OVER the last 50 years, there has been a vast decline in moral standards.

In the 1950s, sex was a word that was avoided like the plague. Sadly, these days, everything seems to revolve around it.

Take pop music -- 50 years ago, a singer got to the top of the hit parade with talent alone. Now, especially in female pop, it is sold purely on sex, by young women, 99 per cent of whom have no talent at all, cavorting around in a state of near undress.

We now have a local band calling themselves 4play, one does not have to be a mastermind or be a dirty old man to conjure up what this implies! Had these girls been born with the surname 4play I have no doubt that when they became of age they would have changed their name by deed poll.

Next take selling, we now have a designer label called 'fcuk.' What word springs to mind with this? Well, it reminds me of a four-letter word that 50 years ago was taboo. Now, I hear it every day, if not on TV, then from kiddies in the street.

Incidentally, for those who did not know, 'fcuk' stands for French Connection UK.

In Blackburn, our council has given the go-ahead for sex shops to open extra hours and Sundays in the run-up to Christmas.

We all have a moral obligation. The most prominent influence a child receives, certainly in its early years, is that of the parents and carers. Sadly, in a lot of cases, parents are failing to bring up their children with good family and moral values.

Times have changed, we are told. Yes, they have for the worse. Respect and common decency have all but disappeared.

J ALLAN (Mr), Rothesay Road, Blackburn.