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An Auckland University psychologist says pornography is a form of modern day colonialism in the way it shapes expressions of identity and sexuality.
Jade Le Grice from Te Rarawa and Ngāpuhi was part of a forum earlier this month talking about the harm internet pornography can do to women and young people, and she's working on a research project titled Becoming sexual beings: Māori recommendations for sexual violence prevention.
She says parents, teachers and communities need to help young people measure what they come across against their values and beliefs.
She says mainstream pornography is biased towards a particular kind of sexualisation around a western construction of gender that sees men as sexually aggressive and dominant and women as compliant.
"By and large representations of pornography tend to position Tūmatauenga front and centre, that sex is something about war rather than something that might evoke complex ranges of emotions, of way of being, of relationships, of narratives and stories that bring people together," Dr Le Grice says.
She says not just rangatahi but adults can also benefit by being cautious about pornography and questioning what they find arousing.
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