LONDON — Only in Britain could a mass pornography protest come served with lashings of hot tea and the musical accompaniment of Monty Python.
In the shadow of the Houses of Parliament in central London, demonstrators gathered on rugs to discuss politics and politely sit on each other’s faces. The protest against censorship of pornography was to take the form of a world-record attempt, but Guinness refused to sanction the event and, in the end, no one remembered to count. Probably about 60 people took part, making this an unofficial record in an uncontested category.
They may have fallen a bit short of their ambitious target of hundreds of face-sitting libertines, but they succeeded in drawing scores of media outlets to hear their message: We need to see women enjoying sex, too.
New British regulations have banned pornography that shows face-sitting, spanking, and female ejaculation. It’s difficult to deny suggestions that there is an element of gender bias in the ruling. “Why is it perfectly fine for me to choke on a penis or be covered in semen but not OK for me to ejaculate on someone?” said Ally Jones, 25, who was attending the first protest of her life. “Come on—this is the country of 50 Shades of Grey!”
She had been moved to take part after what seemed to her an egregious and puritanical restriction on women’s pursuit of ecstasy. “One of the main bones of contention is that it’s acts showing women to be dominant that have been banned,” she said. “Women are supposed to be weaker—that’s why it’s an abomination to see them in control. This is the deliberate suppression of women’s sexuality.”
The women standing on the green outside the House of Commons gave little impression of being suppressed. Among a stellar collection of slogans, one banner questioned Prime Minister David Cameron’s motives: “Can’t Make His Wife Squirt. Bans It in Porn.” Another suggested female sexual liberation wouldn’t hurt anyone: “Vulvas Don’t Kill People, Revolvers Do.”
While song sheets were handed out with the lyrics to Monty Python’s “Sit on My face” in preparation for the record attempt, sporadic outbreaks of mock cunnilingus popped up all over the neat lawn. The first couple, who were dressed in tweed jackets, poured cups of tea and shared sandwiches cut into triangles before indulging in the forbidden fruit.
As the reporters giggled, another woman, this time in leopard-print pants and a red leather jacket, lowered herself onto the face of a man in a scuba mask. When he emerged blinking into the daylight, “Mr D.” from Brighton said he had “survived it many times before,” although this was his first time before a crowd of photographers. “This is about much more than pornography,” he said. “It’s about the entrenched suppression of women.”
Last week, an amendment to Britain’s Communications Act (2003) put video on demand online pornography under the same regulations that already govern DVD sales and theatrical movie releases. Under the British Board of Film Censors rules, people in Britain are no longer able to pay for pornography that contains spanking, caning, verbal abuse, water sports, female ejaculation, fisting, or face-sitting.
Charlotte Rose, who was named sex worker of the year in 2013, organized Friday’s face-sit-in. She said she had been shocked by the new regulations. “Face-sitting and female ejaculation are two of my favorite activities,” she told The Daily Beast. “It is beautiful, any orgasm is a wonderful and sexy expression, which no one has the right to ban. It is taking people’s personal liberties away without consent.”
Addressing the crowd that had assembled on the grass, she advised everyone to move onto the sidewalk where the MPs could see them more clearly from their offices and the ground was dry. “I can’t guarantee it will be dry afterward,” she shouted. It was another of the nudge, nudge, wink, wink jokes that summed up the entire enterprise. One of the teenage boys present to defend pornography’s honor, held a sign that read: “We Cum in Peace.”
On the other side of the road, inside the House of Commons, Liberal Democrat MP Julian Huppert was calling for the new regulations to be overturned. “To me, the case for banning things should be driven by issues around consent, and around genuine risk, not about whether we happen to like things or not,” he said. The government insisted the regulations simply extended protections already in place for DVDs to the Internet.
“Patriarchy!” shouted one woman. “They didn’t ban blow jobs did they?”
Gingerly, about 30 couples lay down and squatted on mats and rugs for the mass face-sit. In unison, they sang along to the Monty Python classic that was performed live at the Hollywood Bowl in 1982:
Sit on my face and tell me that you love meI'll sit on your face and tell you I love you tooI love to hear you oralizeWhen I'm between your thighsYou blow me away…