Child pornography is readily available in Canada. It is mostly imported illegally and is almost impossible for the authorities to detect because it comes to the purchaser through the mail in “plain brown envelopes.”
Child pornography production is not a large industry in Canada, according to the Badgley Committee on Child Abuse. However, a substantial amount of child pornography is now being imported into Canada, and there is evidence that the so-called “soft-core” pornography is not as harmless as is widely supposed.
The Committee on Sexual Offences Against Children and Youths, known as the Badgley Committee, was established in December 1980.Its mandate was “to enquire into the incidence and prevalence in Canada of sexual offences against children and youths from sexual abuse and exploitation.” It was also instructed to “examine the problems of juvenile prostitution and the exploitation of young persons for pornographic purposed.”
The Committee Report, released last August, provides the most timely and comprehensive information on pornography in Canada. Their definition of pornography is “the depiction of licentiousness or lewdness; a portrayal of erotic behaviour designed to cause erotic excitement.”
Hard to prosecute
There is very little Canadian production of commercial child pornography (that is, magazines, photographs or movies that feature children in sexual situations.) Nearly all of this is imported by individuals for “personal enjoyment.”
Very few pornographers have been successfully prosecuted in Canada but the lack of prosecutions does not imply that there is nothing to worry about. Rather, it shows that the current Criminal Code provisions for prosecutions are quite weak, and that the law enforcement officials are frequently hampered in their investigations by considerations of personal freedoms and rights.
I documenting the size or spread of the consumer side of child pornography is difficult, the production and seduction side of the industry is equally difficult to determine. Estimates of the number of individuals “both men and women” who entrap children to perform sexually for pornographic photographs to add to “personal collection,” tend to be on the conservative side. In other words, while there is both commercial and private traffic in child pornography in Canada, there are no accurate figures to show the number of adults and children involved.
A national survey conducted by the Badgley Committee led it to estimate that over 50,000 Canadians (one in 400), some at a very young age, have been subject of sexually-explicit photographs. Two of the statistics are:
- Information gathered from 695 convicted male child sexual offenders indicated that 3.4 percent was reported to have taken sexual-explicit pictures of children.
- Both boys and girls and are at high risk. 57.6 percent of those juvenile prostitutes who gave personal accounts to the Committee said that they had been asked at least once by clients to perform for pornographic photographs.
What kind of person indulges in such creative photography? The Report documents that the majority of children knew these pornographers, who frequently held positions of trust in their lives. The Report states “some individuals had deliberately become associated with various youth-related activities for the purpose of being in close contact with children whom they subsequently sought to entrap.” Cases documented by the Committee show pornographers to have included family, friends, school photographers, fathers, probation officers, members of Big Brothers and Boy Scouts, school teachers, university professors and landlords.
A flourishing industry
The committee also investigated the “adult” pornographic magazines that are widely available in retail stores in Canada. It examined the content, the circulation , and the accessibility to children of the material. It found a flourishing, million-dollar industry. In 1965 there were about 30 pornographic magazines available in Canada: today, at least 540 different magazines are available. Eleven of the best-selling magazines had an audited circulation in 1981 of 13.5 million – a dollar-value of $41,389,264. The Report notes, “If the sales of all other available titles only equals or slightly exceeds those of the 12 listed publications – a plausible supposition – then the retail value of pornographic magazines likely generates a gross revenue of at least $100 million per annum. This $100 million figure excludes the sale of pornographic pockets books, films, videotapes, sex aids and the admission fees charged for commercially-exhibited motion pictures”
A picture worth more than a million words?
After close analysis of the contents of pornographic magazines, the Committee commented that there were considerable difference in tone and style between the graphics and the texts. The Report says,” In most of the photographs showing sexual acts which may involve two or more persons, while the portrayal is often vividly graphic, the situations depicted by be simulations rather than actual sexual acts performed when the photographs were taken. This is especially true of depictions which apparently portray vaginal anal penetration by a penis, finger, fist or object. “In contrast, there is no pretense at simulation in the types of sexual acts described in the text of these magazines. Sexual acts are fully and explicitly described, often in lugubrious detail. The examples of the types of situations described are exemplified by the excerpts which have been published in the Report. These magazines, legally distributed across Canada, are considered to be ‘soft core’ pornography, i.e., in contrast to ‘hard core’ pornography, they are not thought to deal with an explicit and graphic depiction of the full range of sexual behaviour and acts. It is evident from the content analysis of each type of sexual act and the number of times it appeared in the eleven magazines surveyed (fully detailed in a table in the Report), that in the text of some so-called ‘soft core’ pornographic magazines there is a substantial element of ‘hard core’ matter being presented.”
The report notes that 3.0 percent of the magazines studied showed the sexual depiction of children in the text: that is, youths and children were portrayed in sexually explicit acts. The youngest child described was eleven years old; the usual age range was between 13 and 17 years old. The Report says, “At least one inescapable inference which may be drawn from the depiction of situations in which children are portrayed engaging in sexually explicit behaviour with adults is that these are acceptable and normal learning situations for children.”
Consumers’ profiles
The Committee also investigated the average consumer of pornographic magazines.
.In a national survey, nearly two-thirds (59.4 percent) of the males and almost a third (30.8 per cent) of the females said they had bought pornography at least once during their lives.
21.2 per cent of the males and 8.7 per cent of the females bought pornography between the ages of 28 to 20 years. While 24.5 per cent of the males made their first purchase at younger than 18 years, 6.7 per cent of the women bought pornography earlier than 18 years – 15.4 per cent of the women bought pornography over the age of 21.
In the population survey conducted by the Committee, there was a clear consensus that accessibility to pornography should be restricted to adults. The Report says, “Over three in four persons (77.3 per cent ) who did not oppose the sale of pornography altogether felt that only persons age 18 and over should be permitted to purchase this matter.”
The Committee’s findings show that Canadians believe exposure to pornography is harmful. Those surveyed felt that pornography had corrupted their moral and social values, altered their personal values and behavior, and led to sexual assaults and associate physical injuries.
Protection is needed
In summary, the Committee found that the actual and potential harm to children of exposure to pornography “support the need for special statutory provisions to afford children better protection. In addition to the reform of the law concerning these issued, more complete documentation is required of the nature of the long-term effects of exposure to children of pornography.
Accordingly, the Badgley Committee recommends, in conjunction with other means proposed to afford better protection for children, that a comprehensive study be commissioned to consider the long-term effects of exposure to children of pornography, particularly focusing on where it does and where it does not have subsequent negative affects and the factors that distinguish these situations.”.
The Badgley Committee Report gives us the most up-to-date statistics on the pornography industry in Canada, yet the real job is barely begun. The Report does not even begin to discover the long-tern effects of this industry on our live. The Fraser Commission , formed to deal exclusively with questions of prostitution and pornography, is currently preparing its report. No doubt the Fraser report will give even more examples and statistics as to the ill-effects of pornographic material.
The Badgley Report recommends that greater protection be given to our children in the form of legislation that limits accessibility. It recommends that children be educated so that they are not intimidated to keep silent when abused. It does not call for a ban on pornography for adults and it is highly unlikely that the Fraser Commission report will do so.
