Scotland's porn laws: Can we talk about this like grown-ups?

Baise Moi

Am I to understand that I am to become a criminal and put on the register because I own a film, Baise Moi, that I bought on the high street from HMV 5 years ago, that had been passed by the BBFC, because it contains a rape scene? Baise Moi indeed!

Title here

Never mind, it's still ok to to be a drug addicted, racist ,mudering, alcholic.

But NO mucky pics!

Law quite literally an ass

Lawyer friend tells me that sex with an animal is 2 months, possession of photographs of same is 2 years under the new legislation. I don't advocate this activity, of course, it's a revolting idea. However it's a good example of how confused and stupid they are.

These neopuritan dimwits should be put in a rubber room and fed soft food that you can eat with your hands. Never be allowed to pass laws again, never.

Vive la difference.

FTA:

"Not to be outdone, their proposed new Law goes significantly further than the English one, creating the very real possibility that travellers could depart London with nothing but legal pictures on their laptop – and pull into Edinburgh Waverley facing arrest for their hard-drive smut."

And the English law goes further than French law, creating the very real possibility that travellers could depart Paris with nothing but legal pictures on their laptop – and pull into London St Pancras International facing arrest for their hard-drive smut.

Different countries, different laws. What a remarkable concept.

@AC Different countries...

Last I looked, Scotland was part of the UK, France was not....

Unless of course you still belive you are your own little country, in your own little world...

Showgirls?

Perhaps we should add an explicit clause requiring anyone with a copy of Showgirls on their laptop, or anywhere else for that matter, to be locked up. For their own good, if nobody else's.

The Accused

So the Oscar-winning "The Accused", which has a pretty unpleasant rape scene at the end, would be banned in Scotland under this?

Bonkers.

So...

...if Satanic Slut #1 did in #2 with the full consent of #2 it wouldn't be an illegal picture? Armin Meiwes will be happy to hear that.

Alternately, as their relation does not appear to be sexual (being nekkid thegither in a tub is NOT having sexual relations, says my friend Bill C.) the picture is not illegal?

Ma head asplode...

Paris, coz she did not have sexual relations with that man/woman/comfy chair.

@ Tony

"Thankfully having just watched 'Bob the builder' I was able to hide their bodies under my new patio"

LOL!

The Accused

Last time I checked, the rape scene was at the beginning.

The Rape of Lucrece

Presumably it will be illegal to have a copy of this painting in my book of fine art.

Or Shakespeare's poem on my bookshelf.

Nonsense from start to finish.

Idiots

If the material is performance, what's the issue? If it's part of a movie or two consenting porn models had photographs taken for a website, where's the harm? Who's being hurt here? People are making material that people want to buy. The seller makes money, the buyer gets something they want. I fail to see the illegality there. Doesn't the UK have better issues to put these resources to instead of telling us what kind of porn we can look at it. I used to regret moving away from Scotland but things like this really help with the transition.

Mine's the one with the torn up ticket home in the pocket.

Oh, dear...

Usually I am taken to task for forgetting that Scotland has a different legal history to the rest of the UK. This time, as one reader has pointed out in e-mail, I have forgotten the rest.

The current position is that the law on extreme porn, coming into effect next Monday (26 January) will govern conduct in England, Wales and Northern Ireland:

http://www.justice.gov.uk/news/announcement261108a.htm

For the time being, you can fap to whatever floats your boat in Scotland without being subject to the same penalties.

Paris - because in future, that is where you may have to go to buy your stash.

Scotland is a different country

@AC

"Last I looked, Scotland was part of the UK, France was not....

Unless of course you still belive you are your own little country, in your own little world..."

I don't live in Scotland, but they do have their own legal system - have had for a *very long time*.

And if you look at Wikipedia (or constitutional documents starting from the Act of Union) you'll see references to things like this: "The United Kingdom is a unitary state consisting of four countries: England, Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales."

Note the word "countries". The even have, like the French (or Welsh) a different language in some parts of their country.

If it was just one country with one set of laws - then places like Gretna wouldn't be so famous today. For over 200 years you had English couples eloping to Scotland (a different country with different laws) to get married.

Why oh why oh why is so difficult for some (almost always English) to stop peddling the myth that the UK is one country? It's 1 Kingdom (or unitary State) made up of 4 countries. Voila, how hard is that?

There has been a lot of coverage...

...of this on El Reg lately. Do the authors have a stash of pics they don't want to delete?

Fitba bad rugby good, Hic!

@AndyScott

That law doesn't apply to rugby grounds then? Ever walked from Haymarket Station to Murrayfield on match day? The pubs do a roaring trade and nary a polis with arrest on his mind in sight.

Whose Morality are we using here?

"...and other material deemed unsuitable..."

Deemed unsuitable by whom?

One cannot legislate morality, for no common standard exists. Allow me to give an example: Female circumcision is an abhorrent practice, isn't it? Are we all agreed thusly? (unlikely, there is no doubt a small percentage of our nations populace who think it is entirely appropriate, but anyway...) How about male circumcision? Who's ready to stand up and decry orthodox judaism then?

Morality is subjective, and thus blanket legislation is impossible, but despite this someone, somewhere is still 'setting the moral standard' under which we will all have to live. Who is this person or persons? Male? Female? Age? Race? Culture? Religion? Whoever they are, they must be a paragon of virtue, untouchable by any criticism from any part of our multi-cultural society!

How can a multi-cultural nation have a single code of morality applied to it?

Soon, this will be demonstrated to those who dare to create such laws as the very material they are decrying as 'immoral and thus illegal' will be embedded in their own systems, emails and webpages, and then the authorities that they have empowered will be notified of the crimes they commit simply by owning such material and lacking the skills to remove it. It is being made a crime to not be IT/Internet savvy, and they will be the first to suffer under their own draconic measures.

Take it as law.

- Yours, Anonymous.

@ Scotland is a different country

Thou shalt NOT quote Wikipedia in your arguement/opinion on this website on pain of being hung on the nearest tree!!

As a member of the US I suddenly feel like I'm in the sane country for once

Maybe not sane exactly, but a different, less insane, kind of crazy ;P

On the plus side, it'll take away some of the ammo the nuts in the Arab world use against the west. If that's actually a plus I don't really know. Maybe the nuts of the world are trying to create one world of mixed nuts who believe, in the end, it will result in world peace. Which would we prefer, a prison state, or an insane asylum state? Not really much of a choice if you ask me, which you didn't, but what can I say, I'm one of those nuts they excluded from the mixed nuts pack :P

Mine's the one made out of coconuts.

Oh, er...

Anyone owning a bottle of 1993 Château Mouton Rothschild, drink it soon as the label features a print by Balthus, depicts a naked young girl.

but I bought it in Scotland, officer?

http://www.theartistlabels.com/mouton/1993.html

Different legal systems etc...

It doesn't really matter whether Scotland has a different legal system to England or not, because what they're going to do is to copy a law which is, frankly, an utter pig's ear and which even the Ministry of Justice now admits is incomprehensible!

They have finally agreed that "it may not be possible for an individual to have absolute certainty about which side of the line an image may fall" and so the *only* way this can be determined is for the owner of that image to be taken to Court and for our Legal System to try to sort out the complete mess of this law.

Of course the English and Scottish Courts have *so much* free time that they can waste it on trying to figure out what "grossly offensive, disgusting or otherwise of an obscene nature" actually means and then take guesses at what was in a person's mind when they downloaded a picture to see if it is "for sexual arousal" and then they can count the number of angels dancing on the head of a pin whilst they decide if what the image shows is "life threatening" or "likely to result in serious injury"...

Thought police

We are walking into an era with the thought police. Its 1984, albeit 25 years late.

mines the one with the tin foil hat

Scottish Perverts

<i>Does the law mean now that it would be illegal to watch that movie, or is it ok to watch it, but any screenshots (still images) of it would be illegal but the movie itself is fine ?</i>

The law will simply be framed very broadly to mean "whatever it takes for PC Plod to land you in jail". It's probably illegal to enjoy the rape scenes too much also so a little work with some brain electrodes is also in order ;-)

The real point however is.........

That both the proposed Scottish law and the English/Welsh law is blatantly an attempt to once again force people to think as the politicians wish us to think. This is the most dangerous aspect of such a law ! Once again because pornography can be easily looked down upon, far too readily it becomes an easy target. In effect it is the bully mentality of law making! i.e. 'What easy target can we pick on today ?'. History has repeatedly proven what a slippery slope this is. The politicians are yet again the bullyboys of the nation. Instead of robbing the population to pay the bankers for the mess they and the so called financial governing bodies have gotten us all into they should be drafting laws to ensure that no such mess ever occurs again - get a grip on what is really important ! Real lives being ruined rather than fantasies !

Paris - cos at least she has more sense than many of the damn elected politicians !

So, what if...

...I have picture of a man and women having sex on my laptop and... No, let me start again...

On my laptop I have a picture of a man and women having sex. The rozzers think the woman may not have consented, I think she did.

Then what?

Why This Is Happening

Don't be so quick to blame the politicians. Everyone knows they are nothing more than attention-seeking, self-interested careerists who will nail their colours to whichever mast they feel is most expedient. Certainly do not go looking for any intellect or reasoned argument amongst our politicians. Supine, completely without scruples and almost completely bereft of any notion of what an actual 'democracy' might really look like, every last man and woman amongst them will sign away all our freedoms if they think there's a popularity vote to be won in it.

So who are the real culprits here? Who is really responsible for these endless new laws governing our sexual morality, our private thoughts and desires? I think we need look further than advocates. Advocates create an agenda, feed an idiot, unquestioning media with spurious 'reports', create news agendas and bring about an atmosphere in which clueless, heavily lobbied (and often complicit) politicians are left with little choice but to cave in to their every demand.

Of course, when it comes to children, advocates very quickly realised they'd tapped an unimaginably rich seam of emotional blackmail - here is a set of issues so emotive (and impossible to discuss in public) that it renders all the normal rules of engagement practically redundant. Look at how powerful our great child protection advocates have become under the guise of protecting our kids from all those paedos stalking chatrooms, playgrounds and MySpace (allegedly)...

And so we end up here. The 'extreme porn' laws have all but been enacted across the UK, whilst the new proposals for laws on 'indecent' drawings and cartoons will doubtless follow them into the statute books very shortly - because nobody is going to oppose them. Absolutely nobody. Of that, you can be certain. Advocates will always play the 'think of the children!' card, mugging it up before news cameras to deliver completely unsubstatiated but nevertheless snappy, memorable and highly emotionally charged soundbites. Just as the media like it.

And then they will move on, just like they always have, to their next target. It's how these things work. It's how they stay in business. They create a 'national scandal' with the help of a sensationalist media all too happy to blithely pimp their agenda (and fill their schedules), tins are rattled and dues collected from public and private purses and all reconvene to decide on their next campaign and PR spend.

Idiot politicians will always back this stuff - it's in their nature to quiver and capitulate as soon as the magic 'think of the children!' words are sprinkled into any conversation. They remain as incapable of sensible reasoning on this as the very advocates they are pandering to. We really shouldn't expect anything better.

The only ones to lose out are the ordinary voters and society in general who get no say in any of this, but are slowly but surely criminalised (I could say terrorised) by this creeping legislation.

at first AC

You faild to grasp how all that would happen.

1, you would go to jail as a sex ofender.

2, your DNA would be registerd so the police, finding it a a crime seen would pick you up for questioning.

3, on release your name and address would be kept by the police and may be reased to local vigilanties so they can threaten or kill you at will.

Not so funy ?

What is deemed dangerous?

Only extreme pictures should be banned.

Like dominatrix choke pictures or gagging being fake or real

Or any sexual picture that also includes blood or fake blood

wax on the nips if she smiles is ok but if she looks like shes in pain then it should be banned.

Humiliation pictures also ashould be banned and sex with animals

pictures of nude nuns or any slight connection with religion while having intercourse also should be banned.

Also sex with machines such as drills with added devices such as arm extenders.

Picture sof having sex with robots should be ok.... The list could go on and on and on.

Scotland the Schizophrenic

I'm a Scots expat - and I look back sometimes and wonder what the hell is happening!

Wee Eck's determination to ban off-license sales of booze to under-21s, the knee-jerk reactionary laws on the basis of some sink-estate shrieking Senga's Daily Retard campaign (e.g air rifles), and now this dog's dinner of unnecessary legislation?!

And they say that 2009 is the "Homecoming" year for expats - aye right. Coming home to find out the Wee Free's (Lothian chapter) have taken over? Or - as they are less affectionately known - the Tartan Taliban.

Aye, right!

Scotsman balanced?

Not the copy I read, Which was all "Rape super easy to find online", "Disgusting activites everywhere" "Why wasnt this done sooner"

The only anti piece was the small paragraph from CAAN, with the rest of the 2 pages devoted to why this needed to be implemented yesterday, and why anyone who would look at anything vaguely pornographic was a dirty pervert who should be shopped to the police as soon as possible.

Scotland is a seperate country, we even have a seperate parliament, same bunch of numpties running it though and same passports. :-(

US no less confusing

Four of our fifty states are not actually states they're "commonwealths" but they still count as states but then there are some commonwealths like Puerto Rico that in spite of being commonwealths don't count as states... lord knows how the Federated States of Micronesia fit into all of this @_@

Hmmm....

Once again, make it illegal, send it underground! Now I am not saying that you need to legalise everything so we can keep and eye on it, but surely 99.5% of adults can be trusted to think for themselves? Oh sorry, using common sense there. Don't worry the government will soon have that banned too!

How can you tell?

If you've got a basic Tab-A in Slot-B type picture, not showing the faces of the owner of either tab or slot, how could you possibly know whether either of them consented? Even more confusingly, how can you tell if either of them "depicts" a person who has consented? For that matter how can you tell if either of them "depicts" a corpse?

I'm not that up on Scottish law, but I understand they are/were going through a (much needed) reform of rape laws which previously only covered the most blatant assaults. It might have made sense to call a depiction rape under the old law "extreme porn" (though I still oppose censoring it), but when rape is simply defined as an absence consent, how can you apply that to fictional characters?

Freedom of expression

I am dreadfully worried that the creative talents of the exposee team of El Reg might have their creative juices curbed. Prior to the above news, there was a rumour going around that they were going to do a piece on The News of The Earth rag, showing (shock horror) NAKED playmobil figures (suitably censored for our delicate eyes) supposedly being sexed without consent !

Mines trying to search for USB Memory sticks having been planted !

Can we talk about this like grown-ups

You can't have a rational discussion with irrational people about topics on which they know nothing and have only opinions and feelings and no facts or logic.

United we fall !

So, looking at many comments above, I am left with the view that many (mostly English) WANT Scotland to be 'theirs' as in, England is such a small country on its own, we NEED Scotland to make us BIGGER !!!

Well, Scotland is delighted to be part of the unitary state that is the United Kingdom. Would that the English (in general) felt the same !

We Scots do all that we can to help our less able English friends. We give you sensible laws which you can copy if you wish --- you usually decline because they are Scottish and go on to pass some stupidly complex shadow of a bill which requires rapid and frequent amendments. Scotland's educational system is second to none and has been for centuries. In the 60s, those first year university students from Scottish schools attending Scottish Universities had to REPEAT what they did in their last year at school BECAUSE the students coming from the English system had not yet covered that work !! You should have heard the comments from the ones who went south to an English university !! Is that still the same, I don't know, but I could hazard a guess !!

Of course, without us England would grind to a halt. Most successful companies in England have Scotsmen (and women) at their heads --- chairman -- directors --- shit, even 'YOUR' government for Christ's sake !! So shut it with the Scotland isn't s separate country. It IS a separate country which chooses to be within a United Kingdom and a United Europe.

Of course, the more the EU becomes integrated, the more likely Scotland becomes to dump good old England in favour of people who are more appreciative of what the Scots have to offer. Like, we gave the world Penicillin, TV, Tarmac roads, Antiseptics, Anaesthetics, and a whole arm-long list of other stuff in your daily life !! Now, let me see if I can match that with English achievements --- I need to be strictly fair and unbiased here !

Ah .. porn .. right ! .... yup ...now I understand !!

RE: Scotland has a different legal system

Damn right... we English used to have ius primae noctis

They got rid of all the best laws.

"How can a multi-cultural nation have a single code of morality applied to it?"

@Anonymous Coward Posted Wednesday 21st January 2009 "How can a multi-cultural nation have a single code of morality applied to it?"

That is very obvious:

The do-gooders, world-improver's and multiculturalist than come up with laws like that will just scour the land to find the most easily offended, narrow-minded, choleric, bigoted, arse and then they will ask him!!.

Some Wahhabi cleric straight out of Saudi Arabia would be about right.