Urge your legislator to sponsor these bills!
Last Monday, July 29, we were invited by Assemblyman Jay Webber (R-Parsippany) to participate in a special bipartisan hearing at the Statehouse in Trenton on the topic of “Ensuring Safe Online Spaces for Children.” The purpose was to give legislators an opportunity to hear from international experts and state-based advocates on the dangers of children accessing online pornography.
Assemblyman Webber is leading the fight with his bill A4146 – Requires entities to verify age of persons accessing certain online material and prohibits minors from accessing certain online material.
Photo Credit: NJ GOP Assembly
Click here to watch a 1-minute portion of our public testimony
With the rise of technology, children have nearly unlimited access to adult websites containing age-inappropriate pornographic material.
Research proves that pornography harms children. Studies show that over 88% of pornographic videos depict sexual violence, while over 48% of these same videos include some kind of verbal abuse. Studies also show that 53% of male adolescents and 39% of female adolescents actually believe the lie that pornography is an accurate portrayal of sex. This means adolescents are learning about sexuality from a perspective which portrays sex as physical abuse.
Additionally, studies reveal that out of those individuals who have been exposed to pornography, 58% accessed the material unintentionally. As a result, adolescents are becoming addicted to pornography through accidental interaction with certain websites that age verification and parental involvement could have prevented.
Nineteen other states have passed legislation within the last two years with overwhelming bipartisan support that requires age verification to access online pornography.
Clearly, the State has a compelling interest to protect children online from this addictive harmful product. In the real world, verification of age is applied for many reasons including entrance to a bar or strip club, and to purchase cigarettes, alcohol, or even cough syrup. This same standard should be applied in the online world.
Therefore, we want you to urge your state legislator to sponsor three bills that protect children from online pornography and human trafficking.
- Assembly bill 4146 – Requires entities to verify age of persons accessing certain online material and prohibits minors from accessing certain online material.
- Assembly bill 198 and Senate bill1989 – Expands crime of human trafficking to include individuals who benefit financially.
- Assembly bill 3819 and Senate bill 3265 – “Human Trafficking and Child Exploitation Prevention Act”; requires Internet-connected devices to have blocking capability in certain circumstances.
