I talked to my son about porn and it was mortifying but important

A quick skim through a porn site nowadays suggests that unless there are nipple clamps, hoists and a variety of gardening tools involved, you are positively Victorian. So if we don’t educate our kids, who will? Pornhub? Redtube?

Porn is carefully manufactured – and it’s important our children know that (Reuters)

Porn, I read in an article this week, has the greatest influence on our young when it comes to sex education. This is troubling considering some of the porn I have watched in the early hours when I have been unable to get to sleep. The women’s bodies, unreal in their near-robotic smooth perfection, are contorted into positions you know are impossible without terrible cramp.

In porn, sex is so often something that is “done” to the women by men who don’t seem nearly as concerned about the body beautiful or personal grooming. You have to spend hours on porn sites to find women who look like they are actually enjoying themselves. Literally hours. Makes me wonder if I watch porn because I can’t sleep or if I can’t sleep because I watch porn. It’s a chicken and egg situation. All I know for sure is that the chicken was wearing suspenders and the egg was no gentleman.

Teenage girls are being pressured, it seems, by their male porn-obsessed peers into giving blowjobs, having sex and sending nude pictures of their body parts over their smartphones. It’s not a new thing, of course, young girls and women being persuaded to do things they don’t want to or are not ready to do. And the internet means that the pressure isn’t just there when they are out. It can be there when they are in their bedroom pretending to do their geography homework.

My generation fumbled about in the dark to learn about each other’s bits and pieces. A satin blindfold was considered “kinky”. A quick skim through a porn site now, though, suggests that unless there are nipple clamps, hoists and a variety of gardening tools involved, you are positively Victorian.

I can understand how this is not an ideal first port of call for sex education for 14-year-olds.

After reading the latest article, I panicked and interrogated my 10-year-old, internet-obsessed son at breakfast.

“You’ve done sex education at school, right?” I blurted out. He nodded, his mouth full of Corn Flakes.

“What did you learn?” is my next, slightly maniacal question.

My boy politely finishes his mouthful before answering. “We learned about puberty, changes in your body and moods.”

“And sex, right? Willies and stuff?” I’m out of control. My poor boy shoots me a “you need to shut up or I’ll become a banker” look.

But the article has rattled me. I need to teach him right here, right now, that you must never ever pressurise anyone into doing anything they are not comfortable doing and that a whisk should only ever be used when baking.

In the film Captain Fantastic, a father who has raised his children in the woods away from mainstream society allows completely frank dialogue about sexual matters, even with his youngest children. At the end of the film, he gives advice to his teenage son who is about to leave the family for the first time to have his own adventures: “When you have sex with a woman, be gentle, listen to her. Treat her with respect and dignity even if you don’t love her.”

“Sex is completely natural, you can talk about it to your mum,” I tell my mortified son, who hangs on to his Corn Flakes bowl for comfort and support.

“Er...”

I drop it. For now. But we will talk. The birds and the bees chat is not enough. In fairness, it has never been enough. We need to talk about much more. Feelings, consent, that sort of thing. The bee needs to understand that no matter how much nectar has been involved, it must never coerce a lavender.

Our daughters are up against it. Being valued by your looks did not come with the arrival of Instagram. It’s an injustice as old as time. Protesting every ad campaign promoting the “perfect” look is an endless battle. Having conversations is not. Encouraging sports that connect your mind to your body, and help you love it, is not.

It will be awkward talking to my children about matters beyond the reproductive purpose of sex. There are a million things I would rather do, like hit myself on the head with a metronome or eat a bath sponge. But if not me, who? Pornhub? RedTube?

No matter how excruciating, we must cross the Rubicon and discuss porn with our teens. No matter how “fair trade” you are in your choice of voyeurism, you can never be sure that no one is being manipulated. The awful stuff is out there, your kids will see it – and once they do, they cannot unsee it.

Tell your sons and daughters that the plucked chicken look has been manufactured and normalised by porn but that triangle of pubic hair was, not so long ago, considered erotic. Yes, your teenager may bolt for the door – but it’s time we all got a more Captain Fantastic.