Porn - does it matter?

It can sometimes seem that sex, rather than love, is all around us. Lust and betrayal on TV, music videos featuring scantily clad women writhing on big cars with well-muscled men, and internet porn streamed with ease anytime, anywhere to anyone. Welcome to today’s biggest sex educator.

The big question for me (and the starting point for my new book, ‘Educating young people about pornography’) is; does it matter? Many would argue that viewing adult content is harmless fun, a sort of risqué rite of passage and that people like me who raise concerns are part of the fun police, determined to make a fuss and spoil things. After all, pornography is nothing new; it has been around for centuries with the historical evidence to prove it. Generations have grown up looking at sexual images (secretly or otherwise) and plenty of adults in the UK continue to legally enjoy adult entertainment, so why do we need to talk about it now? What has changed? Well, quite simply – accessibility.

For the pre-internet generation watching a porn film, or getting hold of ‘men only’ magazines, was not all that easy. With no DVDs and strictly applied age restrictions, the ‘Carry on’ cheeky brand of humour was the nearest many ever got to seeing a ‘mucky film’. Fast-forward to today and children grow up gazing at sexy underwear and furry handcuffs displayed in high street shop windows from their buggy. Turn on the music channels and life sized screens show simulated sex, often with women bowing before the power and sexual aggression of their men. Sing along and you can be unwittingly reinforcing stereotypes about girls meaning yes when they say no that educators and law enforcers have been challenging for over fifty years. Girl power? Certainly not. Sexual freedom? Maybe – but if we accept that children learn what they live, what messages are we actually giving our little boys and girls? Porn often depicts sex in ways that are threatening, misogynistic, violent and without boundaries. Is that really what we want young people to grow up believing? It is not quite the romantic Hollywood version of love pushed by mainstream films.

Meanwhile SRE lessons in most UK schools continue to studiously leave out any mention of the ‘p’ word, despite evidence that revenge porn, the making and sharing of intimate images and streaming hardcore porn instead of revising for GCSE’s is rife. Further research is required to establish if there is a conclusive link between education and a reduction in the number of children and young people accessing pornography, but surely now is the right time for educators to step forward. After all, if we want young people to grow up to have happy, healthy, positive relationships why are we leaving it to the pornographers to do so much of the teaching?

Rogers, V. ‘Educating young people about pornography’ Jessica Kingsley Publishers (publication due late 2015)

For more details contact bethany.gower@jkp.com or vanessa_rogers@me.com