Three teenagers have a conversation about how online pornography has impacted on their lives in a new video from ABC. The seven-minute video explores the ways in which unrestricted access to pornography shapes young people’s sexuality, their intimate relationships and view of themselves and their bodies.

In a digital age with unrestricted access to hard core pornography, children are being exposed at unprecedented rates and from younger ages. Children are viewing increasingly violent and degrading pornography, typically before they’ve experienced real life sexual encounters. Pornography has become the primary means of sex education for young people, but what does it teach?

“[Porn] is creating an expectation”

Kiki, 19, told ABC she had experienced pressure from male sexual partners to replicate sex acts they had seen in pornography:

“My boyfriend at the time would just nag me and nag me and nag me at the time to do anal. I ended up having to turn around and stop and say, ‘No, I’m not going to do that’ before he retreated… it’s not kind of like ‘Hey, I’m curious about this.’ It’s like, ‘You should do this, I want you to do this.’ They push and push and push.” 

Kiki’s sentiments have been expressed by many young women who have similarly described experiences of coercion and unwanted porn-inspired sex acts instigated by male partners. (Read more here).   

Porn industry blames parents for children’s exposure to porn

Throughout the short video, various spokespeople for the pornography industry shrugged off responsibility for the harms to children who were exposed to hard core pornography, arguing it was up to parents to monitor their child’s internet access.

Ron Jeremy, one of the most famous male porn performers of all time, argued it was not the porn industry’s responsibility to depict healthy sexual relationships. Jeremy, who was a special guest at Sexpo, was last week barred from the industry’s own Adult Video News awards after multiple rape allegations. “Watch your goddamn kids,” he said.

But when the teens featured in the video were asked if they felt their parents could control everything they looked at on the internet, their response was a resounding no. “No, there’s no way you could. To a 13-year-old, parents say ‘No more internet’ so he takes his smartphone down to public wi-fi.”

It’s near impossible for parents to compete with the multi-billion-dollar global sex industry, one that aggressively markets and has successfully mainstreamed its product, and opposes any measures that may curtail its profits- such as age verification on pornographic websites.

Parents need to be educated, but at best, all we can really do is prepare our children for the inevitable.