Last week the Telegraph ran an article
on pornography by Martin Daubney putting the case for what he described as
‘state-approved porn in the UK’.
‘If we can’t axe it, should we tax it – like soft drugs in Holland
or prostitution in Germany’
- he suggested
Mr Daubney is the former editor of lad’s
mag Loaded and he has previously spoken of his concern that the magazine he
edited might have acted as a gateway to pornography for a generation of young
men. He also presented the Channel 4 documentary Porn on the Brain which looked at the effect of pornography
consumption the adolescent brain and in which he described online porn as ‘the
most pernicious threat facing children today’.
According to Mr Daubney his massively
controversial proposition could even achieve the unthinkable: and unite
censors, MPs, child protection agencies and, perhaps most astonishingly of all,
the pornographers themselves.
He proposes that all sites carrying
pornographic material be confined to a dedicated domain -.xxx for example –
with compulsory age verification. These
sites would host material within agreed, legal parameters of taste and be
licensed by the government and any sites not in compliance would be blacklisted
and blocked by ISPs.
On the face of it this is a great idea; if
the internet is the Wild West than a corral for such material has to be better
than nothing. However whether it would
seriously impact material hosted on foreign sites, which are currently where
the most extreme, violent and degrading material is hosted, is a moot point.
Just because there is a demand for
pornography which does not appear to be abating does not mean that its use is
without consequence.
This proposal provides porn with a veneer
of respectability which it does not merit.
It fails to acknowledge the very real potential harm of pornography. We cannot trust the industry itself to
acknowledge this when its current advice site offers nothing more than
information on child protection filters.
Our proposals for opt-in regulation met
with criticism this yet this model would be far more problematic; with material
being blocked by ISPs it really would be state-sponsored censorship. Could all overseas porn be blocked with
violating trade agreements? It’s also doubtful
whether it could work in the long term as vested interests push for more
latitude. We’ve seen time and again that
rules on what and what is not acceptable are open to interpretation leading to
a constant pushing boundaries – why should porn be different?
Clearly verifying the age of children
attempting to access pornography is crucial.
Sites hosted in the UK
already verify age but ATVOD has offered a creative solution to target overseas
sites - by impacting their revenues. The
UK is a substantial market
and to access customers in the UK
would be quite a powerful incentive to introduce restrictions.
ATVOD wants all adult sites to request a licence,
which would only be granted if age checks were in place, with banks and other
payment processors not allowed to handle fees for services from UK
citizens to unregulated sites. Payment
firms say they will act if shown that sites are breaking the law and the regulator
accepts that this means new legislation.
ATVOD say this matter is so urgent it is
‘critical the legislation is enacted during this Parliament’. With an election coming up this is something
you might like to raise with anyone canvassing your vote.
