Move to ban violent pornography on the internet...

but yeah I see what you're saying. I suppose another question would be, is there any kind of argument for the violent porn they're talking about having artistic merit? (I mean yeah I guess it would help to have a clearer idea of what exactly will be considered illegal, as ever the finer points in something like this are kind of off the chart)

simulations of horrible, unimagibale non-sexual violence are pretty standard entertainment fare, interestingly.

ok, just scanned the article. these things shd defo not be allowed, and really i don't want to argue that simulation (as opposed to depiction) of same should be permitted. why would i want to argue that? so i can be #1 liberal? fuck it.

i think i am a bit gloomy about all the gloomy french films about 'the dark heart of desire', etc, etc, hence this negativity.

Ronan, I think a reason that child porn is worse than violent porn (discounting the urban legend that is snuff movies) is the other end of the camera: there's no possibility of it being consensual sex, actual child pornography is undeniably the filming of a crime. Though the nature of the crime as society's most hated is obviously an enormous factor as well.

why, why, and why not?

The bit that makes no sense to me is when they talk about protecting children as a result. There's nothing that talks about limiting access to the internet, so it's not blocked that way - I guess they're just referring to a climate which makes it less prevalent so less likely to be seen?

Full document linked off this BBC, through a box-out about halfway down. http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/4195332.stm

Because acts are the closest thing to objective provable causes of harm, because you either believe in freedom of expression or not and I do, because the idea of "mitigating circumstances" invariably leads to the state making judgments about personality or psychology that are, at best, ideological.

Back later.

'mitigating circumstances' are quite important, i think. eg, mental health is one 'mitigating circumstance' i wouldn't ignore.

So you can't do anything on film that you wouldn't do to a stranger? Apart of course from have sex with them.

are you advocating thought crime?

as andrew farrell said i thought the reason child porn is illegal was because children have to be involved in the making of them. and that adult pr0n is supposed to involve adults who know what's involved and decided to do it out of choice (yeah right not in all cases i'd imagine).

It's an interesting trope in porn that "foreign" is always used as a synonym for "extreme". For example, the huge number of American sites that use "European" as shorthand in that way.

(you should have seen the kind of things they got up to later in the film! it involved neck breaking.)

i've seen the kind of things they get up to in finland.

BAN JACKASS!

then i raped him

You are Carrie and I claim my bucket of pig's blood.

BAN THIS FILTH! NOW!

Glee.

i don't want to argue that simulation (as opposed to depiction) of [sex with corpses] should be permitted. why would i want to argue that? so i can be #1 liberal? fuck it.

Hardly any danger of you being #1 liberal, I'd have thought, Henry. #1 most terminally "British" person, though, perhaps.

No, really, I'm not making this up.

(clearly this was to avoid any nuisance lawsuits trying to define embalming techniques etc as rape)

Two observations on that. First, just like the neocons in the US, we see the UK gov widening their concern from a "war on terrorism" to a "war on extremism" and from "rogue states" to simply "abroad". Secondly, the NIMBYism is startling. Can we expect a "Home Internet" now matching the worldview of the "Home Office"? A kind of internet that never includes anything disturbing, even simulations of disturbing things?

the Home Office suggests making illegal "the possession of a limited range of extreme pornographic material featuring adults"

Switch of focus from producers to consumers. This also widens the net. If producers are "abroad", we prosecute consumers "at home". Literally at home.

"This is material which is extremely offensive to the vast majority of people and it should have no place in our society," said the Home Office minister, Paul Goggins. "The fact that it is available over the internet should in no way legitimise it. These forms of violent and abusive pornography go far beyond what we allow to be shown in films or even sold in licensed sex shops in the UK, so they should not be available online either."

This attitude reveals a real anxiety that local mores may no longer be controllable by local authorities. It also lines up with Tony Blair's recent pronouncement that he "didn't understand what multiculturalism meant", but that if it meant people living in Britain with unBritish attitudes, he didn't agree with it.

i doubt that the law will include a clause where it says if the pr0n is from the UK it'll be legal to keep. sounds more like bad reporting.

On the censorship tip- If a person wants to draw a picture or write a story about all sorts of horrible, stupid, awful shit happening to other people, then we reserve the right to call that person fucked up and ostracize them socially, but not to censor them from semi-public fora. Free expression in that sense must be preserved.

When OTHER people become involved, as with the vast majority of filmmaking and photography germane to this discussion, that is not necessarily protected speech. When the depicted action is a crime, the consent of all people involved must be readily provable, or else the filmmaker and anyone filmed committing said crime can and should be held liable.

Why are we so fucking picky about hurting animals on film, but always assume people who get hurt on film must have consented under no duress? "No humans were harmed in the making of this slap-happy gangbang." What the fuck ever.

http://www.informedconsent.co.uk/boards/activism/46888/

It's an easy one for the government, this could be a really cheap new morality law to keep the Liberals and Conservatives at bay (who could say no to this law). when the most right wing idea that the most right wing candidate for the leadership of the tory party dare speak is compulsory community service for school leavers; the government can easily show that they are stopping the UK going to hell in a hand-basket with a few quick and easy morality laws without having to actually knuckle down and deal difficult issues facing them.

Congratulations on creating the most insipid useless post on this thread!

Basically, I read: "Even though I frequently download and watch the extreme porn in question, I am a normal well-adjusted guy who gets laid and am not a tubby no-ass-getting shut-in nerd virgin. It's just a laugh - yeah, yeah, that's it - just a laugh! I'm above it, because I keep an ironic distance from it. I learned everything I know about the fetish community from watching a smug movie by a guy who also keeps an ironic distance from the fucked-up socially maladjusted sickos he invents and portrays."

Okay. I don't think I argued for it either (though I'd be happy to), except in terms of "censorship is a bad thing". Freedom of expression shouldn't stop at things one dislikes or doesn't understand was my point.

fuck arguing against arguing for it

i'm saying producing pron doesn't easily fall under the abstract right to 'free speech'.

E.G. WHEN THEY'RE ALL GAGGED UP!!!!!!!!!

-- N_RQ (bl0cke...), August 31st, 2005.

oic

erm, no, because producing a porn movie is like producing anything -- the treatment of labour comes into play. 'free speech' is a pretty abstract category. actual conditions of work in the pron industry can't be justified with a nod to same.

the conditions of work in proper pron production places i'd imagine is already covered by EU regulations (so soon licenced sex shops won't have pron with cigarette smokes in them, for example)

the whole idea of this thing is that non-consentual things that may be legal elsewhere or just slipped through the net (hoho) will be made illegal to own just as an attempt to curb the market?

i can't imagine the govt *could* stop people d/lding even if it wanted to.

xxxpost

you mean a BONER CARD system

And that's why cannabis is illegal! Won't somebody please think of the poor mules?

http://img14.imgspot.com/u/05/242/07/esharple.gif

If I post any more, though, I'll be labelled a skullfucker, so I'll stop.

Well obviously I'm aware of that Andrew but how does this translate to treatement of people who possess the porn, in effect, after the crime has been committed.

Is noodle arguing that people who possess images, the production of which may be a crime or involves alot of violence, should not be prosecuted? That only the producers should be targeted?

I think I agree but I think alot of people would defend violent adult porn as art and very few would do the same for child porn, when I suspect the same cynicism could be applied in examining the artistic credentials of either.

I think it's a really interesting discussion, this topic, it touches on so many really vital issues.