LONDON—Strangulation and choking depictions in consensually produced pornography are set to be outlawed in the United Kingdom's digital space. An announcement made by His Majesty's Ministry of Justice last week indicates that such pornography will see prohibition via amendments to the sweeping Crime and Policing Bill.
"Depicting strangulation during sex is not only dangerous, but also degrading, with real-life consequences for women," explained Alex Davies-Jones, Parliamentary Minister for Victims & Violence Against Women and Girls, who also serves as an MP for the Welsh community of Pontypridd.
"Cracking down on the appalling rise of strangulation pornography will protect women and send a clear signal to men and boys that misogyny will not be tolerated," she added. Such an announcement serves as the final result of the controversial Independent Porn Review, led by Baroness Gabrielle Bertin, a Tory peer in the House of Lords.
Lady Bertin urged the criminalization of consensual adult content, per AVN's previous reporting. Some of the examples of “extreme” pornography or material that is “legal but harmful” include popular fetishes and kinks, including various categories and subcategories of BDSM, consensual choking, CNC, CBT, age-play, and countless others.
Serena Smith, news editor for Dazed, referred to the attempts to ban choking pornography as a "publicity stunt." The amended Crime and Policing Bill with strangulation bans advanced out of the House of Commons and is now before the House of Lords, with the clear support of Lady Bertin and her Tory allies across the board.
“From the beginning of the process, it was clear that the review had a specific goal—broad censorship of adult content—something we fought about and pushed back against aggressively," Free Speech Coalition director of public Policy Mike Stabile said in a February report by AVN.
He continued, “While the report claims to focus on ‘extreme’ content, in reality, the terms they’re using are vague, ill-defined, subjective, and broad."
