The War on Porn Regular Updates about the Assault on The Adult Industry
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The question, to me at least, truly is as simple as the headline above frames it.
Growing up as a kid in the 1970s, there were a great many things I wasn’t allowed to do yet, but I was told I would be permitted to do once I was old enough to make my own decisions in life. Things like smoking cigarettes, drinking booze, driving cars and yes – shudder – looking at pornographic images.
In most areas of life, the promise I was given as a kid has held up. I don’t happen to smoke, but I could do so, even knowing it’s terrible for me. I do drink occasionally, although ironically enough, a lot less often now that I’m allowed to do so than I did when I was a teenager doing something forbidden by the law.
And yes, I’m still allowed to look at porn. But as I look around the world and contemplate the circumstances in which many other adults currently find themselves, I can’t help but think they live in countries where the government is functioning like parents who can’t face having their kids move out of the house and become fully formed adults.
Earlier this month, it was reported that in the United Kingdom, “online pornography showing strangulation or suffocation is to be made illegal, as part of government plans to tackle violence against women and girls,” as the BBC put it.
Don’t get me wrong; I’m no fan of choking in porn. In fact, seeing it actively makes me cringe and recoil from the screen. (I’m not too fond of people spitting on each other, either, but that’s a whole other kettle of saliva.)
I also understand that choking someone to the point they almost pass out isn’t good for that person or her/his brain. That’s another reason why people arguably shouldn’t engage in “breath play” during sex (or at any other time, for that matter) – but it’s still not a reason for the government to ban it in porn.
Consider this: It’s illegal to do a lot of what we see inside the cage during an Ultimate Fighting Championship match if it takes place outside such a competition. If you get into a bar fight with someone, put them in armbar and break their freaking arm, you’re likely to be prosecuted for aggravated assault. Do the same thing inside the octagon and you’re the winner!
Is it good for kids to watch people break each other’s arms? Probably not. But do you know what sort of depictions aren’t age-restricted in a way that would lead to a criminal (or civil) penalty for those broadcasting the event, or any adult who allows a kid to watch it? You guessed it – mixed martial arts (MMA) fights.
MMA also doesn’t prevent the adults who participate in it from choking each other unconscious, breaking each other’s limbs, giving each other concussions, or otherwise doing grievous bodily harm to each other.
Why isn’t choking in MMA illegal in the UK, but choking in a porn context is about to become so? My guess is it has a lot to do with paternalism and eons-old double standards regarding men and women.
If a man chokes out another man in a competitive context, or a woman does so to another woman, well, that’s just sport, right? If a man chokes a woman to the edge of consciousness in a pornographic context, well obviously there’s an imbalance of power and he’s abusing her – even if she’s lying there demanding “choke me, choke me!”
(That said, it’s not like the UK choking depiction ban will have an exception for choking in scenes pairing women, so maybe it’s as simple as “sport good, sex bad.”)
You also probably won’t see calls in the UK for depictions of choking in a fictional context to be banned. Game of Thrones fans may recall Stannis Baratheon seizing the Red Woman by the throat and choking her after her perceived failures in helping him seize the Iron Throne; I don’t expect we’ll hear calls for that scene to be deleted from UK-facing platforms, in part because both characters have their clothes on throughout this evidently harmless bit of violence against women.
We also likely won’t hear many people complaining that the NFL games played annually in the UK are too violent, too filled with concussions, or somehow unsuitable for viewing by children. After all, they want to sell out those stadiums and create future generations of fans to come support American football. The NFL’s money talks and the typical, paternalistic logic about “protecting children” walks right out the door.
I could go on and on, because the examples are nearly endless. Everywhere you look, sexually explicit depictions are subjected to restrictions that other forms of expression and entertainment simply are not, but that sure seem as though they should be restricted, if the same reasoning is applied.
Again, don’t get me wrong: I don’t want any of the things I’ve listed above to be banned, or even more strictly regulated. I just want consistency in allowing adults to be adults, permitting us to take informed risks and go about our lives with minimal government intrusion into our lives – and I don’t want consistency to come in the form of comprehensive prohibition on the whole lot.
After all, if we try to restrict people to doing only what’s safe and not “bad for them,” do you know what none of us should be doing? Driving to fucking work.
