pornography “became more and more trashy, more and more violent”, explains this Wednesday, September 28 on franceinfo Alexandra Borchio-Fontimp, senator Les Républicains des Alpes-Maritimes. She is one of the co-authors of a Senate report, “The Hell of Decor”published this Wednesday, which denounces in particular systematic violence against women in the pornographic industry and makes about twenty proposals to better understand and regulate this sector which it describes in this report as “woman grinding machine”. She “asks Arcom, which is supposed to regulate this content, to act”.
franceinfo: You collected many testimonies to make your report. What impressed you the most?
Alexandra Borchio-Fontimp, Senator Les Républicains, co-author of the report: We worked for six months on this report with dozens of hearings from neuropsychologists, doctors, and the entire pornographic industry. What struck me the most was the hearing we held behind closed doors of the victims of a case that is in progress. They suffered all the excesses of pornography, their testimonies are poignant and I still remember them today.
You write that this industry is “a machine for grinding women”. What does that mean ?
This means that today there are more than drifts. Over the past twenty years, we have seen that pornography has evolved enormously with internet platforms that offer pornographic content. To satisfy users, they need to create increasingly trashy, increasingly violent scenes. When you go to these websites, there are tabs, specialties by subject with titles that are extremely shocking. Today, pornography has become very trashy and responds to the addiction demand of these users.
Is there a system that aims to identify women who need money or who are fragile in order to convince them to be filmed?
Yes, what is worrying is the method of recruitment. Often it is men who pretend to be an escort, who contact vulnerable women through social networks, who are often in a precarious situation, young women, just of age. At the beginning, they offer them to take just a few photos and then it’s manipulation, gearing, with sordid techniques. They hold them psychologically and materially since each time they promise them more money.
You advocate a right to be forgotten by erasing these films. Is it possible ?
Yes, it is possible that broadcasters can delete them. Today, when a victim wants the video deleted because she doesn’t want it to follow her all her life, the producer asks for money. What we are proposing is that the video can be removed free of charge at the request of the victim. We know that it is not easy because the content is streamed on sites all over the world, but we really press this right to be forgotten which is very important for the care of the victim.
Two-thirds of 15-year-olds have watched porn. How can we protect them?
First we educate them, in the school environment. We made a trip to a college in Île-de-France where a SVT teacher who, during sex education lessons, educated young people. Today, teenagers often take photos of themselves almost naked or naked on social networks that we know well or on platforms where they are paid without the knowledge of their parents. Today, there is really a trivialization of the body of women, men, young adults, adolescents, even children. This is what we also want to denounce. So, we have to better educate the children but also the parents who sometimes are completely unaware that their children are taking naked pictures. It is proposed that by default, when a subscription is taken out, parental control is installed and that it is not up to the parents to do it. Parents need to be made aware. The excesses are not only in sexuality, they are also in drugs. Today, we offer a lot of things to young people because they are easy targets.
Why do providers say they don’t know how to restrict access to under 18s?
This is false because today there is an article of the Penal Code which is not respected. We met a British company that does facial recognition, with an incidence of one year. We ask that there be a black screen on websites or that there is this kind of device. Tools exist and I ask Arcom, which is supposed to regulate this content, to act.