DEAR ABBY: Unless you are willing to state unequivocally that the books and magazines you read and the movies you saw in your youth did not affect the way you conducted yourself, then your statement, "It's unrealistic to hold the media responsible for your daughter's morality ..." is unrealistic.
When I was a teen-ager, the movies and what I read had some influence on my behavior toward others. Today we see raw sex on TV as early as 7:00 in the evening, and magazines on supermarket shelves devoted almost entirely to sex. I have seen sexual innuendoes on many TV shows to such a degree that it destroys their humor. I have heard more foul language in one Eddie Murphy movie than I heard in my several years in the Navy -- ashore and at sea.
You cannot tell me that the language of the movies is not absorbed by teen-agers, resulting in unbelievable rudeness. And the sex scenes ARE going to reduce their inhibitions.
There is no way that "Concerned in Chicago's" daughter can avoid seeing or reading all of this. When our children said, "But everyone else is ..." we could say, "YOU are not going to ..." with neutral or positive influence by the media. Now the movies and the printed word tell them that such conduct is all right. -- ALEX R. THOMAS, SAN ANTONIO DEAR MR. THOMAS: It is the job of parents to supervise the exposure their impressionable children have to "the media" and to provide moral standards for them. Although the idea seems tempting, I am opposed to censorship. The family should provide the "filter" through which their children view society.