Pregnancy Vlogs and Online Victimisation of Women: A Critical Legal-Victimological Analysis From Global Perspectives

Introduction

Often it is told that womanhood comes to full circle when a woman becomes a mother. Being a mother either biologically or by way of adoption is indeed a unique experience because it not only gives the joy of nurturing another life, it may make the woman more responsible in every sense. For every woman, the phases of motherhood bring special moments. For some, these phases may start right from the day of conceiving, for some, it may start when she decides to adopt a baby, for some it may start right from the moment of the birth of the baby. In this digital era, many couples (especially women) like to capture the moments of motherhood by making digital photo albums or vlogs. In India, this phenomenon is rapidly catching up. In this digital era, many couples (especially women) like to capture the moments of motherhood by making digital photo albums or vlogs. In India, this phenomenon is rapidly catching on. Pregnancy photoshoots, baby birthing photos and videos, newborn photo shoots, etc. are trending nowadays.

YouTube and Instagram are chosen platforms to upload such videos or images. YouTube especially provides wonderful opportunities for the easy creation of amateur vlogs. YouTube users may also use specific tags for listing the video with certain streams, like pregnancy and childbirth, medical learning, fitness during pregnancy, know-hows of childbirth and neonatal care by new parents, etc. Many users love to share such vlogs or images (through other social media platforms and digital messaging apps) with their virtual friends and groups. I have come across several such videos and images which may have been as old as two, three or even five years old. But they may not always bring back good memories. Pregnancy and child birthing videos and images are hugely consumed by porn industry consumers as well. Several researchers on pornography, including non-consensual and revenge porn, have revealed the existence and growth of different sorts of porn content, which may include black porn, older women porn, nude porn, voyeur, amateur porn, big belly porn, and preggo porn.

The last one, i.e., preggo porn, is actually made with women showing different types of pregnant belly formations, very slow movement of pregnant women with huge bellies, (supposed) movement of the baby within the belly and the corresponding gasping or painful twitching of the body of the pregnant woman and necessarily the breasts, which may be half covered. These contents are made by porn actors who may or may not be pregnant in real life. Generally, these porn actors are clad in underwear right from the beginning of the video, to give the impression of real-life birthing scenes. Several videos also show women slowly removing clothing. Such videos may give the impression that the woman suddenly developed labour pain at home or someplace other than the hospital. All such videos may have similar tag lines as the original pregnancy and birthing videos, i.e., “pregnancy,” “childbirth.” The ancillary tag line could be “fake” or “prank” or “sexy preggo.” Such taglines may also pull the real pregnancy and birthing videos into the pool of sexually consumable content.

Getting sexual gratification from birthing scenes and scenes of labour pain is indeed a sign of perversion. But what is more disheartening is how the porn industry has grown preggo porn streams based on this perversion. If one notices the comment sections of such videos, one might see that the woman in the video may be asked to act more accurately in the next video. The woman may also be asked to make videos with different pregnancy postures and sounds of pain which may create more erotica. The producers and actors of these videos may earn a good profit, depending upon their presentation and “perfect” acting. Unfortunately, the real pregnancy vlogs may also be consumed with equal “interest.” A new mother may get trolled in the comment section for her belly shape or for taking too much time to make “birthing sounds” or “labour pain moments,” which may be sexually gratifying for consumers of the videos. Some may even get trolled for “wasting time” for the viewer. Often the creators of genuine vlogs may not have time to look into the comments, which could be extremely disturbing for any new mother. Even if the creator disabled the comments, the links of the videos may still be shared with malicious intent to consume them as porn.