Culture, Media and Sport CommitteeWritten evidence submitted by Stuart Taylor
FIRST: Congratulations, this is an excellent enquiry, and I wish and pray for your every success in it and that God may honour your endeavours.
WHO: (A) I write primarily as a parent/householder who has, with my wife, had the experience and responsibility of bringing up three sons and two daughters, seeking to teach them “the good and right way” (1 Sam 12 v 23) in view of marriage and the setting up of their own households.
(B) I also write as a Christian holding the Holy Scriptures as being the Word of God, affording all the guidance needed to protect our children. Isaiah 7 v 15 “that he may know to refuse the evil and to choose the good.” Romans 16 v 19 “to be wise as to that which is good, and simple as to evil.” 1 Tim 5 v 22 “keep thyself pure.” 2 Tim 2 v 22 “but youthful lusts flee.”
PARENTS: The prime responsibility to protect our children rests with the parents. We are responsible to care for them physically, morally and financially, and instruct them as to purity before marriage. Quoting the words of a Church Leader, “the greatest thing a man can do is to preserve his household [eg children]”. Acts 16 v 31 “Believe on the Lord Jesus and thou shalt be saved, thou and thy house.”
Young people have naturally inquisitive minds and every possible effort should be taken to hinder the promotion of devices or circumstances which would leave them vulnerable or exposed.
As parents, along with other Christians, we set up our own schools in 1993 to endeavour to protect our children from the sadly declining activities and conversations amongst teenage children. We also supplied them with computers which are limited and blocked from the defiling, corrupt and damaging materials which could normally be accessed. I know from bitter experience that contact with unclean literature can damage you for life. I personally know a Peer who always videos programmes before his children view them, taking out the harmful sections.
INDUSTRY: As employers, we would be selective of areas and buildings which we would work in and would personally be proactive in protection of our trainees and sub-contractors. The conditions of engagement include that no pornographic material or means of accessing it is taken on site.
GOVERNMENT: The government does have a responsibility to protect humanity and should be seen to be a terror to evil. Romans 13 v 3 “For rulers are not a terror to a good work, but to an evil one.” Filth is evil.
I would fully support that is should be mandatory for Government to impose strict sanctions where licensing for publications are granted with a penalty in place where these are not adhered to.
SUGGESTIONS: Your suggestion of default blocking facilities on all marketed internet devices is excellent.
The introduction of passwords or filters, such as declaration of age or a “general knowledge” question, the answer to which would be unlikely to be known by anyone under the age of 18, before access can be obtained is another suggestion.
Another possibility may be to link all licensed sites to national records such as registration of birth certificates/national insurance numbers/driving licence number, so that if a person’s details entered cannot be matched, access is denied.
Thank you for the opportunity of contributing to this enquiry.
September 2013