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Aleshia Cooper
Anne Lawler
English 120-10
Tuesday, 21 February, 2012
The Christian Council Has No Control
Pornography, otherwise defined as vulgarity and obscenity, is an issue that has and will
continue to call upon a great deal of debate. For that reason, the Bahamas Christian Council is
calling for a complete ban on pornographic content. According to the Tribune The Bahamas
Christian Council took great interest in reviewing channels 874 to 895 from Bahamian service
provider Cable Bahamas, outlining in detail the scope and nature of the pornographic material
available to Bahamian viewers (NICOLLS). But is it the job of the Christian Council to ban the
pornographic content of Bahamian viewers? Many may argue that the Christian Council has the
right to ban pornographic content because they are the national voice and primary agent of the
Christian community. To a certain extent this might be true, but the job of the Christian
Council is to promote understanding and trust among the numerous Christian churches in the
Bahamas. As far as putting a restriction on pornographic content, I believe that Bahamians adults
should be allowed to watch whatever they want. Obviously no one wants their children watching
porn, but banning it isnt the answer. Why? Basically because you cant porn is everywhere
making it impossible to put restriction on pornographic content.
If the Christian Council puts any restrictions on pornographic content it will be
preventing individuals from accessing their fundamental rights and freedom. So not only does
the Christian Council have no control over individuals fundamental rights and freedom, it lacks
constitutional and democratic power to do so. The most practical and effective way to ensure

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your child's safety is by parental control on television and the internet not by banning it
completely.
Many people are no strangers to pornographic material. Pornographic material includes
books, magazines, videos, and electronic devices. The Christian Councils view on pornography
is that it is not of the Christian faith and needs to be restricted. Many people see pornographic
material as a turn on, a form of sexual expression and entertainment. What might offend a
particular person may not offend another. Just because people find certain materials offensive is
not a sufficient reason for restricting those material. It is unreasonable to ban someone from
reading or seeing inappropriate material based on the opinion of someone else.
My question is what harm does pornography cause viewers and to what extent? One
argument might be that pornography is the influence behind an individual committing rape or
other acts of sexual violence. However in using that argument there is no conclusive evidence to
prove the argument to be true. To characterize crime of rape on sexually explicit is material as
overly simplistic as blaming a drunken driving accident on alcohol. i.e the individual he who
chose to drink and then drive is at fault, comparative to who decides to continue with sexual
intercourse after a woman resists. There is no statistical or any scientific evidence available
which can conclude that a person will absolutely commit rape after viewing or utilizing
pornography. A person motivated to commit an act of rape, commit assault, murder, or any
wrong, there is no evidence suggesting that the basic reason is pornography as the source of such
motivation.
William Orville Douglas once stated that, Restriction of free thought and free speech is
the most dangerous of all subversions. How could Christian Councils impose any restriction
when restriction is takes away the right of the individual? Is it the job of Christian Councils to

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make decisions about what they themselves think is appropriate for the country to see or
hear? My decision on this is that it is not the Christian Councils role to force government
leadership pertaining to its own views, practices, and values. As stated earlier the only role of the
Christian Councils is to promote understanding and trust among the numerous Christian churches
in the Bahamas.
The Christian Council has no constitutional authority or legal privilege in the Bahamas,
for making such laws. Just because the Christian Council finds certain movies offensive, is not
sufficient reason for banning those channels for every viewer. Christian Council is trying to
enforce their personal codes of conduct on what they seem to think are the bad-mannered
masses. They may think its for the good of the Bahamian people and that they are trying to
improve the Island in which we live. Banning pornography programs that cannot be proved to be
directly responsible for any harm is just the form dictatorship takes when its being pushed forth
by the moral crusader. They want to take the choice away from the individual and build an
atmosphere they consider to be safer and create more peace or in this case the respecting of
women.
One may argue that porn may lead men has seeing women as just sex objects, and that
women are worthless for any activity other than sex. However studies had shown that not just
men watch porn for arousal but woman also. Therefore attempting to take away pornography
movies would be virtually impossible. The fact of the matter is that countless persons use various
kinds of sexually explicit materials regularly. By forming laws that restrict pornography from
viewers the result would be extreme and uncontrollable. Besides laws are only obeyed by people
who believe in them, for example there are numerous laws against drug use. Have they stopped
anyone? I happen to believe that mature adults should be allowed to watch whatever they want.

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Its called our freewill. God gave us facts despite their consistent misuse of the Gospel teachings,
the Christian Council should respect that which bring me to my final point; parental control.
The Christian Council stated That adults who view pornographic content are not
responsible enough or care enough to utilize parental controls or only do so when their children
are absent or asleep. Pornography is powerfully addictive and enslaving because it perverts a
pleasurable, God-given appetite. Notwithstanding that fact, some parents allow their children to
view rated R movies containing sexual content and nudity. This Contrasts with parents who
restrict their children from attending sexual educational classes in high school. Finding some
middle ground between the two strongly conflicting standards would be rare.
Many of us would agree that children watching pornography is very inappropriate.
Parents are supposed to be the ones watching what their children view on TV. But realistically
children know that many parents are knowledgeable enough to check the history channel. In
other words when majority of children has access to pornographic material on an unmonitored
television or internet access, the first thing they usually do is look up porn. Like it or not you
cant stop or even limit pornographic material on the television or internet, you have to stop the
child. Open and honest reinforcement of your personal standards with your children is basically
your only hope.
Regulating television should be left to parents not the Christian Council. My philosophy
about children is, if a child really wants to do something and works at it long enough, he or she
will do it. A simpler way of putting it is that if a child wants to watch pornographic material he
or she will no matter how hard you try to prevent it. Do you think children will be permanently
damaged whether they view a few, or even numerous amount of sexually explicit material? Its
better to speak with children about pornographic material and how it may twist peoples view of

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sex and what a healthy sexual relationship really is.