25/06/2026 Session
The Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE), meeting in plenary session in Strasbourg today, warned that the growing dissemination of violent pornography “normalises gender-based violence” and creates “an environment conducive to an increase in such violence”, calling for stronger laws and action against violent sexual content.
Adopting a resolution based on a report by Laura Castel (Spain, UEL), the Assembly expressed concern about the increasing availability of content depicting rape, coercion, humiliation, degradation and other forms of sexual violence, stressing that such material “mainly targets women and girls, dehumanising them”.
The parliamentarians called for clear national laws prohibiting violent pornography, including “non-consensual sexually explicit material, sexually explicit deepfakes and intimate images” produced without consent, as well as rapid procedures requiring online platforms to remove illegal content within 24 to 48 hours and sanctions against those that fail to comply.
The Assembly also called for “mandatory, age-appropriate, medically accurate and evidence-based” sexuality education and media literacy programmes to help young people reject messages that normalise violence and coercion, and urged stronger international co-operation to combat the cross-border dissemination of violent pornography and online sexual exploitation.