Does the internet's impact on boys' attitudes to women worry you? Have your say

Yahoo UK's poll of the week lets you vote and indicate your strength of feeling on one of the week's hot topics. After the poll closes, we'll publish and analyse the results each Friday, giving readers the chance to see how polarising a topic has become and if their view chimes with other Yahoo UK readers.

Adolescence is (almost) all anyone is talking about right now. Netflix's latest limited series takes viewers on a journey into a murky world of misogyny-fuelled violence, youth radicalisation, and so-called toxic masculinity and has kick-started a much-needed conversation about the concerning content children are being exposed to online.

The show sees This Is England star Stephen Graham, who co-wrote the series alongside Jack Thorne, play Eddie Miller, the father of 13-year-old Jamie, played by newcomer Owen Cooper, who has been accused of murdering one of his classmates.

Initially we assume there must be some mistake, but as the drama unfolds the series explores how content viewed online, often in secret, can influence seemingly "nice, normal" boys into adopting misogynistic ideologies, which can have some devastating consequences for the women and girls living alongside them.

While the drama isn't based on any specific real-life incident, Graham has admitted that real-life crimes of a similar nature, involving young boys killing young girls, inspired the series.

And recent statistics certainly certainly seem to highlight that the need for stories like Adolescence has never been greater. A recent report by the National Audit Office (NAO) reveal one in 12 women can expect to experience some form of gender-based violence each year, while around one in four women will be a victim of sexual or attempted assault in their lifetime.

In 2021, the Ofsted Review of Sexual Abuse in Schools and Colleges revealed that 90% of girls and nearly 50% of boys had experienced sexist name-calling, unwanted sexual comments, or unwanted touching in school settings.

Should we be doing more to control what boys are viewing online? Have your say and your comment may be featured in our results article on Friday.

Part of the problem, as Adolescence explores, is the content young people are viewing online. Last year, a report found that the majority of UK boys aged 11-14 have been exposed to online content that promotes misogyny and other harmful views. With 69% of boys having encountered posts promoting misogyny, and 70% of teachers saying they had seen a rise in sexist language in the classroom over the last year.

The same report found that 42% of parents have heard their sons make inappropriate comments because of what they have seen online, including comments that were sexual, violent or degrading about women and girls.

The study warned that AI-powered algorithms pushing content to boys online was a key part of the issue, with the research indicating that such content was often being seen when users were searching for other, innocent material, such as fitness or gaming content.

Again an indication that this sort of content can reach the "ordinary" boys you'd perhaps assume would never engage in that kind of viewing.

The show's co-writer Jack Thorne is so concerned about the content young boys are viewing online he says the UK government "needs to do something" about "putting in legislation to restrict social media access".

"We need to be having conversations like Australia's having conversations where they're actually putting in legislation about restricting social media access," he told Sky News.

Describing the impact of viewing harmful content online he continued: "It teaches kids a logic, and it is logical that makes sense of the world for them in a really distorted, ugly way. And unless we look at that and talk about that, things are only going to get worse."

Graham also issued a call to action for parents to try to be "mindful" of the external influences working on their children. "There's influences that we have no idea of that are having profound effects on our young culture, profound effects, positive and extremely negative," he told Independent. "So it’s having a look at that and seeing that we’re all accountable.”

However, while some are calling for a ban on social media for under 16s as a way of tackling the problem, some experts don't believe that would offer a complete solution.

Peter Kyle, the secretary of state for science and technology, said back in November that a social media ban for under-16s is "not on the cards at the moment."

"There’s no work programme at the moment on banning smartphones to children,” he told the Guardian, adding: "It’s not my preferred choice."

He said he was impressed by the pace of improvement in age verification software and said that if it was even 70% accurate within a year, "that is keeping 70% of children safe from inappropriate content online".

So what do you think? Should we be worried about what are children, particularly boys, are viewing online, and should we be doing more to police it? Or would limiting under 16s access to social media be an over reaction?

Watch: Adolescence stars had never heard of incels before Netflix show

Come back on Friday to read the results and analysis via the link below.

Read more of Yahoo UK's Poll of the Week articles.