U.K. Lawmakers Call For ‘Public Health Campaign’ Against Porn

LONDON, U.K.—As the United Kingdom waits to enact a new law regulating online porn by requiring strict age verification procedures for porn sites, a group of lawmakers in the country’s Parliament have issued a report that calls for the government to study the supposed hazards of porn, comparing the viewing of pornography to smoking and reckless driving. The report, entitled “Sexual Harassment of Women and Girls in Public Places,” calls not only for the British government to restrict access of minors to porn, as the recently passed law intends to do, but also for the government “to address adult men’s use of mainstream online pornography.” The report claims that men who consume porn are more likely to exhibit “sexist attitudes and sexually aggressive behaviors, including violence." The report, by Parliament’s Select Committee on Women And Equalities, also suggests that the viewing of online porn in such public spaces as buses and other public transit vehicles should be criminalized. “Viewing pornography on public transport has developed as a new form of sexual harassment,” the committee members warn, calling for an update to a 1990s regulation on public vehicles to ban the viewing of porn by passengers. "Sexual harassment in public places is a regular experience for many women and girls in the street, in bars and clubs, on buses and trains, at university and online," said the committee chair, Conservative Party member Maria Miller. "Women feel the onus is put on them to avoid 'risky' situations. It is not acceptable that women have to change their behavior to avoid sexual harassment. It has a wider effect on society, contributing to a culture in which sexual violence can be normalized or excused." At least four states in the United States have passed resolutions declaring porn a “public health crisis.”  But despite claims of those state legislatures and by the U.K. Parliament that research has established a link between porn and a variety of harmful public health issues, most studies have failed to establish any such significant connection between porn consumption and health issues. The U.K. report cites a statement by Dr. Maddy Coy of London Metropolitan University’s Child and Woman Abuse Studies Unit, in which Coy says that there is “a meta-analysis of research” showing a link between the viewing of porn by men and the likelihood of committing acts of sexual harassment or violence. But Coy added that “the basis of some of those studies can be critiqued." No kidding! Photo by Adrian Pingstone/Wikimedia Commons Public Domain