Sunday, April 27, 2008

Update on UK "extreme porn" legislation

I reported on this back in July of last year and now it's back in the news again as it rolls forward.

As this new article in The Register points out, this legislation would make it illegal to have pictures of acts which themselves are perfectly legal under the government's justification that so called "extreme pornography" leads to violence. A very weak claim at best on their part.

Aside from the obvious comments on the trouble with the government becoming the "thought police", I found this quote from Lord McIntosh of Haringey rather poignant; "What does it matter to the Government whether what we have in our homes for our own purposes is for sexual arousal or not? What is wrong with sexual arousal anyway? That is not a matter for Parliament or government to be concerned about."