ICA 19 Jan 2008 Report back

(This report by an attendee are their personal opinions not those of backlash.)

On Saturday 19th January 2008, I went along to the Institute of Contemporary Arts in London to watch a panel discussion on "The New Sex Crimes: Electronic Obscenity and Censorship". These are my impressions of the event.

First off, it was noted that the panel had been changed from the advertised line-up: two employees of the BBFC, and the MD of Strictly Broadband had dropped out, and there were two replacements.

The panellists present were: Professor Julian Petley, chair of the Campaign for Press and Broadcasting Freedom and author of Censoring the Word; Feona Attwood, principal lecturer in media at Sheffield Hallam University; Deborah Hyde, backlash; Mark McGowan, artist. The chairperson was Dr Clarissa Smith, author of One for the Girls! The Pleasures and Practices of Reading Women's Porn.

Each speaker began by giving a brief introduction to their viewpoint on what was dubbed as "The Dangerous Images Act":

Julian Petley gave a summary of the proposed law, for the uninitiated. He focussed on the ambiguous "appears to" wording. He also drew attention to the fact that the law would introduce a new crime of possession rather than of publication, and noted that the law takes a "shopping list approach" to proscribed material rather than being based on a jury deciding if a particular image is liable to deprave and corrupt. Apparently censorious types have wanted this for a long time, because juries are usually unwilling to convict on the latter basis.

Deborah Hyde gave a summary of the progress of the bill and Backlash's attempts to stop it, or at least to water it down, and how the government has ignored dissent at every point.

Mark McGowan showed a shakey-cam video of himself wandering about in the country-side with his mate, corraling some sheep, hogtying one and simulating sex with it...

Feona Attwood said that the rapid evidence assessment that was commissioned by the government in support of the law was based on a discredited model of psychological research, which is media-illiterate. She also said that this law came at a time when the proliferation of amateur porn, and webcams etc meant that it is likely to criminalise a very large number of people.

Then the chair, Clarissa Smith, author, threw the discussion open to questions from the floor.

Someone asked what was the point of McGowan's film. He said it was filmed in Georgia and called "Deep Inside Russia 2". It was supposed to be a comment on Russian foreign policy towards former soviet-block states (he wanted the sex to be "consensual" but ended up having to tie up the sheep)... but it was also meant as a comment on animal rights (i.e. why is it ok to kill and eat a sheep but not to shag it?)...

McGowan comes across as a bit of an idiot savant and one of his approaches is to highlight hypocritical or contradictory laws by deliberately breaking them (or appearing to break them), i.e. he once ate a swan, which is not allowed as they are "property of the queen".

Once that was cleared up, the questions were more general. Two things surprised me - first, that out of about forty people present, there was only one person in the room who appeared to favour the law (I have since been informed that he was Gavin Phillipson, lecturer in law at the university of Durham, and his stance on the "Dangerous Images Act" is more nuanced than his devil's advocate role seemed to suggest).

Even the people who felt it important to say that pornography could sometimes be harmful, were very keen to stress that they didn't support the law in its current wording.

Secondly, there was very little emphasis on the implications of the law for the artworld. The audience and panel talked about its effect on pornography, and on violent and sexual films, but "art for art's sake"/high art was only addressed briefly.

A few points from the audience stuck in my mind:

Somebody pointed out that although the necrophilia and bestiality clauses are problematic, the most worrying one, because the most potentially far-reaching, is the prohibition of pornographic imagery of "an act which threatens or appears to threaten a person's life".

He said that this could easily cover any bareback sex, or sexual acts without a condom because it would "appear to" carry a risk of HIV infection (we might also add any act that draws blood, on the same basis).

The panellists responded that the principle of harm is always difficult to define - certain people might say that it is "harmful" to look at a picture of two men kissing, because the viewer might thereby become more positively disposed towards homosexuality.

The law doesn't use the word "harm", exactly, although this ambiguity is inherent int the philosophy behind it - the word "harm" is used repeatedly in the government's explanatory notes.

It struck me, (and here I hope I am being paranoid), that the phrase "threaten a person's life" is a real hostage to fortune... is it possible that a precedent might be established of interpretting the word "life", not in the biological sense of "the quality that distinguishes a vital and functional being from a dead body" but in the sense of "a way or manner of living" ? i.e. "Homosexuality/promiscuity etc. threatens family life"...

The big question, given the progress of the law, seems to be, how will it be interpreted and enforced?

Where will the decision on the pornographic and extreme status of an image be made - by the police? by juries? by judges?

Presumably all of the above, but it isn't clear how any of these groups will interpret the law.

Deborah Hyde seems to think that the police will not actively pursue people in an Operation Ore (paedophile hunt) style, but will rely on the law creating a paranoid culture where people are afraid of being informed on by jilted ex's.

The other panellists were less keen to speculate, but the consensus seemed to be that the enforcement would not be rational or predictable until a precedent has been set, since the law isn't rational or clear as currently worded.

However, Feona Attwood felt that past experience suggests it will not be used against large, mainstream producers of pornography with heterosexual content, but against amateurs with minority sexual interests.

Also interesting was the question of what was the political motive for the law. Julian Petley said that he felt it was partly motivated by personalities within the government - Jack Straw's ministry of justice are approaching the issue in a far more reactionary and authoritarian way then the parallel approach of the department for children, schools and families (research being led by Tanya Byron of TV fame).

He also said that there is a definite trend to roll back the "post-Wolfenden consensus" which established the idea that there were areas of private life into which the government should not interfere.

The absence of the BBFC was also discussed. It appears that there are elements in the government who have been attacking the BBFC for being too lenient in awarding R18 certificates, and this may be the beginnings of a move to reform or replace the BBFC.

Petley explained why the "dangerous images act" scares the BBFC: Although possession of classified films would be exempt from prosecution, extracts from them, made for sexual purposes (i.e. a violent or sexual film clip stored in a folder of "extreme porn") will be illegal to possess.

When a film clip is found to be illegal, there is likely to be an outcry against the film from which it was taken, which will call the BBFC's initial classification into question.

The implication was that the BBFC representatives did not turn up because they were broadly in agreement with the opposition to the law but they were afraid of looking lenient in the eyes of the media and the government, and thereby opening themselves up to further attack.

What can you do ?

For more details of the legislation and opposition to it read this brief.

If you would like to contribute in any way to opposing this legislation, contact us.

If you are a journalist or a researcher and would like to cover all sides of the debate, see previous coverage in the media and contact us.

To make a donation, click here.