Kitty Cannon And The Great Porn Fiasco
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Picture the following scenario…
You arrive home from work after a grueling commute; hot and sweaty from the summer heat, stomach growling with hunger. You walk in the door and your wife says, “We need to talk.”
Those are four words that any man dreads hearing from his wife.
Either it means you have committed a colossal screw-up or she is about to tell you that she is running away with the buff 21-year-old pool boy.
Well, we don’t have a pool so that meant I had committed a colossal screw-up…or at least my wife thought that I had.
As my palms began to sweat and my mind raced to try and determine what I might have done, my wife asked me if I had been using her computer and if not, we needed to talk to our children about their use of the computer.
While my lips muttered that I had not used her computer since last updating her firewall and anti-virus software, I could not help but wonder why she was asking me and my mind quickly settled on a likely answer.
Porn.
My wife was using the computer and noticed that the Internet Explorer address bar had two URLs that immediately caught her eye and gave her a reason to be concerned. She then opened up the browser to show me the URLs that she had noticed:
Kitty dot Cannon dot com
Naked dot Girls dot com
While I was relieved that the “we need to talk” statement was not related to a colossal screw-up on my part, I realized that we had a bigger problem - one of our kids was trying to surf porn.
At first glance, one might think we have a little porn fiend on our hands although I suspected only one of the two URLs was an attempt to actually view naked women. Recognizing “Kitty Cannon” as the name of a Flash-based online game, I realized that the culprit was likely our oldest son as he tried to find the game by typing in the name of the game as a domain.
Seeing that both URLs were entered with the same syntax, using a dot in between words, we suspected that he was also the one that entered the other URL. Unfortunately, that one leaves little to the imagination as to what he was trying to find.
What do you do when you catch your child looking at porn?
While my wife was ready to sell the computer and banish our son to his room until he turns 18, I could not help but think back to my childhood.
When I was about the same age as my son, I remember being over at a friend’s house when we discovered a Playboy that his dad had hidden away. As we unfolded the pages and gasped in awe at what we were seeing, my friend’s mom walked in and saw what we were doing. She immediately confiscated the magazine, yelled at both of us, and sent me home; however, I don’t remember being punished myself.
Did looking at that magazine make me a bad kid?
I don’t think so.
Does the fact that my son attempted to view porn on the computer make him a bad kid?
I don’t think so.
Keeping that in mind, my wife and I sat down with him to ask him about his use of the computer. As we began to discuss this with him, he quickly became embarrassed. Embarrassed by the fact that he had been caught, as well as embarrassed to be discussing naked women with his parents.
We explained to him that using the computer to look at naked women was not acceptable, although we did not punish him for his actions.
Should he have been punished?
That is a tough question.
While he needs to understand that what he did was not appropriate, we also do not want to make him think that sex is a taboo topic that cannot be discussed. While sitting with him, we explained to him that it is natural for him to have questions and to want to explore for answers, but looking at porn on the Interweb was not the way to find the answers.
When he has questions, we want him to be comfortable with coming to us to talk about whatever is on his mind. Had we yelled at him and punished him for trying to look at porn, I believe that we would have closed that door to him.
Do you agree or disagree?
Bill Parlaman is owner of 
Wow - I do not look forward to having that conversation with my boy. Sounds like you guys handled the situation very well, although I do think that I would have ‘grounded’ my son from using the Internet for a week to ensure that he understood that there are consequences to his actions that are beyond disappointing us. It’s a tough call though. I definitely don’t think it makes a kid a bad person/kid for exploring, and sex should not be a taboo topic. Porn, on the other hand, is not the way for a child to explore.
Jeremy (Discovering Dad)s last blog post..How to Create a Parenting Blog that Lasts
My husband and I had a similar experience with our then 12 year old daughter. I completely agree that it doesn’t make a kid a bad person. I can’t fault her for being curious, but the Internet’s not the answer. It really is scary how easily they can access stuff like this. In the end, we discussed it, much to her embarrassment, and for the next two weeks one of us had to be in the same room when she was on the Internet. Great post!
@Jeremy :: Yeah, I wasn’t anticipating this to happen yet but it did. Rather than ground him at this time, we made sure he understood that if we were to find something like this again that his computer privileges would be revoked immediately.
@Julie :: One of us is almost always in the same room when the kids are on the computer, although he said that he did it early in the morning after I had left for work and my wife was getting ready. We could change their computer to require a logon but right now we have kept things status quo.
We had the same situation in my house, back in the Spring, and we dealt with it the same way you did.
I am looking for a router-based solution to better keep an eye on things, in case he ever goes way off base in the future.
Yikes– I’ll bet he was really embarrassed to have that discussion with his mom present. Though, at least it let him know how what he did affected the family.
I agree w/ Jeremy’s comment, above: I would have grounded him from the internet for at least a short while.
I think you handled it well.
When I was growing up my parents never talked to me about this stuff. Like you, I had “learned” things from school friends, when a tape of objectionable material was being circulated (think Traci Lords).
One suggestion I read somewhere on the interweb years ago, was to put the family computer in a public place, and not in rooms. This way anyone can see what’s on the screen.
This of course is not the answer but only addressing a symptom. The cause of course is curiosity, and like I said, you handled it well. Sex should be taught in the correct light, and not learned from the trash that is available online these days; where it can appear violent or demeaning to women.
I agree that it would have closed the door and I think you & your wife handled the situation very well.
I would leave it alone. Tell him you found it, let him know you are monitoring where he goes now and I’ll bet it never happens again. That can be hugely embarassing for a young boy.
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I think the real problem here is that you and your wife are using Internet Explorer. Firefox is the future baby!