Release Date: Tuesday 30 August 2005
Release Time: Immediate

Contact Details:
Sean Gabb, 07956 472 199, sean@libertarian.co.uk

For other contact and link details, see the foot of this message
Release url: http://www.libertarian.co.uk/news/nr030.htm

"NO CONTROLS ON 'VIOLENT PORN'", SAYS FREE MARKET AND CIVIL LIBERTIES THINK TANK

The Libertarian Alliance, the radical free market and civil liberties think tank and pressure group, condemns the proposals by the British Government to make possession of "violent pornography" a criminal offence..

Libertarian Alliance spokesman, Dr Sean Gabb comments:

"There is no proven connection between pornography and sexual violence. There have been dozens of reputable studies. Not one has shown any connection. Indeed, the evidence is that access to pornography reduces sexual violence by providing an alternative release.

"Even if there were a connection, it is only a prompting. Between prompting and action, there must still be some process of deliberation. Anti-porn campaigners accuse adults of being robots who cannot resist any external impulse.

"In any event, if there is a connection between pornography and sexual violence, there is exactly the same kind of connection between reading the Koran and letting off bombs on the London Underground. Are we to censor the Koran on that argument?

"No - the anti-porn campaigners are anti-sex fanatics who will use any excuse to make other people as unhappy about sex as they are themselves.

"As for criminalising possession, this is a sinister extension of a sinister principle established by the last Conservative Government. It is not the business of the State to tell us what literature we can have at home. At the least, it gives another opportunity for the Police to plant evidence.

"The Libertarian Alliance denounces all censorship - whether of erotic material or of material deemed racist or sexist or homophobic or islamophobic. There should be no controls on the availability to adults of any literature. We believe in freedom of speech."

END OF COPY

Note(s) to Editors

Dr Sean Gabb is the Director of Communications for the Libertarian Alliance and edits its journal “Free Life”. His latest book, "Smoking, Class and the Legitimation of Power", is available at http://www.seangabb.co.uk/buy.htm. His other books are available from Hampden Press at http://www.hampdenpress.co.uk.

He can be contacted for further comment on 07956 472 199 or by email at sean@libertarian.co.uk

Extended Contact Details:

The Libertarian Alliance is Britain’s most radical free market and civil liberties policy institute. It has published over 700 articles, pamphlets and books in support of freedom and against statism in all its forms. These are freely available at http://www.libertarian.co.uk

Our postal address is

The Libertarian Alliance
Suite 35
2 Lansdowne Row
Mayfair
London
W1J 6HL
Tel: 07956 472 199


Associated Organisations

The Libertarian International - http://www.libertarian.to - is a sister organisation to the Libertarian Alliance. Its mission is to coordinate various initiatives in the defence of individual liberty throughout the world.

Sean Gabb's personal website - http://www.seangabb.co.uk - contains about a million words of writings on themes interesting to libertarians and conservatives.

Hampden Press - http://www.hampdenpress.co.uk.- the publishing house of the Libertarian Alliance.

Liberalia - http://www.liberalia.com - maintained by by LA Executive member Christian Michel, Liberalia publishes in-depth papers in French and English on libertarianism and free enterprise. It is a prime source of documentation on these issues for students and scholars.

Libertarian Samizdata - http://www.samizdata.net - a topical blog set up by LA Executive member Perry de Havilland..