>This uncensored reading thing is a tradition in my family. My aunt,
>as a high school student, wanted to get a copy of de Sade's JUSTINE
>from the school library, and the librarian wouldn't let her have
>it. This was in the late 1950s. According to family legend, my
>grandfather stormed in there and demanded, as a paying customer
>(it was a private boarding school, not like the public schools I
>attended), that the book be delivered into his daughter's hands.
In this respects our upbringings were similar. From the age of 6, I had
unrestricted access to my parent's library, including bodice-rippers, war
stories (often with gruesome pictures), and my (psychologist) mother's
collections of texts on human sexuality. Indeed, they even assisted the
education process. When my baby brother was born (I was 4) they got me a
picture book with stylized but still graphic illustrations of sex, adult
human genitalia, and childbirth. They would never have made a scene to get
me a copy of de Sade, but that's only because they're not the type to make a
scene.
They did hide the pornography, but I found it anyway :-) I personally
wouldn't care if a child of my own saw any, because I remember my reaction
(pre-puberty) was "what's the big deal?"