Porn: What's the Harm? (2014)

This programme contains
some scenes of a sexual nature
Pornography is everywhere, and
with smartphones and tablets making
it easier than ever to get hold of,
there are fears that each generation
is seeing porn earlier
than the one before.
How old were you
when this happened? Eight.
You were eight?!
So how much porn do kids REALLY see?
I haven't even
had to prove my age yet
and some of the most
explicit images I have...
EVER seen are on this website.
And what does that mean
for a generation
that always has porn
at their fingertips?
I've seen some pretty scary
stuff on the internet.
To us, it's just normal, because
we've seen it that many times.
To discover the truth about kids and
porn, we've done an exclusive survey
with over 1,000 teens giving it to
us straight about what they've seen.
Who watches porn?
Me. Me. I'm not going to lie, innit?
Yeah. All of us do. Yeah.
And how it makes them feel.
It sort of makes you feel
a bit embarrassed, er,
because I don't want
to look at stuff like that.
I'll meet the people behind some
of what the kids are watching...
I think people need to understand
that, that it's not real. It's...
It's not how I would have sex
at home at all.
..and find out if they're
worried about who's watching.
GASPS: Aw!
'I definitely wouldn't change it.'
I'd do it again, if I could
go back in time to do it.
And as I hear about the effect
some say porn has had on them...
For him to just think that...
that I was an object
that he could use seemed
so similar to the images that I saw.
..I'll discover whether teaching
kids about porn is the answer
and, if so, at what age
should that start?
When we said
we were going to school,
I didn't know it would be primary.
I mean, these are kids
who are sort of 10 and under.
My name's Jameela Jamil.
I'm a writer,
a presenter and a DJ
and, every week, I host
the Radio 1 Official Chart.
Last week, I announced that
Calvin Harris, Alleso and Hurts
topped the official chart.
MUSIC: "Feel So Close"
by Calvin Harris
I've been working in the music
industry since I was 19,
and I'm in touch
with thousands of teenagers
through my blog and on Twitter.
So, although I'm now in my twenties,
I still like to think
I know what's going on.
But it seems there's one area
where I don't know quite as much
as I thought I did.
I think the first time
young people see porn,
they're probably around 12, 13,
like going into the first and
second years of high school.
I don't really watch it,
but my friends tell me some of it is
really disturbing and they might...
Like, say if they wanted
to try it out and...
I don't think that'd be good.
My mum can't even access the
computer and if she knew how to
and if she went on the sites
which young people were looking at,
she'd just be horrified. Cos it is,
in my mind, it's disgusting.
When it comes to
sex and relationships,
I'm pretty open minded. And
although I don't use porn myself,
I know a lot of adults who do and
I don't have a problem with that.
But like most people,
I've seen all the scare stories
about how much young kids
now watch it too.
So I want to know if that's true
and if we really do have a
generation growing up watching porn.
I remember I was 15 the first time
I ever came across proper
pornography, because it was
at a time really before
the internet was as huge as it is.
I was at a friend's house
and they were watching it,
and I had a little look and
I'm not going to get too graphic,
but the things that I saw done
with a cucumber and a woman
genuinely made me
not eat a salad for 12 years.
That was in 2002 and, to be honest,
I haven't really seen
much porn since.
But today's 15-year-olds
have grown up in
an age of smartphones and tablets,
and it's reckoned that
a quarter of 9 to 16-year-olds
will have seen porn
in the last 12 months.
So what exactly is pornography?
Legally, it's defined
as an image that's
"assumed to have been
produced solely or principally
"for the purpose of sexual arousal"
I've genuinely never searched for
porn before, but I'm now so curious
to see what it is that young people
are seeing out there
and, more so, how easy it is
to actually access.
So OK, I'm just going
to type in the word porn...
I know this seems really basic,
but I'm just going to type in
the word porn into a search engine
and just see what happens.
OK...porn.
There are 436 million results
in 28 seconds,
so just an abundance
of free porn sites have come up.
So I'll click on the first one.
OK, I haven't even had
to prove my age yet
and some of the most
explicit images I have...
EVER seen are on this website.
There's a lot of use
of the words "teen slut".
It's just...
It's lot of really...
SHE SIGHS
..sort of distressing
images of women
looking like they're
in quite a lot of pain.
Just performing these
unbelievably explicit sex acts.
They all look really young.
I'm not even a parent yet
and I'm already terrified
of the idea of having children
knowing what's out there.
I completely get why people
would be concerned
about their children going on the
internet. This is unbelievable!
'But easy access to porn is
'something that ordinary families
have to deal with every day.'
Hi. Hi. I'm Jameela. Nice to meet
you. Nice to meet you. Do come in.
Alison and her husband James
have two sons -
Cameron, aged 10,
and 18-year-old Brandon.
It's only an eight-year age gap,
but in terms of access to porn,
these boys might as well
come from different worlds.
When Brandon was ten,
he'd have been playing on
a little games console. No wi-fi,
no internet. I don't even think we
had a computer when Brandon was 10.
Certainly no smartphones.
So there wasn't...
We were still doing the thing of
"Don't walk backwards up the slide,
cos you'll bump yourself."
How young do you think it is
that young people can start
watching pornography or do start
coming across at least pornography,
even if it's accidental?
I would've said about 8, 10.
We actually had an incident here
where Cameron was upstairs
and we only found out by chance,
because of the phone bill.
And one of his friends
had gone upstairs
and put the porn channel on.
'I'm intrigued by this revelation,
'so I decide to have a little chat
with ten-year-old Cameron.'
My friend came over to my house
one time, we put on my TV,
and he said,
"Put this porn channel on."
And he rang the porn channel up
and it cost money.
How old were you when this happened?
Er, eight.
You were eight?! And your friend
knew about the porn channel,
what it was and how
to get onto it? Yeah.
So after your friend had
shown you the pornography,
how did it come about,
like how where you able
to talk about it?
What happened next? Um...
I went downstairs feeling confused.
I didn't tell my mum, but...
How come? Um...
I didn't feel safe about it,
I didn't know what it was,
so I didn't feel right
to tell her about it.
But then, a phone bill came in
and my mum started
questioning me about it.
So what did your mum do?
How did she react? She was furious.
18-year-old Brandon is concerned
about what else his little
brother might be exposed to.
I do worry about him. I do worry
about the stuff out there
that he hasn't seen, because
of the explicit material out there.
So it's just a worry
of if he's going to see it,
when he's going to see it,
cos, one day, he most likely will
and how it's going to affect him.
I just hope that
it doesn't affect him too much.
So is it inevitable
that online porn
will become part
of every teenager's life?
To find out, I need to
hear from kids themselves.
And first, I've come
to one of the very few schools
where pornography is
openly discussed.
This workshop is run
by Rape Crisis South London.
Who watches porn? Me. Me.
I'm not going to lie, innit?
Yeah. All of us do.
We'd be lying
if we told you we didn't.
Every single teenage guy
watches porn.
You think every single guy watches
porn? Yeah, definitely. True story.
There's not a guy out there
who doesn't watch porn?
I'd be surprised.
You'd be surprised? OK.
'I'm sitting in on sessions
with boys and girls and, like me,
'they're shocked to learn that the
porn industry is worth billions!'
4 billion by the end of 2012
was spent on pornography
via mobile phones.
When young people watch pornography,
do you think young people
feel pressured?
Well, the girls watching it
might think, like,
they need to act like that,
and the same for the boys.
How do girls act in porn?
Like they're liking it.
Yeah, they put it on
a little bit, I think.
GIRL: A little bit?!
Quite a lot, I think.
Do you think it means
that young people sometimes
have different expectations
of what sex will be like?
Yeah, because I think
young people will see it
and think they can treat
a woman in that way
and it's not right
to treat a woman in that way.
Like, with porn videos,
they last bear long, innit, yeah?
But if you're having sex
for the first time,
you're not going to last,
like, 25 minutes, are you?
No. More like 10...
Maybe. Seconds.
LAUGHTER
And do you, young ladies, feel like
there is a pressure among girls
to maybe behave
like the porn starlets?
If we started, like,
behaving like a porn star,
we'd get called slut.
But if the boys do it...
GIGGLING
It's true! Yeah, it is true.
When girls go around
having sex with boys,
they're called a slag,
but when boys do it...
It's like an achievement, yeah.
An achievement. They'll be like...
It's just boys!
It's like, "Good on you, mate,"
but with a girl, it's not good.
Do you think that
that promotes young people
using that language about women?
Yeah, it does.
Do you agree with it?
It depends what they've done.
Like, obviously, if you hear about
a girl sleeping with loads of boys,
you're not going to be
attracted to her, are you? Mmm.
I think some boys,
the way they speak about girls,
sometimes, they forget that,
like, when they're older,
would they want boys to speak
about their daughter like that?
That's true. I've started to
think about that recently as well.
Would I like it if another boy was
talking about my sister like that
or doing things with my sister?
'I'm amazed that
these 15 and 16-year-olds
'seem to know so much
about the porn that's out there,
'and that they understand the impact
that it's having on them.'
'But it's no surprise to people
like sex educator Lynnette Smith,
'who work with teenagers every day.'
I've been involved in sex education
for about 20 years now
and it was literally one summer,
one summer we saw a change,
and that was summer 2002.
Now most of the classes,
at that time, we worked
just in senior schools... Yeah.
..in year nines and year tens,
which is 14 and 15-year-olds,
and up until that, in a class of 30,
we would maybe have
three lads out of the 15 in the
class that had accessed pornography,
and that would have been
through Fiesta magazines,
that type of... Yeah, yeah,
top shelf. Yeah, that's the thing.
And then, after that summer,
when everybody seemed to get
the internet piped into their homes,
in the September, the October,
we found that it was only
three lads out of 15 that HADN' actually accessed pornography.
SHE CLICKS HER FINGERS
It was literally that quick.
And now, one in three
9-16 year olds in the UK
has access to the internet
via their mobile phone. So the days
when porn had an age limit that
could be enforced are long gone.
The Government says it's clamping
down on easy access to porn,
encouraging internet providers
to introduce new filters
only adults can lift.
But some say it's too late
and that countless children
have already been exposed
to shocking images
at an age when I was
still playing with dolls.
So how do we know for sure
just how much online porn
teenagers are seeing?
And what effect
does that have on them?
To find out, we've carried out
the biggest survey of its kind
ever done in the UK.
Over 1,000 people aged
between 16 and 21 took part,
answering questions on
everything to do with porn.
How old they were
when they first saw it.
How often they watch it now.
And how they think it affects
what men and women expect from sex.
Their answers were sent anonymously
to a market research company.
And then, we got two of
the country's leading experts
on pornography and sexualisation
to help us analyse the results.
What was so exciting about this was
it was an opportunity to really go
to a large number of young people
in the UK, which is
where there hasn't been
a lot of research in the past
and really get them to tell us
what they thought, what they felt.
The answers that young people
gave us in the survey were
so interesting,
so inspiring, so thoughtful.
This is the biggest survey
in the UK that has been done
of young people's experiences
and really gives them a chance
to talk about what they think
about pornography and they did.
They had really interesting,
thoughtful things to say.
At the same time, I also talked to
dozens of teenagers aged 14 and up
from all over the UK, so we could
get the most accurate picture yet
of the truth about
young people and porn.
It boosts confidence of men a lot
more, and it makes them think,
"Well," you know, "it looks quite
easy, you know, I could do that."
My brother, he's 13 and I wouldn't
like the idea of him at all,
like, looking at porn
and sexual things like that,
because I don't think
it's sort of real life.
It's all like an act
and it's not really sort of sex.
Most young boys, they, like,
before they actually go to have sex,
they do, like, watch porn
to get a bit of experience
and knowledge in the whole game.
First in our survey, we asked people
to tell us how old they were
when they first saw porn online,
including downloads.
The average age
for first time porn viewing
turned out to be 14 years old.
But that doesn't give
the whole picture.
Just over 60% of those
who answered the question
told us they were
14 years old or younger
the first time
they saw pornography online.
Nearly a quarter were 12 or younger.
And 7% said they were
10 years old or younger.
Having seen
how easily accessible it is,
I shouldn't be surprised by
the fact that 7% of our respondents
were 10 or younger
when they first came across porn,
but I am. I'm still horrified.
As a grown woman,
I'm horrified seeing these images.
I can't imagine seeing that
through the eyes of a child.
Our survey also asked young people
why they look for porn.
Perhaps not surprisingly,
the most common reason given
was that men and women
use it for sexual stimulation
or as an aid to masturbation.
However, around 10%
of the 1,000 young people
said that, while men look
at porn for sexual pleasure,
young women do so
in order to learn about sex.
As one young woman put it, "women
for education, men for arousal".
And that worries me. Because if
they're turning to porn to learn,
how much of what they're seeing
is a true reflection
of what sex is really like?
I'm going to meet a woman
who should know.
She describes herself as
Britain's highest paid porn star.
Hello. Hi. How are you?
I'm good, thank you.
I'm Jameela. Nice to meet you.
How's things? Good, thank you.
Gemma Massey appeared
in more than 20 porn films
over a two year period,
but she's now left the industry.
THEY LAUGH
Oh, my God!
Your shoes have a bedroom! I know!
This is amazing! A whole bedroom
just for my clothes and shoes.
That's a weapon! That's not at shoe!
LAUGHTER
'Although Gemma stopped
working in porn two years ago,
'her films are on the web for ever.'
MOANING ON VIDEO
Would you ever go back
into porn? No.
Why? Cos no-one would else would
pay me that sort of money to do it
and I would never do it
for the standard going rate.
What is the standard going rate?
300 quid.
For what, what would you do
for 300 quid? For a scene.
How long does a scene take? Er...
Some companies, 12 hour days.
Some girls may need money and think,
"I'll do anal,
cos I'll get a bit more,"
and they're not doing it
cos they want to do it,
they're doing it cos they need to do
it, cos they need money or whatever.
Then, that's when I'd be like, "No."
I don't want to end up how
some of the girls have ended up.
What have they ended up like?
Mad in the head. In what way?
You know, some might have to
take drugs to then do the job,
which, again,
I would never want to do that.
So they can be, like,
in another place? Yeah.
What I want to know is do you think
that porn reflects real sex? No.
Why? And I think people need
to understand that it's not real.
It's...it's not how I would
have sex at home at all.
'Although Gemma wants people to
understand that porn isn't real,
'I'm not sure
she's faced up to the reality
'of how young
a lot of her audience is.'
How do you feel about the fact
that 11-year-olds now
are watching your films?
I know, that is quite disturbing
that it's getting
younger and younger. Um...
They can't really stop it, can they?
What do your family
think about the porn?
My mum and dad wasn't too happy
about it when I told them,
like most parents, I suppose.
What parent would want to see
their daughter doing porn?
It's kind of one of those ones.
It's not the most normal...
So you do recognise it's... Oh,
yeah, I know that it's not normal.
That's why I want to get out of it
and do something different, because,
if I was to stay in that industry
and carry on,
mentally it's just going
to mess you up in the head,
doing that all the time.
You can't do porn for ever.
'That wasn't what I expected.
I've never met a porn star.'
So I thought I was
going to come in here
and she was going to be a dominatrix
and be really fierce and sassy,
'the way that she's portrayed
in films and online.
'She was nothing like that.
She's really sweet.'
There's some pictures of when I was
younger, going from four boob jobs.
'There's something about her that's
almost just not completely there.
'She's lovely, she's adorable,'
but she's just almost like in
a fantasy world of thinking it's OK
and that's the same fantasy I feel
kids have when they're watching it.
When we talk about young people
seeing porn online,
it's often assumed
they're looking for it.
But our nationwide survey showed
this isn't always the case.
Of the hundreds of young people
who took part, only 22%
were looking for it on purpose
the first time they saw porn online.
The rest saw it accidentally
or were shown it by someone else.
And in their day-to-day lives,
young people just continue to be
bombarded with pornographic images.
Nearly a quarter said
that they see porn online
when they don't expect to
at least once a week.
Some of the most commonly
reported ways were
when they're searching
for something else online.
Someone said that,
"I click on a game or website
"which says it's something else,
but then it's porn,"
so there's no escaping it.
'And these days, you don't even have
to visit an explicit site
'to see pornographic images.'
We've got six new entries and
four re-entries, including tracks
from Pharrell Williams,
James Arthur and Mariah Carey.
'Sexual images are everywhere -
in adverts, magazines,
'and, more than ever,
in music videos.'
And this at number 26 is Miley Cyrus
and that big old Wrecking Ball.
# I came in like
a wrecking ball... #
Music stars,
like Miley Cyrus, Kanye West,
Rihanna and Robin Thicke,
are often singled out for criticism,
accused of using pornographic images
and editing techniques
in their videos.
But it's grime artist Skepta
who's taken the sexual imagery in
music videos to a whole new level.
# We were chilling
then we had sex... #
The video for his single
All Over the House
features him singing as two
porn actors have explicit sex.
This is a hardcore porn film
labelled as a music video.
'In fact, with close ups
of genitals,
'the images are SO explicit,
we can't even show them.'
So talk me through the decision
to use a porno as a music video.
I always think to try and do
something what nobody else has done.
I didn't think too much about it
or how big it would be or whatever.
I just did it. I never tweeted that
video once. I never spoke about it.
I never did anything...
Yeah, but it's the internet.
Right, so it found
its way back to me.
I just didn't want to promote it.
I know that I have young fans...
Mm-hm. ..that follow me on Twitter,
so for me to put that on there,
it is a stupid thing for me to do, so
I kind of left it for people to find.
So if people find it...
But it's so easy to find.
Literally, you Google it,
if I even write in "Skepta",
the first thing that comes up is
All Over The House, then they say
you have to be 18-plus to watch it,
but I mean, I could be five
and could've gotten through to that.
It just comes up immediately.
OK, you found it,
but you still clicked it.
Do you know what I mean?
That's what it was for me.
Now you know how many kids have
seen it... Yeah. ..how do you feel?
I don't feel any different.
I definitely wouldn't change it.
I'd do it again if I could
go back in time to do it.
I didn't put that much thought into
it when I did it in the first place
and I do a lot of stuff in life, just
wanting to do something different.
# She came closer
# I popped up
like bread in a toaster... #
'Skepta was happy
to appear in the video
'and for it to show real sex,
but I'm curious
'as to why he wasn't prepared
to be filmed having sex himself.'
I think there's a quite lot
of reasons. That's probably
why I can't pinpoint what it is.
Well, I'd love some of them.
One is because I'm me.
That is definitely one.
It's because of who I am.
What about you? Um...
Like my mum would be very upset
if I did it. Why? Because...
I know my mum, innit? So I know
she wouldn't like me to do that.
A quick search on the internet
shows just how shocked some
young fans were by Skepta's video.
LOUD GASPS
Oh, my God!
'This girl was filmed on webcam as
she watched it for the first time.'
Eugh!
# She knows I've got this
Open it up like a locksmith... #
What the hell is wrong
with this man?!
First of all, what I would say,
yeah, straightaway,
this girl's an attention seeker,
definitely.
So are you!
Look at your porno video.
# All over the house
All over the house... #
'I met up with Naomi, the girl who
found Skepta's video so shocking.'
Eugh! How can you be doing that?!
SHE LAUGHS
'She told me her friend had
sent her the link to the video
'without telling her
it had explicit sex in it.
'Naomi posted her reaction online.'
Do you remember that reaction? Do
you want to tell me a bit about it?
Yeah, that reaction was genuine.
I was like, "What the actual hell?"
Like I expected a music video,
and I got a porno and, like,
if I'd knew it was going to be
a porno, I'd have put headphones in,
so that it wouldn't be out loud
for my mum to hear.
It was just shocking.
When I showed the video to Skepta,
he felt like you were
just attention seeking.
Were you just attention seeking
or was that genuine?
I was shocked.
I was too shocked to hold it all in.
My mouth... The way it was
open the majority of the video,
it was literally like,
"Oh, my God, this is nasty!"
What he was trying to do was
almost as if he knew controversy
would come with it.
Therefore, whether it's good or bad,
you're going to get attention.
# She knows I've got this
# I'm-a open it up
like a locksmith... #
But despite such hostile reactions,
Skepta says he still doesn't
regret his porn music video.
He's says it's up to parents
to educate their kids
about the internet.
These parents need to take time out,
get off the couch and leave the
Kardashians and the X-Factors alone
and go and chill with your child.
Why do children of today connect more
with me than their own parents?
You shouldn't watch my video
or you shouldn't watch a video
and not feel comfortable to
go back to your dad or your mum
and say, "What's going on here?"
# Let me show you something
you won't forget
# Just hold me around my neck... #
That was really intense,
because I know him
and he's someone that I respect
and really like and it was a video
that was very poignant to me
when it first came out,
because I felt uncomfortable
about its existence,
knowing the audience
that were going to watch it.
Even though I believe he didn't have
any intention for kids to see that,
and he didn't think it would
become as viral as it did,
you have to think, with our platform
and our responsibility,
you have to think,
you have to be responsible.
In our survey,
we wanted to find out more
about the impact that online
pornography has on teenagers.
And we discovered
there's a massive difference
in the views and experiences
of young men and young women.
There are clear gender differences
in how young people
first see pornography,
how they feel when they first see it,
why they look for it,
how often they look for it,
and how it affects
what they expect from sex.
In our survey, 30% of the boys said
the first time they saw porn,
they'd looked for it on purpose,
compared to just 12% of girls.
And nearly 20% of girls told us
they have never seen porn online,
compared to only 4% of boys.
And those differences
between girls and boys persist.
So a quarter of young men say they
go looking for porn all the time,
so let's say every couple of days.
A quarter of young men say that
they look for porn some of the time,
so at least once a week,
and 50% of women say they never
go looking for online pornography.
It seems one reason for that
could be that young women
don't like what they see in porn.
In our survey,
229 of our 1,000 young people
told us there is
nothing good about porn.
Almost three quarters of them
were women.
'At the Salmon Centre
in South London,
'they provide a space
for teenagers to meet,
'let off steam and get support.
And as I discover,
'some of the older boys
have strong views about porn.'
Why do you think young people
look at porn?
Develop their understanding of sex.
So you think they learn about it?
Mm-hm. Some schools,
you have sex education, innit?
So it's just like verbally
explaining it to you,
whereas, if you were to watch porn,
you can see what's actually going on.
Sometimes, it helps.
It's like theory and practical.
And where do you guys find porn?
Where do people...?
Where do young people find porn?
Internet or like...
You know they have them vine videos
and, you know, they have girls...
You know? Doing what? Like, you know,
doing sexual things, innit?
And people just click on it.
When you watch one link, it leads to
another link and it just carries on.
Do you think girls and boys
see porn differently?
I think that it affects boys more.
In what way?
In a sexual way. It makes you
more eager to have sex. Yeah.
When you watch porn, you want sex
straight away. Trust me. Honest.
Why do you think girls
watch pornography?
Do you think it's
the same reason as why boys do?
It's hard to see girls
watching porn, man. How come?
You'd normally, stereotypically,
you'd associate porn with boys,
like...
I've watched porn with a girl
and it just made it awkward.
She didn't want to
talk about it or nothing.
Really? Yeah.
And do you think it's good for girls
to watch porn or not good? No.
Why do you not think
it's good for girls?
Most girls find it disgusting. It's
unattractive. They're like, "Eugh!"
Schools in the UK don't have
to cover issues like pornography
in sex and relationships classes,
so most don't do so.
Which makes this workshop
for 14 and 15-year-old girls
at a school in Cardiff
extremely unusual.
I'm going to say the word
"pornography" to you
and I want you to think
about what comes to mind.
You can discuss it
between yourselves,
but just write something
down on the paper.
So there's pens there and paper.
So what comes to mind when
you hear the word "pornography"?
All done? Would you like to start?
Um...sex was the first one
that came to mind. OK.
Sex. Sex? Sex. Sex?
Sexual video. Sexual videos.
OK, well, that...
'It's interesting that, like
the young men in South London,
'these girls think
that porn is for boys.'
So I'll read out a statement.
Go with your own gut reaction, OK?
"All young people are
interested in pornography."
So what do you think there?
I don't want to be sexist,
but it's sort of mostly boys.
Mostly boys? Not all young people,
but maybe mostly boys? Yeah. OK.
And how do young people
come across...
different types of
pornography, generally?
When you're 11-12, you have a page
on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram,
and, um, the little advertisements
will come up on the side
without you necessarily
wanting to look at porn
and they'll have an advert
and, if you click on the advert,
it'll take you straight
to a pornography website.
Is it quite explicit, what you see?
It's sort of half-naked men
and half-naked women.
How do you think
young women like yourself
feel when they're suddenly,
like, confronted with that image?
It sort of makes you feel
a bit embarrassed,
because I don't want
to look at stuff like that
and, um, like,
to other people, sort of...
it'd be as if they have to
click on it, because it's come up
on their Facebook and stuff, so
they want to check out what it is.
But to me, it makes me feel a bit
awkward, cos I don't really want to.
But if many young people are
having to deal with sexual images
earlier than they ever did
in the past,
what exactly might be
the consequences of that?
One of the most worrying results
from our survey
was when we asked the question
"Do you think pornography affects
what young people expect from sex?"
Nearly 75% said young men's
expectations of sex
are affected by porn,
while 53% said young women's
expectations of sex are affected
by porn. When we asked young people
how porn affects
what young men expect from sex,
one of the top three most
common responses was that boys
expect girls' bodies to look
like they do in pornography,
with no pubic hair
and with large breasts.
An 18-year-old boy said they want
skinny women with big boobs.
A 16-year-old boy said
that boys expect girls
to have a perfect, shaved
vagina like porn stars.
I mean, that's quite a lot
of pressure for young women.
I often see reports in the media
linking porn to a dramatic increase
in the number of women
asking for labiaplasty.
That's a cosmetic procedure
where the inner labia,
or vaginal lips, are reduced.
And what's worse,
gynaecologists like Dr Gail Busby
say more and more young girls
are now requesting this procedure.
She believes education is the key
to stopping media images
giving young people
such limited views on
what a woman's body is like.
So we've invited two groups
of teenage volunteers -
one boys and one girls -
to take part in a workshop.
Dr Busby starts by correcting
a common misunderstanding
about female genitals.
The vagina's actually the part
inside that you can't see.
The part on the outside that you can
see is actually called the vulva.
Dr Busby is going to use a sculpture
called 57 Women from
the Great Wall of Vagina series
to show the wide range
of normal vaginas or vulvas.
The artist, Jamie McCartney,
took plaster casts of real women.
Although they look very different,
they are all normal
and none needs surgery.
So these are all actual vulvas
from actual women.
They're horrible! They're horrible?
ALL: Yeah.
They're all different. Yeah.
OK. What makes them horrible?
Some are like saggy and...
GIGGLING
The one in the middle looks weird.
That one there.
That one? Yes. OK.
That one looks dodgy there.
This one looks dodgy.
This one? Yeah. It's a bit bigger!
It's a bit larger? OK. Yeah, yeah.
'Although dozens of girls under 18
ask Dr Busby for labiaplasty,
'because they think
they're abnormal,
'none of them have needed surgery.'
Is it really common? Yeah,
it's common and getting more common.
It's definitely noticeable and
getting younger and younger as well.
Really? So, what's the youngest age
you would have a girl worrying about
the size and shape of her vagina
and wanting to alter it?
Um, the youngest,
somewhere between 12 and 14.
Is this the first time that you have
seen images of adult women's vulvas?
Unless it's been all over Facebook.
SOME GIGGLING
You don't really take much notice
of what they look like.
Unless it's seen, like on social
networking sites, stuff like that.
Sorry, do you guys see a lot
of vaginas on social media?
It's not pictures, it's videos.
How do you see videos?
They just pop up! They all
scroll and people share them
and put them on, like,
Facebook and stuff.
So people your age share videos
of their own vaginas? Yeah. Yeah.
Like a page... There's a page
on Facebook. And they put them on.
So what do those vaginas look like?
They stick things up themselves,
so you can't really see it.
In my clinics, I see many, many
girls your age who come along
asking me to operate and
remove bits of their vulvas.
And do you think that would be
a good idea in a 15, 16-year-old?
No. No? Why do you not think
it would be a good idea?
Because it could change by the time
they grow up. That is exactly it.
If these are all our age, well,
it's just you haven't gone
through development yet,
so it's just going to mess up
your system more, to be honest.
I couldn't agree with you more. They
might change. They're still growing.
That growth and development
keeps going on until adulthood.
So if they had an operation when
they were 16, it may grow again.
Yeah. And they may need another
or another or another.
These women don't need surgery,
cos there's nothing wrong with them.
But porn doesn't just affect the way
young people think they should look.
It also influences how they behave.
In our survey,
after we asked if porn affects
what boys AND girls expect from sex,
we went on to ask those
who took part to tell us how.
The most common answer
that we got back was that
young men expect women
to behave like sex objects
and young women expect
to be TREATED like sex objects.
So we had this wealth of just
quotes from young people.
I picked out a few that
I thought were quite poignant.
A 19-year-old young woman said that,
"I think that because porn
is so easily obtainable
"and the fact that
more boys than girls watch it
"that men expect girls to be
like the women in porn,"
you know, which I can see
is completely true.
A 17-year-old boy said that,
"Guys will expect the chance
"for rougher sex or for a girl
to be very flexible, etc."
Um, a 16-year old girl said that,
"Boys think that all girls
"will behave like the girls in porn
"and that quite a lot of the
extreme stuff is totally normal."
For me, one of the most worrying
things about all this
is that sexual images have become
so normal, that many young people
don't see a problem with
creating and sharing their own.
The trouble starts
when explicit photographs
or videos taken on phones
are passed around or posted
on social media websites
like Facebook or Twitter.
Hi. Hi.
'These students are ambassadors
for a project in Manchester,
'which aims to warn school children
about the dangers of "sexting".'
People are becoming
more used to seeing, like,
indecent images of people and
therefore thinking it's OK for them
to take, you know, sort of
a half naked photo of themself.
And boys are getting
a high expectation of women
and what they think they should
be doing and should look like
and then asking for that off girls.
Yeah, and then, girls feel like they
need to live up to this standard.
That's when, you know, they may
start sending things round.
Obviously, since the emergence
of Snapchat,
things have become, like, a lot
worse, because obviously send them
and they're like, "It's only
a few seconds," but then,
you can screen shot it, you replay
it, and then it just reappears,
people will save it,
send it, Facebook, Twitter.
Like, before the end of the night,
if you send it at 7 o'clock,
8 o'clock... Yeah.
..it could be everywhere.
I mean, there's been cases
we know where, in two days,
it's travelled from another part
of the country into our area
and we've seen these images
and we've gone like,
"Oh, we used to know them,
we knew them." Oh, my word!
SOME LAUGHTER
Why do think no-one
talks about this at school?
Adults sometimes try
to ignore it a little bit,
think that it doesn't really happen,
especially teachers who work in
schools. I mean, they're not stupid.
They see that sort of thing
going on every day.
Mmm. Bullying between people,
but I just think,
because it's a sensitive issue,
and it's quite a new issue as well,
they just kind of try to ignore it.
'But being talked about and bullied
'is not necessarily
the worst thing that can happen
'if someone under 18 sends or posts
an explicit image of themselves.
'They could be arrested and charged.
'Because what they're doing is
'classed as generating and
distributing a child abuse image.
'And anyone else who re-sends
or re-posts that image
'could also be prosecuted.'
So, what kind of trouble
can you get in
for posting a picture
of someone under 18 naked?
You could be put on
the sex offenders' register.
And what is that? For people like
paedophiles and people like that.
It stays with you your whole life,
can hinder you getting a job,
you can never work with children
your entire life.
Studies have found
that kids across the UK
are unaware of the legal
implications of sexting.
But police in Devon,
along with other forces in England,
are going into schools
to try and change that
by showing a video
and discussing the risks.
'I wanted to show him how much
I liked him. I wanted to do it.'
Thinking about that film,
do you think that any laws
were broken in that film?
I think she broke
the law by sending them,
her boyfriend broke the law by
keeping them and sending them on,
and then everyone kind of
broke the law by looking at them
and keeping them on their phones
and sending them around
and setting up a page and stuff. OK.
We've certainly found that,
since we've started
completing the presentations
in a number of schools now,
it is clear that young people
have unfortunately fallen foul
of having sent an image to another.
So we're certainly
seeing an increase.
It does appear to be
almost perceived as
a normal part of a relationship,
so, unfortunately, it does appear
to be quite an up and coming issue
that we're facing now.
I'm not going to tell you not to
share information online
because that's your
choice to do that...
'The police will normally take
a softer line the first time
'a young person is caught sexting
'or posting sexual images of
themselves or another under-18.'
The way that we would deal with
that situation is to speak to the
young person and almost treat them
as a victim because, actually,
they've made a mistake that they
didn't appreciate the consequences.
'Sophia is a 20-year-old student
from Blackpool.
'When she was 14 a boy she was
seeing persuaded her to text him
'a naked photo of herself.'
We'd been texting and it got
a bit rude and I reciprocated it
and then he asked me for, basically,
a naked image of myself.
You were 14 years old.
What was your reaction?
Well, initially I was quite
reluctant to send anything.
I played it quite coy, I was like,
"Oh, no I don't want to do that,"
I was quite shy with it.
But then because he was being
so consistent with asking,
I eventually gave in.
So what did he do with the image?
He showed his friends
initially first and they said,
"Oh, will you send me that image?"
And he was like, "Yeah, sure,
why not?" And then what happened?
They sent it on to their friends
and so forth and so forth.
I sent it him on the weekend
and then I'd say by Wednesday,
all the local schools had it.
How did you feel? I mean, everybody
has got a picture of you naked,
you're 14 years old. I felt
completely stripped of my value,
I felt like I was completely
accessible. It's like, they were...
It's like, I felt almost as though
people were having intimate
relationships with me
that I wasn't even engaged with
because they'd seen me
in that light.
Were people mean at all?
Were they cruel?
Girls were mean, girls were awful.
What happened?
In the street, they'd be like,
"Oh, that's that so-and-so,
that Sophia girl.
"She sent that naked picture."
And they called me a slag, they
called me a slut, a camera whore.
How did it play out?
I'd say for a good year and a half,
people still associated me with the
girl that did that at that school.
A year and a half?
Yeah, yeah, a year and a half later.
Oh, my God! That's insane.
Yeah, no, they did.
Why do you think
young girls still do it?
To be desired is to feel empowered,
and I think that's what
I felt when I was younger.
I thought, "This person wants me,
"therefore I'm sending out
this image,
"therefore I'm empowered as a
female because I am desired,"
when in fact it's
weakening your image.
As soon as something becomes
accessible it loses value.
If everyone's got it,
nobody wants it any more
and you feel somewhat worthless.
'Because any sexual image of
someone under 18
'counts as a child abuse image,
'once it's out there
on the internet,
'it can be taken and used in a way
'that whoever posted it
would never even think of.
'This is the Headquarters of the
Internet Watch Foundation or IWF.
'It's their job to identify
'and remove child sexual abuse
images from the internet.
'Last year, their hotline received
50,000 calls and e-mails
'tipping them off about
such images on the net.
'And analysts here are finding that
more and more of those images
'are photographs and videos
'originally posted by young people
on social networking sites.'
We've certainly seen a big rise in
the last few years in the amount of
self-generated content
featuring young people.
This would be an example of
an adult website
which accepts user-generated
content.
The reason everything is so
pixellated right now is because
we would be committing an offence
by actually looking at these images
and downloading them. That's right.
These are images that have been
taken from a Facebook profile,
and you can see, it says here,
"This is dedicated to
self-shot amateur teens."
"All teens, all curvy,
with big tits only."
Again another adult website
with collections,
specifically of young teens.
Several descriptions of the type of
content you can expect to see there.
And down there we have
"Jail bait collection."
So anyone can go on to
Facebook or Twitter,
and let's say someone doesn't
have a protected account,
they can just take that picture
off... That's the problem, yes.
..then they can put it anywhere.
Where is the worst place that
these photos can end up?
We have seen, over the last couple
of years, this content is starting
to migrate onto the traditional
commercial child sexual abuse sites.
So they can be sold?
And this content is now
being sold commercially.
This is a sanitised screenshot of
an extremely prolific commercial
child sex distribution website.
It claims to have 723 webcam
captures available for purchase.
The youngest victim is between
the age of three and six.
The three to six-year-old would not
have generated that themselves.
It was not generated by them
but there are other individuals
in the room who are assessed
as being slightly older.
Other children being involved,
performing sex acts.
They're all children.
I didn't expect to learn quite
so much today, I knew what they did
was so incredibly important,
I knew it was very serious,
but I don't think I realised
how accessible such
explicit material is.
'Also I found it quite staggering
to realise the consequence of
'something as simple as a sext
and realise how fast the process is,
'that it can literally just
take over your life.'
I am so glad that every
boyfriend I've had before now
was before picture messaging.
I can't even tell you.
It's terrifying.
'If there are clear
consequences for young people
'when it comes to sexting
and posting sexual images,
'the effects of childhood exposure
to porn are harder to gauge.
'In February, news broke
that a 12-year-old boy
'raped his seven-year-old sister
'after watching hardcore
pornography on the internet.
'Blackburn Youth Court heard that
he'd watched it with friends
'and gained
"a desire to try it out."
'With other sexual crimes
frequently linked to porn,
'it's easy to see why parents
and politicians are so concerned.
'Sally is in her early 20s.
'She says she was raped by someone
she thought was a friend.
'She was drunk at the time
'and was slipping in and out of
consciousness.
'She's convinced pornography
played a part in the attack.'
I actually came across
a blog that they had
and it was mostly made up of
pornographic images.
Erm, and that made it quite
clear to me how his mind worked
and the opinion that he had
of women.
That they were... They just
existed to be used in porn.
It just made me realise that for
certain people that do these things
it's just so ingrained in
their mind that that's OK.
You mean rape? Yeah. Uh-huh.
'Sally didn't report
the rape to the police
'because she didn't think
she'd be believed.
'But she did seek support
from Rape Crisis.'
So what nature of pornography
was on his blog?
Erm, it was mostly soft porn.
But there were other images
that were quite graphic.
And a lot of them sort of
revolved around women being used
and being abused, and women having
no control over what was going on.
So do you think that that had an
influence on what he did to you?
Yeah, because I feel
as though seeing that,
it made it clear to me that
that was what he was interested in
and that he thought that
that was completely normal,
and for him to just think that
I was an object that he could use
seemed so similar to
the images that I saw.
'Everything I've seen and heard
makes me convinced
'that children need to
learn about porn,
'so they can understand the risks
and put it into context.
'But most schools
don't want to teach it,
'partly because it's
so controversial,
'but also because they can have
so much trouble
'teaching even the most
basic sex education.
'Regulator Ofsted says
the sex education
'in a third of English schools
isn't up to scratch,
'while in Scotland there's
no obligation to teach it all.
'But there are schools like the
Limes College in South London
'where they believe the dangers of
porn can no longer be ignored.'
"Pornography shows men and women
"as equal partners in a
sexual relationship."
They're not equal partners at all.
If you see a porn video,
the woman is like the dogsbody.
The man can do whatever
he wants to that woman.
No respect towards a woman at all.
You guys agree?
Yeah. Yeah?
'Sex education consultant Lynnette
Smith has been going into schools
'in North Lincolnshire for 20 years,
'and she is concerned about what
she's hearing from teenage boys.'
We're asked quite often,
and this is not just at one school
but several schools...
"If I'm being intimate, or if
I'm trying it on with a girl
"and she doesn't like it,
"if I keep going and going, she will
finally like it, won't she?"
When we first started
getting these questions,
we started exploring this,
and it links back to what
they're seeing on pornography.
'When porn is something
so many kids are being exposed to,
'I can see why people like Lynette
'say schools need to adapt what
they teach to keep up with that.
'But just how young should
the process start?
'I'm about to get a shock.'
I'm slightly surprised cos when
we said we were going to a school,
I didn't know it would be a primary.
I mean, these are kids
who are sort of 10 and under,
and we're having a
sex education lesson today.
It's going to be...I mean,
the kids are going to be
learning about pornography,
which is slightly terrifying
that there is even a need to educate
such young children about porn.
This should be interesting.
'And then I discover that it's
the Year Ones, five-year-olds,
'who will be getting this lesson.
'So, not surprisingly,
'that means worried parents
need to be reassured.'
I always like to have
a meeting with parents
so you know exactly what I'm
talking about to your children.
'I never work in a primary school'
without at least first having
a session with the parents
because if I was the parent
I would want to know
who was teaching my child about
pornography at five and why.
When we were all young,
we couldn't access the things
that children can access now.
Even though there may be fear,
there may be suppressed anger
and shock at the beginning,
parents come round
when they suddenly realise,
"Yeah, this is necessary.
This is needed."
From ages three to six
they're interested in the
differences between boys and girls.
It's the whole title,
"Porn and Pornography"
and those words that are
terrifying for parents.
Now I've been in and learned
what it's going to be
and that it's in the right context,
I'm at ease with it.
My husband was terrified
thinking his little girl's
going to be taught about
pornography, but it's not.
'After 45 minutes
reassuring the parents,
'it's time to bring in
the five-year-olds.'
I find this so interesting cos
I don't know how you explain
where babies come from
to a five-year-old.
It's a lot easier than you think.
Oh, really? Cos I'm 27
and I don't think I've still
spoken about it with my parents.
Would you like to just sit down here,
please? Let's have a little line.
I've got lots of you.
That's brilliant, isn't it?
Now what we're going to do today
is we're going to
talk about keeping safe.
Does anybody know the
correct scientific word
for what a boy's got?
The penis.
Excellent, that's said like a proper
scientist or a doctor or a nurse.
Yes. I know the other one.
You know what a girl's got, do you,
the correct scientific word,
and what's that? Vagina.
Excellent.
'So far so good, but I'm still
not sure how Lynnette is going to
'broach the subject of porn
with five-year-olds.'
Now, we've got a boy taking
a picture of another boy.
Is that OK? Yeah. Yes!
But I want you to look
closely at this picture.
Is that OK? No!
KIDS GIGGLE
Shh.
That's not OK, is it?
No! No! No.
Nobody should ever take
photographs of you like that
or the private parts of your body.
Let's have a look at this
next picture.
If you look at that,
somebody's got a phone or a tablet,
and can you see on that phone
or tablet? It's women!
It's a woman with no clothes on,
isn't it? Naked! Yeah.
Right, if any older children
try to show you photos or pictures
on their phones like that,
you need to tell an adult
or a grown-up.
I really think we owe it to children
and young people to keep them safe,
and, as we all know,
knowledge is power.
But if we can't get over the basics
of straightforward sex education,
how on earth can we tackle these
stronger issues like pornography?
Nobody should touch us there
between our legs,
and nobody should touch our bottoms.
KIDS GIGGLE
We need to take this
far more seriously.
It's not an optional extra.
We've got to wake up and realise
that it's becoming a big, big issue.
Now what I want us to do
very quietly
is to go back to our class room.
KIDS LAUGH AND CHATTER
When I first walked in, you know,
it being a primary school
and then finding out
it was five-year-olds
broaching the topic of pornography,
I was a little bit reluctant
because I thought...
It felt slightly
unnecessarily young.
And yet within about
five minutes of the lesson
you realise how armed they are
with knowledge.
'What I found really interesting
'was that in the sessions with
the youngest children,
'the word "pornography"
wasn't even used.
'So I can see that if these ideas
are introduced carefully early on,
'it could make a big difference
'when kids come across
real porn as they get older.
'And certainly many of the
teenagers I've met
'wish they'd been better prepared
for what they've seen.'
I heard a group of, erm,
Year 8 boys talking about...
They'd been watching porn
and they're only, like, 12, 13,
and they were saying stuff like,
"Oh, is this normal, is that
normal?" and stuff like that,
so I don't think they
really understand that
not everything that you see on porn
is normal and what's expected.
I think it would be a good idea
to teach kids about porn
and what it's all about
and the things that they watch,
they shouldn't be
expecting that in real life.
I have seen some pretty
scary stuff on the internet.
If parents did see that they'd be
like, "Whoa, why is that on there?"
Or, "That shouldn't be on there,
that's disgraceful."
And to us it's just normal cos
we've seen it that many times.
So I don't think
parents have any idea
that that type of stuff
is out there.
I don't think there's ever going to
be a way of protecting all children
from seeing online pornography.
The internet's too big, it's too
vast and it's way too accessible.
But there is a huge difference
between the kids who are scared
and affected by what they see
and those who aren't necessarily,
the ones who put it into context
and they really understand
what it is that they're seeing.
We have to understand that this is
something that is in the homes
and in the lives and in the
minds of our children,
and we have to protect them
by discussing it
and educating them about
what it is that they're seeing.