Audiovisual Media Services Regulations 2014

The Audiovisual Media Services Regulations 2014

Statutory Instrument
Parliament of the United Kingdom
Citation	2014 No. 2916
Introduced by	Ed Vaizey (Department for Culture, Media and Sport)
Dates
Made	4 November 2014
Commencement	1 December 2014
Other legislation
Made under	Communications Act 2003
Status: Current legislation
Text of statute as originally enacted
Text of the Audiovisual Media Services Regulations 2014 as in force today (including any amendments) within the United Kingdom, from the UK Statute Law Database

The Audiovisual Media Services Regulations 2014 is a Statutory Instrument of the Parliament of the United Kingdom that applies regulations to R18-rated pornography that is available through video on demand or other streaming platforms. Prior to the regulations coming into force, neither Ofcom nor the British Board of Film Classification (BBFC) had jurisdiction over such content. In force from 1 December 2014, these regulations have been made by the Secretary of State in exercise of the powers conferred by section 2(2) of the European Communities Act 1972.

Content

Current British obscenity law prohibits obscene publications, including pornography that may seriously harm the performer or threaten their life. Prior to the regulations coming into force, online pornography was not subject to the same regulations as pornography available for purchase in sex shops; the intention of the regulations was to create a parity between the two forms. Material that was already banned by the BBFC in home video – and therefore restricted under the regulations – includes:

• Sadomasochistic material, including spanking, caning, whipping
• Physical restraint
• Urolagnia
• Female ejaculation
• Erotic asphyxiation
• Facesitting
• Fisting

The Department for Culture, Media and Sport defended the regulations by stating that the BBFC's R18 certificate was a "tried and tested" method of protecting children, and highlighted the need for consistency in regulation. Peter Johnson, the chair of the Authority for Television On Demand (ATVOD), stated that he believed unregistered material from overseas would violate the Obscene Publications Act 1959, and credit card payments to premium sites would be able to be blocked.

Protests

Upon going into force on 1 December 2014, the regulations were subject to immediate criticism, particularly for their ban on female ejaculation whilst male ejaculation was unaffected by the regulations. A Vice interview with BBFC officials indicated that the prohibition on female ejaculation was due to the ban on urolagnia, and the difficulty of distinguishing female ejaculate from urine. A blog for the New Statesman highlighted that many of the activities were popular in the LGBT and BDSM communities or related to expressions of female sexuality. Myles Jackman, an obscenity lawyer, expressed concerns that the regulations set a dangerous precedent and described pornography as "the canary in the coal mine" of freedom of speech.

The regulations were subject to a protest by opponents in Parliament Square on 12 December 2014, organised by sex worker and Clacton by-election candidate Charlotte Rose, which included a mass demonstration of facesitting and singing of the Monty Python song "Sit on My Face". One protest sign read, "Urine for a shock if you expect us to stop." Rose and other female erotic performers expressed concern that the regulations were approved without a vote or public consent, and that the changes could be indicative of further changes to obscenity law.

In response to the controversy, Julian Huppert, the Liberal Democrat MP for Cambridge, laid down an Early Day Motion seeking a debate to annul the regulations, which was signed by fellow Lib Dem MPs David Ward and John Leech, and independent MP Mike Hancock. Huppert stated that any regulations on sex or pornography should be based on issues of consent or risk and not "moral objection. Huppert's EDM also received support from Deputy Prime Minister and Lib Dem leader Nick Clegg, who stated that politicians should not be in a role to judge anybody's sexual behaviour, and that supporting sexual freedom was a "classic liberal assertion".

The regulations, and obscenity law in general, were also criticised by the chair of the LGBT+ Liberal Democrats, Dave Page, after the release of the film adaptation of the erotic novel Fifty Shades of Grey, which was given an 18 rating; Page noted that BBFC's reasoning for the 18 certificate rather than the R18 rating—that the sexual scenes in film were portrayals instead of actual intercourse—is not consistent with obscenity law, which does not make that distinction, and attacked the legislative double standard in which depictions of legal and consensual sex, often between LGBT people, were censored but films that were criticised for portraying abusive relationships as normal were passed uncut. Legal scholar Guido Noto La Diega also noted that the BBFC's regulations are inconsistent with case law such as R v Peacock, which ruled that consensual BDSM pornography depicting gay men did not fall afoul of obscenity law.

Feminist Opposition

Following the December 2014 face-sitting protest outside of Parliament, the feminist magazine Bitch criticized the regulations for censoring women's sexuality on the basis that “[t]he laws seem to specifically target acts that prioritize female pleasure or indicate female dominance.” The article pointed out the double-standard in permitting men—but not women—to assume a dominant position during oral sex acts, and accused the regulations of perpetuating the sexual subordination of women in porn by writing porn’s gender bias into law. Its author Catherine Scott explained:

For example, while female ejaculation is banned, male ejaculation and its consumption remain acceptable. Although the British Board of Film Classification reports that the pornographic act it most regularly censors is “scenes of choking and gagging during deep throat fellatio,” there is no suggestion of banning these acts—only ones that see a woman receiving pleasure from sitting on a man’s face.

Pandora Blake, webmaster of the BDSM-themed site Dreams of Spanking, insinuated that the sites shut down for failure to comply with the regulations “have been gay sites and female domination. No BDSM sites with female submissives have been targeted because that [women’s subordination] is apparently fine.”

See also

• Operation Spanner
• Section 63 of the Criminal Justice and Immigration Act 2008

References

• Scott, Catherine (2015). "Banning Cheek to Cheek: Are the U.K.'s new porn laws anti-woman?", Bitch. Spring 2015.