Latest news with #Bertin
Daily Mail
03-05-2025
- Politics
- Daily Mail
MPs calling for ban on choking in pornography as they warn the aggressive act is being ‘glamourised'
Choking in pornography could be banned with MPs expressing concerns the act is being 'glamourised'. An amendment to the Crime and Policing Bill seeks to include 'non-fatal strangulation' in its definition of extreme pornography. The move would ban choking in porn and comes amid worries such content has fuelled rising male misogyny. It follows suggestions from Baroness Bertin's Independent Pornography Review. Shadow victims minister Alicia Kearns said: 'To tackle violence against women and girls, we must tackle porn that promotes violent and misogynistic behaviour towards us. Porn has helped to glamourise strangulation, which has led to significant numbers of young people being non-consensually choked during sex and girls told this is a normal expectation.' Last month the Times reported that sex education materials taught to teenagers in schools in Wales included references to asking for consent before choking a partner. The content, funded by Bridgend county borough council, was described by London's victims' commissioner Claire Waxman as 'deeply concerning'. The amendment to ban chocking in pornography, which is due to be discussed by MPs in the committee stage of the Bill, follows recommendations from Baroness Bertin's Independent Pornography Review. Tory MP Harriet Cross said: 'Strangulation should never be normalised. Too often, pornography blurs the lines between what is and can be consented to, and when this slides into dangerous or even abusive acts. 'The impact on those viewing extreme pornography, especially in the young, and being exposed to behaviours such as strangulation and the distorted perception this can give to what is normal in terms of sexual activity or relationships must be addressed. This amendment seeks to classify non-fatal strangulation in these terms.'
Telegraph
13-03-2025
- Telegraph
Strangulation during sex is not kinky - it's dangerous and misogynistic
For feminist campaigners against domestic and sexual violence, it is no surprise that a recent Government review has found that online pornography that features choking is affecting the sexual practices of young people. The report by Baroness Bertin, entitled 'Creating a Safer World – the Challenge of Regulating Online Pornography', states that: 'Non-fatal strangulation (NFS) or 'choking' sex is perhaps the starkest example of where online violent pornography has changed 'offline' behaviour.' When I first started looking at pornography, as a young feminist determined to understand what I was campaigning against, it ranged from 'soft' Page 3 images to the infamous cover image of Hustler Magazine where a woman is being put head first through a meat grinder. Those images seem quaint today. Gone are the days of the ripped plumber coming to fix the washing machine who is greeted by the housewife in a negligée. The world of contemporary online pornography is more violent and extreme. And it is not just passively consumed; it also drives sexual fantasies and practices. Its ready accessibility to young boys and girls, moreover, means that it also passes for sex education. This month the Institute for Addressing Strangulation (IFAS) received Home Office funding to conduct a survey of 2,344 UK-based adults. It found that half of those who had experienced strangulation said they had consented. 17 per cent said they had not. A whopping 38 per cent of the women respondents aged 18-39 had been choked during sex. Strangulation as a sex kink has even entered popular culture. Just look at the lyrics of Jack Harlow's 2023 number one hit 'Lovin On Me': 'I'm vanilla, baby/ I'll choke you, but I ain't no killa, baby'. Perpetrators who choke their partners are seven times more likely to kill them. Strangulation is more than a precursor to homicide – it is also a predictor. But whether he stops in time or not, permanent damage has often been done. Some women have died weeks later due to internal injuries. Others suffer from traumatic brain injury, significant memory loss, miscarriage, seizures and changes in mood or personality that lead to agitation and hypervigilance. There have long been calls to decriminalise serious acts of violence on the basis of 'consent'. In 1990, 16 gay men were convicted following the 'Operation Spanner' police investigation. Police uncovered a group of sado-masochistic gay men who were inflicting actual bodily harm on each other. These men (and their supporters) campaigned against this criminalisation on the grounds that it was all consensual. Feminists, including myself, had argued that this argument was very dangerous because one defence commonly used by domestic abusers is that their victims had consented to 'rough sex'. Feminist campaign group We Can't Consent To This found that between 1996 and 2016 there was a tenfold increase in 'rough sex' claims used by men to defend themselves after killing a female partner in bed. Between November 2019 and March 2020, UK courts heard of 15 female victims where 'rough sex' claims were made. The latest Femicide Census shows that 550 (27 per cent) of the 2,000 women killed in the UK since 2014 were victims of strangulation. The invocation of 'consent' is nonsense. Strangulation kills. The pornography that pedals the message that women enjoy being choked during sex is insidious. It is a dangerous and misogynistic practice. This issue is not about 'freedom' or 'choice'. It is about the safety of women.
The Independent
27-02-2025
- Politics
- The Independent
Pornography showing women being choked should be banned, Government told
The Government will clamp down on pornography which shows women being choked after a review found the content can have 'devastating' real-world consequences. Videos showing the practice are rife on pornography sites and have helped established it as a sexual norm, a review of the industry led by Conservative peer Baroness Gabby Bertin said. Non-fatal strangulation is already an offence in its own right, but it is not illegal to show it online. Downing Street suggested it would 'act swiftly' to address gaps in the law around choking pornography, but stopped short of saying it would be banned. Writing in the report, which was commissioned under Rishi Sunak's government, Baroness Bertin said there had been a 'total absence of government scrutiny' of the pornography industry. The Tory peer referred to worrying anecdotal evidence from teachers about students asking how to choke girls during sex. People acting out choking in their sex lives 'may face devastating consequences', she said in the review. ' Evidence shows that even a small amount of pressure to the neck can harm the brain, and there is no safe way to strangle a person,' she added. 'I do not think Government should take the risk of allowing this content to be legal, given what we know about how much pornography exposure can influence sexual behaviour,' she said. Responding to the concerns in a written statement, technology minister Feryal Clark said the Government would take 'urgent action to ensure pornography platforms, law enforcement and prosecutors are taking all necessary steps to tackle this increasingly prevalent harm'. Baroness Bertin's review also recommended that videos considered too harmful for certification in the offline world should not be available online, ending the 'disparity' between the two. Welcoming the report's recommendations, Andrea Simon, director of the End Violence Against Women Coalition, said: 'For too long, the porn industry has been free to profit from sexual violence against women and children, shaping collective behaviours and expectations about sex in a deeply harmful way. 'We know these companies are profiting enormously from sexual violence, and until they are forced to clean up their act, they won't. 'We know that tech company algorithms are serving harmful content to boys and young men when they aren't necessarily seeking it, because extreme content drives engagement and therefore revenue. '(The Government) cannot continue to ignore the immense harms arising from the current state of the porn industry which puts business over women and girls' safety.' A Government spokesperson said: 'To deliver our mission to halve violence against women and girls, we must interrogate the link between violent pornography online and dangerous behaviours offline which this important review highlights. 'We have already announced we will ban the creation of intimate deepfakes without consent and, from next month, under the Online Safety Act, platforms will have to proactively tackle illegal content including extreme pornography and sexual abuse material. 'But further action is needed to address the review's shocking finding that graphic strangulation is increasingly appearing in pornography, despite being illegal, and is becoming normalised in real life. 'We will urgently ensure that platforms, law enforcement and prosecutors take all necessary steps to tackle this disturbing harm.'
The Independent
27-02-2025
- Politics
- The Independent
Ban violent pornography showing strangulation, ministers urged
Ministers have been urged to ban degrading, violent and misogynistic pornography including making it illegal to publish videos of women being choked during sex. A major review of the industry has proposed giving regulator Ofcom the power to police porn sites plagued with 'harmful' material. The review, commissioned by Rishi Sunak and carried out by Tory peer Gabby Bertin, said porn depicting non-fatal strangulation is 'rife on mainstream platforms'. It said the prevalence of choking videos online had normalised the behaviour in real life and that videos considered too harmful should be banned online, as they are in the offline world. She also called for a ban on the possession or sharing of other degrading, violent or misogynistic pornography, as well as the prohibition of 'nudification' apps. Speaking to the BBC, Baroness Bertin said online pornography is fuelling some of the 'gravest issues in our society, from domestic violence to toxic masculinity to the mental health crisis among young people". She added: 'I'm not saying that people shouldn't watch porn. I'm not saying porn shouldn't exist. I'm not a prude. 'It strikes me as incredible that to buy a DVD, which sounds so sort of retro, the BBFC [British Board of Film Classification] has to put a stamp on it, has to check that certain standards have been met. That there's no sense you are encouraging child sexual abuse. No harmful, degrading, humiliating practices which is not through consensual role play. "You just have to go on the homepages of some of these mainstream sites and you will see of all that degrading content – particularly violent towards women – and it's all there for everyone to see." Baroness Bertin's report contained 32 recommendations for the government to tackle the 'high-harm sector' of online pornography, including the ban on videos depicting strangulation. It said: 'The evidence is overwhelming that allowing people to view legal but harmful pornography like choking sex, violent and degrading acts, and even content that could encourage child sexual abuse, is having a damaging impact on children and society. 'The law needs to be tightened with more proactive regulation of online platforms.' Tech secretary Peter Kyle, who is responsible for online safety, said he would not hesitate to "adapt the law" to prevent people from accessing degrading pornography online. Speaking to BBC Radio 4's Today programme, he added: 'I know that this content is harmful to many of the people who currently have free access to it. "We have the powers to prevent people getting access to it, even if the material is provided from elsewhere. "We just need to find ways of making sure that that is done efficiently and effectively. "And if I have to adapt the law in response to any gaps that emerge in these powers, then, of course, I'll act as swiftly as I can." Non-fatal strangulation without consent is already an offence, but depicting it online is not illegal. Baroness Bertin said her recommendations would help Labour with its key mission of halving violence against women and girls. In one case cited in the report, a 14-year-old boy asked a teacher how to choke girls during sex, with Baroness Bertin warning online porn has created 'such a confusing world for our sons'. 'They are, quite rightly, encouraged and taught to reject sexist attitudes, while a subterranean online world of pornography is simultaneously showing them that anything goes,' her report said.
Yahoo
27-02-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
Ban online porn that would be illegal on high street, urges Tory peer
Harmful online porn that would be illegal on the high street should be banned, a government review of the industry has said. The review, commissioned by Rishi Sunak and published on Thursday, found that violent, harmful and misogynistic porn was common on mainstream platforms. However, the material would be judged as illegal and refused classification by the British Board of Film Classification (BBFC) if it was sold in shops on the high street, according to the review by Baroness Bertin, a Tory peer. She said: 'This means that if this content was distributed in physical form (for example, in DVDs), the person supplying the material would face criminal charges, including a prison sentence of up to two years under the Video Recordings Act 1984. 'This disparity between the online and 'offline' world cannot continue. Pornographic content that would be refused classification in the 'offline' world should not be available to view online.' She suggested that such a ban could be introduced through a safe porn code in the Online Safety Act or by creating a new publication offence. Her report said: 'The aim of this would be to prohibit certain pornographic content online – including degrading, violent and misogynistic content, as well as that which could encourage an interest in child sex abuse – just as it is prohibited in the 'offline' world.' Making it illegal would also mean mainstream online platforms – the worst of which for porn is Elon Musk's X – would be required by law to remove it and prevent it appearing online. If they persistently failed to take it down, Ofcom, the online regulator, would have powers to impose fines of up to 10 per cent of their global turnover – and to jail executives for up to two years if they failed to abide by the watchdog's demands. Lady Bertin also recommended that non-fatal strangulation pornography – commonly known as 'choking' – should be illegal to possess, distribute and publish. She said it was the starkest example of where online violent pornography had changed 'offline' behaviour. ''Choking' sex is now being normalised, with a survey showing 38 per cent of women aged 18-39 have been choked during sex,' she added. She noted that the Domestic Abuse Act of 2021 had made non-fatal strangulation a crime in itself, so that the definition of extreme illegal pornography needed to clearly state that it fell within its scope. Lady Bertin also recommended that incest pornography should be made illegal and that content that might encourage an interest in child sex abuse should be prohibited. 'Some online pornographic content depicts disturbing 'role-play' including incest and adults role playing as children – evidence shows that this type of pornography is used by perpetrators to permit child sex abuse. This is totally unacceptable,' she said. Writing for The Telegraph, Natasha Kaplinsky, the president of the BBFC, said: 'This is not about restricting adults' access to legal content: where pornographic content is neither illegal nor harmful, adults have a right to choose what to watch. 'This is about content that eroticises rape and the violent abuse of women or which promotes a sexual interest in children. 'Parity between how pornographic content is regulated online and offline is vitally important. If society is serious about addressing the fundamental challenge of harmful content, we must ensure that what is unacceptable offline is also unacceptable online.' The Department for Science Innovation and Technology has said it will respond to the recommendations once they have been laid before Parliament. Measures to increase regulation of pornography, including to prevent access by children, are already part of the Online Safety Act, which became law in October 2023. Services that publish their own pornographic content – including with generative artificial intelligence tools – are already required to have age checks. From July, all websites on which pornographic material can be found must also introduce 'robust' age-checking techniques such as demanding photo ID or running credit card checks for UK users. Ofcom estimates that approximately a third of adult internet users in the UK – 14 million people – watch online pornography, of which about three-quarters are men. By Natasha Kaplinsky Choking. Incest. Violent abuse. This is just some of the harmful pornographic content that is freely available online. Such material would never be approved for distribution on physical media formats like DVD and Blu-ray – what we call 'offline'. The BBFC has been classifying offline pornographic content for 40 years and our position has always been the same: pornography is for adults only. And, we are legally required to refuse classification of any content which is illegal or potentially harmful. Adult content we consider harmful includes any pornography which depicts non-consensual or sexually abusive activity or which encourages an interest in abusive relationships – such as incestuous or underage relationships. We also refuse to classify the depiction of any acts likely to cause serious physical harm, such as 'choking'. Unclassified pornography is illegal to distribute offline and a retailer convicted of selling such content could face a prison sentence under the Video Recordings Act 1984. However, legislation has not kept pace with how pornography is primarily consumed today. The BBFC's statutory remit covers content published offline but there are no equivalent protections online, where this appalling content remains freely available. Whenever I have a conversation with a fellow parent, we invariably share our fears about our children growing up in a society where unfettered access to violent pornography has become normalised. Today there is reason for hope. The Government has published the findings of an independent pornography review, led over the past year by Baroness Bertin. The review has found this content, and its influence, to be deep-rooted in society; its harm potential, abundant. Lady Bertin recommends that violent and abusive pornography online should be treated as illegal content. It also calls for a body such as the BBFC to take on an auditing role to ensure that online platforms do not carry any such material. I welcome Lady Bertin's report and the BBFC will work with the Government on the recommendations in any way we can, including by taking on a formal auditing role to better protect audiences online. This would be a natural extension of the offline role we have fulfilled for decades. This is not about restricting adults' access to legal content: where pornographic content is neither illegal nor harmful, adults have a right to choose what to watch. This is about content that eroticises rape and the violent abuse of women or which promotes a sexual interest in children. Parity between how pornographic content is regulated online and offline is vitally important. If society is serious about addressing the fundamental challenge of harmful content, we must ensure that what is unacceptable offline is also unacceptable online. Natasha Kaplinsky is the president of the British Board of Film Classification Broaden your horizons with award-winning British journalism. Try The Telegraph free for 1 month with unlimited access to our award-winning website, exclusive app, money-saving offers and more.
