Pillow Talks: Sextortion, disability and navigating online relationships

When online interactions are often used to threaten or exploit someone, are disabled people being included in online safety conversations?
About this Event

For this edition of Pillow Talks, we’re bringing together perspectives from disability, cyber safety, sex and relationships education and gender-based violence to explore sextortion, online relationships and the support available when things go wrong.

Sextortion is a form of blackmail or coercion involving sexual or intimate material. Someone may threaten to share images, videos or information unless the person gives them money, sends more images, agrees to sexual activity or meets another demand.

It can happen in lots of different ways. Sometimes it begins through dating apps, social media, messaging or online relationships. In other cases, intimate material may be stolen, obtained through deception or coercion, recorded without consent, or even fabricated.

As more of our relationships and social lives take place online, understanding these risks matters. But conversations about online safety can also leave disabled people out, focus too heavily on vulnerability, or treat avoiding sex and relationships as the solution.

This discussion will look at sextortion through a wider lens: how disabled people navigate relationships online, what accessible sex and relationships education can do to support people, why recognising coercion is not always straightforward, and what happens when someone tries to ask for help.

We’ll explore questions including:

• What is sextortion, and what can it look like in practice?
• How can sextortion begin, both within and outside online relationships?
• What can make manipulation or exploitation difficult to recognise?
• Are disabled people getting enough accessible information about online relationships, sexual boundaries and digital safety?
• What barriers can disabled people face when reporting abuse or asking for support?
• How can we talk about online safety without infantilising disabled adults or denying them sexual and romantic autonomy?
• What would better prevention, education and support look like?

The conversation will also explore consent in online spaces: what consent means when sharing intimate images or information, how coercion can undermine it, and why accessible education about digital boundaries and sexual autonomy matters.

Speakers to be announced soon!

About Sex Ed for Grown Ups

This event is part of Sex Ed for Grown Ups, Pillow Talk Scotland’s disabled-led sex and relationships education programme in collaboration with Three Sisters Consultancy for disabled adults in Scotland who feel they missed out on this kind of education earlier in life.

The programme creates accessible, non-judgemental spaces to learn and talk about subjects including relationships, sexual health, consent, pleasure, disability and online safety.

Who is this event for?

This event is open to adults aged 18+. Disabled and neurodivergent people are particularly welcome as well as their carers and loved ones.

Please be aware that the discussion will include references to sexual coercion, intimate-image abuse, blackmail, exploitation and online abuse. You are welcome to step out at any point if you need to.

Accessibility

Project Ability is an accessible venue, and we want the event to be as welcoming and accessible as possible.

If there is anything we can do to support you to attend or take part, please let us know when booking. If you need a BSL interpreter for this session, please do send us an email to [email protected].