Lily Phillips makes shocking claim after revealing she watched porn from age 11

Sex worker Lily Phillips, who shot to fame after sleeping with 101 men in a single day, has revealed she watched porn for the first time at just 11 years old.

Speaking on BBC Newsnight, the 24-year-old porn star revealed to presenter Victoria Derbyshire that she always thought sexual content was ‘very normal to watch’, even at such a young age.

Lily isn’t alone in being exposed to porn before reaching her teens.

The 2023 Children’s Commissioner report found that half of children have watched porn by 13, while 27% have watched it by 11, and 10% of kids have seen it by just nine years old.

The report found that pornography exposure is so widespread and ‘normalised’ that children cannot ‘opt-out’ of seeing it.

But while Lily claims viewing such content was ‘positive’, the report shows those who do are more likely to engage in ‘physically aggressive sex acts’.

The adult performer shared a different outlook, though. ‘It made me really sex confident… I learnt through pornography,’ she explained. ‘I think it had a positive effect on me.’

However, Lily has previously admitted to Metro that porn has also given her body image issues. She shared that she’d had labiaplasty after being influenced by unrealistic body standards in porn.

‘In comparison to what I’d seen online and what I’d seen in porn, my vagina wasn’t the norm,’ she said.

Victoria also questioned the Derbyshire-born sex worker on whether she felt let down by parents or government officials for being exposed to porn so young.

‘It’s hard because sex is a part of life,’ Lily replied, as the concerned BBC presenter looked on. ‘I think you should be learning [about porn] from that age, because that’s when you start to think about things like that.

‘Maybe not learning from pornography, but understanding it from that age would be helpful,’ she adds.

She continued: ‘I don’t know life without porn.’

Victoria also questioned Lily on whether she feels porn has ‘destroyed her brain’, but she disagreed.

‘I didn’t watch it often enough, so I don’t think it’s destroyed me, but I do think it’s destroyed people my age,’ Lily explained. ‘There’s porn I make with average guys which is normal sex… I’d like to say that’s relatable and wouldn’t damage your brain.’

There are currently measures being taken to try and prevent children watching porn, with Ofcom mandating that all porn sites must introduce effective age-verification measures by July this year.

The British Board of Film Classification found that 62% of 11 to 13-year-olds stumbled across porn unintentionally and described feeling ‘grossed out’ and ‘confused’ by what they saw.

How catastrophic is watching porn at 11?

Psychosexual therapist Natasha Silverman sees countless clients who have felt the long-term impacts of being exposed to porn at a young age.

‘Porn skews the perception of sex so dramatically that men and women and have assumptions of what their partner will like sexually, because porn has set the tone,’ Natasha tells Metro.

‘I had a teenage boy tell me he thought it was normal to never lose an erection, and he thought he had a micropenis because of what he’d seen in porn, which medically wasn’t the case.’

The therapist explains that the days of the ‘birds and the bees’ chat sufficing are behind us.

Natasha explains: ‘The concern isn’t just the porn itself but about what happens when young people encounter such adult content before they’ve received any meaningful, age-appropriate sex education from parents or schools.

‘Children’s brains are simply not equipped to process this content without support. When no one talks to them about sex, porn fills the gap – and what they see becomes internalised as part of their sexual blueprint as “normal”, when in actual fact what they see can bears little resemblance to real-life intimacy.’

She adds that the young men and women coming to see her now have increasing problems with intimacy and safe consensual sex.

‘Women tell me frequently they’ve been with a sexual partner who immediately put their hand around their neck, which they’re not into,’ she says. ‘They’re coming to see me with pain conditions because they’ve watched porn and have a skewed perception of what it means to become aroused.

‘They’re also engaging in sex they don’t want to have to prove they’re enough to be in a relationship – there’s a lot of tolerating what they don’t like because the boundaries are being pushed so far in porn.’

As concerning as this is, Natasha says there’s simply no way we can stop children watching porn, because ‘it’s everywhere’.

‘The only option apart from living in a bubble is to have conversations with children,’ she says. ‘They need to know there’s no shame and no blame if they watch something.

‘If they watch something shocking or disturbing, it’s really hard for people to look away. We can’t punish children for being exposed to something – they’re curious.’

Ultimately, children’s developing brains are not prepared to interpret explicit content without context, which can lead to distorted expectations and perceptions of sex, relationships, and consent, according to the therapist.

‘Help them feel safe discussing their experiences and questions, by telling them that encountering such content is not their fault – it is normal to find it hard to look away when confronted with shocking or confusing image,’ she says.

‘They need to know that they can always approach a trusted adult for support.’

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