BBFC PUBLISHES RESPONSE TO HOME OFFICE CONSULTATION ON THE POSSESSION OF EXTREME PORNOGRAPHIC MATERIAL

The BBFC today published its response to the Home Office’s consultation on the possession of extreme pornography.  Whilst sharing the Home Office’s view that the easy availability of extreme pornography which features a lack of consent, serious violence, or both, is a cause for real concern, the BBFC has raised a number of questions about how the proposed legislation would work in practice.

 The Board’s main concerns are as follows;

•     How would enforcement agencies judge whether the primary purpose of the work was sexual arousal?  Separating the ‘pornographic’ from the ‘non pornographic’ is becoming more rather than less difficult as film makers borrow styles images and themes from both sides of the divide.

•     It may be difficult to frame the various definitions in a way which ensures that mainstream material is not unintentionally captured.

•     Perceptions of whether an activity appears to be real will vary from viewer to viewer.

•     It is proposed that cartoons should be excluded, but given the advances in CGI technology cartoons can look very realistic and the Board has cut or banned violent pornographic Japanese anime.

•     The definitions of material such as sex with animals or a human corpse are wider than the definitions in the Sexual Offences Act 2003.   

•     Geographical variations in attitudes could lead to the anomalies which existed during the ‘video nasties’ era of the early 1980s as well as with current Obscene Publications Act (OPA) prosecutions with courts in different parts of the country returning different verdicts in relation to the same material.  

•     The legislation could lead to a reluctance to create legitimate works which seek to explore the nature and effect of outlawed material for fear that the research materials or even the resulting works will be caught by the legislation.

 The BBFC would like to see works classified by the BBFC specifically excluded from prosecution under the proposed legislation.  This would help ensure that material not intended to be covered would not be prosecuted and would also allow the public to be confident that they would not face possible prosecution for owning material as long as it was classified by the BBFC.  The BBFC also suggests that the legislation should include a ‘public good’ defence along the lines of that available to defendants under the OPA.  In addition the legislation could reduce the risk of confusion about whether to prosecute by requiring the Crown Prosecution Service to take account of the views of relevant authorities such as the BBFC.

 The BBFC takes the issue of sexual violence very seriously and research and our own public opinion polling tells us that material which would fall short of that covered by the proposed legislation is of concern.  An unintentional consequence of the proposed legislation could be that only the type of material which is specified on the face of the Act would come to be deemed to be harmful.  This could have the effect, not only of undermining the OPA, but of unintentionally undermining the BBFC’s classification Guidelines.  We would therefore welcome confirmation that the proposal should not be taken as a reason for the BBFC to liberalise its sexual violence policy.

 The BBFC has over 90 years’ experience of regulating the moving image and in its response to this consultation has offered it expertise to the Home Office.  Copies of the Board’s response can be found at;

http://www.bbfc.co.uk/downloads/files/Extreme_Porn_-_BBFC_Response.pdf

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22 November 2005