OKAY folks, it's confession time.

I saw my first "X-rated" movie at the age of 15.

All you kids out there, please stop laughing.

This was in those days when getting your hands on anything "X-rated" was about the hardest thing one could do.

And believe me, coming from an all-boys school, it was not for the want of trying.

In those days, in our desperation, we even acted on really far-out rumours.

We were told of a mysterious mamak shop, located near a local theatre, which supposedly sold adult magazines in brown paper bags.

Some of us staked out the shop for hours, hoping to catch a glimpse of the famous paper bags in any transactions with customers.

A week later, after steeling ourselves to approach the shopkeeper, three of us did so - only to be shooed away and told not to be desperadoes.

That shopkeeper probably never even sold the stuff.

But finally, one day, someone somehow got hold of a "blue" movie and an overnighter was arranged at a friend's place.

I cannot really remember the movie, but all of us hyper-curious miscreants - knowing full well we were breaking the law - watched it in open-mouthed wonder.

Fast forward 25 years to the present day.

A recent global survey said that the fourth most searched term by 7-year-olds-and-under is "porn".

Fourth. Behind YouTube, Google and Facebook.

Can you imagine that?

I mean, at the age of 7, I probably wasn't even aware of the real difference between girls and boys. Forget about searching for porn.

But two days later, I read that the British government is planning to introduce sex education at the age of 7.

Again, I am dumbfounded.

Are kids these days that aware of things?

I cannot even imagine bringing up the subject of sex to my 10-year-old daughter. (You'll take that one, won't you, honey?)

But my son, whom I suspect will become my responsibility, will be 7 in 2011.

This kid hasn't even completely stopped drinking milk from the bottle and we are already talking about sex education and porn?

Anguish

It is at times like these that I wish no one had ever invented the darned Internet. (And, to make my point, I refuse to Google to find out who actually did.)

I am positive that this free flow of information is the main cause of all this anguish for us parents.

Conversations about the birds and the bees should take place when the kid is 16 or 18, preferably 21.

Not at 5 or 7 or 9 or 10.

So there. We shall not be moved.

Honey, please pull the plug on the cable modem on your way to bed, will you?

This article was first published in The New Paper.