind all the other magazines so that only the title was visible and it was out of reach of children. Movie stores would have separate rooms at the front of the store for their porn videos; this way they could monitor who went into the room. In today's technologically advanced society, pornographic magazines and videos are becoming extinct. Computer users can easily search for sex sites, with millions and millions or results. All it talks is the click of the mouse and children can visit any site they want. There is know way for Internet sites to monitor who is on there site, if you click the button that says your over 18 they let you in, so a 15 year old can easily get on to the site. Pornographic websites also place other moral and social problems not just on underage teenagers but on adults as well.

Slavery has been banned worldwide since 1948 when the UN officially illegalized it everywhere in Article 4 of the Declaration of Human Rights. Nonetheless, a myriad of people continue to be exploited like slaves, and the talibés in Senegal are among those who suffer greatly from this predicament. Talibés refer to male students or disciples of Islam. (“Senegal”) They are children usually under the age of twelve and not uncommon to be as young as four years old, whose parents entrust to marabouts, teachers or religious leaders, who educate them in daaras, residential Muslim schools, about moral values and the Q’uran, or at least they are supposed to. Sadly, this is not how it is in reality. Instead, most of these boys are being exploited and forced to ask for alms in the streets “to provide for the marabout and his family.” (“Senegal: Boys in Many Quranic Schools Suffer Severe Abuse”) The young talibés are so unfairly taken advantage of that they are even assigned a begging quota depending on which city they visit. And if they fail to meet the quota for the allotted span of time, they are chained to be stroke and flogged with a club or an electric cable by their teacher or an assistant. (Wells 39)