Melinda Tankard Reist as published on ABC Religion and Ethics
"[I want] better education regarding sex for both boys and girls [and] information about pornography, and the way it influences harmful sexual practices."
These are the words of Lucy, aged 15, one of 600 young Australian women and girls who took part in a just-released survey commissioned by Plan Australia and Our Watch. The survey, conducted by Ipsos, gathered responses from the girls and young women aged 15-19 in all states and territories.
In the survey report, entitled Don't send me that pic, participants reported that online sexual abuse and harassment were endemic. More than 80% said it was unacceptable for boyfriends to request naked images.
Sexual bullying and harassment are part of daily life for many girls. Young people are speaking out more and more about how these practices have links with pornography - and so they should, because they have most to lose.
Pornography is moulding and conditioning the sexual behaviours and attitudes of boys, and girls are being left without the resources to deal with these porn-saturated boys.
My own engagement with young women over the last few years in schools around Australia, confirms that we are conducting a pornographic experiment on young people - an assault on their healthy sexual development.
If there are still any questions about whether porn has an impact on young people's sexual attitudes and behaviours, perhaps it's time to listen to young people themselves. Girls and young women describe boys pressuring them to provide acts inspired by the porn they consume routinely. Girls tell of being expected to put up with things they don't enjoy.
Some see sex only in terms of performance, where what counts most is the boy enjoying it. I asked a 15-year-old about her first sexual experience. She replied: "I think my body looked OK. He seemed to enjoy it". Many girls seem cut off from their own sense of pleasure or intimacy. That he enjoyed it is the main thing. Girls and young women are under a lot of pressure to give boys and men what they want, to adopt pornified roles and behaviours, with their bodies being merely sex aids. Growing up in a pornified landscape, girls learn that they are service stations for male gratification and pleasure.
Asked "How do you know a guy likes you?," a Year 8 replied: "He still wants to talk to you after you suck him off." A male high school student said to a girl: "If you suck my dick I'll give you a kiss." Girls are expected to provide sex acts for tokens of affection. A 15-year-old told me she didn't enjoy sex at all, but that getting it out of the way quickly was the only way her boyfriend would settle down and watch a movie with her.
I'm increasingly seeing Year 7 girls who seek help on what to do about requests for naked images. Being asked "send me a picture of your tits" is an almost daily occurrence for many. "How do I say 'no' without hurting his feelings"? girls ask.
As the Plan Australia/Our Watch report found, girls are tired of being pressured for images they don't want to send, but they seem resigned to how normal the practice has become. Boys use the images as a form of currency, to swap and share and to use to humiliate girls publicly.
Year 7 girls ask me questions about bondage and S&M. Many of them had seen 50 Shades of Grey (which was released on Valentine's Day). They ask, if he wants to hit me, tie me up and stalk me, does that mean he loves me? Girls are putting up with demeaning and disrespectful behaviours, and thereby internalizing pornography's messages about their submissive role.
I meet girls who describe being groped in the school yard, girls routinely sexually harassed at school or on the school bus on the way home. They tell me boys act like they are entitled to girls' bodies. Defenders of porn often say that it provides sex education. And it does: it teaches even very young boys that women and girls are always up for it. "No" in fact means yes, or persuade me.
Girls describe being ranked at school on their bodies, and are sometimes compared to the bodies of porn stars. They know they can't compete, but that doesn't stop them thinking they have to. Requests for labiaplasty have tripled in a little over a decade among young women aged 15-24. Girls who don't undergo porn-inspired "Brazilian" waxing are often considered ugly or ungroomed (by boys as well as by other girls).
Some girls suffer physical injury from porn-inspired sexual acts, including anal sex. The director of a domestic violence centre on the Gold Coast wrote to me a couple of years ago about the increase in porn-related injuries to girls aged 14 and up, from acts including torture:
"In the past few years we have had a huge increase in intimate partner rape of women from 14 to 80+. The biggest common denominator is consumption of porn by the offender. With offenders not able to differentiate between fantasy and reality, believing women are 'up for it' 24/7, ascribing to the myth that 'no means yes and yes means anal', oblivious to injuries caused and never ever considering consent. We have seen a huge increase in deprivation of liberty, physical injuries, torture, drugging, filming and sharing footage without consent."
The Australian Psychological Society estimates that adolescent boys are responsible for around 20% of rapes of adult women and between 30% and 50% of all reported sexual assaults of children. Just last week , Emeritus Professor Freda Briggs argued that online pornography is turning children into copycat sexual predators - acting out on other children what they are seeing in porn.
A 2012 review of research on "The Impact of Internet Pornography on Adolescents" found that adolescent consumption of Internet pornography was linked to attitudinal changes, including acceptance of male dominance and female submission as the primary sexual paradigm, with women viewed as "sexual playthings eager to fulfil male sexual desires." The authors found that "adolescents who are intentionally exposed to violent sexually explicit material were six times more likely to be sexually aggressive than those who were not exposed."
I have asked girls what messages they might like me to pass on to boys. So far, these messages include: "Stop telling us we are wet," "Stop commenting on our bodies," "Stop demanding pictures," "Rape jokes are never funny" and "Sex before the age of consent is illegal."
The proliferation and globalisation of hypersexualised imagery and pornographic themes makes healthy sexual exploration almost impossible. Sexual conquest and domination are untempered by the bounds of respect, intimacy and authentic human connection. Young people are not learning about intimacy, friendship and love, but about cruelty and humiliation. As a recent study found:
"online mainstream pornography overwhelmingly centered on acts of violence and degradation toward women, the sexual behaviors exemplified in pornography skew away from intimacy and tenderness and typify patriarchal constructions of masculinity and femininity."
It is intimacy and tenderness that so many girls and young women say they are looking for. A young woman told me that on dating sites she lists under "fetish" wanting to stare longingly into someone's eyes and to take sex slow. She said if she didn't put these desires in the "fetish" category, they wouldn't warrant a second glance.
But how will young women find these sensual, slow-burn experiences in men indoctrinated by pornography? Psychologist Philip Zimbardo says of young men: "They don't know the language of face to face contact ... Constant arousal, change, novelty excitement makes them out of sync with slow developing relationships - relationships which build slowly."
It is wrong to leave sexual formation in the hands of the global sex industry. We need to do more to help young people stand up against warped notions of sexuality conveyed in pornography.
Fortunately, the ill-effects of the pornographic experiment on relationships and sexuality are being named out loud. A groundbreaking Australia-first symposium on the issue was held at UNSW last month, to a standing room crowd, and a current Senate inquiry is gathering evidence of the distorting harmful impacts of porn on our young people.
Most importantly, it's young people themselves demanding change. Josie, 18, is quoted in the Plan Australia/Our Watch report:
"We need some sort of crack down on the violent pornography that is currently accessible to boys and men. This violent pornography should be illegal to make or view in Australia as we clearly have a problem with violence and boys are watching a lot of pornography which can be very violent ... This is influencing men's attitude towards women and what they think is acceptable. Violent pornography is infiltrating Australian relationships."
Girls like Lucy and Josie deserve our response.
As published on ABC Religion and Ethics
Add your comment
Showing 54 reactions
Sign in with
This very specific type of pornography referenced in the article is mainstream pornography. It is what you will find if you type ‘porn’ into google. It is what consumers are watching, and it is what is keeping the $200 billion porn industry afloat. Yes, other niche genres of porn exist, however, they are statistically irrelevant.
You are right, adolescent girls also access pornography, but the research tells us that porn is primarily used by males, and when women view porn it is most often with a (male) partner. I don’t see how that changes the fact that boys are finding their sexual tastes shaped by the pornography they consume, and acting out on girls? Boys themselves tell us as much…and so do the girls.
The vast majority of porn websites require no age verification and if they do, it involves clicking “I am over 18”, which let’s face it, any 6 year old can do. The porn industry also actively targets children by studying common keystroke errors they make and directing them to porn sites, as well as by creating entire porn sites modelled on popular children’s cartoon characters- e.g. My Little Pony porn. This multi billion dollar industry is preying on kids and parents can’t keep up. All the child needs is access to the internet or a smart phone- or a friend with access to the internet or a smart phone.
Surely in a competition between parents and a multi-billion dollar industry you can see that the odds are not exactly stacked in the parents’ favour?
The article also appears to be speaking about a very specific type of pornography, one in which the male is dominant and agressive. There are countless genres, some where the male is submissive, and some where they appear to be tender and loving. is a little too broad to blame the whole industry for a very specific genre.
I understand that it seems to be centralising on the fact that it is focussed on adolecent males obtaining this material, however, I’d like to point out that girls acccess this material as well. Also that to access these websites people are required to be 18, and obviously these children are not, so it falls on the responsible adult to ensure that the material is not accessable
Deut 21:15-16 does NOT state that a man can have more than one wife. God made marriage to be between a man and a woman from the beginning. Look in Genesis. Christ repeats it in Mark 10. But you twisted it for your convenience.
Ephesians 6:5 does NOT condone slaverly. It tells you how to behave if you are a slave. Again, you twisted it for your convenience.
No where did I say that progressives are satanists. I explained that Satan is who says that you only need to spend quality time with your kids
-just like the progressives say the same thing. That couldn’t be further from the truth. Your kids need as much time as is possible from you.Yes, women are to submit to their husbands — but you keep forgetting that husbands are supposed to submit to God’s will and treat their wives like Christ treated the Church (He suffered and died for the church if you recall). Why don’t you do a little reading about what Jesus said in the Gospel of Mark chapter 10 – particularly verses 2-18.
What is so special about the New Testament that I should follow it, Jamie? If I follow that, I must follow the Old Testament as well. If I pick and choose, I am only making myself into my own god. Jesus said very clearly that “you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, mind, etc” and “Thou shalt have no other gods before me”.
As for a moral compass…. Who is to say my moral compass is right? Who is to say your moral compass is right? Who is to say Jeffrey Dahmer’s moral compass was right? That is the pickle we get ourselves in when we turn ourselves into gods. Every body’s moral compass is different. ISIS’ moral compass says it’s OK to exterminate infidels. Tim McVeigh and his buddy – their moral compass said it was OK to blow up children in a day care.
The article bemoans what has happened to society. What has happened to society has happened because many folks’ moral compasses are badly out of whack. I expresssed my view on how to fix the situation. You got all uptight about what you THOUGHT I stood for and you didn’t even bother addressing the points about raising the kids. You can believe what you want, Jamie. But try acting like a grown up when you see a point of view that you don’t like.
The BIBLE condones Women being sexually submissive to their partners.
It says that men who go to war and take captives they can TAKE a beautiful woman they find as a WIFE. Not once does this ask for the woman’s consent.
Deuteronomy 21:15-16 states that a man can have MORE than one wife – but you “Christians” are always moaning about the “Sanctity of Marriage” and how it should be between ONE man and ONE woman.
The bible condones Slavery – even in the new testament.
Ephesians 6:5 Slaves, obey your earthly masters with respect and fear, and with sincerity of heart, just as you would obey Christ.
The BIBLE was written BY men FOR men. The Holy Spirit might have tried to pass on Gods word to mankind, but the message got Chinese Whispered the SHIT out of it before it ever reached the Quill.
Either follow ONLY whats in the NEW Testament (with the exception of the 10 Commandments if you like) – although CLEARLY there is a lot of messed up s*** in the NEW testament as well – about being GOOD to your fellow man, or shut up about your so called Holier-than-thou lifestyle.
And Progressives are NOT satanists.
We are just people who have our OWN moral compass without the need for some invisible sky-daddy to point the way with fear of eternal hell if we don’t comply.
YOU need a threat to be a good person.
We do not.
Contrary to what Satan (the progressives) says, it is NOT about spending quality time with your kids – rather it is quality AND quantity time. They are only small for a while. Use that time to teach them. If you don’t brain-wash them, culture will brain-wash them.
Too big for be left to the ‘sex educators’.
If you have kids of your own or know anyone under 25 then you gotta get informed. This shit is going down right now in a for kids near you. Its a cold and emotionally brutal world out there. Physical and emotionally abusive sex has become normalised.
Article like this paint a sobering picture.
SEX and LOVE have become divorced. I’m not talking about ‘now he is going to be with me forever’ love, I’m talking about basic dignity. I’m talking about love as a very real kind of FELT CONNECTION between two humans.
And its not just women that are affected, although they may be better at articulating what is going on…
Porno-consciousness is a disease and 100% of young people growing up in today’s world will be exposed to it. Probably long before they even reach puberty.
THIS NEEDS TO BE TALKED ABOUT
As horrible as this reality is, we need to get it out in the open and deal with it.
Condoms are not going to stop this disease from spreading.
This is more contagious than the bubonic plague.
Kids are getting exposed to this younger and younger.
Most ADULTS are going to be adversely affected by watching porn, whether they realise it or not.
So what effect do you think its going to have on a 12 year old? How about a 9 year old?
The porn ‘industry’ is not going to go away overnight.
The internet is here to stay.
Parental controls! Are you kidding?
The emotional landscape is toxic. Kids are under attack. The innocence of their sexuality has been polluted.
There is no point arguing about WHOSE FAULT IT IS. We are too late for that…
No, what we need to do is to somehow find a way to create something new out of this toxic wasteland. It is time to reunite SEX with LOVE. To start to explore the mystery and discover what is possible between human beings. Time to create a NEW NORMAL for sexuality. And it begins with YOU. Are you ready to bring the magic back into your sexuality? Are you willing to reject all that is not loving?
Imagine what would happen if women everywhere started to just say NO to ALL pornography-polluted interactions. Just NO. I am not going to demean myself. I am not interested in disconnection and acting.
Sacred sexuality is real. It is not common but IS potent. If your heart has been touched just as deeply as your genitals then you will know it.
I repeat: PORN IS NOT GOING TO GO AWAY
With a vacuum of wholesome sexuality, pornography has become perceived as ‘what is normal’ by a whole generation of kids growing up online.
We need something better. Something to fill the vacuum.
Something real and substantial to educate young people about their full potential as living, breathing, growing sexual beings.
It is not good enough to attempt to deny that kids have sexuality. OF COURSE they are going to explore it.
But what if we could role model something more beautiful?
Something so potent that it makes porno look like the cheap C-grade acting that it is?
Its a big call, right?
And I want to be honest with you. I’m not there yet.
Something in me still gets pulled about by porn images.
There is power in sex. We have to be discerning.
I want to PURIFY my sexuality. To strip out all that is polluted. All that is FAKE.
In the face of this epidemic there are SO MANY opportunities for those who have the courage to explore them.
What if women everywhere began to reject EVERYTHING that didn’t feel good in their bodies?
What if young boys took a stand and began to seek out some high quality content on sexuality?
What if we actually made it easy for such materials to be found?
Imagine a World where kids attempting ridiculous porno style manoeuvres just got LAUGHED AT.
Its a big call. We have a long way to go.
I don’t know HOW but my heart has no choice.
I begin in the only place that I can.
I begin with ME
As for porn….. yes, it is way too easy to find. But there is little you can do to stop the source. Rather you must teach the kids what is right and wrong. Too many parents have abdicated that responsibility. Too many parents are only interested in keeping up with the Joneses rather than teaching their kids what is right and wrong..
I agree with Arzu’s response to you, girls and young women are shown that what we look like and being sexy is ALL that matters – just look at the kind of abuse a young woman will get on youtube, for example – men and women get terrible comments, but the sexually orientated comments are almost always aimed at women and girls.
This makes things incredibly difficult for a teen who is trying to work out how she wants to explore her sexuality. Most teen girls do not have the assertiveness and courage to be firm and direct with all boys/ men, and if they do they probably get called cock blocking bitches.
When I think about porn, rape, commercialisation of sex, child abuse, domestic violence, I wonder if sex is broken.