Consent question forms part of teen sex season

net1

Channel 4 is to devote a season of programmes to teenage sex.

The Adult At 14 season will offer a "realistic examination of teenage sexuality" which will feature scenes that could shock many parents.

It includes a documentary, Age Of Consent, in which presenter Miranda Sawyer argues that sex below the age of 16 should be legalised.

Another documentary, Porn To Be Young, will interview young people about their attitude towards pornography.

And in 14 Alone, a group of ten 14-year-old boys and girls will be allowed to spend five days and nights together in a house without adult supervision.

It is the follow-up to Boys Alone and the subsequent Girls Alone, the social experiment which attracted criticism for putting a bunch of 11-year-olds in a house to fend for themselves.

In 14 Alone, cameras will follow the teenagers as they live together free of the usual teen trappings of TV, music or computer games.

The programme claims it will offer an insight into "this tender age when children are on the cusp of adulthood".

A Channel 4 spokeswoman stressed that rules would be imposed and a camera crew would be present at all times to ensure things did not get out of hand.

"This is not like Big Brother where they are left completely alone, there will be cameramen in the house with them," she said.

It will also broadcast Pornography: The Musical in which real-life sex workers will sing about their working lives.

jimbo

Call me old fashioned but I see this as titilation to increase viewer share rather than offering a serious insight into the subject. Thinking back to Big Brother, it seems that the censorship was so intense that if anyone removed even a shoe the cameras cut away to chickens eating corn.So using it as a parallel that will be avoided seems odd to me.

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Jimbo