Ron Jeremy has hit the headlines again. The veteran adult movie star took part in “The Great Porn Debate” with anti-pornography activist Craig Gross, and argued against the claim that online smut has become a misleading substitute for sex education. In the USA, where abstinence-only teaching for teens has had such a resurgence over the past decade, hormone-addled youths will inevitably get curious and turn to the internet for clues and, quite rightly, the adult industry is unanimous in its support of tighter controls over porn to prevent access by anyone under the age of eighteen.

Of course, Ron Jeremy agrees with this: “We don’t want kids to watch porn,” he told the crowd at the Consumer Electronics Show debate. “Though if they do, there are far worse influences out there — like video games. Studies have found that violent video games are a much bigger negative influence on kids.”

In the end, it’s all about context. There is some dreadful porn out there, just as there are some horrendous computer games, and both could potentially have a negative effect on an impressionable person, no matter what age they happen to be. The main problem is a lack of communication, and if the core influences on someone’s social and sexual development are porn and pixels, then their problems have been caused by more than just the software developers and adult entertainment industry.

Both sides of the debate are in agreement that families should take more responsibility for what their offspring do at the computer.

“Parents better start to learn the Internet,” said Ron Jeremy.

“For the most part, kids are smarter about technology than their parents,” added Craig Gross. “That has to change.”