London Porn Protest Turns Out the Media

LONDON—To be sure, lots protesters showed up to the demonstration outside of Parliament today to denounce Britain's odious censorship regime that took a few more steps back to the Dark Ages this month with the implementation of new regulations targeting sexual speech online. But from the photos of the event, it looks as though many more media cameras showed up to the Old Palace Yard, which is understandable considering the promise of mass face-sitting by the protesters. In the end, a reported 22 couples decided to participate in the face-sitting, the images of which are now plastered across the internet. A gimmick from the start, employing couples to sit astride one another (while clothed) was a clever way to get mass media coverage of an event whose purpose was to raise alarm about pernicious encroachments upon non-obscene sexual speech by the government, the argument being that the "slippery slope" rule of government interference is very much in play, and that Brits who think it can't be imposed upon them had better think twice about that all-too-common fatal assumption. Indeed, today's face-sitting spectacle was more than metaphorical. Under the new regs, doing the very same thing nude is now outlawed in the United Kingdom for the purposes of production. One may presumably sit on as many faces as one likes in the privacy of one's abode, assuming no one is harmed, but turn the camera on and one could become a criminal. Watch it all you like on foreign websites, the government allows; just don't make it. They don't think it's proper. They don't think it's good for the kids. Reason.com has a bunch of photos from the protest, and it does look like a jolly time was had by all, but a more coordinated campaign is also underway to roll back Whitehall's alarming restrictions to speech. Not only has Liberal Democrat Julian Huppert introduced a motion in parliament to annul the Audiovisual Media Services Regulations 2014, which was the immediate target of today's protest, but according to the Daily Mail, the host of the event, British sex worker Charlotte Rose intends to run for political office, making the abolition of the legislation a major campaign issue "We've done something and we've achieved something today," she told the paper. "This is just the start." Image: London protest outside Parliament, courtesy of reason.com.