Violence against Women and Girls

Debate between Karen Bradley and Rebecca Paul

Thursday 9th January 2025 Commons Chamber

[Rebecca Paul (Reigate) (Con)]

Thank you, Madam Deputy Speaker, for allowing me the opportunity to speak in this incredibly important debate. I very much welcome the Government’s ambition to halve violence against women and girls over the next decade, and I hope everyone in this place will work together to ensure success, because if we do not, it is our daughters, mothers, sisters, neighbours and friends who will all pay the price.

There are many factors driving sex-based violence, and many powerful contributions have been made today laying them out. I intend to speak specifically about the impact of online pornography on attitudes and violence towards women and girls, especially when viewed by young people during their formative years. With 50%—yes, 50%—of all internet-using adult males in the UK visiting Pornhub in September 2020, this is not a fringe concern or something that can be ignored.

To be very clear, we are not talking about the type of content once seen in ’80s jazz mags, but about harmful, degrading and violent imagery that dehumanises women. This type of extreme online pornographic content has proliferated over the last decade and includes footage featuring physical aggression and violence, predominantly directed at women. This material has become mainstream, though it bears little resemblance to real sex or what goes on in genuinely loving relationships. Worryingly, in these videos, women are typically shown responding neutrally when on the receiving end of this aggression, or even with pleasure. Make no mistake, this content reinforces the idea that women desire and derive pleasure from violence, and ultimately perpetuates rape culture. When we then layer on the fact that this content can be pulled out of anyone’s pocket and watched repeatedly throughout the day on smartphones, even by children, it becomes clear why this is such a problem for our society. Boys will think that this type of activity is normal in the bedroom, while girls will think it is expected.

A survey done by the Children’s Commissioner in November 2022 found that one in 10 children had seen pornography by the age of nine, with half having seen it before they turned 13. It is horrifying to think of our children watching these acts of sexual violence that they cannot properly comprehend or understand. Its consequences can be clearly seen, with 47% of young people between the ages of 16 and 21 stating that girls “expect” sex to involve aggression, and a further 42% stating that most girls “enjoy” it. A study that analysed heterosexual scenes published on two leading free pornographic websites found that between 35% and 45% of content contained at least one act of physical aggression, the most common of which were gagging, choking, spanking, slapping and hair-pulling. Women were the target of the aggression in 97% of those scenes. It can be no surprise to anyone that if young men are watching this content day in and day out, it will impact their perceptions and relationships with women negatively.

Hundreds of studies have been undertaken over the past 30 years, which confirm the obvious: porn culture is pervasive and influential. It has normalised and sexualised choking and strangling of women during sex, spitting on them, and other unsafe and degrading acts. As Dr Jackson Katz, an educator and author, has said,

“It requires wilful naivety to pretend that this has no negative effects on generations of young people’s sexuality or has no connection to the ongoing pandemic of men’s violence against women”.

Moreover, disturbingly, frequent viewing of online pornography can desensitise some men to sexual content, driving a need for ever more hardcore content to satisfy them. This causes some boys and men who would not otherwise do so to escalate to viewing illegal content such as child abuse imagery or rape videos.

So what do we do to address this situation? It is not easy—it is a bit like trying to get the genie back in the bottle—but we must address it. I suspect that in the years to come, we will look back at the content that was so accessible to our children and so damaging and be utterly incredulous. Today, I have two asks for the Minister. First, we must put in place basic safeguards requiring online platforms to verify that every individual featured in pornographic content is an adult and gave permission for their content to be published. Verification information must be provided by each individual featured in the content, not by any other person, and most importantly, failure to comply with this requirement must result in robust sanctions by Ofcom, including preventing the website in question from operating in the UK if need be. Enforcement must be swift and robust to protect victims and create the necessary deterrent effect.

Secondly, we must bring the regulation of online pornography in line with that for offline pornography. The main statutory regulator of offline pornography is the British Board of Film Classification. It is responsible for classifying pornographic content before it can be published and ensuring it does not contain illegal content such as child sexual abuse, incest, trafficking, torture, rape or strangulation. Any such offline illegal content cannot be sold or supplied in the UK, yet the law has never been extended to cover regulation of online pornographic content. This is anachronistic.

[Dame Karen Bradley]

My hon. Friend is making a powerful point: what is illegal offline must be treated the same way online. I fully support everything she is saying.

[Rebecca Paul]

I thank my right hon. Friend for that intervention, and I completely concur. The fact that our laws have not been extended in this way demonstrates that they have not kept up with our ever-changing world. I therefore call on the Government to ensure that online pornographic content is held to the same standards as offline pornographic content.

Lastly, I thank the all-party parliamentary group on commercial sexual exploitation for its groundbreaking inquiry into pornography during the last parliamentary term. That APPG has shone a light on this important issue, and has not shied away from harsh truths. We cannot end the epidemic of male violence against women and girls in this country without recognising and confronting the role that harmful online pornography is playing. Enough is enough. If everyone in this House cares about women and girls—and our boys too, because this is bad for them as well—it is time to take action and ensure that online content is properly regulated.