The European Parliament will vote next Tuesday on a report that could lead to a blanket ban on pornography in any forms of media, not limited to advertising, television and radio, but also the Web.
Titled Eliminating gender stereotypes in the
EU , the report is nominally about improving rights for people across the gender spectrum. The report states that there is an increasingly noticeable tendency... to show provocatively dressed women, in sexual poses it also notes that
pornography is becoming mainstream and is slipping into our everyday lives as an evermore universally accepted, often idealised, cultural element.
Christian Engstro m, Member of the European Parliament (MEP) for the Pirate Party,
said on his blog that the devil is in the detail. He warned that the wording in older resolution from 1997 could lead to statutory measures to prevent any form of pornography in the media.
A Dutch PC extremist for the Socialist Party, Kartika
Tamara Liotard, tabled the report in the European Parliament's Committee on Women's Rights and Gender Equality (FEMM) late last year. In one section of the new report, Liotard calls on the European Union to enforce a blanket ban on pornography in the
media of the the 27 member states, which could also include online pornography. The report makes several calls on the EU:
Calls on the EU and its Member States to take concrete action on its resolution of 16 September
1997 on discrimination against women in advertising, which called for a ban on all forms of pornography in the media and on the advertising of sex tourism.
Points out that a policy to eliminate stereotypes in the media will of
necessity involve action in the digital field; considers that this requires the launching of initiatives coordinated at EU level with a view to developing a genuine culture of equality on the internet; calls on the Commission to draw up in partnership
with the parties concerned a charter to which all internet operators will be invited to adhere;
Calls on the Member States to establish independent regulation bodies with the aim of controlling the media and advertising industry
and a mandate to impose effective sanctions on companies and individuals promoting the sexualisation of girls;
This initiative report, which will be voted on is not a draft legislative measure, though it is a report to suggest that
legislation should be in the future drafted and voted on.
Update: News makes the UK press
9th March 2013. See
article from telegraph.co.uk
. Thanks to David & MsDemmie
MEPs to vote on EU ban on all forms of pornography MEPs will next week vote on a ban on all forms of pornography including censorship of the internet in a bid to eliminate gender stereotypes
that demean women.
Update: Voted Down
12th March 2013. See article from
news.cnet.com
EU politicians have voted against a pan-European ban on all forms of porn, including on the web, at least for now.
European citizens can breathe a sigh of relief after a vote in the European Parliament has rejected proposals to ban all forms of
pornography -- including on the Web -- in the region.
The European Parliament voted in favor of the report, but rejected the porn ban section.
Today, 625 members of the European Parliament voted 368-159 in favor of passing the
report, which aims to stamp out gender stereotypes in the region, with 98 abstaining. However, the controversial porn ban section of the proposal was rejected.
This vote forms a majority opinion based on Europe's voting politicians, from
which the European Commission can form legislation. Such a law would again be voted upon, and become legally binding in the 27 member state bloc of the EU.
Because the opinion of the parliament has now been made, it will make it extraordinarily
difficult for the Commission to draw up similar porn-blocking legislation only to pass it back to the parliament for another vote.
