Sexual strangulation is common among young people, some of whom fear being labeled “vanilla” and others are unaware of its deadly dangers.
A large university study found the practice to be shockingly common among young Australians, with 57% of adults under 35 having been choked at least once during sex.
More than half have choked their partner, a cultural phenomenon that experts say often has its roots in pornography, followed by movies and ballroom dancing.
“There’s increasing pressure on young women in particular to be adventurous rather than mundane in their sex lives,” study co-author Heather Douglas told AAP.
“They need help thinking through why they are consenting, what they are consenting to, and how they might withdraw consent or decide not to consent.”
Professor Douglas expressed concern that many young people are ignorant about the dangers of the habit, and stressed that medical experts say there is no safe way to do it.
“One of the things we really need to remember about strangulation is that most of the time it doesn’t leave visible wounds, but it can still cause harm.”
Douglas said it could cause brain damage even if the person is conscious, and that the brain damage could develop gradually and get worse with each choking episode.
According to researchers, this dangerous practice can also cause miscarriage or death weeks or months after the initial strangulation.
Researchers say it can take 10 seconds for a victim to become unconscious during sexual strangulation, and 150 seconds for death to occur.
The study found that sexual strangulation is gendered, with more female victims than males, and that approximately 80% of transgender and gender diverse young people have experienced it.
Nearly 60% of young people said they first learned about sexual strangulation (often called “choking”) through pornography.
Marie Crabbe, project director of It’s Time We Talked, is very concerned and the Violence Prevention Initiative is running a campaign on this.
“Porn has become the default sex education for many people.”
She speaks to young people and tells them that sexual strangulation is common, terrifying and dangerous, and often takes place without communication or consent.
“Young women in particular say they feel they are either innocent or mediocre if they are not prepared to commit acts of sexual strangulation,” Mr Crabbe told AAP.
“Pornography has become a staple of sex education for many young people in a way that it wasn’t 25 or 30 years ago, or even 15 years ago.”
“Half of boys have viewed pornography by age 13, and half of girls have viewed pornography by age 15.”
Matilda, who joined the Breathless campaign using a pseudonym to hide her identity, said choking was “very mainstream”.
The 18-year-old woman said that if she was on the receiving end of this, she would just have to hope that the person would stop at the right time.
“I never felt scared when he first started strangling me and I don’t know why. Maybe I should have,” she said.
“But over time, the longer they go without breathing, the more they panic and the more they become unable to move.”
Experts told Crabbe there has been an “explosion” of harmful sexual behaviour by children and adolescents towards their peers, and pornography is a big part of it, he said.
Crabbe said experts were finding that children under the age of 10 were committing more violent, more abusive and more “adult” forms of sexual abuse against other children.
“That’s a very clear, sharp tip that something is wrong,” Crabbe said.
“Pornography is a global, multi-billion dollar industry that sets the agenda for what sex looks like and how it should be experienced, with deeply harmful effects.”
Crabbe said there needed to be more awareness about the prevalence and dangers of sexual strangulation, and to encourage young people to think critically about why the behaviour was normalised.
Spreading misinformation
She said the lack of accountability and regulation by social media companies also meant that misinformation about sexual strangulation was spreading without being addressed.
Douglas added that parents need support in talking to their children about pornography and strangulation.
Canberra Health Service forensic expert Jane van Diemen, an expert quoted by the Breathless campaign, stressed there was no safe way to strangle someone.
“I’ve worked in this field for 15 years,” Van Dieman said on the campaign trail.
“With everything I know about strangulation, I cannot predict the point at which it will cause irreparable damage or death.”
The findings on sexual strangulation, by researchers from the University of Melbourne Law School and the University of Queensland, were published on Tuesday in the journal Archives of Sexual Behaviour.
On average, participants in the study of more than 4,700 young people reported being choked six times by three different partners.
First-time strangulation victims are usually between the ages of 19 and 21, and are strangled by their partners.
Federal Communications Minister Michel Rolland has welcomed the latest step, highlighted by the eSafety Commissioner, towards mandatory industry codes to protect children from online pornography.
“The new rules will impose obligations on industry to restrict access to age-inappropriate content on their services,” the minister said in a statement on Tuesday.
The provisions are in line with the Online Safety Act and apply to app stores, internet service providers, pornographic sites, social media and gaming sites, among other sites where children may unintentionally encounter pornography.
Rowland said the government’s recently funded Age Assurance Trial would complement the Code.
