Pornography and child protection - Essay Example

Pornography and Child Protection The Article in question comes from The Age website and it was first published on February 15, 2008. The ethical issue being discussed is the protection of children from pornographic images. Since there are no exact reasons given for why children should be protected from pornographic images, it appears that the protection of children from such images is a universal good as accepted by ethical theorists such as Kant and others. However, it seems that the major search engines such as Google and Yahoo are doing little to ensure that children are protected.

Standard Form of Ethical ArgumentPremise 1: Children should be protected from pornographic images.Premise 2: Major search engines such as Yahoo and Google can do more to protect children.Premise 2: Major search engines such as Yahoo and Google can do more to protect children.Conclusion: Major search engines should do more to protect children.Article AnalysisOur society has decided that the idea of children watching pornographic images is abhorrent to us. As discussed by Tavani, (2007), in some ways it appears to be an issue of ethical relativism since several societies may have objections to even wizened adults looking at pornographic images to the extent that such material is banned altogether from their countries.

On the other hand, there are also societies where women do not wear the same type of clothes leading children to view them in states which might be considered pornographic by our social order. However, despite the relativism of the situation, the law for protecting minors is certainly there and while the ethics of the law itself can be debated, we as a society have decided that we have to protect children from being exposed to pornographic images. Towards that purpose we have placed barriers on the internet and on other means by which children can access these images.

These barriers include age verification requirements before pornographic images can be viewed by adults and they try to ensure that only those of a verifiable age can access such files on the internet.At the same time, the internet itself is so vast that it becomes difficult to police it and people may have images on their website that are pornographic and children may be exposed to them without verification of their age or any other barrier to protect them. Additionally, while the article makes the premise that Google and Yahoo can do more to protect children from being exposed to such images, it does not make it clear how these search companies can go about doing so.

Unless these search engines start storing verifiable information about each of their users, it is unlikely that they will be able to prevent many children from gaining access to pornographic material. Works CitedThe Age. 2008, ‘Porn studio wants Google, Yahoo to help protect kids’, [Online] Available at: http://www.theage.com.au/news/security/porn-studio-wants-help-from-google-yahoo/2008/02/15/1202760541330.htmlTavani, H. 2007, Ethics and Technology: Ethical issues in an age of information and communication technology, John Wiley.