This story for the Literotica
Crime & Punishment 2023 Story Event
is set in 2029, to avoid references to real politics or politicians, and to simplify legal processes for story-telling purposes.
Similar legislation to ban 'extreme porn' has been proposed several times in the UK. Opposition has been partially successful.
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Image Nine Point Four
"Jan, love? You'll want a read of this!"
"What is it?" My husband is waving his precious tablet at me, so the article must be important.
"New Government, same old paranoia about kinky porn. They're as bad as the last bloody lot." We had yet another election last year, in 2028.
I read. A new Home Secretary, a new attempt to act tough on 'violent' porn. What my hubby Mike calls kinky, and I call BDSM. So it goes. I'd hoped this Government would have better things to worry about, like managing to find a Prime Minister with a longer shelf life than a lettuce.
Like last time round, this 'consultation' is biased as hell, clearly didn't engage with any knowledgable groups before being written, and the proposed legislation would be completely unenforceable in most cases. More worryingly, it could be enforced against almost anyone, if you were deemed to be taking an 'unhealthy interest' in 'specific parts' of completely inoffensive media.
Who here didn't first consider bondage erotic when seeing Penelope Pitstop tied, helpless, to the railway tracks? Or that titian-haired permanent eighteen-year-old, Nancy Drew, bound and gagged in the illustrations, yet again? It always was those scenes chosen to be illustrated, wasn't it, in every single book? According to this proposal, Nancy's publishers should be distinctly worried...
There's a distinct whiff of homophobia, as well, as the document describes various sex toys and piss play in the most distasteful ways possible. It accuses anyone who enjoys any pain of being mentally ill, before it tries the 'protecting women' angle, for good measure. "Typical, getting some terfy bollocks in, too," I mutter.
Mike laughs, greying hairs glinting in the light. "How to tell they've never been to a fetish club, where most of the subs wanting to be degraded are men, and practically everyone wants to be hurt!"
My husband Mike tends to only be a dom in public, but sometimes, at home, he too just wants to hand over control. Outside, he enjoys getting to show me off, because despite my respectable team-leader day job and my ordinary appearance, I'm a total slut who is quite happy for others to watch. If said others are also at a club, so can't be too judgemental, at least.
A good Saturday night will likely see me bound to a bondage frame at a fetish event, wearing nothing but a corset, collar and cuffs, lots of rope holding me still. Mike -- or a friend, or both -- will tease and torture me, building up both pain and pleasure until I'm frantically begging to be fucked and whipped. Either. Both. Just harder. More? Please?
Proper pissed off, energised by a good mug of coffee, I scribble a response to this latest feeble attempt at a neutral consultation document, mostly explaining "this would be counter-productive and a waste of time," and email it to Mike.
"Can you send this in? Me being a politically-neutral civil servant and that."
"Sure. I can add your name, too, using my surname, so it doesn't just look like a dodgy bloke who likes watching filthy porn." I never changed my surname to his.
"You
are
just a dodgy bloke who likes watching filthy porn!"
"True, but thanks to you, I'm arguing for everyone's right to do it, right? Me and my wife: Jan 'Jones'."
My surname's rare and much nicer. I only use his when ordering pizza from the good place, who still don't have an app. Saves time, not having to spell it.
I rant about the proposal on my friends-only social networks. A few folk promise to respond, but honestly, individual replies to Government consultations are mostly ignored, until either there's thousands of them -- tens of thousands, if you really want attention -- or the person happens to be an expert. Organisations are more likely to be listened to. I'm often the one doing the listening, then explaining it all in words of few syllables to the relevant Minister. Sometimes the PM, even.
In this case, it's obvious that officials at the Home Office were ordered to put out what purported to be a consultation, because Ministers can't lay potential laws in Parliament until consultation, meeting the required standards of the Consultation Code of Practice, such as three months for people to respond, happens.
Two days later, my mate John asks if I can come to a meeting after work. He lives up north, so it's nice to see him when he visits London. The meet-up is in a very gay pub, which holds various fetish nights in the basement.
"You all right, love?" the doorman asks. Women are a rarity here, women in tailored skirt suits even more so.
"Yeah, thanks. Meeting John Phillips and friends, upstairs."
"Oh, right, come on in. There's a bunch up there, already."
I pride myself on blending in anywhere, but in my work clothes, today I feel out of place. Three squat shaven-headed tattooed guys, a couple younger women in streetwalker clothes, a large possibly-trans woman with huge tacky fake-pearl earrings, and a heavily pierced goth, female, who is joined by a male version.
I'm grateful when John turns up -- skinny jeans and band T-shirt as usual, chatting with an imposing professional dominatrix whom I vaguely recognise. She takes the lead.
"I'll chair this meeting."
There's a round of introductions. We're asked to explain why we're interested in this Government consultation. This rag-tag lot have had some practice in opposing campaigns, apparently.
Our purple-haired chair is Magenta, 'a dominatrix for a living', to supplement her tattooing business.
John: "Twenty-five years of being a kinky queer pervert on the scene." One way to sum him up, I suppose. He's also a university lecturer on tech and internet security, which may be more relevant.
"I'm one of the three owners of melonsellers, the biggest porn site for big breasts in the UK. Call me Melons," grins the biggest bald guy.
Suzy, 'a prostitute' from the Sex Workers Collective, a union for sex workers. Her friend is Trixie, 'a fetish porn actress'.
The goths are Raven and Random, who run a kink club in Essex.
Jenni, a journalist who focuses on trans and sex issues. People nod approvingly. Some more supportive media would be great. Then they all stare at me.
I've handled hostile meetings with trawlermen threatening to push me into the sea. And investment bankers. I can do this.
"Hi, I'm Jan. I go to fetish clubs a lot -- well, regularly, again, now the kids are grown. But more importantly, I'm a civil servant who writes government consultations for a living." That triggers a rustle of interest. "And this one breaks most of the rules of the Consultation Code of Practice!" I warm to my theme. "There's clearly been no engagement with our creative industries," I gesture round the room, "no discussion with stakeholders to ensure their facts are correct, a woeful lack of publicity, and I'm not clear that there's any legal grounds for establishing what's essentially a thoughtcrime, a crime only if you collected images for certain reasons, like to wank over them. Which means that legally, if the Government doesn't see sense after we respond, they could and should be taken to a Judicial Review."
"How does that work?" one of the goths asks. Everyone else sits back in thoughtful silence.
"Basically, how making law works is, Ministers tell their civil servants, including their pet lawyers, to draft some legislation to do what they want. The lawyers will point out where that would break Human Rights law or other UK laws and that. Or rather, they'll say there's a 'risk' of it, risks of it not passing Parliament, etc. Lawyers hate being definite!"
"What's the process?"someone asks.
"OK. We can assume the Government want to get some Regulations laid in Parliament. Regs, rules, secondary legislation, a Statutory Instrument under the Sexual Offences Act 2003 -- all means the same thing. The main Sexual Offences Act tidied up loads of earlier laws. It got the full monty of big debates in each House; this will be deemed something that can be done under the powers that were agreed then, that's why it's called secondary legislation. So lawyers draft these Regs, which need to be laid in Parliament -- literally, placed in the libraries in the House of Commons and House of Lords, for all to see. If they get approved by Parliament, they come into force shortly after. In this case, approval simply means no-one -- MPs or Lords -- complaining during the 20 working days after they're laid -- it's called negative resolution.
"How can we stop that?"
Before these Regs are laid, they need to get agreed by a Parliamentary Committee called JCSI -- Joint Committee on Statutory Instruments, seeing as you ask. So lobbying them, so they don't just wave it through, will be important. But usually they pass stuff the first time they see it -- don't get your hopes up.
If that doesn't work, then we'll need to persuade an MP to object to the legislation during its 20 days. The Government could then go for Parliament debating it -- that's called affirmative resolution, both the Commons and the Lords would have to vote for it -- but most likely, they'd withdraw the text, re-draft, and try again later. Which then means JCSI will pay more attention next time round. They could insist on a judge looking at whether the Government followed the law and their agreed processes, and can halt the legislation if it didn't."
There's a smattering of applause. Jenny the journo turns to ask, "Does that mean we can only complain about the process? What about the nonsensical 'facts' in the proposals, like any SM that causes severe bruising or raised marks is 'impossible' to consent to or enjoy? Or that all porn actresses doing such are being forced, if not outright trafficked?" Suzy snorts.
