The concept of heroism has been much debased in popular culture. Pretty much anyone who has survived a stressful or dangerous situation is described as heroic. The popular media really only has two categories – hero and villain, so hyperbole is inevitable.
To my mind heroism isn’t only about courage and fortitude, it’s also about personal sacrifice. It’s about making a choice, and doing something for others despite the cost. It’s about taking a risk for a worthy cause. With that in mind I give you the heroic lawyer – Myles Jackman.
As this long article makes clear he’s fighting for the idea that “people’s private sexuality should not be held against them in any way, whether it’s criminal, civil, for intelligence purposes, or whatever”. As an obviously highly intelligent and well qualified man he could choose to make a bunch of money in more conventional legal cases and practice his kink in private. As a wealthy white educated male it’s unlikely he’d ever face problems doing that. Yet at significant personal and financial cost he chooses to defend people caught up in Britain’s ridiculous and outdated obscenity laws. That seems pretty heroic to me.
I’ve actually previously posted on a number of the cases mentioned in the article itself. There was the crazy tiger porn story, the Michael Peacock case, the Simon Walsh case, and the impact of the new UK censorship laws (here and here). Since those posts were written the new laws have forced Pandora Blake to close her Dreams of Spanking site, thereby putting a successful female producer out of business while reducing the total amount of porn on the Internet by 0.00%. It’s clear from the article that even those that win their cases often end up with their lives in pieces, and I sadly suspect that Myles Jackman is going to be a busy man for a long while yet.
The image is from the Urban Chick Supremacy Cell – a femdom site with a little more attitude than most. It’s run by by Itzi Urrutia. She’s quoted in the article and has already successfully battled the UK government. You can access her clips store here.
Hear hear.
What an absurd and cruel law this is. I read the article this morning and I was particularly struck by how many principles of natural justice it seems to offend. For example, a video that is apparently so horrific that possessing or viewing it has to be a crime, is viewed in its entirety in open court by the jurors and presumably another 15 or so court officials. And they don’t all go out and start torturing people to death, presumably.
It is illegal to possess images of consensual fisting, but it is legal to actually fist someone consensually. Meanwhile it’s legal to posses images of murder, but it’s not – oh why go on.
It would be funny, were it not for the sobering figure that this legislation is ruining 800 lives each year. That’s not funny; it’s evil. Given the nature of the accusations, it hardly matters whether someone accused is found guilty or not, frankly. But nonetheless, I think the label of hero is entirely appropriate for Mr Jackman.
I’m surprised he hasn’t taken to showing juries a collection of sequences from the Hollywood version of ‘torture porn’. i.e. The various Saw movies, Hostel, etc. With million dollar budgets they manage to have far more convincing special effects and far more grotesque sequences than anything described in the article. Yet oddly movies of people being ripped apart is shown down at your local multiplex.
I remember reading John Waters describing his experiences in going to court for his early movies. He said what people would scream and laugh about late at night with friends in a movie theater played quite differently in a courtroom at 9am on a Tuesday morning. It’s tough for jurors to go back and say they thought it all look OK to them in that situation, so the defense always has the deck stacked against them. He therefore doing well to be winning the cases he is with these crazy laws.
-paltego
Incidentally, according to the article, sounding is one of the activities that’s legal to do but not to show. So if you were in the UK, your post from Sept 9th would make you a criminal. Good thing for all of us you’re not.
Just unbelievable, really, even for Britain.
Next time I visit I’ll be sure to avoid mentioning my nom de plume at passport control. Don’t want them looking me up!
I’m not sure what annoys me more. The fundamental stupidity of the laws or the stupid biases within them. If you’re going to be stupid, at least be consistently stupid.
-paltego