Netflix’s new show Adolescence racked up 66.3 million views in two weeks and is causing robust conversation amongst adults and young people across the globe.
The series focuses on the impact of the ‘manosphere’ on a young boy and the role of parents needing to be stronger.
However, we believe there are three discussions missing from this:
- Pornography’s impact on a young brain.
- The role of other adults outside of a child’s immediate family in moulding them.
- God’s invitation of redemption and good design.
The reality is that pornography is a social norm and sold as a boy’s rite of passage in our broader culture. This toxic permission is rewiring their brains to see violent sex as standard.
With this in mind, let’s get a crash course on the stats:
- We know that 85% of young Australian men aged 15-29 view pornography weekly or daily and that boys are viewing this content an average of 3.2 years before their first sexual experience. (Statista Research Department, 2021)
- We also know that pornography is directly linked to a 6 times increase in sexually aggressive behaviour compared to those who do not consume it. (Antonia Quadara and Alissa El-Murr, 2017)
- Finally, we know that one study showed 88% of porn scenes on a mainstream porn website displayed violence towards women that was received with a neutral or positive response. (Bridges, Wosnitzer, Schaffer, Sun & Lieberman, 2010)
This means that the messages and values that pornography holds – ones of violence, a lack of consent, force, and objectification – are creating the scaffolding that our young people are building their decision making about sex and relationships on. Both young boys and girls.
At BKT workshops at Christian schools and churches across the country, we regularly hear young men express that they are entitled to sex, that consent shouldn’t be a conversation and that they need to get their virginity out of the way – both in explicit and implicit ways. In contrast, we regularly hear young women express feeling uncomfortable and unsafe around their male peer’s behaviour and share their stories where consent was not respected or they were made to accept behaviour in the school yard that classifies as sexual harassment.
This is not an exaggeration, this is the reality. But this is not just a parent’s problem. This is our responsibility as a community.
As the old saying goes, ‘it takes a village to raise a child’. So, who is your village?
Who are the adults outside of a child’s immediate family who are coaching, mentoring, and intentionally investing in them?
Let’s share the load and invite intergenerational relationships into a young person’s life. The research conducted in David Kinnaman and Mark Matlock’s Faith for Exiles demonstrates that one of the key themes that builds a resilient young person, and a resilient person of faith, is meaningful intergenerational relationships.
So we ask again, who is your village? How, outside of your immediate family, is playing a part in discipling your child?
Finally, let’s remember that God has a better ending to this story. He wants young people to know the hope that is in Christ and to hold onto it with both hands. He wants them to navigate sexual experienced with kindness, gentleness, and love. We believe he’d want consent to be respect always and young men given tools to be a voice for God in their communities.
Young men are not the problem. Our cultures approach to sex education and what it sees as normal are.
What would it look like for young men to meet Jesus and to model masculinity after Him? What would it look like for young girls to feel safe and empowered in their God-given identity?
We believe God has a different narrative available for this generation and that’s exactly why we do what we do.
