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Showing certain types of sexualised imagery has just been outlawed in England and Wales, and in the past the Welsh Government (WG) has offered advice to families on “tackling pornography”, but leading political figures have told The Eye that the state should not be involved in this area, and it is all baed on ‘flimsy evidence’.
Online pornography depicting strangulation or incestuous relationships was banned from today, but one critic said: “I am very uncomfortable about this. Apparently a lot of people take pleasure in seeing this stuff, and who are we to say they shouldn’t? I don’t want to give my name in case I am viewed as condoning this practice”.
It is now illegal to possess or publish pornography which shows strangulation or suffocation, depicts sexual activity between people who are related, or shows adults role-playing as children under 16.
The new rules follow a review into porn regulation in 2025 which was commissioned by former Prime Minister (PM) Rishi Sunak’s government
It found that depictions of choking were “rife” on popular porn sites, and had helped normalise the act among young people.
Conservative peer Baroness Gabby Bertin, who headed the review, said the news came “not a moment too soon”.
She said the change in the law would “send the unequivocal signal” to companies that host and facilitate porn, and also to wider society, that “extreme and violent content that encourages real-life harm is not acceptable”.
Speaking to BBC Radio 4’s Today programme, Baroness Bertin said porn showing strangulation had “absolutely sort of normalised this kind of sexual violence. That has to come to an end and I hope this law change will be the beginning of that”, adding that it aimed to “marry up” differences in the law about what was acceptable online and offline.
Justice minister Alex Davies-Jones (who represents Pontypridd) said:“porn can shape what people think a healthy relationship looks like, especially young people”.
Durham University (DU) law professor Clare McGlynn – who has previously warned widely available extreme content normalises sexual violence – welcomed what was happening, proclaiming: “This is a potential turning point, the commencement of these laws marking a line in the sand when we decided that we were no longer going to accept the normalisation of sexually violent content in pornography”.
Meanwhile in November 2019 the WG offered details of Hwb advice for families worried about the effects of pornography. Their headline declared: “Tackling pornography: new film and guide for families”, while underneath they said: “A ‘Start the conversation’ film and guide which explore the challenges families face in tackling pornography has been published on the online safety zone on Hwb”.
However the actual evidence supporting these moves is not strong, and has been described as “flmsy” in The Economist.
A study in Australia tested several variables to see what might predict whether an individual has a positive perception of choking during sex. Having seen choking in porn had little predictive value, whereas having previously tried choking or discussing it with friends was much more likely to predict positive attitudes towards it.
Other surveys find that the majority of sexual choking is consensual and pleasurable for those involved. A review in 2016, looking at 20 years of porn research, concluded that methodological shortcomings and “biases in the literature” prevent researchers from drawing conclusions about porn’s effect on adolescents. A further review in 2023 similarly concluded most studies had “substantial limitations” that preclude any firm conclusions.
Each to their own, some appear to say, and it’s not the state’s business anyway.
So will a new law banning a repugnant type of pornography actually work?
The memories of our Editor, Welshman Phil Parry’s astonishing decades long award-winning career in journalism (which didn’t involve strangling ANYONE!) as he was gripped by the rare disabling condition Hereditary Spastic Paraplegia (HSP), have been released in a major book ‘A GOOD STORY’. Order the book now!
