Slashdot Mirror
UK to Ban Possession of Certain 'Violent' Pornography
Backlash writes "Massive surveillance? Check. Building a DNA database? Check. Laws against thought crime? Not yet, but coming very soon. The UK government is soon to pass legislation that would criminalise possession of certain types of 'violent' pornography, even if it was part of a consensual session between two adults. Lord Wallace of Tankerness pointed out an ideological schism during last week's debate in the House of Lords: 'If no sexual offence is being committed it seems very odd indeed that there should be an offence for having an image of something which was not an offence. ... Having engaged in it consensually would not be a crime, but to have a photograph of it in one's possession would be a crime. That does not seem to make sense to me.'" Combine laws like this with widespread computer ownership, and it makes a whole lot of (Orwellian) sense.
Nazis!
The government is not your daddy. Its purpose is not to raid middle-class neighbors' wallets and give it to you.
Lord Tallace of Wankerness?
to go through my porn folders to tell me if I am breaking the law or not.
And before anyone here volunteers, you're going to need a fuckton of kleenex, eyebleach and anti-psychotic medication just to get through the folder names.
From FTA: "Five years ago Jane Longhurst, a teacher from Brighton, was murdered. It later emerged her killer had been compulsively accessing websites such as Club Dead and Rape Action, which contained images of women being abused and violated."
I agree that a substantial number of rapists and molesters and whatnot probably do get off on "violent" porn. But so do quite a few very normal people who will never rape someone. Consensual kink is a gorgeous thing, an expression of incredible trust. The fact that some rapists get off on it is insufficient to justify banning it, after all, last I heard quite a few rapists drink water and eat bread.
Of course, this parallels some sex laws already enacted where I live. It's legal to have sex with someone who's 16, provided you're not in a position of authority over them... But have a picture of you having sex with your 16 year old girlfriend? Not a wise move.
I think that both laws are ridiculous personally. If it's not illegal to do, then it shouldn't be illegal to represent digitally with a bunch of 1s and 0s.
Time for a serious reply: "Having engaged in it consensually would not be a crime, but to have a photograph of it in one's possession would be a crime."
Yeah.
No more fun for me and my British girlfriend. Time to put the whips and chains on ebay. (Although this is consistent with UK law that arrests citizens for gun possession, even if the gun was used to save my life. No crime committed except in the eyes of the British Moral Patrol.)
The government is not your daddy. Its purpose is not to raid middle-class neighbors' wallets and give it to you.
If fictionally depicting someone being raped or abused is a crime then surely horror flicks must be banned as well. Oh and the Die Hard movies too because they can be training tools for terrorists.
It's like the printing press all over again. We need to stop people from having access to "dangerous" information.
*rolls eyes*
erm, hang on... we in the uk already have laws against thought crime, this is just another one.
You can be convicted of possessing materials that might be useful to a terrorist or might be useful in the perpetration of terrorist acts... like survival handbooks and stuff like that
I'm happy to take pictures of myself in simulated violent acts with anyone, male or female, and post them to a free hosting account as an act of civil disobedience.
In the background of each picture will be two televisions. One will be playing scenes from the Iraq war, the other will be playing scenes from various British gangster films.
The real irony, though, is that this incredible level of control of information comes at a time when near-anarchy prevails in more important areas.
"The more corrupt the state, the more numerous the laws."
I really hope a revolution comes through in the near future. Someone needs to get rid of all these New World Order bastards who try passing every law they can think of to invade our rights and privacy.
This seems like a silly issue to post this comment in, but this is something that seems to pervade many facets of our lives today.
In a world that is increasingly connected; where slavery and human trafficking are increasing; one has to draw a line somewhere in the sand to mark where civilization ends and barbarism begins... don't you think?
Orwell was an optimist.
"Did you really think that we want those laws to be observed?" said Dr. Ferris. "We want them broken. You'd better get it straight that it's not a bunch of boy scouts you're up against - then you'll know that this is not the age for beautiful gestures. We're after power and we mean it. You fellows were pikers, but we know the real trick, and you'd better get wise to it. There's no way to rule innocent men. The only power any government has is the power to crack down on criminals. Well, when there aren't enough criminals, one makes them. One declares so many things to be a crime that it becomes impossible for men to live without breaking laws. Who wants a nation of law-abiding citizens? What's there in that for anyone? But just pass the kind of laws that can neither be observed nor enforced nor objectively interpreted - and you create a nation of law-breakers - and then you cash in on guilt. Now, that's the system, Mr. Rearden, that's the game, and once you understand it, you'll be much easier to deal with."
from theregister, the new logo of UK's Office of Government Commerce: http://www.theregister.co.uk/2008/04/22/ogc_logo/
Colorless green Cthulhu waits dreaming furiously.
Though outright outlawing this type of material is only going to push it underground and do nothing to stop those who really want to consume it, I wonder if it isn't in society's best interest to at least monitor and track those who do consume "aberrant" pornography. If Joe Perv just gets his kicks from watching women raped and tortured but is otherwise a fine upstanding citizen, then a quick background scan would show him to be relatively safe (as safe as any other fine upstanding citizen) and no further monitoring is necessary. However, if Jim Proto-Raper who had a troubled childhood and a history of torturing animals is also jerking it to torture porn, wouldn't it be useful to keep an eye on him in case his behavior patterns change for the worse (perhaps his porn preferences get more and more violent over time).
I'm not saying you need to run a background check every time you want to rent Slut Teachers Get What They Deserve VI. Just that there is a balance to keep between protecting the citizenry from potentially dangerous people and allowing people the freedom to consume whatever vices they need.
FTFA, it looks like the reasoning for the introduction of such legislation stems from someone watching said pr0n and murdering a woman...this is a huge step backwards for people taking responsibility for their own actions. What, the pr0n made him kill her? Come on.
I'm wondering what other images will become illegal because they elicit violence...perhaps it will be illegal to draw a picture of Muhammad too? Just my 2 cents.
Quiz: True or False -- On a scale of 1 to 10, what is your middle name?
I am sure "V for Victory" sales just went up again.
Lifestyles of the Poor and Obscure involves sex with a prostitute. It isn't graphic, however. But an earlier journal, NSFW does contain graphic descriptions of a sex act, although it is revealed in the story that the sex is in fact only a dream. The journal "Dork Side of the Moon concerns an attempted murder, as does Ask Slashdot: Women (which also has hookers, as do many other of my journals).
If they pass this stupid law will I have to add a disclaimer that EU residents may be incarcerated for reading my journals?
It seems that the US and the UK are in a fucktarded race to see who can become the worst police state. I pointed out in yet another journal, Police State: In USSA, cops hassle YOU! as well as a blagh on my site (down at the moment) that the US is in fact already a police state, and that any country that uses secret police (in the US they're called "undercover agents" or "plainclothesmen") IS a police state.
At leat in the UK they're not torturing people or holding them without trial, as we do in Guantanimo. But I guess given enough time, they will.
-mcgrew
mcgrew's razor: Never attribute to stupidity that which can be explained by greedy self-interest
As the law stands in the UK you have have sex at 16 lawfully but can not take photographs or record it on video as the participants are under 18.
I know, it's ridiculous, just as this proposed law is.
I am fine with this. People who have pics of people doing corpses or animals, or pics of people basicly ripping someone apart or killing them are screwed up big time. Anyone that gets off on that sort of thing needs to have their head checked. This law dosent affect soft stuff like bondage, it just affects the stuff that would be illegal to do to another person.
Ponder the combination of age of consent laws allowing sexual activity at 16 with child pornography laws making it illegal to posses sexual images of someone under 18. That's a two year window where it's legal to do it, but illegal to keep a picture for later.
And what about hentai anime? A LOT of the hentai stuff I've seen has been, ah, rather rape-based, sometimes with tentacles, and sometimes otherwise (yes, I will admit now I've seen a lot, and even own a few titles on laserdisc). So does the UK law cover that sort of thing? Its often extreme, sometimes far more disturbing than anything in possible "reality," but it isn't that much less "real" than pornography with actual people.
I am playing devil's advocate here, but the government has a job to maintain a safe and working society. There are laws that restrict personal freedoms because they have a bad effect on society. For example, guns were banned. Again I'm not saying any individual action is correct, but they do have that power. A logical argument could be made that consensual acts in private by a small number of people does not have the same negative impact on society that wide distribution of depictions of those acts would. So, the importnat questions here are: are there things that the UK government _cannot_ restrict in the interest of protecting society? Is the material in question one of those things? Are the materials really harmful (and, according to who) to the extent that they need to be banned? If you are going to make an argument either pro or con regarding banning, you need to answer questions like these.
While there is a market for violent pornography or child pornography, criminals will supply it. In doing so I doubt they will consider the civil rights of those forced to take part.
That is why, to my mind, even though it may be of limited effectiveness, it is right to make possession of this material illegal. Anything you can do to destroy or disrupt the market is attacking the revenue stream that makes the criminals do it in the first place. If you cannot persuade people that they should not pay other people to abuse, rape and beat strangers for their entertainment - then more stringent sanctions are needed.
The situation is rather different from, say, drug legislation. Poor farmers grow drugs in Colombia and Afghanistan because they pay better and travel better than vegetables. They don't care if rich Westerners want to die early from hepatitis. Here, people are being physically maltreated and the rich Westerners suffer no unpleasant consequences at all (or if they do, it's because they enjoy being whipped - it takes all sorts.)
Those who saw bits of the Mosley tape will be aware that he apparently paid money to beat (and be beaten by) prostitutes, and may wonder what compulsion the prostitutes were under to put up with this kind of treatment. How much money would it take for you to do that willingly? I just can't easily express how proud I am of the fact that, during the 1930s, my father and his Jewish friends threw bricks at Mosley's father.
From scarped cliff or quarried stone she cries "A thousand types are gone, I care for nothing, no not one."
There are two parallel failures to distinguish reality from fantasy here:
1 -- The usual way. Regular grown up people know that pornography is not real life and that many things that are fun to fantasize about would be unwise, unhygienic, fatal etc. in real life.
2 -- This crackdown on everything, and this massive effort to gather data and powers, come at a time when actual street crime is very high, white-collar crime has drastically undermined the UK's 'level playing field', and policies from tax to immigration seem to be selected without any hope of actually implementing them. In other words, the real fantasy here is the fantasy that the UK government can really control the things around it -- and I'm much afraid the government has confused that pleasant fantasy with reality, and that they will only pile on more regulations and powers as actual ability to influence events at ground level slips from their grasp.
Note that this is subtly different from the US situation. In the US, there's been a scramble for new data and powers, but I never have the feeling that the Executive branch has too *little* control...
Also, thank fuck for the House of Lords. There are few elected representatives who'll speak out on an issue that's got the word 'pornography' stuck to it.
Whence? Hence. Whither? Thither.
Man it's going to suck to be thrown in the slammer just for owning the System of a Down song.
If two 17 year olds are married and they make a porn movie of themselves, they are criminals, even though as married people both are considered adults in most US states.
Knowledge is how to play a game, intelligence is how to win, wisdom is knowing what game to play.
No you horny and inncensitive clods! Rule is alot simpler: just 2 porns a day!
GTA4 released.
Obligatory resurrection of the 'game|porn|voices in my head|song|insert your own whackjob excuse here' horse.
If this manages to become law I propose that everyone in Britain find 1) a buddy and 2) a surveillance camera. Then engage in some consensual "violent" kinkiness with the first in front of the second.
The Statue of Liberty is America's lawn jockey.
Looks like they watched the recently released movie
Without coming down either side of this, how is banning a type of picture a "thought crime"?
"Obviously anything that leads to violence against women has to be taken very seriously," says Baroness Miller.
Why is it just violence against women that needs to be taken very seriously? It should read "Obviously anything that leads to violence has to be taken very seriously."
Another example of reverse sexism and societies uncaring attitudes towards men.
I love Jesus, I Love that blood dripping from his wounds, I like the way he's scantly dressed, I wank over his image so much I could become a nun.
Now that their banning this kind of imagery it looks like my Jesus wanking days are over.
thank God the internet isn't a human right.
However, something like this ban where it may be a film of consensual 'violent' sex...maybe simulated rape....just isn't right. What if you take the people out of it completely....and use computer generated images for rape, snuff or kiddie crap. If someone wants to create and view those images, aside from someone having morality problems....no crime has been committed, and therefore what is the problem with people creating, owning and viewing such content if they are adult?
This brings up something I see coming...with the seeming 'rash' of young teens today, filming themselves beating the shit out of other teens, or even older people....when will we see a ban on these types of video content? Sure, it isn't sexual, but, someone is being hurt...seriously in some cases. Will we see bans on that, or is it not sensational enough since it didn't involve any ones naughty parts?
Light travels faster than sound. This is why some people appear bright until you hear them speak.........
I've a vague recollection of a prosecution following this pattern.
I don't see how this is "thought police", no one is stopping people from doing the things, nor from thinking about it, just from possessing images which it would be illegal to produce in the UK.
after the hours spent in the rat helmet, I can truthfully say, I love Big Brother.
Hey! Look a Distraction!
The law is not designed to be used against the population (but, of course, it will be), it's just an easy was to prevent paparazi to blackmail goverment members using pictures of their weekend activities.
I do dislike violence and i support movement against crimes. But I totally against having another law. European countries tendency to become communist and that scares me. I believe that only God, someone almighty, can judge one and punish one's sin. Law does not stop any crime to happen. It only serves to protect victim. People make mistakes. Everyone does. It is going back to "eye for eye" logic. it doesn't work. People were never so naive and obedient. People just started to express more open-minded and honest. People just need to realize that only solution is to seek the truth and be modest at best. I believe that this is the only solution and it is too bad that people doesn't buy that anymore.
Isn't part of this concerned with the fact that it can be hard to tell if a violent sex act is simulate, consensual or real?
I know the law regarding child pornography errs on the side of caution, outlawing photoshopped pictures even if it's just a kids head on a naked body.
"V" for Vendetta. Talk about a joke going flat...
You can have sex at 16 in the UK but as far as I'm aware you can't photograph it for pornographic purposes until you're 18. I always found this equally odd.
Oh wait that's no analogy. OK, pornography is like photos of feet. How's that for a bad analogy? Well, it really isn't, and in fact is not an analogy at all! I shall explain:
Define "violent". Define "pornography". Ok, let the dictionary do it:Ok, now we have two more problems: defining "Obscene" and more importantly "art". I commented earlier that some of my journals were obscene, and I would argue that they have "little or no artistic merit" as well.I know a fellow (the one in Dork Side of the Moon, the one who committed the attempted murder that he spent two weeks in the county jail for) who has a foot fetish. A woman with small feet excites him sexually. By the dictionary definition I just quoted, pictures of feet are then obscene.
Obscenity is in the mind of the beholder. This law makes every writing, painting, photograph, drawing, print, and sculpture against the law. Better close your museums!
mcgrew's razor: Never attribute to stupidity that which can be explained by greedy self-interest
"If no sexual offence is being committed it seems very odd indeed that there should be an offence for having an image of something which was not an offence. ... Having engaged in it consensually would not be a crime, but to have a photograph of it in one's possession would be a crime. That does not seem to make sense to me."
It's legal for me to sleep with a 16 year old girl here in Indiana, but I can't photograph the act. I guess that could be considered a special case because it involves a minor. I just wanted to be the devil's advocate, even though I agree with the other side in this case.
All you need to do is email photos of violent pornography to people in parliament. (Best to do this from an account overseas) Then send anonymous tips to the police that they have those images on their computers.
Help! I'm a slashdot refugee.
This sort of thing was really inevitable. I mean if you are going to ban porn with anyone over arbitrary age X, surely it is only being consistent to ban any other depiction of something that would be illegal if it were real. Slippery slope. And the slide will continue. While I do realize that in most cases the original act was probably legal this is difficult to know for certain. This is one difference from child porn where the original act was without a doubt illegal. However I do predict that violence in films and video games will eventually be targeted on both sides of the Atlantic. At least in some cases it can be shown to incite violence as well. Of course Hollywood is a powerful lobby on this side of the pond. So the UK will probably beat us to that particular milestone. Personally I find the idea of violence of any kind in porn to be a lot more offensive than any depiction of physical affection.
Quite an experience to live in fear, isn't it? That's what it is to be a slave.
Stuff That Matters.
/* No Comment */
That goatse will be banned?
What an absolutely amazing solution. Instead of dealing with people traffickers and abuse of women we'll hide it all from public view by making it illegal hence pushing it underground so that it only continues in the background where no one can see it and no one need care whilst simultaneously removing the personal freedoms of those innocent people who enjoy BDSM in an absolutely harmless manner.
What pure genius, have you thought about working as a law maker for the British government?
Of course this new law is obscene, but the concept of having photographs/video of something that's legal being illegal is not new (even if the reasons are different in that case).
Spelling mistakes, grammatical errors, and stupid comments are intentional.
"If no sexual offence is being committed it seems very odd indeed that there should be an offence for having an image of something which was not an offence... Having engaged in it consensually would not be a crime, but to have a photograph of it in one's possession would be a crime. That does not seem to make sense to me."
This is true for porn involving only minors. If two sixteen year olds (or something under the consent age wherever you are) have consensual sex with each other, that's effectively legal, at least to the extent neither of them are going to be prosecuted. What, did they each commit statutory rape by having sex with a minor? Do you prosecute them both for raping each other? In reality, if this is even illegal at all, it's ignored. But taking pictures of it, having those pictures, selling those pictures, that's highly illegal. So we already have the situation he's describing as "very odd indeed."
I think the current laws operate on the presumption that, if you're photographing it, you "put them up to it." While this would, in most cases regarding underage pornography, be true, I don't think there's any sort of legal distinction being made here. That is, if you're trafficking in underage pornography, I don't think the prosecutors care whether you recruited kids and put them up to it, or whether you used a hidden camera to unknowingly capture what kids were doing entirely on their own. In the former case, you probably can be charged with corrupting a minor or such if you encourage or facilitate sex between minors regardless of the pornography aspect, so Lord Wallace's assertion doesn't apply to that scenario, the act itself is illegal. But in the later case, we're dealing with exactly the same situation as the one they're currently trying to criminalize- an act where it's not illegal for the minors to engage in sex, but it's hellaciously illegal to document and sell it.
I'm certainly NOT arguing in favor of this new law- I think that pretty much any act taking place between and affecting only consenting adults should be legal. I'm also not arguing againts the existing laws categorically banning underage pornography. I'm just pointing out that Lord Wallace's objection makes it sound like this would create an unusual and novel situation because it would be illegal to record an otherwise legal act. This is not the case, it's already illegal to record otherwise legal sexual acts.
Can anyone tell me how to set my sig on Slashdot?
It actually pains me that the unelected house is the only thing keeping the governments nastiest instincts in check now. British people have become so politically impotent that we rely on the munificence of aristocrats to safeguard our liberty.
That said, there is probably no legislative body on Earth so qualified to stand up for deviant sexual practices.
If we can put a man on the moon, why can't we shoot people for Apollo-related non-sequiturs?
They are only criminals if found guilty in a court of law. Lets re-write your statement to....
"If two 17 year olds are married and they make a [sexually explicit] movie of themselves [and distribute it], they [may face criminal charges], even though as married people both are considered adults in most US states."
There is a big difference between being brought up on charges and convicted... i'm not sure if a court would convict a married couple so long as their intention is to make some erotica for private viewing. If their intention was to get married just so they could make legal-kiddypron, then yeah, they'd get the book thrown at them.
So, please can someone tell me, so as not to fall foul of the law and be branded some kind of sex offender:
1. As a UK citizen am I breaking any laws (inc. this proposed law) when visiting http://www.captivemale.com./
2. As a UK citizen am I breaking any laws (inc. this proposed law) by having downloaded and stored material such as that from http://www.captivemale.com?
Please. This is a serious question.
This sig has been deprecated.
A 'quick background scan' on Dennis Rader would show he had a bachelors degree in Justice Administration and worked for the city and was on city advisory panels, was a cub scout troop leader (who didn't abuse boys), was the president of his church's congregation panel, and a father with two grown children and a marriage of over 25 years.
He was also the BTK serial killer (BTK standing for bind, torture, kill.)
The only reason police caught him was his own stupidity. He actually asked (in his letters to the police and their response through a newspaper) whether a floppy disk could be traced back to the person who had created it. They said of course not, he sent them a disk, they got metadata from deleted files with his name and the name of his church all over it.
Unfortunately not all criminals are that stupid.
And even worse, what are the characteristics that you will use to determine what is dangerous? Unless you use prior criminal arrests for violent crimes, you are profiling. That's an unfortunate part of law enforcement, which I understand is somewhat necessary for screening. However to use profiling to limit the activities one may engage in lawfully is even more repulsive. "Sorry Mr Smith, you are not allowed to possess BDSM pron because of your age, gender, race, religion, hairstyle, and music tastes as indicated by your iPod. If you were gay or a woman or had just a bit more Yanni on your iPod, it would be fine... What? Oh, that's your wife's pron? Oh, OK. That's fine then. Have a good day."
Ok so I may be a hardcore SM freak and like similar pictures, but whose business is it except mine and my partners. It's not like im gonna go yeah lets go and fuck up this old granny or whatever. I was brought up to know right and wrong (and thats all this is really, or more accuratly the difference between reality and make believe) I can seperate reality from make believe.
;)
However, one interesting question is this. If I take photographs of my hardcore S/M activities with Girlfriend, and get raided by the filth, whats the point because I have already gone one better than merely looking at pictures, i've actually done the deed. Man, if the law catches me, im screwed. Time for double rot encryption i think
http://www.writeitfor.us - Writing IT for the IT generation.
Already, violent sex acts between consenting adult individuals are banned in the UK - look up the Spanner case. All this bill does is make an illegal act in the UK illegal to possess pictures of.
The role of the writer is not to say what we can all say, but what we are unable to say. -Anais Nin
Just don't take a picture.
Remember that Guy Fawkes fellow? Perhaps it's time to try that one again, only don't fuck it up.
"The state has no place in the bedrooms of the nation." - Pierre Trudeau, 1967
Additionally, what this means is that the seriousness of a crime has little or no relevance any more over here. And since someone driving at 7mph over the speed limit is deemed to be committing a "crime", it's far easier for our police to sit in the backs of their cars with speed cameras in the middle of major roads catching "criminals" than it is to put the large amount of detection resources to solve a rape or murder.
Likewise, our glorious government has chosen to put CCTV cameras everywhere which means that someone who drops a piece of litter can be fined but a mugger in a hooded sweatshirt won't be identifiable on camera. They've done this because despite grossly high taxation here, there is a huge waste of public money in this country with our own Members of Parliament being able to put in unlimited expense claims for anything from decorating their own houses, employing unqualified members of their own families and, yes, even claiming for widescreen TVs on expenses.
So now we have cameras just about everywhere, our government wants to exercise more control over us. Quite clearly, trying to scare us that there are millions of paedophiles prowling the Internet and every street corner hasn't worked because, in practice, there has been no real change in the number of sex crimes against children. Consequently, despite playing the "terrorism" card against us all, they can still find little or no justification to monitor what everyone does on the Internet as they would really like to do.
Therefore, the solution is to turn more of the easily-targetted "great unwashed" into criminals by extending the pornography laws as above - this allows them to continue with their "Internet is dangerous" arguments in the hope of gaining control of it.
Incidentally, I have no personal interest in that type of pornographic material but I am a firm believer (like the judge) in that anything that goes on between consenting adults is up to them - so if they're into violent sex and want to film it to sell it to someone else, then let them get on with it if they all agree to it.
Gentoo Linux - another day, another USE flag.
In American rating systems, one of the chief rules that seperates rated R from X, is the number of thrusts seen on screen in any sex scene (hence all those rapid cuts you see in any given sex scene).
So are the Brits going to determine violent pornography by how many times someone swats their partner on the ass, saying "Who's yer daddy?"?
Just because you can mod me down, doesn't mean you're right. Shoes for industry!
17 aint kiddy porn, no matter how you cut it. I know the US has some odd laws but even they wouldn't call a 17 year old a child.
Under this law, no-one will be able to be completely sure they are not breaking the law. For example, the Bill even covers clips taken from mainstream films, so if someone decides that clip you have from "Mr and Mrs Smith" is disturbingly violent (because Angelina Jolie kills the man after whipping him) then you could be in trouble. Are we going to have a future full of laws that leave us in a state of fear and anxiety over whether we are criminals or not? It's amazing how they can find the time to pass ridiculous laws like this, but can't find the time for a full and independent inquiry into the Iraq War, or introducing Proportional Representation as they promised.
Of course, you could go and protest about this outside parliament, or a least you could before they made it an offence.
I find your ideas disturbing and wish to unsubscribe from your newsletter.
Obligatory Soundbite Catchphrase
So an adult couple having consensual (if unorthodox) sex is ok, probably also the couple taking pictures of themselves. But as soon as the pictures are taken, and on the film/memory-card, the couple are suddenly criminals due to the possession of those pictures they just taken?
/ The Arrow
"How lovely you are. So lovely in my straightjacket..." - Nny
Time for a serious reply: "Having engaged in it consensually would not be a crime, but to have a photograph of it in one's possession would be a crime."
Yeah.
No more fun for me and my British girlfriend. Time to put the whips and chains on ebay. Although no crime was committed, the British Moral Patrol need to punish us for filming/photographing our acts.
Reminds me of Americans.
The government is not your daddy. Its purpose is not to raid middle-class neighbors' wallets and give it to you.
1) they don't have to distribute it to face criminal charges. If the police find out for any reason, such as finding in the course of an unrelated criminal investigation or if a nosy house-guest or computer-repair person finds it and reports it, they will be arrested.
2) all it takes for the court to convict is a DA that wants to prosecute and a jury that would rather follow the letter of the law than do a jury nullification. After all, they are technically guilty.
Knowledge is how to play a game, intelligence is how to win, wisdom is knowing what game to play.
Am I the only one who wants to rename the peer in the story Lord Tall-Ass of Wankerness?
Even England is suppposed to be one of the good guys, but it looks like the government there is using 1984 as an instruction manual, not a warning. Even Europe is one of the "good places", yet if the Allies didn't win WWII the whole world would have been a very nasty place indeed. And WWII was started by a country that used to be democratic, before the Nazis took over.
Many of the current and recent governments in the world specialize in abuse and killing to keep and maintain power. Creating laws to keep the population in control would be child's play to them. What makes you so certain that human nature is different in America than in the rest of the world?
Quoth Noe:
There is no line between art and pornography. You can make art of anything. You can make an experimental movie with that candle or with this tape recorder. You can make a piece of art with a cat drinking milk. You can make a piece of art with people having sex. There is no line. Anything that is shot or reproduced in an unusual way is considered artistic or experimental.
Just raise the tax on anal sex.. that should put a stop to most of it!!
You know what's more fucking hilarious? Movies depicting realistic murder situations are considered harmless by these people. Or at least not as bad as rape. Rape bad, yes, but necessarily worse than murder by definition?
More prudish bullshit by people who have no concept of responsibility.
The BBC have taken off the comments from the web-page. Probably because they were a) too many and (b) too liberal.
The whole case really is too much. It's irrational, it's making sloppily worded laws based on cases taken out of context. Opportunist politicians trying to look good for the newspapers. Cracking down on 'crime.' It's the thinnest end of the wedge. It offends me in the deepest possible sense. I hope, now, that the court cases that arise out of this case - and I think they will come thick and fast and very soon - will, literally, be laughed out of court. I hope that an administrative review will be called.
Patriotism is a virtue of the vicious
The British politicians are acting like American politicians!
(morality police)
The government is not your daddy. Its purpose is not to raid middle-class neighbors' wallets and give it to you.
Please remember that this is in the UK, not the US. Despite the best efforts of our politicians, we are not the US and we do have cultural differences.
Actually I doubt that under UK law (or the individual laws of many US States) people do have such rights. The extreme Pelagianism of US Law simply has no place in Europe. At the bottom of it all is the definition of "consensual".
Pelagianism, the root of Protestantism, believes that people are responsible for their own decisions every minute of the day. It points inevitably to the death penalty, (because in this view it is always a conscious decision borne of "sin" to commit murder) and the idea that provided people agree to do something that does not affect others, that makes it permissible. (Of course US lawmakers then get into a total tangle over, say, abortion...but I guess you may believe that US law can be irrational too.)
The anti-Pelagian trend in Europe accepts that often people do not do things that they want to do although apparently they consent. Therefore, for instance, the law may intervene when a man beats up a woman even though she declines to press charges, on the basis that her consent was not voluntary and that her silence arises from fear rather than consent. Domestic violence in Europe is not a consensual act. I do not know the legal position in the US, but I would be surprised if individual States did not have laws about it.
At which point does violent sex turn into a criminal act? At what point do pictures cease to be a matter of private titillation and become evidence of a crime? That is the issue that lawmakers have to deal with.
The extreme position taken by many posters on this thread is that, in effect, sexual violence is permissible provided that you cannot find someone to testify against it, and that therefore it is permissible to sell pictures of what may be criminal acts for gain. I cannot see that as being a rational position, and it is in fact quite illegal under English law for a criminal to profit in this way from a crime.
I notice that many posters are in fact talking about cartoons and unreal violence. In my original post I was clearly (I thought) referring to material which was photographic and therefore a recording of real world acts. But this seems to have been missed by the "libertarians".
From scarped cliff or quarried stone she cries "A thousand types are gone, I care for nothing, no not one."
What, precisely, does everyone expect?
When you not only expect but DEMAND that someone else take care of your every whim: I can't get a job, the government should pay me! My job sucks, but I had 16 children anyway, the government should pay me! I didn't finish school because, well, I didn't want to, but the government should train me! I'm hooked on drugs, the government should provide a program to get me off them and then train me to be a human again. I can't afford a home, the government should house me! I live BELOW SEA LEVEL but the government should rebuild my home when it floods! Etc. etc. ad infinitum ad nauseum.
When you surrender your individual sovereignty in so many ways, is it so surprising that this monster you've created starts to take on a life of its own? When the government is paying for our health care, are we surprised that the government starts to circumscribe our dangerous, self-destructive activities for "our own good"? First it's risky sports, then smoking, then other less clear 'risky behaviours'. When our fear of (terrorists/pedophiles/boogeymen) impels us to allow our government to surveil our every activity, restrict our movements, and even peruse our private messages without outcry, does it surprise anyone that some bureaucratic moralist will start to define what's 'permissible' according to his own particular morality?
Bah, we've gotten PRECISELY the government we deserve. We sit at home, hypnotized by television or playing meaningless games on the internet, while the real world crumbles outside our doors. Ever see Brazil?
And as far as a legal activity being illegal in some other form, you should try smoking in the states. Cigarettes are legal to buy, own, and smoke...just not anywhere specifically. You can probably get away with it now in your own car, but certainly not if it's a rental. Mark my words, soon enough they will ban smoking in people's private homes because little Billy comes to school with colds all the time.*
* and I'm not even a smoker, never have been.
-Styopa
http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/ld200708/ldhansrd/text/80421-0015.htm
As you can read it isn't as cut and dried as the BBC article claims (but then it never is). There are some great quotes in there - especially about '[keeping it inside and not] frightening the horses [in the stree]'.
The Obscene Publications Act covers pretty much most things
Spot on. Makes me wonder if they're gonna try to ban furry porn as well, given that, if you squint the right way (... or the wrong one), it could probably fall under animal porn. ... Mind you, it might be fun to sic all the furries in UK at the government's ass.
"Massive surveillance?" in public areas Good.
"Building a DNA database?" Good.
"Laws against thought crime? Not yet, but coming very soon." very soon? Well, FUD seems to be already here.
I will add my points
"Massive liberal idiocy" check.
"Absurdist pushing "freedoms" to the insane limits" check.
I do not believe in karma. "Funny"=-6. Do good and forbid evil. Yours, Oft-Offtopic Flamebaiting Troll.
Lord Wallace of Tankerness - you guys ought to elect this guy President, or whatever you have over there.
not in the UK - we're getting to the stage where there's little difference between being arrested and being convicted.
doesn't this article make you guys think of system of a down? ya know, "violent pornography"?
i'll bet one of those lawwy guys just had a bad day when someone played that song just a little too loud. voila, now we know how the UK legal system works.
Murder and assault are illegal and should be. However, in the US we've introduced the idea of 'hate' crimes that are crimes above and beyond the actions taken. These crimes are based not on your actions but who the victim is and your possible feelings about the victim.
Worse even though you may be found not guilty of the Murder/assault there have been cases where people are re-tried under the thought-crime.. er. uh. excuse me hate-crime statute even though it seems to violate double jeopardy protection.
Even more on point as far as this article are concerned the FBI ran an sting that resulted in arrests for simply following links they put out there to catch people looking for child porn. Hope they remembered to disallow fasterfox from doing pre-fetch on the sites to avoid people who got a click away and had their browser commit the crime for them.
There's a reason the US has the worlds largest prison population by percentage.
If these people even want to talk about banning any type of pornography, they should be forced to show exactly which pornography they "get off on".
The results? Either they are into "missionarypositionasgodintendedit.com", or they aren't into pornography. If they aren't "into" pornography...that simply raises the question of their credibility and makes them seem "less human". Either way, there's bound to be (In a room of over 10 people, which I imagine there was to get this law written up) at least one guy with a fetish other people find disgusting.
Personally though, I believe everyone has some fetish other people find disgusting. Even if they don't know it yet. The simple fact I know some people are disgusted by "normal sex"...
Either way, this is the government getting into our private lies and doing more than...well...protecting our lives and right to private properties.
Ginga no Rekshiya Mata Each page.
The gov't distributed it and controlled it.
They should encourage the use of the Diehard series for training - it would be a useful counter-terrorism move.
for anyone looking for a conspiracy , this must an attempt to bury the Max Mosley video :)
17 aint kiddy porn, no matter how you cut it. I know the US has some odd laws but even they wouldn't call a 17 year old a child.
*sigh*
You underestimate the level of stupid fundies produce.
***Caveat: audio is NSFW - PLEASE MUTE YOUR SPEAKERS***
The Internet is for porn
or two hatching such plots. They are the ones who own the politicians. Perhaps it's not really insidious as all that though. Prisons mean more jobs for constituents, and more contributions from privatized corrections companies. Prisons also provide free labor. It's just the usual motive - money.
A large part of the motivating force behind this law are the anti-pornography feminists. The rhetoric about how porn causes women to be harmed and creates crime is right out of radfem literature. Anyone who has read even part of the following will recognize this:
Pornography: Men Possessing Women - Andrea Dworkin
Getting Off: Pornography and the End of Masculinity - Robert Jensen
Or maybe you should try reading a few anti-porn feminist blogs:
http://binthebunny.wordpress.com/
http://charliegrrl.wordpress.com/category/anti-porn-activism/
http://www.swapcampaign.co.uk/
These anti-porn feminists have been waging a gorilla war against porn for the better part of 4 decades. This law is just the beginning of what they'd like to see. They seriously believed that porn causes women to be raped and that seeing porn turns men into rapists. They don't get a lot of attention because most people think they're nuts. I'd say that their success in getting this law as far as it has gotten should change that. If you don't want to live in a society where porn is banned because those in power believe that it turns men into rapists, then you'd better start paying more attention to what radicals like these are doing - and opposing it.
A large part of the motivating force behind this law are the anti-pornography feminists. The rhetoric about how porn causes women to be harmed and creates crime is right out of radfem literature. Anyone who has read even part of the following will recognize this:
Pornography: Men Possessing Women - Andrea Dworkin
Getting Off: Pornography and the End of Masculinity - Robert Jensen
Also you should try reading a few anti-porn feminist blogs:
http://binthebunny.wordpress.com/
http://charliegrrl.wordpress.com/category/anti-porn-activism/
http://www.swapcampaign.co.uk/
These anti-porn feminists have been waging a gorilla war against porn for the better part of 4 decades. This law is just the beginning of what they'd like to see. They seriously believed that porn causes women to be raped and that seeing porn turns men into rapists. They don't get a lot of attention because most people think they're nuts. I'd say that their success in getting this law as far as it has gotten should change that. If you don't want to live in a society where porn is banned because those in power believe that it turns men into rapists, then you'd better start paying more attention to what radicals like these are doing - and opposing it.
shhhhh. Don't let on that 17 years olds are NOT kids any more. The priests will be very disappointed. They need some fantasy too you know...
Sorry too lazy to find my password and username.
I think the whole free speech issue is getting out of hand lately.
Not everything that can be done should be done.
I mean really: Sex with animals, actions that cause harm to someone's body? Why should anyone do perverted things like that?
Also there are complaints about the wording which includes "actions that 'seem' to harm someone". Of course they need to put that. Otherwise you can just make it look like tearing someone's anus apart and someone else seeing that picture will want to give it a shit themselves - and you all know how many stupid people are out there who won't understand it's not a real situation.
As for myself: I hope that mother gets her way. Hopefully it will bring peace to her mind.
from the heart of your parents basement, wacking off to bondage porn, you stab at the true evil in society, censorship.
of course, poverty stricken teenagers having sex under high pressure circumstances, such as being taken to remote locations without provision for transport back if they 'back out', or heavy mental pressure, playing on their addictions and/or abuse histories,,,,,,, well i guess ill never see a slashdot story (or poster) pointing out the evil of that.... i guess it has nothing to do with computers? or does it?
Atleast in sweden it is not difficult to discern a pattern behind the various politicians and the laws they support. Those who are vocal against child porn are enemies of porn in general, and i am sure they will embrace the UK's decision to adapt this law. I am sure they will even suggest we should copy it here in sweden. After all, we already have a law against child pornographic drawings (prison sentence w00t!). They're just going to wait a couple of years and then make a blatant copy of this piece of shit law, and then it will get accepted and we'll get even more sex criminals. It's not like we're not among the worst countries in europe when it comes to the amount of sex crimes reported...
There's been some recent debate in sweden about another change in the child porn law that would not only set a definite minimum age of 18 for all participation in porn (right now the definition is basically: If she looks old enough, she is old enough) it would also allow for porn with models OVER the age of eighteen to be "child porn" if the model LOOKS like she is younger. Thus it has nothing to do with protecting children whatsoever. But what is interesting is a statement made by one of the supporters after the law. The supporter was asked about what her opinion is when it concerns porn that could be "borderline" illegal. Her reply, whose exact phrasing i've forgotten, essentially was "People should stay away from any porn that is borderline". Basically: Stay away from porn with women younger than 25.
Thomas Bodström, former minister of law, who is involved in recent debates on swedish child porn laws is, not surprisingly, also involved in the fight against piracy. The connection isn't entirely obvious until you realize that the swedish national "child porn filter" has been used to block The Pirate Bay. Bodström was also the minister who ordered the raid on piratebay some years ago. The fight against porn (and child porn) goes hand in hand with the fight on piracy. As the wider they can make the definition of child porn, the more websites they can shut out with the filter. Feminazis also back the child porn laws, as the wider the definition is, the more legal porn is suddenly illegal. These women love their Andrea Dworkin.
I think it's disgusting that important issues like free speech are always wrapped up in issues of filth like this.
Fine, censoring porn hurts free speech, and hurting free speech is bad, but the fact that there are people who want this kind of stuff is scary, disgusting and an example of how sad and pathetic parts of our world has become.
There is nothing respectable in some man fantasizing about raping/killing women, and don't ever confuse your 'right' to free speech to mean that you are involved with anything but the most despicable, disgusting of things.
You want free speech? Fine. It's what you do with your freedome that determines what kind of person you are.
Who makes the call of what's sick and what's not? Your problem with the law is about how its boundaries cannot be defined. Personally, my problem with the law is that it would allow someone (government? a panel of psychologists maybe? parents? religious figures? anyone?) impose upon others their taste and convictions.
You wanna stop rape? Why not increase the penalties for violators? Why not dispatch more police on the streets instead of having them sit in hiding around speed traps? Why not revoke laws that prohibit people from carrying weapons they can use to defend themselves from attack? Use the same process we use to prevent general anarchy to weed out those in society that ARE actually suseptible to violence AND CHOOSE to act them out knowing the consequences. You know, instead of forbidding people to freely engage in fantasy if they so choose, regardless of how sick anyone thinks it is.
At least if a person (perhaps you'd call them a rapist-in-waiting or a sick fuck) is getting off to a fictional reenactment they're not out in public actually victimizing women.
More Twoson than Cupertino
Watch this youtube video of The Excorcist crucifix masturbation scene:
...congratulations! Soon you will be a sex offender under UK law. Because you are "in possesion" of that extract in your computer, and "It is an offence for a person to be in possession of an extreme pornographic image...(for example) an image of...an act which results in or appears to result (or be likely to result) in serious injury to a person's...genitals..."
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JyOSVqKYQNE
Now it's not an offense to watch The Excorcist -- but is IS an offense to own extracts (like this YouTube extract) where "it appears that the image was extracted (whether with or without other images) solely or principally for the purpose of sexual arousal." That's not why you watched it? Better hope the jury believes you...
http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm200607/cmbills/130/07130.43-46.html#j400
" [...] it seems very odd indeed that there should be an offence for having an image of something which was not an offence."
Does that mean that it makes sense to automatically punish people for taking, owning or looking at a picture of something which is "an offence"? I guess that makes just about every movie made in Hollywood in the last 50 years illegal. And it certainly would come in handy for governments trying to cover up what their troops do abroad ("A journalist took a picture of it? Throw him in jail!").
Man hating feminists have Sweden fairly well sewn up. Men bought into the radical feminist line there and they have paid for it. Now Swedish men are scapegoated for all manner of ills and, in many ways, it's too late for them to object to their treatment now. If I lived there I would leave as soon as I was able. The whole country will likely be under sharia law within my lifetime anyway, so there's no sense I can see in any self respecting man sticking around in a country like that. Who would want to live in a country where teachers force little boys to wear dresses at school:
http://www.estatevaults.com/bol/archives/2007/05/31/when_boys_are_f.html
Or what man would want to live in a country where major politicians believe that all men should be forced to pay a man tax due to the presumption that all men are guilty in some way for the crimes of every other man:
http://www.nationalreview.com/kurtz/kurtz200602220826.asp
This is what hard core radfems are really all about. They preach equality when they're in front of an audience but, deep down, they hate men and want men to live in a subordinated way - if at all.
Just because there is a problem with criminals committing some type of crime doesn't give the state Carte Blanche to do what ever it wants just in the interests of stopping those crimes. You say the state should be able to censor the media that people are allowed to possess because this media 'creates a market' for criminal activity. That's ridiculous. Should prescription drugs be outlawed? After all, their availability allows people to abuse them. Are prescription drugs 'creating a market' for criminal activity? Maybe we should outlaw cars. Just think how many people speed or commit traffic offenses. This doesn't even mention car theft. Doesn't the availability of cars 'create a market' for criminal activity? Just because some people may be willing to break laws to produce porn doesn't mean that the porn itself is the problem. The problem is the people who are breaking the laws. This law isn't going to put the abusers you're talking about in jail. Instead, it's going to create a new category of thought criminal and put people into prison simply because they happened to possess images of activities that would be perfectly legal (at least for now) for two consenting adults to engage in. The whole line of reasoning supporting this new law is nuts. Nobody has the right to restrict the freedom of what others are allowed to see, hear or do only and simply because they are afraid that somebody, somewhere might be motivated to commit a crime because of that freedom. Once that precedent is set none of our freedoms are safe.
but the fact that there are people who want this kind of stuff is scary, disgusting and an example of how sad and pathetic parts of our world has become.
Wait - it's scary that there are consenting adults who do sexual acts in private?
No, what's scary is that there are perverts out there who want to lock people up because they disapprove of those people's sex lives.
don't ever confuse your 'right' to free speech to mean that you are involved with anything but the most despicable, disgusting of things.
Freedom of speech that does not apply to things you think are merely "disgusting" is no freedom of speech at all. Otherwise, I just point out that I think what you say and think is disgusting.
...have sex with a 17 year old - perfectly legal (the age of consent is 16 in the UK). Take a picture of it - that's child pornography, you'll be gaoled and banned from working with children for life.
If it's the depiction of violence that is to be outlawed, the movie and video industries are in deep trouble. Just imagine where they'd be without sex, violence, and sex-and-violence.
Of course, killing people is considered good clean fun just as long as there's none of that vile, godless S-E-X.
I am sure that there are many other solipsists out there.
What is the matter with these people?
Power-grabbing nanny-state dimwits, pretending to be enlightened 'NEW LABOUR' whilst steeped in FUN-DUH-MENTALIST Victorian purdery.
David Blunkett,
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Blunkett
BLIND FROM BIRTH, got behind the BILL/ACT outlawing violent images he cannot even see, much less imagine, and had to resign from the front bench TWICE because of his own scandalous antics (including knocking up the owner of a TORY NEWS MAGAZINE) and other shortcomings.
Sheesh! If only they could 'get a life; of their own and stop meddling with everyone elses!
RR
My wife is a damned good marksman. She shoots moving targets. She also believes in tasers/non lethal options, as well as gun safety training and having a yapping dog to alert us.
Women are hardly the primary opponent of gun rights.
--- Grow a pair, liberals... stop letting the Republicans bully you!
"If no sexual offence is being committed it seems very odd indeed that there should be an offence for having an image of something which was not an offence"
In the UK the age of consent is 16, so you can have sex at this age. However if you video it then it becomes child porn, and presumably by definition the people appearing in the video have become exploited and abused, even if it was them who set up the camera.
It's never made much sense to me that you can legally have sex with a 16 year old, but you can't look at a picture of one naked.
(p.s. just in case there is any doubt - i'm not a paedophile, it's just an interesting legal point!)
If they say that even simulations are illegal, when no human is harmed by it, that is the definition of a thought crime.
All they are going to do is make the violence harder to see and trace. People will use poison instead of guns, and then what will these idiots think?
The goal is not to stop violence. The goal is to ban violent thoughts, which is really stupid because most murderers aren't obsessed with violent thoughts, they are the ones who actually do it.
"2400 years later, we still didn't reach a conclusion. Go figure..."
Pick any type of event or content and there are people who are emboldened or aroused to action, there are those who are sated, there those who are repulsed, there are those who are unaffected. The issue is as it always has been is there are also those who would try to use extreme examples to further their own ambitions for power and control or to simply push their own world view for ego gratification.
This all being said I personally think that what one has as an input has to be considered as affecting ones output. I think at a specific level of consciousness our minds are basically organic self programming computation devices. If you choose to input information of a specific genera without any conflicting data your output will be observant of this. Not quite "monkey see, monkey do" but the long term implications of such behavior would similar. If you choose ONLY one input type, be it of violent pornography, the rants of a crazy preacher or mullah, the teachings of classic philosophers, the study of chemistry or physics you can expect your output to reflect your choice of input. Aristotle had a fix for this in "the golden mean" or "moderation in all things", which actually reflects the way most people live their lives.
However there are "some people" who choose to limit their inputs to those that reflect their world view as compiled to date, hence the popularity of stuff like extreme political views, religious orders, FOX News and the various tabloids. Remember where I mentioned those people who would use such to further their own ambitions. All this is human nature as viewed from the amber side. We have been through these before and will again. There have been many microcosms of "dark ages" and "enlightenments" the best we can hope for is to avoid the longer darker ones. With the issues today like the complexity and size of our global civilization, the cultural mixing in real time instead of decades, the dependency and unintended consequence type dangers that come in tandem with technological progress, the depletion of resources and the explosion in disparity of wealth I feel a great unease about the near future.
Good old Eric Blair had an excellent insight into human nature, the English in particular, and great skill as a word smith. This is why his works seem so relevant today, they are based on countless millennial old observations of the human animal.
wabi-sabi
matthew
I think it's sad that you actually think what you're saying is logical.
And I think it's sad that the mods chose to mod up your reply, but not my comments... I think it says something about their own sense of freedom of speech.
We're not talking about whether people are having sex. That gets done billions of times. We're talking about whether people who fantasize about murdering and raping women should think of themselves as honourable. I don't think they should. And, a women cannot consent to being murdered, and she doesn't consent to being raped, so we're not talking about consensual sex. We're talking much more about people who are NOT in consensual relationships fantasizing about murdering and raping women, and about companies profitting about that type of violence towards women.
And, my point is not to limit free speech at all. It is simply stating that deciding that freedom of speech needs to be protected doesn't mean that some of the things people want to think about or do are not disgusting and despicable. Things like murdering or raping women.
In my post I said fine, have your free speech. But don't think that using that freedom to promote fantasizing murdering or raping women is not disgusting, vile and horrific. Because it is.
Maybe there are people here who want to use the privilege of free speech to think about murdering or raping women. I am going to spend my time trying to protect women and children from people who do those kinds of things, and people who fantasize about them.
I'm not too familiar with British government, but from what I do understand; when the House of Lords comes out on the side of reason and personal rights, doesn't that signal the end of days?
The thing I find most disturbing about this law is the incredibly lack of reasoning displayed by some people - mostly those in favour of it. It reminds me - obscurely - of the new tax here in Australia on "alcopops" (premixed alcoholic drinks). This will, of course, help prevent binge drinking. Makes perfect sense.
Banning is usually the best way to make a subject more intriguing to just the wrong sort of people. Banning child porn is good, since among other things it's the industry you're trying to destroy. But does it stop paedophiles? Seems we haven't got around to that bit yet. Seriously helping people not to become paedophiles is too hard, so let's stick with enforcing a ban so it always looks like we're working hard to protect the public. Excellent.
It's this sort of maimed ability to think about the hard stuff and implement socially responsible policies that is unfortunately the hallmark of everything bad in our society and politics.
Here in Aus, we have only recently started safe hot-lines for men (and women) who commit domestic violence. Great idea, well promoted, you almost feel sorry for them watching the ads. And why not feel sorry for them? Don't they need help? Why do we so rarely offer any help at all to those people who really need it, *before* they completely go off the rails? Why can't we invest money in effective preventative schemes instead of more and more laws and regulation?
Of course that's too hard to think about, so people blame anything and everything else for how someone turns out - if it's not porn, it's computer games, violent movies, Goth culture, Dungeons and Dragons... As long as we, as a society, don't have to take responsibility for it.
I'm surprised they didn't just introduce a Violent Porn Tax. That way most voters will be kept happy and pollies can as usual appear to be doing something, which is what everyone really seems to want.