This week the new Audiovisual Media Services Regulations 2014 aimed at censoring On Demand Video in the UK were ratified. I can’t say I watch a lot of porn of any kind, and my personal opinions of the remediated acts listed in the regulations range from a shrug to a shudder. There are lots of things I’m not interested in seeing and, because I have free will, I can choose not to see them. However, I do have a conceptual problem with the regulations for a number of reasons.
They purport to be necessary to ‘save our children’ from seeing terrible things and, it is implied, becoming warped by them. (I don’t want to get into the discussion of all the awful non-sexual things they might see on the news, in the theatres, on TV) There are many, many things that children should not see, both in the media and in real life, and it is the obligation of a parent to make sure they don’t see them. State intrusion into the making of cultural product ‘for the sake of the children’ is denying the very real and important responsibility that parents should exercise themselves. Governments that do it end up creating a population that feels itself able to relieve itself of this important aspect of parenting and growth that should be a matter between parents and their children.
Although not explicitly stated, the regulations infer that there is empirical evidence that children who watch, say, a woman sitting on a man’s face, are more likely to be psychologically and socially affected by it that, for instance, seeing 10 men ejaculating on a woman. There is NO creditable research to this effect. Now, I don’t want to suggest its time to kick the net-nanny to the curb. There is some – not a lot – of research to indicate that exposure to extreme types of violent pornography might be psychologically problematic (Flood 2003) but, frankly, the conclusion is based on a lot of assumptions and not a great deal of solid research. The irony of the discussion is that, since it would be illegal to expose under 18s to porn, it’s almost impossible to get hard data on what the effects of it are.
In the absence of any solid, scientific data, let us be responsible about what our kids our watching, yes? Seems sensible. But in order to do that, we would have to play an active role in how our children formed their thinking about sex. Since, as a society, we are so hell bent on pretending children HAVE no sexuality, thereby neatly absolving parents from their roles as good sex educators, we’re letting the government do it for us? That can’t end well – for many, many reasons.
Meanwhile, the list of prohibited acts on VOD and the rationale behind them remains stunningly puzzling. I don’t agree with the censoring of any of the acts (as long as the actors are of age, consenting and the viewers are equally of age and consenting) but some are actually laughable.
No spanking.
Although, according to Debra Lynne Herbenick PhD, of the Kinsey Instituted, it is assumed to be a very, very common form of sexual play (Washington Post). On an admittedly anecdotal basis, I don’t even KNOW anyone who has not at least tried it once. When regulations don’t reflect some semblance of agreement with what ‘normative’ people do in the bedroom, the regulators stop simply looking like over-zealous prudes; they take on something a little more sinister. Is this an attempt to socially engineer a view of sexuality formed in the image of their own fantasies?
The second newly prohibited act is the remediation of female ejaculation. It’s not totally prohibited: only if it gets on anyone else’s body. Why, you ask? Because according to this learned group of censors, it’s watersports in disguise. They maintain that since female ejaculation may contain some urine in it, there’s no difference between a squirting scene and a golden shower.
It does tell you something about how utterly tone deaf these people are to the nuances of sexual semiotics that they equate the two. Not that I personally have a problem with either of the acts.
But let us not be disingenuous. Golden showers always carry, however subtly, the implication of degradation about them. The person being urinated on is, from a sexual power dynamic, usually the ‘bottom’ in the scene. That’s why people find them hot.
Squirting, meanwhile, is rarely semiotically degrading to the person who gets ‘squirted on’. It happens to have emerged, for better or for worse, as a symbol of extreme pleasure in an orgasming woman. If anything, there is some flavour of the helplessness in the throws of pleasure of the woman doing the squirting.
But also, what is this obsession with the urine content?
This is where it gets personal for me. Many women don’t experience female ejaculation, but I do. Not after one or two orgasms, but past the third, it is likely to happen. I honestly don’t know what’s in it. It doesn’t smell like urine, but I’m more than willing to admit there might be some in there. When I was younger, the prospect that there might be terrified me. I would forcefully stop a lover from giving me more than two orgasms for fear I would squirt. And, of course, due to the fact that one squirts during orgasms, there’s a very good chance that you will get it on your partner, and all over the bed. But it is a natural consequence of my body reaction. It is not obscene, or perverse, and it certainly WOULDN’T damage a child to see it (anymore than a glimpse at anything else they shouldn’t be watching).
It took me many years to get over the fear of it. It took me a long time to grapple and settle on the reality that sex is messy and involves a LOT of body fluids: saliva, mucus, semen, effluvia, urine, even blood sometimes, and … wait for it… shit too. I can assure you that there are microscopic fragments of feces on every cock caught on camera penetrating an anus, and the censors haven’t banned THAT, why?
But, from a purely gendered perspective – why is it socially acceptable to have video of semen all over the place, but not female ejaculation? Why is it fine to show women choking on cock, but not women sitting on a man’s face? Now the legislation doesn’t simply seem prudish, it looks downright sexist!
Look, from a erotic writing perspective, I’m thrilled they’re banning things. Banning stuff just makes it more transgressive and hotter. The writer in me says: heck, ban it all! Ban ankles. I can write a great erotic story about calves!
But the 21st century woman in me says: what planet to these idiots live on? This is not about keeping anyone safe. This is about the exercise of power for the sake of power. This is about a society that has grown so demanding that they be ‘kept safe’ from everything. A society so unwilling to take individual and personal responsibility for itself and live with the consequences of its choices that it has allowed an authoritarian monster to reemerge from the murky deep age of sexual repression.
Please be offended by this. Not because you want to view these things but because you have free will and are intelligent and can choose to watch or not watch as you wish; because you know the difference between acted-out fantasy and reality and its consequences; because letting authorities exercise this kind of power unopposed has never, in the history of mankind, ended well.
P.S. It has come to my attention that Malin James has also written a post on this: The Pendulum: Why American’s Should Care that British Porn is Fucked.
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Flood, Michael, and Clive Hamilton. “Youth and Pornography in Australia Evidence on the Extent of Exposure and Likely Effects.” 52 (2003): n. pag. Print.
Herbenick, Debra. Interviewed for the article “Sex study: Sexual behavior, habits, and enjoyment.” Washington Post Online (2010) http://live.washingtonpost.com/sex-survey:-sexual-behavior,-habits,-and-enjoyment-.html
I’d like to be offended but I’m afraid I’m not. I couldn’t agree more.
I’m a single man, getting on a bit now, so unable to attract the kind of women to whom I’m attracted. So, I have to rely on masturbation for my sexual pleasure. I’m trying to get into written erotica, but I still use visual porn, mainly the free stuff on the internet.
Maybe it’s because I was brought up catholic and the guilt about sex never leaves us, despite being an atheist now, but I almost unfailingly find internet porn to be awful, and I’m ashamed of myself for using it. It is largely misogynistic and degrading of women. They are largely there to be used, often abused, frequently insulted and labelled – whores, bitches, slags and plenty of other derogatory terms. I have no idea why. It doesn’t turn me on more to see a woman being treated like a spunk receptacle. And in terms of content most pornographers have no idea how to present sexual content in a way that turns people (well, me) on in a way that gradually excites, grows and builds towards the best possible climax.
I’ve searched for porn that offers genuine equality between the sexes and I’d be willing to pay for it if necessary. I’ve never found anything good.
But to be more specific about the issue you’re covering. I find the things now banned to be bizarre and, as you say, it seems to be based on no proper research whatsoever. Who are these people to decide what is and isn’t appropriate? I’m old enough to remember the Mary Whitehouse days and (as a young teenager) the Lady Chatterley trial, including the famous comment by the judge abut what one might want one’s servants to watch. I really thought we’d got past all that censorship nonsense.
Of course, you’re right, it’s up to parents and society to control what our kids watch, not some lawmaker, who knows no better than anyone else.
I don’t like most of what I see on the internet, but I don’t want some random bureaucrat to tell me whether I can watch it or not.
Take care,
James
I am offended. Despite the fact that I disagree with you, I do appreciate what you wrote. You were clear and reasonable, so thank you for that. There is porn that is not misogynistic, although it is admittedly harder to find. We should encourage that kind of sexual entertainment rather than muzzling the former. Any simple search of BDSM or pegging will turn up the opposite side. Men being used and humiliated by women. As a straight man, I often find these scenarios stimulating.
You do not, however, seem to be looking for that sort of thing. It seems like you would prefer to watch scenes where the actors seem to love and respect each other. These can be more difficult to find. Maybe there’s a reason for that. I’ve been in relationships with a variety of people (although now that I’m married, I’ve found the last. Yay!) and during sexual encounters one or the other of us has submitted to the other in a way that outsiders might view as degrading. I think that’s more common than most realize.
If you’re curious, I might suggest you look for Throat, Malice in LaLaLand, or Sex and Violins (all from Vivid). While the women in these films are treated poorly . . . the consequences of the bad behavior are also explored. This changes it from a dirty wish fulfillment scenario to something that speaks to a human experience.
My best,
Larry
So in fact, you DO agree with each other, in as much as you are both thinking men who like different kinds of porn, but agree that the kind you DON’T like should not be banned.
Judging people for their porn preferences is a whole lot like judging people for reading sci-fi or detective fiction. There are, shall we say, different genres of porn and very few people like it all. And yet to liken porn to different film genres or text genres is odd, and not quite right, is it?
If porn only appealed to the drive, we’d all like the same stuff. But the drive is psychologically buried deep beneath a layer of language, of culture, of morality and rules and the accretion of a thousand years of ‘stuff’ that ‘civilizes’ the drive and allows us to live together in some semblance of civility.
It’s THAT accretion that most porn addresses – either to reinforce it (in the cases of sweet, loving type porn) or to struggle against it (in the case of raunchier, more transgressive and sometimes downright violent porn). But either way it is not the drive (which concerns itself with spreading the DNA wide) but the ‘culturization’ of sex that porn addresses – fictionally or mimetically interacting with what sex ‘means’ to us as humans.
Luckily, I am pretty confident that both of you have enough free will to view what pleases you and turn off what offends you.
More interesting to me is… what happens when you see something that both offends you AND arouses you? Now that… is interesting, is it not? It’s happened to all of us.
I do manage to find porn that’s not abusive (from among the free web stuff.) Things that make me stop viewing: anal, derogatory language or relationships, too much doggy, etc., etc. I’ve studied porn genres for years, and I think it’s actually getting saner, less abusive (again,) after moving this way a little in the 1980s. I get my transgression from social ruptures: interracial, age difference, group (if done well – it usually isn’t,) but I don’t need for it to be transgressive all the time. There’s some nice tantric-type porn now. In this, even gender disappears, as it does in real life. I realize porn *might* victimize some actors, but probably no more than most jobs under capitalism.
Just read Malin James’ article on this as well. I was immediately struck by the sexism in the situation, especially the banning of female ejaculation. I don’t experience it, but I find the banning of it outrageous and offensive. I’m quite surprised anyone can accept any of this as reasonable. One more thing that shocks and saddens me…
RG,
In my humble opinion, censorship by government officials is never usually a good idea. These “officials” are prompted by the one reason as you mentioned, power. Power generally corrupts, wielding authority over others without personal consequences or responsibility, it almost seems to be a role that must be played. Generations quickly forget the past, ground already covered in the pages of history. The problem is few dig into hidden or even unhidden history, relying on the current corporate state sponsored academics or the quick blurbs of biased media, subtlety spoon feeding the masses with the supposed ‘proper’ information.
Concerning parenting, it is the parents responsibility not to shield or pretend things do not exist. The parent needs to provide proper information to their children, impart a standard of conduct, including the difficult subject of sexual education. The challenge with parenting is that most parents are in their 20’s or 30’s still learning about life or who they are themselves. Meanwhile, the children are in the fragile formative years, curious, wondering why the government says certain things are off limits. Many look back on their childhood with a bit of disdain, blaming their parents for short changing them in one way or another. Myself, being raised by a single mother with two other siblings I was not immune to this thinking until a few years ago. Happening upon a shoebox of forgotten photos tucked away in a closet, I looked at one of my mother & her children, myself among them. As I looked upon my mother in the old image all I could think of was, “My God, she was so young.” She was far from perfect but looking back she did the best she could with what she had.
As far as porn goes, we humans are a curious sort. Curiosity has as much drive as actual erotic desire, perhaps its one in the same? There is a great desire to ‘see’ stuff that may or may not offend. The desire to know about or to see the unknown is very great, combine it with heels, a corset, and some bondage…oh my!
Interesting subject and comments,
Thank You!
I totally agree with you, RG about the sexism of banning content such as face-sitting and female ejaculation. I’m not greatly turned on by the majority of porn, but that may be because not much is made with women in mind, but I am certainly in favour of people having free access to it, as long as it’s not abusive.
Why don’t they go the full distance and mandate missionary as the only allowable sex position in porn movies, ’cause it seems that any suggestion of women taking a predominate role in sex is a no-no to these people. And spanking? Please! As you say, that’s mainstream. Who are these idiots, and more importantly, do the British public have any avenue to protest this lop-sided hypocrisy?
First, I’m convinced you are not a parent. Second, there is no way I can stand between what my teen boys (3) view on the internet, even should they stumble across it embedded in their usual games. Third, you obviously have given no thought to innocence and how it can be fucked with. Their innocence deserves the government’s intervention in my opinion. Sorry for you if it’s an inconvenience to your pocket.
First: I resent your implication that my motives are financial. It is insulting. I am far from being a money-motivated thinker. If you are, please don’t project your lack of ethics onto me. Second: these rules are in no way an inconvenience to my pocket. I don’t make porn, or sell port, and I rarely watch it myself. If you had bothered following the link to the list of regulations, you’d see that this applies to Video on Demand. Not text.
Third: if you are going to abrogate the important dialogue you need to have with your teens about what they see, and how they are forming their thinking about sex, please move to an authoritarian country like Singapore or Saudi Arabia, which bans everything, so you can divest yourself of your parental responsibilities.
However why should I tolerate state-imposed morality (and very sexist, male-centric at that) because YOU can’t be fucked to take care of your children? They aren’t MY children. You chose to breed. You take care of them. Don’t put the responsibility of their mental welfare onto the rest of us.
By God, RM, I think I love you!
Brilliant response, with an appropo amount of sentiment. Hopw you don’t mind if I memorize PP 2 &3, for future conversations. 😀
Note: While I whole-heartedly agree with your sentiment, I will admit that as a functioning adult non-parent member of society, I nontheless do find myself compelled to “look out for” the well-being of children nearby. I’m not *obligated* by society, but by my *own* morals/values. But I vehemently resent foisting upon others, the responsibility for children by the abrogation of their parents. Grow up and do your damn job, parents (mine did)!
Vanessa, please read paragraph 2 of my previous comment. You need to act quickly, usually by the time children are in their mid teens it’s to late…
There have been a lot of reactions to this, both on blogs and in print; Malin James has a good list. Not one that I’ve seen thinks that this censorship is anyway a good thing—but then I don’t read the ‘Daily Fail’ which probably does (alongside the sidebar of shame).
The list of bad things is quite irrational, and as you and others have said, quite gendered; as if it were a return to the ‘dual standard’ of Victorian times. There seems to be no empirical evidence behind any of these bans.
1. Safety. Well, perhaps anal fisting isn’t such a good idea—it might just be a bit dangerous— (and it’s certainly not my idea of fun), but it’s not illegal to perform among consenting people; it’s just illegal to portray it. And then, apparently it doesn’t matter about ‘consent’ in these videos. Just what sort of message does this send?
Just for amusement I used the ‘famous search engine’ and found numerous instances of people who had died during sex. There are several Popes, at least one French President and a Cardinal who all died in this way, often during blow jobs. So if blow jobs are, anecdotally, so dangerous, why aren’t they banned?
I think that part of the problem lies with the inability of many people, including censors, to understand the concepts of ‘risk’ and ‘statistics’. There cannot be any (human) activity which is without risk, yet for most activities this risk is minimal (but not non-existent), and mostly we try consciously or otherwise to minimise this risk. I have no idea what the risk from fisting might be and neither do the censors.
2. “Think of the children”. This is a wonderful cop-out excuse for anything that “they” don’t like. There is never an explanation of what this actually means—let alone what a “child” is. There is surely a big difference between a five year old infant and a 15 year old adolescent; and when does a “child” become an “adult”? This last question has preyed on the minds of “purity” campaigners for over a century. A simple concept of an adult is perhaps when the child leaves school, either to work or to go to University. If so, the age of attaining adulthood has been gradually increasing over the centuries—in parallel with the change from a rural to an urban population, and the rise of the “child’s bedroom”. It can be argued that, in the past, children in the country were used to seeing bullocks trying to mount other bullocks; and then, the family lived in one or at most two rooms, in shared beds, and what the parents got up to must have been not only obvious but entirely natural. In short, modern society infantalises and protects children from the real world to an extent unknown in the past.
3. There’s also a moral argument. In my theocratic quasi-democratic part of the UK, lots of activities around sex are to be banned. Any form of “payment” will soon be illegal, so presumably it’s goodbye to presents and favours. This is based on a highly selective understanding of Christian morality, and a total disregard for any evidence; it’s always, “my belief outweighs any evidence you can produce, I simply won’t believe it”. Just like these censors, if rather more extreme.
It will apparently cost the censors £36k per annum to employ someone to watch and check. There’s another report on Cliterati, with links:
http://www.cliterati.co.uk/2014/12/sexcrime-2/
As always, RG, an excellent piece. I agree completely, particularly about the idea of protecting children as an excuse. As a parent, it may impossible to monitor your children at all times but there is certainly software, hardware, settings, and such that allow total restriction of anything that you would prefer they not see. If they game online at all, they’ve read and heard worse, believe me.
At 9 years old, my friend and I happened across a stash of magazines belonging to her father. We were left with no illusions about adulthood according to Penthouse, Playboy, and Hustler. Believe it or not, we were not damaged for life – although slightly disappointed to not develop breasts of those proportions. ~smile~ We visited that stash many, many times over the ensuing years. It was forbidden, and fascinating.
Restricting adult access simply reinforces the nanny state, nothing more. Thank you for opening this dialogue, I must go – I feel the need to write a spanking, squirting story. 🙂
Well said, May.
I’d like ot note one important point you made: “As a parent, it may impossible to monitor your children at all times…”
True, it *is* impossible to “monitor” children – and that is not how a child is lead or instructed. Monitoring removes control from the child, preventing any opportunity to *learn* how to handle something. That’s the classic religious approach – simply make something inaccessible and it’s not a problem…when quite th eopposite is true (as you learned when you discovered those magazines! 😀 )
The key is to educate children that “stuff” is out there, and to address each subject in an age/maturity-appropriate way. Yes, monitoring/restricting is part of that process, but should diminish as the child grows, providing opportunity to discuss each subject through the maturation process.
We don’t teach 5 year-olds how fusion works in the sun, do we? No, we teach them the sun is giant ball of flaming gasses, maybe by sixth grade they understand what fusion is, perhaps plasma, so we explain at that level.
Why would sexuality be any different?
Again, well-stated May, and drop a link here when you’ve completed that story! 😀
i could not agree with you more. I personally don’t want government censoring anything. That’s a pretty slippery slope. If people don’t like something, not watching or reading it is a far less intrusive solution than any form of censorship.