Sexual abuse pervasive, systemic in 'predatory' French porn industry, Senate report finds

A French Senate report released on Wednesday concluded that sexual and physical abuse in country's porn industry is "systemic" and lawmakers should better regulate the production of videos and protect children who are "heavily exposed" to the content.

The Senate report, titled "Hell Behind the Scenes", aims to alert the government and the broader public about the huge scale of the problem, the authors said.

The report suggested that sexual, physical and verbal abuses are widespread in porn, making them systemic, adding that such acts are not simulated but very real for the women who are being filmed.

During six months of research, the Senate's delegation for women's rights and gender equality heard from over 50 people including some involved in the industry, women's right activists and victims.

They noted the "massive, ordinary and toxic" viewing of porn by children despite French law requiring viewers to be at least 18 years old.

The report's authors found that 90% of pornographic scenes include violence and that two thirds of children aged 14 and less have seen pornographic content.

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"We aim to provoke an electroshock in our society to tell everyone what is pornography today in 2022," senator Annick Billon, co-author and president of the Senate's delegation, said.

A police investigation into alleged rape, human trafficking and pimping in France's porn industry has called attention to abuse in the business.

Dozens of alleged victims have come forward in two separate cases linked to a major video platform and France's leading amateur porn site.

'Nikita Bellucci', who has been working in the porn industry for more than a decade in France, Eastern Europe and the U.S., has always been outspoken about her experience.

She said she was proud of her job yet stood in the front line to denounce how women tend to be targets of abuses in the industry.

Billon and the other delegation members issued 23 recommendations for enforcing current laws and introducing new regulations.

This also comes after a 2016 law against prostitution and sex trafficking that banned buying sex, not selling it.