It is a risk for a teacher to tackle this topic publicly. It is still a taboo subject.
Thus it is important to find the right words and avoid any kind of sanctimoniousness. On 12 December 2011, Deutschlandradio Kultur broadcast a programme called “Naked madness? The pornographication of society and its consequences”. In the programme the pastor and social worker Bernd Siggelkow reported about his work. Siggelkow works in the Christian “Arche” children’s and youth centre in Berlin-Hellersdorf. In this desolate district of tower blocks, “Arche” attempts to counter the lack of meaning and neglect through a free provision for children and young people aged two to twenty. Siggelkow reports that the staff had notice curious games among some of the children. On the stairs five boys and one girl, all dressed, copied a gangbang scene in which the girl appeared to be raped. The children explained that they had seen the scene in a film and also wanted to try something like that when they were older.
Sexualisation does not stop before Waldorf schools
The majority of Waldorf schools are not in deprived areas and to that extent it is unlikely that a Waldorf kindergarten teacher or a class teacher will be confronted by such an imitative game. Yet an increase in sexualisation and pornographication is noticeable also in Waldorf schools. Parents of first class pupils commonly report that it only takes a few months from when their children start school for them to be told the facts of life by their fellow pupils. The higher the classes, the more open the phenomenon becomes.
The conversations among the pupils leave nothing to the imagination. It is striking that it is becoming increasingly unimportant for the pupils whether a teacher is within hearing or not. Pupils can be clearly heard calling their fellow pupils male or female genitalia. Or this scene: while pupils organise the food for a weekend event on the blackboard, a group of class nine pupils sitting at the side draws male genitalia on yellow sticky notes alternating with slogans, and these sticky notes are then compiled into a panorama on the table. The teacher joining them meets a good-humoured group of boys and girls who do not see any problem when the teacher glances at the collage of notes. Instead, one of the pupils asks to be allowed to photograph the picture on the table with the camera on his mobile phone before the collage is removed. There is, indeed, a consistent tendency to leave sexualised drawings on school desks. An eighteen-year-old pupil even referred to “table art” in this respect.
Increasingly obscene language
The Internet appears to have lost any verbal inhibitions particularly in the social networks such as Facebook. This can clearly be seen in cases where pupils were bullied which were given to the school to deal with; an incredible obscenity of language was evident here.
Alongside these particular extreme utterances, we have the daily slang used by young people with varying intensity. Pupils confirmed the presumption that language interspersed with pornography was on the way to becoming the norm. On the one hand they stressed that they were able to distinguish their use of language between school and leisure, teachers and fellow pupils; but on the other hand they explained that they used pornographic formulations which they no longer experienced as such. The latter had acquired a different meaning and to that extent there was a risk that they would use such formulations not towards teachers but towards fellow pupils in the presence of teachers. The example of “fuck you” in the sense of “you idiot! Leave me alone” was quoted by one pupil.
This selection of experiences of the pornographication of the public space of the school could be effortlessly expanded and intensified. However, in order to avoid creating a false picture: of course an appropriate culture of interaction continues to predominate in lessons and also in breaks, and language is not constantly pornographically obscene but appropriately civilised. And yet, a transformation is taking place which we cannot ignore any longer.
The role of music
The digital media are primarily seen as the source and amplifier of this process of change. The fields of music, film, television and Internet play a key role in this respect. Music in particular is enormously significant for young people discovering their identity. Young people define themselves to a considerable extent through music and their taste in music and there is a wide range of styles. One of them is rap music; one of its characteristics is a considerable portion of provocation and hardness. Thus it is not surprising that a new dimension was reached at the end of the 1990s: porno rap appeared. “King Orgasmus One” (King Orgasm One) declared himself to be the first porno rapper in Germany, followed by rappers such as Frauenarzt (Gynaecologist), Sido und Bushido. Some of the texts were so extreme that the prosecution authorities took action to stop the spread of violent pornography. Meanwhile porno rap has disappeared out of the limelight and former performers such as Bushido have transformed themselves into generally recognised mainstream pop musicians. But even if porno rap is no longer of interest except to a minority – the verbal breaches of the dike continue to have an effect. Alongside the texts, the fashion and behaviour of the music stars are also enormously important for young people. It is significant in this respect that well-known pop singers such as Lady Gaga, Madonna or Christina Aguilera have made so-called porno chic presentable through lascivious and obscene stage shows. Porno chic refers to stage clothes and representational means which deliberately use individual attributes from the pornography industry. There are also pornographic allusions in the advertising.
The Internet as source of pornography
However, the most important thing for young people in connection with pornography is the Internet, because this is where the images can be found from which the two other areas described above borrow. It has never been so easy to gain access to pornographic films at any time and almost any place. There are said to be 400 million pornographic websites worldwide. The best-known Internet platform went live in August 2006 and serves the free exchange of pornographic videos, as Wikipedia explains. It is interesting that its homepage resembles a forbidden garden before which there is no guard. Instead there is the warning: “This website contains explicit adult material”. You are only allowed to enter if you are over 18. There is then a choice of two buttons which say “Enter” and “Exit”.
It is difficult to say how many young people enter daily through this forbidden gateway. But there are tentative figures on the general usage behaviour of young people. A handout for schools and social workers says the following: “The information about the number of young people who have experienced (Internet) pornography from age 13 onwards fluctuates strongly and lies between 60 and 80 percent. In general boys consume pornography much more frequently than girls, all studies agree on that point. Only eight percent of boys and one percent of girls consume pornography regularly according to the Bravo Dr. Sommer Study 2009.
“In contrast to girls, boys frequently consume pornography among their peers and obtain their status in the group from their knowledge about the subject. Girls, on the other hand, consume pornography less in the circle of their friends or alone than with a partner. It should be noted that young people by no means consume pornography alone or in secret but frequently with friends or lovers. These (group) situations have an effect on the perception of and emotional reaction to pornography.”
And the Deutschlandradio Kultur broadcast mentioned at the beginning says: “Thus according to a Hamburg study about one third of 16 to 19-year-old young men consume pornography at least once a week; they mostly started during puberty at age 13 or 14. By contrast, it is rarer for girls to consume pornography regularly. They generally prefer erotic pictures to sexually explicit pornographic films.”
Are appearances deceptive?
While the increasing pornographication of our everyday culture is hardly called into question by social workers and academics, the analysis of this process with regard to children and young people varies a great deal.
Thus Bernd Siggelkow, mentioned above, and the journalist Wolfgang Büscher drew attention in a book published in 2008 to “Germany’s sexual tragedy”, thus the title (Deutschlands sexuelle Tragödie). After considering individual cases, the authors reach the conclusion that young people not only have sex earlier and more frequently, but that they also do so with constantly changing partners. Sex was increasingly replacing love and affection. The concept of the “porn generation” arose, referring to the children of the Internet-age born in the 1990s. But this thesis of sexually promiscuous young people is contradicted by the 2010 study of the German Federal Centre for Health Education according to which the “first time” occurred later when compared to 2006; in other words, greater sexual restraint could be observed. Whether this has happened because or in spite of the easy access to pornography is hard to say. Appeasers argue in the debate that it is above all adults who have a problem with pornography. Individual sexual researchers even go as far as to accord a civilising influence to pornography as it took the drama out of sexuality.
Let’s talk about porno
Such contradictory statements make it difficult to form a judgement and draw conclusions. Legally the matter is clear-cut: according to section 184 of the German criminal code (§ 184 StGB), pornography may not be offered, provided or made accessible to persons under 18. But this is where the dilemma already sets in because it is not always clear what precisely is to be understood by pornography and in cases of doubt is left for the courts to decide.
The difficulty of drawing boundaries is made clear in contemporary culture. Thus neither Jeff Koon’s series of portraits “Made in Heaven” nor Charlotte Roche’s novel Wetlands are classed by everyone as pornography. Furthermore, the sword of justice as shown itself to be blunted by the Internet world whose supreme dictum is unfettered freedom of access. Pornography is consumed in the private space which young people seek for themselves. Teachers have no influence there and the influence of the parents rapidly diminishes as the children grow older. In the age of smartphones and laptops, I consider the view that the media consumption of young people could be controlled and that they could be kept away from Internet pornography by that means to be of little help. So we have to start in the realm which we can influence. We have access to public spaces, of which schools are a significant part, but they also exist in the family. We can, for example, start with the language we speak and (wish to) hear. That sounds banal but on closer examination is quite the opposite. Often teachers turn a deaf ear when pupils communicate with one another in unreflected sexualised language. Stepping in here and seeking a conversation with the pupils surprises them.
As teachers, we can note with surprise that pupils like to talk about themselves and what it is like to be a young person. A process of reflection starts which is a step forward both for pupils and teachers. Alongside language there are other areas such as, for example, the ideal of beauty and gender roles which are worth discussing. Because, despite the information overload, our society offers little opportunity for young people to talk about the delicate themes of growing up. There are many interesting suggestions and lesson concepts in this respect in the handout “Let’s talk about porno” on klicksafe.de.
Sources:
Deutschland Radio Kultur: Nackter Wahnsinn? Die Pornographisierung der Gesellschaft und ihre Folgen, a feature by Ulrike Köppchen broadcast on 12.12.2011, http://www.dradio.de/dkultur/Sendung/ zeitfrage/1626633 /
Let’s talk about Porno. Jugendsexualität, Internet und Pornographie. Study material for school and youth work, produced by klicksafe.de in collaboration with the Landesmedienzentrum Baden Württemberg and pro familia, Landesverband Bayern, 2011.
“Der Lustfaktor: Sexualisierte Medien - Sexualisierter Alltag?” In: tv diskurs. Verantwortung in audiovisuellen Medien, Issue 3/2011
Wolfgang Büscher, Bernd Siggelkow: Deutschlands sexuelle Tragödie, Munich 2009
