What teachers and parents wish they could tell kids about porn

Layla, 27, who wants to use only her first name for privacy reasons, wishes she could tell her students more about pornography. Layla teaches PSHE (Personal, Social and Health Education) and says porn is one of the many serious issues her school doesn’t talk about, but she believes students are “obsessed with it” and “urgently need to learn safety practices.” .

“I hear kids as young as 11 talking about porn in my classes,” she tells Mashable. “13/14 year olds show each other porn at school. Kids watch leaked celebrity sex tapes on their lunch break and laugh at them,” explains Layla.

She brought her principal back to porn classes and suggested a porn safety assembly, but there was a “huge fear” about it. “A lot of teachers don’t want to believe that young kids watch porn, and they also think that if they don’t watch porn and we talk to them about it, they find it because of us,” Layla explains.

Why kids need to learn about porn

Like it or not, kids need to learn about porn. It is estimated that half of children by the age of 13 have seen pornography. That’s worrying for experts like Lucy Emmerson of the Sex Education Forum. Mainstream pornography often contains violent and misogynist depictions of sex, which could affect a young person who is unaware that porn is for entertainment only.

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It is therefore “urgent to ensure that there is an alternative script for young people today” so that they know what they can expect and aspire to from sex.

That should come from teachers as part of sex education. It has been like this since 2021 Compulsory for all secondary schools in England educate about the harms of pornography. But in one survey from the same year, 58 percent of young people said they did not learn anything or not enough about pornography.

Emmerson adds that while young people need to learn about porn in school, they need a solid foundation of sex and relationship education first, as this builds their body knowledge, healthy relationships, online safety and skills related to things developed as peer pressure and communication. This makes it easier to teach about pornography, but many schools in the UK lack the basics.

VICE World News reporter Sophia Smith Galer found that government-provided teacher training modules on topics such as consent and internet safety (including the use of pornography) have only been downloaded a few thousand times.

A 2019 survey found that 28 percent of teachers felt their school was unwilling to offer sex education and 47 percent lacked confidence in their own abilities to teach it.

Some teachers are also uncomfortable talking to children about porn (or sex in general). A Survey 2019 found that 28 percent of teachers felt their school was unwilling to offer sex education and 47 percent lacked confidence in their own abilities to teach it.

Three out of ten sex education courses are also made possible by teachers who have no sex education appropriate training. While some might argue that this is better than nothing, poor sex education in schools by inappropriate facilitators does can lead to negative sexual experiences in adulthood, including learning about sex through trial and error, which can lead to unwanted sexual experiences, increasing shame about sex, and even sexual dysfunction.

RResearch also points out that consumption of pornography without education about what pornography is, what it should be used for, and the potential harms it can cause can lead to increased misogyny.

So why do teachers refuse to talk about porn?

Emmerson points out that many adults have received little or inadequate sex education themselves, and as a result there is “a societal lack of experience of pleasant and appropriate intergenerational conversations about porn and sex in general.”

This generation gap is overstated when it comes to porn, as the nature of porn has changed both in content and speed in recent years. “There’s the pervasiveness of aggression and violence and the context of accessing porn on smartphones,” she says.

Laura Clarke is a freelance sex educator who teaches at various schools and also provides sex education counseling to teachers. She includes informational pornography in sex education and thinks it’s important because “kids go on the internet specifically to learn about sex when nobody else is teaching them about it, and they find porn.”

“Kids go online specifically to learn about sex when nobody else is teaching them about it, and they find porn.”

Because of this, her teaching focuses mostly on the fact that porn is a fantasy and not a reality. “A quote I like to use when teaching young people about porn is, ‘You wouldn’t learn to drive from him.’ Fast and Furious “So don’t learn about sex from porn” – I want to make it clear that porn is just entertainment.”

“I tell teenagers that in porn, everything is amplified, that people’s bodies are usually made to beauty standards — especially when it comes to penis size.” [how vaginas are presented] and that it’s okay to look different,” explains Clarke.

“You don’t learn to drive from ‘Fast and Furious,’ so you don’t learn to have sex from porn.”

“A big part of my porn lessons is teaching people that if they see a sex act in a porn movie, like gagging, that’s not what their real-life sex partners want.”

She adds that in most mainstream porn, consent exchanges and communication don’t happen on screen, even if they do happen behind the scenes. So she makes sure kids know this is not to be skipped in the real world.

Many of the young people Clarke teaches about porn will tell her it’s the first time they’ve ever had open conversations about porn. Sometimes they had no sex education at all.

This isn’t surprising to Clarke, who wishes she could incorporate more information about porn into her sex education, but there are some serious obstacles that are hampering that progress in the classroom.

What teachers (and parents) wish they could tell kids about porn

Like Layla, Clarke wishes she could do more to help and says there are many obstacles that prevent sex educators from offering the classes they want.

In addition to explaining the dangers, Clarke wishes she could speak openly with young people about the safe use of porn. “You’re not going to stop young people from looking at porn, so I wish I could show them ways to be healthier about this content and remove the shame, but that’s considered taboo.”

She explains that many schools would no longer welcome an outside moderator if they started talking about porn use being in any way healthy, even if she directed people to ethical porn where sex depictions seem more real and diverse.

She also notes that the current moral panic surrounding sex education is already making parents skeptical about the courses. She fears being accused of encouraging porn viewing if she gave teens tips on safe porn.

“I think teachers are afraid of upsetting parents and want to placate them, but they also want to give young people the education they deserve,” she says.

Emmerson explains that many parents get their heads in the sand when it comes to porn. Recent research found that was the case with the parents They grossly underestimated how much porn their children watched.

However, this can mean that teachers are afraid to teach porn at length because the parents will avoid the conversation altogether. Ultimately, it is young people who suffer the consequences of this avoidance.

It’s easy to see why teachers and parents find it difficult to talk to children about pornography. It feels inherently “wrong” to talk to a child about pornography, and it is understandably uncomfortable for parents to be confronted with the thought that their children, whom they are trying to protect, are viewing at a young age. And if teachers don’t get the right training, lack confidence, or fear backlash, just saying the word “porn” in front of a class can feel like a huge burden.

But just because something is difficult doesn’t mean it should be left behind. Parents, teachers, and other guardians need to acknowledge that children watch porn and start talking to them about it.

Erica Lustan award-winning ethical porn director, also provides free resources for parents to talk to their kids about porn in collaboration with sexologists and educators The Porn Talk.

Lust tells Mashable, “Our children deserve to be heard in their natural curiosity about sex and to be supported in the knowledge that they have the power, as individuals, to choose how they want to live their sex lives, no matter what.” tell them the media.” .”

She adds that they shouldn’t be put off by porn or shamed for using it, but should be given tools to differentiate between the types of porn they come across online.

“Families and educators can create a space where children and young people can freely express their thoughts, curiosity and feelings about porn, knowing they will be listened to and supported without prejudice,” adds Lust.

She continues, “Encourage them to question and criticize what they see in porn so they can make wiser decisions about sex and relationships in their real life, based on knowledge and not fear or shame.”

Emmerson of the Sex Education Forum advises parents and teachers to take the time to ask themselves what specifically worries you about the idea of ​​children consuming porn. Is it the nudity, the objectification of women, the prioritization of male pleasure, the violence, the normalization of certain sexual acts, the porn industry? Whatever the answer, talking openly with children can eliminate those fears.

A survey from this year showed that more people want an open discussion about real sexual scenarios from their school education. Whether adults like it or not, porn use among young people is a real scenario.

So, as Emmerson puts it, “It’s high time to move on from the fringes and help both teachers and parents have more honest and well-planned conversations about porn, in ways that are changing.” meaningfully deals with the reality of young people.”