WATCH: Jersey students schooled on dangers of porn

Friday 29 March 2019

On average, children are aged 10 when they first see porn… so a group has been in the island this week to teach local teens about, “...the good, the bad and the ugly,” of the industry.

The RAP Project – which stands for raising awareness and prevention – has been visiting Jersey secondary schools this week to discuss issues like the impact of pornography, body image and making the ‘big leap’ from school to university.

This is the second time the project has come to Jersey, having been brought over by Jersey Action Against Rape (JAAR), and comes after the Jersey School Survey which found that around one in ten of schoolchildren ‘sext’ and that online pornography was classed as the “main source of information about sex” for half of boys in year 12 and 25% of those in year 10.

Video: The RAP Project's Allison Havey spoke to Highlands students about the good, the bad and the ugly of online pornography.

Jayne Gruchy, who is Office Manager at the charity, told Express: “Building on the success of last year’s visit, we decided to bring the RAP Project over again to visit more schools… we’re hoping that the messages that we want to get across will reach more students.” 

Allison Havey, co-founder of the RAP Project, yesterday delivered a presentation to sixth-form age students at Highlands College about pornography – the good, the bad and the downright ugly.

When asked by Allison to think of words they would associate with porn, the students came up with “unrealistic”, “staged”, “sexy”, “fake people”, “male dominant”, with one audience member adding a pun into the mix – “sexcellent!” 

The students were asked to think about the pros and cons of pornography as well as hearing shocking statistics about the industry.

Pictured: JAAR's Jayne Gruchy hopes the RAP Project presentations will bring home important messages to Jersey's students.

When discussing the cons of pornography, the students raised issues like addiction and promoting unrealistic body images for both men and women.

Speaking to Express afterwards, two performing arts students, Elizabeth and Ethan, shared their reactions to the RAP Project’s presentation.

Elizabeth said that although she wasn’t surprised by the statistics in the presentation, she added: “I can see it becoming an issue and it’s already an issue. I can see how it’s becoming a big epidemic for people." 

Ethan, however, took a different view: “I still think it’s not really as bad as people are making it out to be because there are still some good benefits to what porn actually does for people. So, there is a bad side but there’s also good things.”

Pictured: The presentation got the students talking about porn even after it was over.

When asked how they found discussing this kind of issue in a school environment, Elizabeth said that because her course is very “close”, they didn’t find it embarrassing, but she said, “I feel like some people found it relatively awkward to say anything and it’s kind of embarrassing to talk about it.” 

Ethan agreed, saying: “I feel like almost around students your own age you’ve almost feel like you’ve got to try and not be the ‘weird one’, you’ve got to sort of fit in. It’s like; ‘I want to say something, but if I do then I’m going to be made fun of.’”

When asked about the impact the presentation might have had on them and their classmates, Elizabeth told Express: “I think it makes people more aware of it, it makes them more open to talk about it afterwards… I think it makes people more opinionated and more open to talking about it.”

The RAP Project have visited six schools this week, bringing their presentations on young peoples’ issues to Jersey students.