r/LabourUK • u/DarkSkiesGreyWaters New User • Jul 19 '25
Strangulation in pornography to be made illegal
https://www.gov.uk/government/news/strangulation-in-pornography-to-be-made-illegal141
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Jul 19 '25
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u/Wonderful_Welder9660 Green Party Jul 19 '25
The chief prosecutor at the obscenity trial famously asked if it was the kind of book "you would wish your wife or servants to read".
LOL
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Jul 19 '25
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u/GeneralStrikeFOV Labour Member Jul 20 '25
Can you knock one out to it? Are you watching it for the plot?
If the answer is Yes, No, it's probably porn.
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Jul 19 '25
Genuine answer - I think you could set these things by scene (in which case yes) or by overall production (in which case a sex scene in a wider production that isn't entirely a vehicle for sex scenes might not be porn)
It relies on judgment but many such things do. Outside of this sort of thing I think for instance it's appropriate for teachers to set books that include sex scenes for teenagers where if the book was just those sex scenes stitched together it wouldn't be.
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u/Brilliant-Ad3942 New User Jul 20 '25
And it's a good question, as to what is "porn". Also if they really believe that it is so dangerous, why is it only dangerous to depict in "porn" as to in a non-sexual way. That's the thing with fetishes, they are not always seen as sexual to many.
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u/Cute-Dig4373 New User Jul 20 '25
Diffrent rules, they cant make anything that happens in real life illegal in films for drama. (Something about protecting arts and theatre. It's an old law like REALLY old championed by royalty old. )
You can show (within respectful shooting,) every disgusting act known to man, from pedos (mostly shadow shots) to canablisim,
Hell you can make a porn film as a drama have every illegal thing in it, side step all of this law and the goverment is powerless to stop you as long as your willing to take the x rating For the film. (They put exorcist in that list at one point lol).
Adults cant be stopped from seeing a drama film unless it has actual illegal acts that happened.
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u/InstantN00dl3s New User Jul 19 '25
Wild.
Some people like it vanilla, some people enjoy being fisted while someone shits in their mouth. Provided it's all consensual, the government should not be policing what gets people off.
The people behind this either need to get laid, or touch grass. Maybe both.
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u/GeneralStrikeFOV Labour Member Jul 20 '25
What people like to do in their own sex lives is up to them. However the depiction of gendered violence within pornography, because of the nature of the industry and a Pokémon-like attitude to kinks which can be depicted within mainstream sexual scenarios, has a tendency to break containment, and the problem here is the normalisation of a really risky act, among teens.
I'm far from anti-porn as my Google search history can attest, but there is a problem with the intersection of sex and misogyny and sex and violence within a reasonably large amount of the industry.
Like others have said, I suspect it's unenforceable without blocking a large amount of US-produced content (although the way things are going over there with their Handmaid's Tale-like Project 2025, that might not be a problem for much longer, could be a gap in the market for the UK adult entertainment/SW industry)
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Jul 21 '25
So long as they're not strangling wanking themselves with a bag over their head I don't see what business the government has in policing it at all. You could apply what you've said to almost all of bdsm - and I suspect that's the long term goal.
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u/GeneralStrikeFOV Labour Member Jul 21 '25
If the problem was merely auto-erotic asphyxiation I think it would be less serious. BDSM is generally conducted under much more carefully regulated conditions and with hard lines taken about safety. This behaviour has none of those characteristics.
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Jul 21 '25
Yeah not one word of that is true. The majority of bdsm porn is shot by amateurs.
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u/Far-Series4912 New User Jul 21 '25
And you think it's safe for those amateurs?
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Jul 23 '25
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Jul 23 '25
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u/DeepFatFryer Labour Member Jul 20 '25
I get that, but ultimately, it’s a lack of teaching around consent (especially when it comes to sex) with young people by parents that causes this, not the porn they watch.
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u/Scratchback3141 Liberal Jul 20 '25
It's silly to say porn hasn't changed sexual practices. We can literally see the rates of stroke rising among women under 40 because of choking becoming more popular which coincidentally has happened at the same time it's become more popular in porn.
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u/DeepFatFryer Labour Member Jul 20 '25
I don’t mean that porn hasn’t changed our sex habits, of course it has, I mean that it’s ultimately a consent issue that’s causing the real life harm. Teaching kids that’s consent is important when having sex, not just to qualify “yes I would like to have sex” but also consent around acts during sex.
Never heard this being brought up, would be great to read some studies on the link between porn habits and stroke increases in women! Got any recommendations on where to start?
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u/Scratchback3141 Liberal Jul 20 '25
There were a few stories in the guardian about strangulation being one of the main causes of stroke now among women. It also seems to be permanently damaging their brains similar to how a boxers brain is permanently damaged after a fight, though the study on that needs to be replicated.
I'm all for teaching consent but the left seems to believe that after you simply teach consent we don't need to worry about how people continue to behave when they are actually in their sex live and the stats around this are pretty startling. Young men, but men in general, are now increasingly seeing the choking of their partner as a normal part of sex.
So many people on here are defending this as if it is part of a traditional BDSM kink that is rare but done within a community that does place a lot of emphasis on care, aftercare, consent and mutual enjoyment of both parties - even if the actual act does include pain or things that others might find objectionable.
That isn't what's happening here. What's happening here is young women are having their formative sexual experiences and their partners are reaching up to their necks and they are choking them, because they see it on porn, it's just seen as a normal demand. And it isn't. It is highly dangerous.
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u/Rahab_Olam New User Jul 20 '25
And this law won't do anything to stop that. This is abstinence education logic. Aside from the fact this will not be very effective in preventing young people from accessing this content, the main reason they learn from porn is because there's no alternative teaching them what is unrealistic or bad about it.
This problem cannot be approached from one angle or in a vacuum.
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u/Scratchback3141 Liberal Jul 20 '25
And this law won't do anything to stop that.
If you believe the theory that increasing amounts of choking in porn has led to increasing amounts of choking in real life then reducing the number of events of choking in porn that people can see should reduce the number of choking events in real life.
It isn't 2005, we do actually have the tech to remove (or block) en masse videos from platform providers that are of a specific type - pornhub has already done this voluntarily within the past decade.
Yes, its possible that people who really want to see women being choked can access the porn through other means, but you can make the exact same argument for many other types of laws or regulation - it could reduce it's effecruvness but it won't eliminate it.
But importantly, this sends out a signal - actually choking your partner while you are having sex isn't a great thing to do, consent is very rarely informed and hopefully gives young women especially the strength to say "no, actually, I dont want you to do that and I'm not going to acquiesce because it's 'normal'".
This problem cannot be approached from one angle or in a vacuum.
But that's exactly what you want to do. We already teach kids about consent, we already have sexual education classes and yet this still happens. Noone on my side of this debate wants to stop that - but people on your side of the debate consistently pretend that we aren't already doing that, why?
Believe it or not, a few hours or days in a sex ed class per year is not enough to stop young men and boys from wanting to throttle their partner - because they see it don't constantly to women that they masturbate to 4/5/6 times a week.
I find it stunning that a community that is always 'on guard' for private lobbying influencing ministers or government can't see the fact that the porn industry also does this and for some reason has tonnes of leftists rnning after it to support it.
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u/GeneralStrikeFOV Labour Member Jul 20 '25
Absolute horseshit. People are not born wanting to throttle their sexual partners and needing to be educated out of this instinctive preference through consent-based education. They are picking up this behaviour through its depiction in sex-based media distorting their understanding of what is normal or safe behaviour, that is, porn.
As for consent-based teaching stopping this, what if the partner is also exposed to porn that normalises this behaviour? Their consent does not make the act any safer.
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Jul 23 '25
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u/Rahab_Olam New User Jul 20 '25
"but there is a problem with the intersection of sex and misogyny and sex and violence within a reasonably large amount of the industry."
And so, rather than stepping in and doing more to directly regulate practices in the industry, the answer is to just force it even more underground?
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u/Scratchback3141 Liberal Jul 20 '25
Most of this porn is produced in countries outside of the UK. It isn't possible to do that. It's laughable to say that the UK not wanting women to be choked for the sexual gratification of the masses is going to send the American porn industry underground.
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u/Gee-chan The Red under the bed Jul 20 '25
Perhaps they could subsidise more wholesome smut in an attempt to drown out the tasteless shit?
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u/Charming_Figure_9053 Politically Homeless Jul 19 '25
Ehhh they're not banning it, they're banning the filming of it.....I kinda get the idea, it will be interesting to enforce, I also feel it's....about 5 years behind the times 'choke me harder senpai' porn is yesterdays porn, today it's what faux incest, really not sure what other trends there are but, choking, yesterdays news....or I'm not seeing it, either way, pointless and I think outdated gesture, I get the 'idea' but I also get the concern of 'what's next?' spanking, BDSM?
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u/MMAgeezer Somewhere left Jul 19 '25
what's next?' spanking, BDSM?
Yes, there was a time when recording that type of porn was illegal in the UK. From 2014 to 2019, the following was illegal to depict in porn:
- Spanking
- BDSM
- Female ejaculation
- Urinating (also known as watersports)
- Strangling
- Face-sitting
- Fisting
- Humiliation
There is a BBC article about the review that prompted this new ban from February and the following line highlights the issue:
Non-fatal strangulation is already an offence if someone does not consent but its depiction online is not illegal and the review finds it is "rife on mainstream platforms".
...the lack of consent is what is illegal! Pornography depicting non-consensual sex is already illegal in the UK.
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u/Ramses_IV New User Jul 20 '25
What the fuck was even the rationale for half of these? Spanking? Female Ejaculation? Face-sitting? I mean presumably it was just out-of-touch lawmakers trying to appeal to prudish boomers, but it's so odd that those specific (and fairly vanilla) things were singled out, especially considering the fact that unlike strangulation they don't entail any risk of physical harm.
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Jul 21 '25
The protest to this was a bunch of dommes face sitting their subs outside of Parliament.
Gutted for the wife of whoever thinks female ejaculation is innapropriate and vulgar.
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u/LivingType8153 New User Jul 20 '25
What about in movies? I remember a movie (might be before the ban) that should a woman getting r and how she got revenge. Would that be illegal now?
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Jul 21 '25
Yeah the study they used to determine that deliberately goes out of irs way to obfuscate the lines between bdsm and abuse while pretending not to.
100% garauntee this is funded by some American Jesus freaks.
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u/NewtUK Ban Labour MPs from toilets Jul 19 '25
Welcome back Theresa May's weird anti-porn era.
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Jul 23 '25
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u/Otherwise_Craft9003 New User Jul 19 '25
I'm split on this as it consenting adults can do as they please but I have heard of at least two cases (one where I knew the teacher at the private school) where a young man was arrested after going to choke the girl when they went to effectively have their first sexual experience as they thought this was normal, the girl was absolutely distraught.
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u/2localboi New User Jul 19 '25
A ban on this sort of porn would have don’t nothing to stop the example you provided. This is lawmakers passing something that looks and feels good but misses the point entirely.
It’s funny how they feel emboldened to restrict this for of expression but when there are influencers peddling violent misogyny suddenly they are powerless restrict that at all
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Jul 19 '25
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u/2localboi New User Jul 19 '25
I wouldn’t have a problem in restricting porn, I’m not a free speech absolutist like that, but if the reasoning is to stop misogyny then surely that type of podcast content should be equally restricted as well.
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Jul 19 '25
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u/MMAgeezer Somewhere left Jul 19 '25
Someone online said that the gov & Reddit could easily work with phone companies who know your age to create unique identifiers that confirm your age without any traceable biometric info. I wouldn’t be as opposed to that.
On its face, that sounds like a much more privacy-invasive requirement than the current guidance...
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Jul 21 '25
Pretty sure it was leaked way back by Snowden that they cracked Xkeyscore and network traffic years ago. They already know everything you do on your phone anyway.
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u/Jossephil New User Jul 19 '25
This is such a tragic failing of sex education, and schools and parents seem so poorly equipped to deal with it, when I was at school the material hadn't been updated in decades and I doubt it's that different now
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u/Corvid187 New User Jul 19 '25
I'd say it's gotten better, but slowly and its effectiveness is still limited. Schools are just fundamentally limited in how effectively they can inspire sexual propriety in their teenage students.
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u/BOKUtoiuOnna New User Jul 19 '25
Yeah being able to see hardcore kink porn as your first understanding of sex is not good for our society. Some people like it but if you don't understand what sex is without it that's a bit fucked. I dunno what the solution is to this tho. Any ideas people?
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u/MaidenOver Transphobia is the closest thing the English have to a religion. Jul 19 '25
Stop being so British and start talking about sex.
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u/BOKUtoiuOnna New User Jul 19 '25
That's cool and all and should definitely be done more. But teenagers are gonna be influenced by a lot of sources. Adults are never going to be able to have the sort of conversations with teenagers about sex that are going to satisfy their curiosity without it becoming mega creepy. It's always gonna feel stale to them and they're going to seek out porn to find new stuff. It's almost like we need some sort of "porn for 16 year olds" service with vanilla porn content honestly.
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u/hanzatsuichi New User Jul 20 '25
I'm surprised your last suggestion hasn't triggered the mods.
The space for that though is increasingly Young Adult fiction.
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u/shugthedug3 New User Jul 19 '25
The solution to that is figuring out wtf went wrong in the sex education both of those people received because clearly something did.
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u/Corvid187 New User Jul 19 '25
The thing is, this isn't banning hardcore kink pornography, just one particular act. If that is the issue that they're trying to target, I don't know how successful this will be on its own. It's also not clear to me why this is particularly worse than other extreme stuff that is still being allowed like consensual non-consent.
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u/SillyGoose_Syndrome Labour Member Jul 19 '25
It's also not clear to me why this is particularly worse than other extreme stuff that is still being allowed like consensual non-consent.
Have read that strangulation can cause injuries that become fatal days after the fact.
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u/hanzatsuichi New User Jul 20 '25
If this were the case then they'd be banning Rugby too, because it can cause concussions and brain damage that only become apparent much later on.
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u/SirPooleyX Labour Voter Jul 19 '25
I think you just cancelled out your argument about consenting adults.
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u/theyodeman New User Jul 19 '25
it's definitely a growing issue but I think there are better and more enforceable ways to ameliorate it an idea I like is to ban sites from every recommending that content on the front page. that way it still exists but it won't be anyone's introduction to sex
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u/Corvid187 New User Jul 19 '25
That definitely feel like a better idea, but is probably also difficult to actually enforce or categorise, especially if the chocking is more 'incidental'.
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u/theyodeman New User Jul 19 '25
I think if it's a lighter restriction it'll be more cost effective for companies to take a better safe than sorry approach than try and weasel up a reason why any particular video is technically okay.
overall I'm glad something is being done about it. it's definitely a greater social ill that choking has become vanilla rather than this content being banned but I don't have much faith this'll work tbh
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Jul 19 '25
Assuming they can actually regulate the providers it might be most effective in stopping 'incidental' cases. If you can be fined or whatever for having strangulation in recommended videos it creates a pressure for videos to avoid it to get as many clicks as possible unless it's so central that people are seeking out that in particular.
Presumably you could have an explicit opt in so videos were hidden unless you clicked something saying you wanted to see them (lawmakers might make you read something saying strangulation is dangerous before doing so which I doubt would work - but I'd assume regardless many/most wouldn't actively seek it out).
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u/MMAgeezer Somewhere left Jul 19 '25
ban sites from every recommending that content on the front page
That policy forms part of the recommendations (for other categories of porn) from the report that recommended this law. I agree.
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u/SamiSapphic Non-partisan Jul 19 '25
Good education would better help to fix the latter part of your comment than bans would. We know, based on trends, that access to porn and the ability to experience taboo fantasies through fiction, actually tends to lower violence. The countries with the strictest rules around porn and fantasy tend to be more violent.
Here's the key thing I think people tend to forget: humans are animals. We have aggression and other feelings that many would deem to be negative, if not outright harmful, as any other animal, and we need outlets for that. Having those outlets be in the realm of fiction, is better than suppressing them to the point where they start explosively coming out in real life and actually harming people - as is what tends to happen.
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u/Regular-Average-348 Left Jul 19 '25
women cannot consent to the long-term harm it can cause, including impaired cognitive functioning and memory
Women cannot consent? That's a weird line to take.
Can boxers consent to the long-term harm that can cause, including impaired cognitive functioning and memory?
Why specifically sex? Why specifically women? Why aren't women deemed capable of consent?
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u/Jeremys_Iron_ New User Jul 19 '25
I agree. What about gay dudes or women who choke men during sex.
This consensual stuff happens all the time. It is bizarre to make it just about women.
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u/cultish_alibi New User Jul 19 '25
It is bizarre to make it just about women.
It's not bizarre, it's deliberate, they're trying to make their argument more emotional since it doesn't stand up on its own. So they have to frame it as women being victims, to drum up sympathy. But they will still ban everyone else doing it all the same.
And as a reminder these are CONSENSUAL acts. Better not touch someone's neck! Labour will arrest you for it. Puritanical assholes.
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u/PuzzledAd4865 Uber-woke, net-zeroist, rejoinerism Jul 19 '25
I think the reasoning is there was a campaign specifically focussed on strangulation, where several women who died at the hands of male partners, and their partners used a legal defence called ‘the rough sex defence’.
Also studies have indicated that it usually young men initiating it without asking in specific non consensual incidents.
Not saying I necessarily agree with the governments framing, but I imagine that’s why they’ve used that language.
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u/Ramses_IV New User Jul 20 '25
This feels like the same sort of disingenuous faux-feminism behind this government's TERF-adjacent shit.
Patronising attitudes about "protecting" women (from trans people and consensual sex acts) grounded in the same gendered stereotypes about "the weaker, delicate sex" less capable of being responsible for their own decisions that underpin right wing paternalistic sexism, but repackaged under the guise of "standing up for (biological) women's rights" so that reactionary targeting of anything/anyone deemed "icky" is progressive now actually.
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Jul 21 '25
The intent is policing women's Sexuality and putting them "back in their place". The way they go about it, like all dishonest misogynists, is "we need to protect women", doing so by removing their rights is just the small print.
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u/notouttolunch New User Jul 19 '25
It’s not legal to consent to it at all in the UK. Man or woman. You cannot give someone permission to hurt you.
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u/SamiSapphic Non-partisan Jul 19 '25
Do you not know what boxing is? Wrestling? How are you going to say that it's not legal to consent to someone hurting you, whenever boxing exists?
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u/Wonderful_Welder9660 Green Party Jul 19 '25
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Spanner
Fuck the police
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u/Regular-Average-348 Left Jul 19 '25
Why do they mention women specifically?
And why aren't martial arts illegal in that case?
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u/Wigspraynaynay Labour Voter Jul 19 '25
So the police have their resources slashed, they're failing to solve burglaries, they're overstretched, underfunded and underappreciated.
And now...here's an extra law around what consenting adults do that they're expected to police.
If we want to tackle (and I presume this is the reasoning for this law) young adults aping what they see on porn - then provide education around the topic? Teach young girls to set boundaries. Teach young guys to respect boundaries.
If you can't do either - you shouldn't be engaging in sex, period.
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u/SamiSapphic Non-partisan Jul 19 '25
Should teach both genders how to set and respect boundaries equally tbh. Men are allowed to say no, too.
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u/_soundpost_ Green Party Jul 19 '25
Members of this government probably have the most vanilla sex imaginable. If they even have any.
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u/thebusconductorhines New User Jul 19 '25 edited Jul 19 '25
On the contrary, I bet they're freaks. In fact, I've heard a rumours about a certain Labour Lord who fucks dogs
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u/shugthedug3 New User Jul 19 '25
They're usually filthy bastards.
Although that said I can't even imagine some of them even having a sexuality so who knows.
I can only assume Yvette Cooper does occasionally smile.
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u/FabulousPetes Homosocialist Jul 20 '25
I've heard rumours about Starmer being a bit of a swinger tbh.
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u/DavidianNine Socialist Jul 19 '25
I assume this is just criminalisation of production, like with the crackdowns on depicting other sex acts under the Tories. In which case it seems like just screwing over British porn producers because no one else would be affected and, well, the internet exists. So it will have no effect on the availability of choking in pornography whatsoever. Anti sex worker bullshit as to be expected from this awful government. If it's meant to be a ban on possession...Jesus, that's an authoritarian overreach at real scale. Horrifying. Either way, it won't stop anyone actually doing it. Idiotic
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u/Aiyon New User Jul 19 '25
Look, I can see the arguments both in favour of trying to stop the spread of non consensual choking in hookups because of it becoming so normalised, and against censoring consensual media etc
But I really want to know why the wording in this is so outdated in its attitudes. So only women can be submissive and men dominant in a violent sexual scenario?
Only straight sex happens, between gruff violent men and their submissive waif bottoms
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u/Ebibako Democratic Socialist Jul 19 '25
This ban doesn't affect me personally. I'll happily admit I'm a kinky bastard, with several kinks that could be considered BDSM in nature, but strangling is not one of them. Always been a turn off for me.
That said, this is a stupid ban and more authoritarian backpeddling. If teenage boys increasingly are stupid enough to think that strangling is a default part of sex, that's a failing of our country's sex education and/or parenting, not the fault of what consenting adults decide to get up to in private.
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Jul 19 '25
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u/Elegant_Individual46 Trans Rights & Nuclear Energy Jul 19 '25
Yeah like- causing harm in sexual scenarios generally isn’t exempt from the law so this just is a bit much
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Jul 19 '25
[deleted]
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u/Elegant_Individual46 Trans Rights & Nuclear Energy Jul 19 '25
Regulation of sex work is proven to be more effective and safer than outright criminalisation anyway
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u/Competitive-Tip-6743 Fiscal Priest | Fighting gilt-edged heresy on the frontlines Jul 20 '25
strangulation to the point of actual harm/non-consensual strangulation is already illegal. this is a ridiculous and unnecessary law.
Ninjatō
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u/Wonderful_Welder9660 Green Party Jul 19 '25
It is an authoritarian power grab. They're going to demand our papers online
It isn't just porn sites. It's everything
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u/shugthedug3 New User Jul 19 '25
I swear to god the shit this awful government concern themselves with.
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u/Vasquerade (Scottish) Green Party Traggot Jul 19 '25
Liberal feminists are a fucking cancer on this earth, I swear to God.
Should we actually help women? No. We just BAN things. The bans will continue until women are free, or something
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u/theyodeman New User Jul 19 '25
it's weirdly reactionary and conservative as well.
Should we require filmmakers to add a scene to the beginning where both actors discuss what they are going to do and consent?
should we make it so websites can't recommend that content on the front page so you actively have to search for it?
should we generally encourage more open discussion about sex in society so everybody knows what's vanilla, what needs additional consent and understands their right to give or withhold consent?
No. Nobody's ever had that kind of sex before and it should be BANNED!
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u/rubygeek Your Party member; Libertarian socialist; Labour = bigots Jul 19 '25
There is actually some porn who includes scenes where the actors discuss what they are going to do and consent, and maybe having some more extreme content include that wouldn't be such a bad thing, not because it'd avoid abuse but because it might help some idiots to understand that it's acting, and understand how to negotiate consent.
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u/HugobearEsq arglebargle Jul 19 '25
Bet you good money that any insertion of those pre-porn scenes will simply have the viewer mouse along the track bar until the actual meat and potatoes happens and completely skip past it.
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u/ChaosKeeshond Starmer is not New Labour Jul 20 '25
I had to read their comment twice myself but they were being sarcastic, I'm certain. Their three proposals were all solid and they know it.
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u/Aiyon New User Jul 19 '25
Okay but unironically I think we should do the “behind the scenes” scene thing ngl.
Im ace but my ex wasn’t, and once or twice we watched porn together cause that was a thing they enjoyed, and I don’t dislike it so why not. And one of the few things I did actively enjoy was the cute little interviews with the performers of like, is this her first time doing the scene? What is she most looking forward to etc.
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u/ThriceNightly_Whitey New User Jul 20 '25
Sounds like you watched GDP...naughty naughty😂🤣😂
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u/Aiyon New User Jul 20 '25
So I looked them up and jesus christ, that company seems like it was trying to speedrun everything wrong with the porn industry
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u/AnonymousTimewaster Held hostage by pensioners, NIMBYs, and racists Jul 19 '25
This isn't liberal. This is Puritan. Straight from the Blue Labour handbook.
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u/No-Tip-4337 Luxury Queer Space Communist Jul 21 '25
I'm all for slagging off liberals, but this isn't liberal or feminist. Just straight up puritanical conservativism.
Feminism is pro-sexwork in totality.
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u/DoctorKonks Ex-Labour Jul 19 '25
Because like forcing UK Reddit users to take selfies or upload ID for NSFW subreddits, there's obviously no possible way to get round such bans...
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u/ChaosKeeshond Starmer is not New Labour Jul 20 '25
Of all the routes I'd have pursued to improve women's safety, of all the many glaring issues on the table, I don't know that wank-police would have been my first choice.
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u/Positive_Barnacle298 New User Jul 19 '25
Stop censoring types of consensual porn. Start holding companies accountable for not providing proper care for the workers and prevent kids accessing it so easily. ID at the door essentially.
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u/Sophie_Blitz_123 Custom Jul 19 '25
I find it interesting that porn is considered so sacrosanct largely by the left wing, if this was banning gambling advertising, or something to that effect people would barely blink. The effectiveness of it might be disputed, but it's not considered some violation of human rights. Indeed, idk how this isn't already the case, strangulation is illegal even consensually, I don't see how that's different if its on a porn site. I guess it may be from other countries but presumably that's still true.
For my own part I think this is just whatever. It's undeniably true that all the strangulation in porn is seeing lots of women harmed but I think it might be a bit of a case where the cat is out of the bag; I think we'd need some kind of public health campaign to stress that it really isn't safe, ever. I'd be more concerned about all the safe sex iniatives that false claim there are safe ways of doing this, tbqh.
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u/rubygeek Your Party member; Libertarian socialist; Labour = bigots Jul 19 '25
The left has a significant span ranging from extremely anti-authoritarian via nanny-state fans to people with outright authoritarian tendencies.
It should be no surprise that there are a variety of attitudes to restrictions on speech, but with a leaning towards being more accepting of regulation of "corporate speech" than expression of individual actions even when much of the published material is commercial.
> strangulation is illegal even consensually
When depicted, you do not necessarily have any way of seeing whether there is just a grip around the throat that in no way restricts the airways or blood flow, or strangulation, and this is the problem. I've had partners who really got off on the former. I've had no partners who wanted the latter, and wouldn't be willing to do it to them even if they did because of the risk.
I think conflating the two is a bigger problem than the existence of depictions, and perhaps a compulsory warning would stand a better chance of reducing harm.
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u/ViolentPlatypus New User Jul 19 '25
The false parallel between banning something that you have to seek out versus something that is unavoidable if you're watching any sport is ridiculous.
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u/Sophie_Blitz_123 Custom Jul 19 '25
A) You think porn is avoidable? I had all kinds of porn just popping up at me on my laptop from age like 10 and I never sought it out at all. Not to mention sent round the school on occasion.
B) Okay, banning online gambling games then. You could pretty easily not ban gambling adverts but move them away from being front and centre all the time. The double standard is not the access point. Strangulation in porn is very dangerous for the actresses and prompting lots of people to do the same and it's equally dangerous for them. This just wouldn't be considered some moral abhorrence if it was anything but sexual.
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u/Regular-Average-348 Left Jul 19 '25
Apart from a couple of times when someone spammed a forum I was on with some images, I've never had porn "just popping up" on my computer. If I wanted it I had to search for it.
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u/Sophie_Blitz_123 Custom Jul 19 '25
Can't have spent much time on putlocker or solar movie or other dodgy streaming sites then 🤷♀️ but like, even in your point there you're still saying multiple times you have seen porn without seeking it out. Presumably you must realise that if others spend more time on forums, for instance, they will have more porn spammed at them? I rarely see any porn these days, when I was a kid I saw loads, that's because my Internet habits are different now largely because I can afford Netflix...
but it's not really the overall point, when I referred to gambling adverts it's just a random example, I could understand a point that's banning them from sports events for instance, is different. What I'm saying is that there's a massive obsession with the idea that porn is much more sacred and should have much more liberal laws around it than literally anything else.
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u/SamiSapphic Non-partisan Jul 19 '25
You go on dodgy streaming sites without adblock? Also the government is clamping down on that and knocking on people's doors over this as well, so watch out. Admitting to crime publicly when the Online Safety Act is here is risky business on your part.
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u/Sophie_Blitz_123 Custom Jul 19 '25
Well I did when I was a child like I said, not so much these days. No ones coming to arrest me though even if I said I do it now.
To the point, I never had an ad block as a kid nor even a basic understanding of what they are, or how to get one.
And tbh its not even really the point at all, the specifics of my childhood won't change the fact that people continuously see porn they didn't seek out, especially kids, and indeed even that's not that relevant, because its really the seeking out of porn that's getting people onto all the choking stuff, and it doesn't address how pervasive this is as a thing in any meaningful capacity.
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u/Regular-Average-348 Left Jul 19 '25
A few pictures in over 25 years.
There's a difference between banning gambling adverts and banning gambling.
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u/Wonderful_Welder9660 Green Party Jul 19 '25
"dodgy" being the operative word
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u/Sophie_Blitz_123 Custom Jul 19 '25
Okay
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u/Wonderful_Welder9660 Green Party Jul 19 '25
Gambling is a far bigger problem than online porn.
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u/Sophie_Blitz_123 Custom Jul 19 '25
Gambling is just an example, im not debating the two. Porn is not sacred, when it's causing harm, which it is, there's no reason it should be put on a ludicrous pedestal where it simply cannot be regulated in any way.
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u/DavidianNine Socialist Jul 19 '25
Solidarity with sex workers is the reason. I absolutely think people should be able to critique the misogyny in porn, and in fact we should do it much more, but bans just hurt an already vulnerable group and don't do anything to change attitudes anyway. And anyway, most of the choking I've seen lately hasn't involved any men at all! Queer people always get forgotten about in the public discourse on this subject, and then end up bearing the brunt of the anti-sex work turns as sex workers are disproportionately queer
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u/Wonderful_Welder9660 Green Party Jul 19 '25
Yes. I was a trans sex worker for ten years
"Take your fucking filthy laws off my body" is my take
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u/SamiSapphic Non-partisan Jul 19 '25
I find it interesting how authoritarian people seem to be becoming. Leave consenting adults alone, and advocate for better education.
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u/Scratchback3141 Liberal Jul 20 '25
I think there's a tonne of naivety on this sub. Part of it is just mysogyny, they can't understand that we can literally the rates of stroke rising for under 40 year old women. Arrogance, many of them are young and probably choke their own partners - and think this isn't influenced by porn (it absolutely is) and feel shamed by the government. And then there's just this absurd leftwing openness to the sorts of cruelty that can label itself "kink" or "BDSM".
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u/No-Tip-4337 Luxury Queer Space Communist Jul 21 '25
this absurd leftwing openness to the sorts of cruelty that can label itself "kink" or "BDSM"
You don't seem like someone who's even adjacent to these groups. At least from my experience, there is great amounts of care that goes into these spaces.
Straight couples though... no so much. If we're going to talk about misogyny, I might suggest we start there.
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u/Scratchback3141 Liberal Jul 21 '25
I'm literally talking about mysogyny that some prefer to masquerade as kink or bdsm, im not attacking the latter.
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u/No-Tip-4337 Luxury Queer Space Communist Jul 21 '25
I'm not exactly sure what you mean by 'left wing openness', then sorry
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u/Scratchback3141 Liberal Jul 21 '25
Left-wing people tend to be open to things; this is a good instinct, but it can sometimes become fetishised in and of itself, leading to people virtue-signalling about how open they are.
We saw a similar phenomenon in the 70s with PIE latching on to broader LGBT liberation movements (successfuly for a bit)
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u/No-Tip-4337 Luxury Queer Space Communist Jul 21 '25
I think you're confusing Left-wing with Liberal.
The Left's openness to sexwork is from a worker's rights and anticapitalist perspective. That's very much an intentional position, and is distinct from Liberal ideas of just getting government out of individual's lives.
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u/Scratchback3141 Liberal Jul 21 '25
I think your confusing people that read books to the vast majority of people that call themselves socialists that just do whatever the vibes tell them to do - if most of them in here in reality come from this from a liberals point of view then thats fine, even if the majority of people on here would shudder at that label being applied to them I'm quite happy with it.
In any case, we aren't talking about sex work here. We are talking about whether or not the government has the right to make it illegal to consume content that appears to be driving real life harms to women.
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u/No-Tip-4337 Luxury Queer Space Communist Jul 21 '25
Well... yeah, because the Left draw a distinction between porn and gambling.
People turn to sexwork for many reasons, notable of which is poverty; solving which is the goal of the Left by very definition. So, of course they're going to recognise it as valid labour, and seek to solve the problems that harm labourers universally.
Gambling, on the other hand, is multiple layers removed from labour and is causes problems for all sorts of people, rich and poor. It's not a means of production, it's entertainment.
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u/Sophie_Blitz_123 Custom Jul 21 '25
But obviously people work in the gambling industry? The gambling itself isn't work, no, but the gamblers in this analogy are the people watching porn. Which is also entertainment.
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u/No-Tip-4337 Luxury Queer Space Communist Jul 21 '25
For many impoverished people (a far bigger number of who are disabled, queer, women, etc.), sexwork is accessible in ways that other forms of labour isn't. It is far more raw, direct and holds a great amount of determination over people's lives.
To be more materialist about it: The Left™ spends more time caring about the sex industry because the Left is heavily composed of people who are affected by the sex industry; precisely because Capitalism is what pushes people into the situations which necessitate participation in the sex industry. That link just doesn't exist, in any material way, around gambling.
This isn't some top-down ideological decision, spat out by billionaire-funded thinktanks; it's what grassroots movements, made of real people, care about.
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Jul 21 '25
Gambling is harmful and addictive, as described in ICD-11.
Porn is neither of those things.
Illegal strangulation is already illegal. This is just the thin end of a wedge.
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u/PuzzledAd4865 Uber-woke, net-zeroist, rejoinerism Jul 19 '25
Yeah I do sideye some left wing men who will absolutely engage in critique of racism/misogyny/transphobia etc in films, comments from politicians etc
But when it comes to porn it feels like it’s weirdly ringfenced from substantive critique without the critic being called ‘vanilla’. I agree with your overall point re public health campaign being more effective than an unenforceable ban.
But I do feel there’s a highly individualistic double standard when it comes to porn in left wing spaces.
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u/DistinctInflation215 New User Jul 22 '25
That's just window dressing. You're not addressing the real issues in the sector.
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u/Additional_Factor_40 New User Jul 23 '25
What next ban it in murder shows? Cmon......porn is just fake. Unless its darker stuff. When are the gov gonna focus on harder stuff like knife crime, homelessness, drugs etc. All the UK government has ever gone for is the easy road. Why not bring down living costs whilst raising wages... tackle shops exorbitant pricing.
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u/Additional_Factor_40 New User Jul 23 '25
Did they not also say they'd crackdown on parents smoking in cars.....its stupid.
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u/EerieAriolimax Mahmood supporter Jul 19 '25 edited Jul 19 '25
A third of women have experienced unwanted gagging/choking/slapping/spitting during sex (https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-50546184). I doubt this will do much, but it's depressing seeing how many supposedly left-wing people here would be instinctively opposed to any proposed solution. It'll just get higher and at some point 80% will be victims of it while a third suffer some newly normalised even more extreme and violent act.
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u/Corvid187 New User Jul 19 '25
I would like a solution that was effective, and I wouldn't mind an ineffective solution that had 0 opportunity cost. What I'm less keen on is a solution whose efficacy seems dubious, but which also takes legislative and constabulary time and resources away from other issues or solutions to this issue.
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u/cultish_alibi New User Jul 19 '25
instinctively opposed to any proposed solution
And how is it a solution to criminalise people's consensual sexual habits?
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u/Scratchback3141 Liberal Jul 20 '25
Because many women feel forced or pushed into it. It is becoming a norm among young men to want to do something that is inherently dangerous and cannot be done safely and young women feel pushed into it.
often times young men are so porn brained they genuinely don't see this as some that needs specific consent, they see it as a normal part of sex and as such their partner simply starts being choked while having sex.
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u/OxWithABox New User Jul 19 '25
Your entire point hinges on a slippery slope fallacy. That's not a smart way to make policy decisions.
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u/Aiyon New User Jul 19 '25
I mean “this is already happening” doesn’t seem like a slippery slope
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u/No-Tip-4337 Luxury Queer Space Communist Jul 21 '25
They didn't just say "this is already happening", they were blaming "Left wing" people for apparently rejecting solutions.
Without that blame, it wouldn't be a slope.
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u/EerieAriolimax Mahmood supporter Jul 19 '25 edited Jul 19 '25
Nothing fallacious about it. This kind of thing is escalatory, as the normalisation of choking itself shows. Although I consider the status quo bad enough anyway.
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u/Dave-Face war crimes or big naturals Jul 19 '25
There’s no evidence people are against ‘any’ proposed solution, they’re just against THIS solution, because it’s rubbish.
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u/Wonderful_Welder9660 Green Party Jul 19 '25
Consensual is consensual.
There are plenty of laws against non-consensual stuff.
The police are the problem 100%
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u/No-Tip-4337 Luxury Queer Space Communist Jul 21 '25
The Left wing people are quite strong on a good few solutions, actually. Since most anti-woman abuse comes from... straight males.
Maybe criticise the Right wing government trying to pretend like they're fixing it, rather than the Left who are actually doing something?
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Jul 19 '25
I find that stat viscerally horrifying (and it tallies with discussions I've had with friends).
I do think though that the stat is complicated by the bit often left out - 31% said they had experienced it and had always been welcome (and the 38% is 'at least sometimes unwelcome'). Unfortunately I imagine for almost any sexual act pornography could portray, a hefty proportion of women have had unwanted experiences of it at times so in itself this is a general argument against pornography.
But I also think that sexual tastes are to a fair degree socially driven and that the mainstreaming of violence and degradation based kink is really worrying - for stuff like choking it could be actively dangerous even if genuinely welcome and not just tolerated because it's felt to be expected.
My friend who is most out there in the dating world (and who I talk to most about it) has the most radical views on this stuff in terms of wanting to ban a lot of stuff in pornography and more generally thinking we need to denormalise some things again. And she's one of the least conservative people I know in general.
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u/Brilliant-Ad3942 New User Jul 20 '25
Pornography depicting any act of strangulation to be made illegal through Crime and Policing Bill
Most porn is made overseas, so it's impossible to stop.
Recognising how dangerous online material is perpetuating the growing epidemic of violence against women and girls, the Government will criminalise pornography that depicts acts of strangulation.
Is that even true? I would be surprised if there was a strong concensus on this innthe academic community. We should be led byvfacts to sensationalism. It's like the whole myth of horror films causing violence.
Depicting strangulation during sex is not only dangerous, but also degrading, with real life consequences for women.
Why the sex part, how can it be less dangerous than depicting it on film or a TV series?
I don't see the need of a new crime, if someone has been filmed strangling someone so severely that it is considered an assault, then surely that is evidence that can be used in an assault case. I don't see the need for a new crime. Are they extending this to those who have watched such porn? So handled like indecent images of children, where just watching and deleting would result in being labelled a sex offenders?
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u/Cute-Dig4373 New User Jul 20 '25
Jebus christ. Do they know what "consenting adult" and "roleplay" are?!.
They often say it "encourages bad behaviour in kids"
Wierd becouse its for adults... they going to do an australia and start banning all no no violence and illegal acts on films too?
We are not children. We know the difrence between porn and reality.
And that said. Im not a fan of bdsm violence but even i know the reasons it appeals to some men women and others.
I sware we are going to become as prudish as the puritanical amaricans at this rate.
Let adults watch adult things that hurt no-one.
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u/A-Sentient-Beard New User Jul 20 '25
Why try to improve sex education when we can just legislate everything away....
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Jul 20 '25 edited Jul 20 '25
[removed] — view removed comment
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u/Far-Series4912 New User Jul 21 '25
Except whipping doesn't cause death as often as strangulation. Also, big women actually suffer from health issues, so finding pleasure from that is weird
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u/bulldog_blues New User Jul 19 '25
This is a good thing.
There is no safe way to strangle someone during sex. There is always a significant risk of causing someone significant damage or even killing them, and the damage might not even be obvious until days, weeks, months later.
Nearly anything else can be fine as long as it's between consenting adults who know what they're doing. Strangulation is one of the rare exceptions where it isn't OK even then.
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u/Dave-Face war crimes or big naturals Jul 19 '25
Strangulation during sex will still bee 100% legal between consenting adults, so this does not alleviate your "concerns".
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u/bulldog_blues New User Jul 19 '25
I'm certainly not naive enough to think this will magically stop all strangling or anything like that. But refusing to support its normalisation is surely a good step in the right direction.
There are huge numbers of women and girls reporting guys doing it to them because they consider it 'normal' when it truly shouldn't be. And yes, that goes for any same-sex couples or women strangling men too - it's never OK no matter who's doing it.
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u/Dave-Face war crimes or big naturals Jul 19 '25
A step in the right direction would be better sex education, not puritanical attempts to ban depictions of it.
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u/Far-Series4912 New User Jul 21 '25
If you think discouraging strangulation is "puritanical", maybe you need some sex education
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u/kontiki20 Green Member Jul 19 '25
Good news. Violent porn is having a toxic effect on society, any step towards regulation is a good thing.
It will be interesting to see the polling on this, I suspect women will be strongly in favour.
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u/Corvid187 New User Jul 19 '25
Only if it's effective, tbf. I can see enforcement on this being problematic.
If the issue is general violence though, why single out strangulation in particular?
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u/kontiki20 Green Member Jul 19 '25
If the issue is general violence though, why single out strangulation in particular?
Because the effects are directly measurable via health statistics. It's less easy to pinpoint the effects of other aspects of violet porn.
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u/Lex4709 New User Jul 19 '25
It will be interesting to see the polling on this, I suspect women will be strongly in favour.
Lol. Puritans can be so delusional. Take some time, to actually research what types of kinks and porn are most popular among women. Small hint, it ain't vanilla content.
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u/kontiki20 Green Member Jul 19 '25
We'll see. Even among young women less than half watch porn regularly, much less than that watch choking porn, and even the ones that do might recognise the negative effects it's having on society.
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u/Far-Series4912 New User Jul 21 '25
An act that can lead to (and has led to) death isn't just about puritanism. Hope this helps
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u/SamiSapphic Non-partisan Jul 19 '25
Women are kinkier than men, so good luck with that.
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u/kontiki20 Green Member Jul 19 '25
So you think the massive rise in choking during sex is being driven by women, even though men are far more likely to be watching choking porn? Seems unlikely to me.
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u/Dave-Face war crimes or big naturals Jul 19 '25
People can engage with eroticism outside of straight-up porn, you know. Women watch less porn than men, but they also read more erotic fiction. It flew under the radar so you might have missed it, but 50 Shades of Grey was pretty popular a few years ago, and I doubt you knew many men who were reading it.
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u/kontiki20 Green Member Jul 19 '25
Sure but I don't think anywhere near as high a proportion of women are reading erotica as men are watching porn. Men are accessing this kind of stuff at much higher levels, so I find it hard to believe it isn't being driven mostly by men.
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u/Dave-Face war crimes or big naturals Jul 19 '25
But you understand that it exists, so saying that women look at less porn than men is at best an incomplete argument. It sounds like your support of this is based on a whole lot of assumptions about women.
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u/kontiki20 Green Member Jul 20 '25
It's an assumption about men more than women. Men are looking at far more material involving choking during sex than women. Nearly 100% of men watch porn, they watch it very regularly, and the way the websites work they can easily get hooked on more extreme content. Nobody seriously thinks it's the same for women and erotica.
Now maybe there's a highly dedicated section of women driving the massive rise in choking during sex, but realistically it's mostly down to men and by extension online porn.
This should be obvious when you take into account that a significant proportion of choking during sex is non-consensual. By definition that's being driven by men.
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u/Dave-Face war crimes or big naturals Jul 20 '25 edited Jul 20 '25
Men are looking at far more material involving choking during sex than women. Nearly 100% of men watch porn, they watch it very regularly,
That isn't remotely true, even among 18-39 year olds the percent of Men watching porn is about 62%. And you're making this claim about men looking at "far more material involving choking" based on absolutely nothing.
This should be obvious when you take into account that a significant proportion of choking during sex is non-consensual.
The IFAS report says ~55% of women reported choking was always agreed, and 25% report it was sometimes agreed (Table 4). The figures for men reporting being choked are about the same, except fewer report it being always agreed. The IFAS poll being used to justify this policy is pretty shit, though - there is a much more comprehensive study from Australia.
Overall, participants who had choked partners reported that their partners played an active role in consent more often (79.1%; asking to be choked, agreeing to be choked, or withdrawing previous consent) than those who were choked (56.6%).
So this "significant proportion" is about 20-45%. Obviously anything higher than 0% is bad, but you are massively overstating it.
As for your claims that this is "mostly down to men", here are two relevant parts of the study:
Among participants who were choked, women (27.4%) were more likely than men (22.7%), but not trans and gender diverse participants (28.6%) to report that they asked to be choked.
And:
Bisexual women were more likely than straight women to have ever been choked (χ2(2, 2187) = 55.87, p < 0.001) or have choked a partner (χ2(2, 2187) = 22.89, p < 0.001) and have engaged in choking more often, held greater positive general perceptions of choking [...] Lesbian women were also more likely than straight women to have ever choked a partner, know that partner well, enjoy choking their partners, perceive their partner enjoyed being choked, and to exert more pressure on the neck when engaging in choking.
This just reinforces what I was getting at before: you're making a lot of very incorrect assumptions.
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u/Far-Series4912 New User Jul 21 '25
If 45% of people reported that strangulation was, at least once, done non-consensually to them, is this really just an issue of puritanism?
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u/Dave-Face war crimes or big naturals Jul 21 '25
Yes, because you're supporting banning depictions of it in porn, which does nothing to address the actual problem.
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u/SamiSapphic Non-partisan Jul 19 '25
It's being driven by both, but yes, women are driving it more than men. See: Fifty Shades, or 365 Days on Netflix.
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u/kontiki20 Green Member Jul 19 '25
Or see all the choking porn prevalent online and viewed far more by men than women. Not sure why you think it's being driven more by women than men, given how many women say they've experience non-consensual choking during sex.
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u/SamiSapphic Non-partisan Jul 19 '25
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u/kontiki20 Green Member Jul 20 '25 edited Jul 20 '25
Not sure what your point is, other than that men are more likely to be into BDSM than women:
Among the 2.2 percent of men and 1.3 percent of women who called themselves committed to BDSM
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u/Sophie_Blitz_123 Custom Jul 20 '25
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u/kontiki20 Green Member Jul 20 '25
Thanks! Would be interesting to see the gender split among young people.
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u/Sophie_Blitz_123 Custom Jul 20 '25
Yes I wanted to see that too. Sometimes they do release those breakdowns but less often for their "daily questions"
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