Britain is a country that put a man on the sex offenders’ register for fondling his bicycle in his locked hotel room, which cleaning staff happened to enter while he was doing so. There, any sexual proclivity that’s not designated safely normal is considered potentially dangerous and proscribed, just in case. (After all, can you prove that someone who gets aroused by bizarre things you and I and the justices of the High Court cannot imagine as erotic won’t escalate from that to committing horrific crimes?)

Good Monday morning. Last week, the UK imposed one of the strictest, most vague (and therefore overly broad) new laws around pornography in recent memory. Recording yourself having consensual kinky sex in private could come with jail time, as could watching other people do it. And sex workers are the ones to feel the repercussions of bad laws like these first, of course, with many reporting content disappearing from their online stores en masse. Keep reading to learn more about what it covers, and how creators are responding.

In the UK, Face Sitting Porn Might Land You in Jail

“I adore breath play. I love being strangled, suffocated and drowned, and I love strangling and suffocating others. Waterboarding: that’s my favourite,” Melissa Todd, a UK-based writer and sex worker, told me. “Many women do: it really isn’t only horrid men forcing us to do these dreadful depraved acts. Interrupting oxygen supply produces the most intense sensation of euphoria. I enjoy it in my private life, and I offer it in sessions too.”

Starting Friday, she and anyone else in the UK distributing or possessing certain types of choking, suffocation, breath play, strangulation and a bunch of other types of porn — even if it’s just recorded in the privacy of their homes and not for sale on a porn site — could face up to five years in prison. 

This is, predictably, already a huge mess for sex workers. Adult creators watched platforms remove hundreds of their videos — even when the creators thought they were in compliance with the law. These creators say they were blindsided by the removals, since the content didn’t seem to violate the law at all. Creators are reporting one platform in particular, Clips4Sale, is purging content with little notice, “a precautionary measure,” with videos disappearing in the hundreds.

“Of course, we were all aware of the new Act coming in and prepared accordingly, but not for anything at this scale. We’ve had nothing since and they’ve been tweeting as normal,” adult creator Sophia Truee said. Clips4Sale launched in 2003 and caters heavily to fetish content. “It’s a huge blow to this area of the industry, and I can only hope things will be communicated soon. We, as creators, understand how difficult it is to be a content site in this current climate, but communication has not been prioritized,” Truee said, noting that this is happening right before the holidays, with Black Friday being one of the most popular times for creators selling content. “For many, this will be devastating, as over 20 years of the work will have just been wiped.” 

In the UK, Face Sitting Porn Might Land You in Jail

Face sitting is pure poppycock anyways. Yuss.

Brexit was just the first step for the Puritans to show their countrymen the light. With no escape acceptance is inevitable.

There needs to be a word that’s stronger than “stupid” but isn’t an ableist slur. That word is what would describe this law.

Inbred Island

*I love how this is somehow too far for y’all lol