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The House of Lords had a three-hour debate today about porn .

As you may have guessed, they don't like it.

Browbeaten peers moaned about 'ugly, dirty, squalid sex', claimed porn shrinks people's brains and called for it to be a crime.

Unelected Lords in the debate, led by the Bishop of Chester, were allowed to claim £300 each for turning up.

They made some serious points, quoting reams of research about the harm pornography has on children and backing calls for stronger internet filters .

But they also made some bold claims, prompting complaints from some other peers that they should furnish their ideas with more hard evidence.

Here are some of the more unusual moments from the debate.

Read more:

1. 'There's too much ugly, squalid, dirty sex'

The Bishop of Chester kicked off the debate by getting very upset about 'squalid dirty sex'.

He said the 'innocent' sex in Chaucer or Renaissance art 'declined over the years into the brutality of modern pornography'.

Quoting from author DH Lawrence, he said porn was the 'catastrophe of our civilisation' adding: "Pornography is the attempt to insult sex, to do dirt on it.

"I am sure no other civilisation, not even the Roman, has showed such a vast proportion of ignominious and degraded nudity, and ugly, squalid, dirty sex".

2. 'Porn makes your brain smaller'

Tory peer Lord McColl of Dulwich got his knickers in a twist over the extraordinary claim porn makes your brain smaller.

He cited the study by the Max Planck Institute for Human Development and the Psychiatric University Hospital Charité at St Hedwig Hospital.

"The study used scans to examine the brain activity of 64 healthy men as they viewed sexually explicit and non-sexually explicit videos," he said.

"The results were published last year in the journal JAMA Psychiatry and revealed that constant pornography consumption can reduce the size of the parts of the brain that relate to reward."

He quoted a second study which compared porn addiction to drug addiction.

3. 'Making porn should be a crime'

Tory Lord Cormack powered through the debate by claiming he wasn't wanting to crack down on anyone.

But in a very well-chosen phrase, he then said: "There is a very big 'but', my Lords, here".

He called on ministers to make sure distributing porn becomes a 'very severe offence indeed' and said there should be 'punishments which really punish'.

"Those who purvey sadistic images, sex without love for commercial gain caring not whom they damage in the process, should be regarded as pariahs," he fumed.

"And we need to devise a proper structure and scheme to ensure that the penalties that those people face are enormous and potentially deterrent.

"To pollute the minds of the young is as damaging and despicable as to pollute the oceans."

4. 'Porn makes you get divorced'

The Bishop of Bristol was flummoxed by evidence that some couples like porn.

"I am not sure I understand this", the bashful bishop shrugged.

He pointed to other studies which showed 23% of 16 to 34 year olds reported porn had a negative impact on their relationship.

He added: "Last year, in the Journal of Family and Economic Issues, the results of an analysis of a large set of data collected annually in the USA since 1973 showed that adults who had watched an X-rated movie in the past year were more likely to be divorced and more likely to have had an extramarital affair when married."

5. 'The rise of porn is like Uber'

Labour peer Lord Giddens struggled to find something to compare the rise of porn to. So taxi app Uber was the perfect choice.

"Sexuality is being transformed at the same dramatic rate as some areas of business," he said.

"Think of the rise of Uber from nothing to a capital value of some £50bn - the same as General Motors - in less than six years, and apply the same principle to everyday life and emotions.

"In some ways, cybersex has become simply part and parcel of everyday sexuality."

6. 'Porn has caused incontinence'

Tory peer Lord Farmer raised issues no one will doubt is serious - from teenage boys persuading their girlfriends to have sex to the girls being victims of violence.

However, he also used some unusual language when he pointed to porn as the biggest culprit.

"Internal injuries can be caused by sex acts inspired by young men’s access to porn," he said.

"I have read about one family doctor working in a leafy suburb in the Home Counties treating growing numbers of teenage girls suffering from the after-effects of frequent anal sex, such as incontinence."

Tory minister Baroness Shields agreed to look into whether any statistics backed up the anecdote.

7. 'I know nothing about porn'

Lord Northbourne, a crossbench peer, happily admitted to knowing nothing about porn but decided to contribute to the debate anyway.

He'd read two reports on the subject so considered himself well-prepared.

Like many others, he said: "My Lords, I have to admit that I am not an expert on pornography.

"I took the liberty of putting my name down for this debate because I am very deeply concerned.

"Judging from two reports on pornography which I have read recently, pornography is a growing problem."

8. 'I don't know how to access the internet'

Fellow Tory Lord Framlingham (above left) was even more honest when he appeared to admit not knowing how the internet works.

"Life in the internet world, a world of flickering images, a world where we adults cannot join them, can seem a strange place to children," he said.

Making serious points about the need to protect youngsters, he added: "Children need limits."

9. 'The porn debate is like an omelette'

Yes, it's the Bishop of Chester again.

He closed today's debate by turning a time-honoured analogy on its head.

"Baroness Murphy asked, 'Does the chicken or the egg come first?'" he said.

"When you are looking at a chicken omelette, that question becomes a bit academic."

And finally... 'You're all talking a load of rubbish'

Okay, so academic psychiatrist Baroness Murphy didn't use those words.

But she did pour scorn on many of her colleagues' claims, saying the effect of porn was being overblown.

She added: "Forgive me using this language but pornography is there to aid masturbation. Much of the literature is about the impact of watching pornography without masturbating.

"I don't think we should leap to conclusions."