Shock report: The eight-year-olds addicted to porn
Do you know what your grandkids are watching? A quarter of 11-yearolds in the UK have viewed explicit content online – and the effects can be devastating...
When young boys reach a certain age, it’s natural that they’ll begin to explore their sexuality. In the past, their curiosity probably went as far as sneaking a peek at their mum’s Littlewoods catalogue lingerie section.
But today’s children can access the most explicit and degrading pornography – on the internet. Online porn is a growing issue for parents, grandparents, children’s charities and mental health professionals, who all agree it can have a huge impact on developing minds.
In 2012, the prestigious Tavistock Clinic in London reported a rise in addiction to hardcore online porn among young boys. One who started viewing porn aged 10 told a counsellor, ‘I didn’t know
it was possible for people to do those sorts of things. The websites led me to other websites, and soon I was looking at weirder stuff I could never have imagined…’
Tara Deschambault’s son, Joe, now 15, became addicted to online porn aged eight. It had a devastating effect.
Tara, who also has two daughters, says, ‘Joe was the sweetest, most thoughtful little boy on the planet. But, when he was eight, his personality changed overnight. He became withdrawn and started beating up his older sisters… he was totally out of control.
‘Then we got a call from his music teacher to say Joe had taken photographs of his genitals with her mobile phone. We also found pictures on our camera at home, and I was aware that he’d started masturbating.’
Tara began to fear her son was being sexually abused.
‘I was looking at family members, teachers – I even questioned my own husband.’
Tara, who lives in Canada, discovered the real reason behind Joe’s disturbing behaviour. She says, ‘One night, I was on my computer… I looked into the browser history and was horrified to find hundreds of links to online porn. It was violent, aggressive and demeaning.
‘I thought I was going to throw up. My husband and I confronted Joe, and I said, “Is there anything you need to tell Mummy?”
His eyes went very big and he said, “I can’t, it’s too bad.” We all ended up sobbing.’
Sadly, Tara’s story isn’t an unusual one. A parliamentary report in 2012 found that a third of 10-year-olds has seen explicit material, and 80 per cent of 16-year-old boys regularly access online porn.
The NSPCC reports that three in four young women believe pornography has led to pressure on women to act a certain way. Doctors have reported an increase in girls coming to them with sexual injuries, as young men act out what they’ve seen online.
Steve Biddulph, whose bestselling parenting book, Raising Boys, has been updated and re-released, has dedicated a new chapter to the issue.
‘Researchers have found that the more porn is viewed by young boys or men, the more those males “dehumanise” women – they see them deserving of maltreatment,’ he explains.
He doesn’t blame the youngsters. ‘Porn sites are designed to entrap, sometimes even using children’s cartoon characters or placement among games sites to get children to click through.’
This was how Joe’s addiction started. He was playing a game online when an ad popped up. It said, ‘ Wanna see? Click here!’ So, he did… ‘I’d installed filters, so I thought I’d protected him, but this was totally targeted,’ Tara says.
Joe had been accessing porn sites for eight months. ‘He’d wake up in the middle of the night and first thing in the morning and look at porn,’ Tara says. ‘He figured out how to manipulate the computer so that he could look at porn for 30 seconds while I was out of the room.’
Joe was banned from using technology for two years. ‘But, when he saw sexy ads on billboards, the anger and aggression would start,’ says Tara. ‘He said the images of the porn flooded his brain.’
So, how do we protect our kids? In the UK, all porn sites must now use age-verification software to block under-18s. Businesses that refuse to comply can be fined up to £250,000 and blocked to all UK users. These measures should be in place by the end of the year.
Steve Biddulph says talking to kids is key. ‘They’re likely