From I May Destroy You To The Jetty, How Popular Culture Finally Bust Open The Taboos Around Sexual Consent

This article references grooming, sexual assault, and image-based abuse.

It’s never been more important that we have conversations around consent – a concept that underpins our freedom, sense of self, safety and sexuality.

Talking about it can save and change lives, especially when this leads to laws and social attitudes reflecting the importance of any one person’s sexual consent. These shifts in perspective and legislation can be set in motion by many different factors. Even what we watch on the telly.

Certain TV shows, films and books are exploring these issues right now, including BBC series The Jetty, which may appear at first glance to be your average British police drama, but actually explores consent within the context of grooming and intimate image-based abuse.

These issues need to be represented on screen – to start conversations and encourage campaigns for change. It’s an issue on many people’s minds, after all. GLAMOUR’s very own consent survey found that 91% of women think that deepfakes – AKA sexually explicit artificial images – are a danger to women.

And following the news from the King’s Speech that spiking will become a specific criminal offence – which will reportedly help the police to better respond to cases – we need to keep talking about consent, and the many other ways it manifests and can be abused.

It affects all of us and our relationships with our bodies, sexuality and mental health – particularly young women. In a study, 71% of women reported being sexually harassed in public, and 97% between the ages of 18-24 reported being harassed or assaulted.

Conversations around the issue are – and must be – far-reaching and nuanced. They must cover sexual harassment and assault in public and private, as much as they must cover image-based abuse, an equally important violation of consent.

The Jetty protagonist Ember (Jenna Coleman)’s teenage daughter Hannah (Bridgerton‘s Ruby Stokes) experiences her nudes being leaked by a partner – leading to local men sharing the images amongst themselves, without her consent. Ember feels powerless to comfort or help her – and we are shown how little can be done (currently) to undo the sharing of such images, and the complications around prosecuting someone who shared these images.

This instance is a very real problem, and deserves representation on screen. A recent report found that a third (33%) of UK people reported either knowing someone who has experienced intimate image abuse or have experienced it themselves (7%).