Ireland ‘the Wild West for access to porn by children’
IRELAND has become the ‘Wild West’ when it comes to children’s access to online pornography, a child psychology expert has warned.
And she says decisive action needs to be taken by the Government.
Speaking to the Irish Daily Mail, Stella O’Malley said young people were being harmed by ‘easy access’ to pornography on a daily basis through smartphones and tablets.
‘They have access to hardcore pornography that I think a lot of adults don’t understand,’ Ms O’Malley said.
The porn industry was fuelling addiction among teenagers to hardcore material, and more and more of them were coming to her for help, she said. ‘The very nature of the porn industry, they basically keep a profile of you and once a teenager clicks onto porn websites, they will be invited forever more to view disturbing videos,’ Ms O’Malley said.
‘The teenagers who come to me for help are disturbed by their porn habits. They say: “I have a porn habit, I’m freaking myself out”.’
The psychologist said this was the first generation that has had such easy access to pornography, but ‘as a live experiment, it’s not going well’.
‘I think the boys in particular are developing very destructive habits, and the girls’ sexual development is impacted by the boys’ use of porn.’
Ms O’Malley said that while the Government must legislate to rein in the tech industry and porn creators to force them to block children from accessing explicit material, an education campaign carried out by the Department of Health would be a start.
She suggested this might work in the same way Ireland warns the public on the dangers of smoking.
‘Ireland has been a Wild West for a long time when it comes to pornography. Not all technology is bad, but I really think for under18s we’re going to look back at the way children have such access to truly inappropriate images and say: “Why didn’t we stop it?”’
Internet addiction is also leading to the rise in pornography consumption, Ms O’Malley said. ‘The [technology] industry have spent billions trying to get children to stay online longer and we have to be very strong individuals to try and resist this,’ she said.
Last year, a study by NUI Galway found 53.3% of boys and 22.8% of girls first viewed pornography between the ages of ten and 13.
There is growing evidence that easy access to hardcore porn is fuelling a rise in sexual assaults by children and teenagers.
Earlier this month, Justice Michael White said he had recently handled four cases ‘where young children have committed the most serious offences... where the start was exposure to pornography on smartphones’.
This week Simon Harris issued a stark warning that society must tackle the crisis. The Health Minister said he was shocked to learn the young age at which many were accessing porn online, which he said gave them a ‘false reality’.
‘They’re learning of an environment where sex is often violent, where it’s often domineering and where women are generally the subservient partners,’ he said.
They say ‘I have a porn habit’