From Today's Mailbag:
Dear Susie:
Ars Technica reports that the FBI is being paid to surf the web for porn.
Already, sites such as Suicide Girls are self-censoring photo albums containing bondage, while the Religious Wrongs are crowing their satisfaction...
Susie, here we go again. They're publicly targeting s/m, how much longer before they target same-sex porn as well? Please tell your readers to fight back by contacting their Congresspeople and Senators.
Yours in free speech,
Chris/Bifemmefatale
Chris, I've been covering the new Gonzales Porn WitchHunt on my Audible show, and the tremendous amount of derision and exasperation it's received both in the media, and in the FBI itself. Apparently rank and file G-men are loathe to take on this assignment— it's the kind of thing you really want to assign a Brownie to— i.e., Michael Brownie.
However, as you point out, it's going down already, and I was amazed to see Suicide Girls, of all people, taking the first steps to remove pictures... mild bondage photos, in their case.
I wrote an email to SG's staff, asking them for more details, because the page you directed me to, had only Olivia "bumming out" about their decision, as if Dad had taken away a set of car keys.
Suicide Girls is a significant adult business, not a pouty teenager. I want to know if they were contacted by the Feds directly, or they are simply reacting to the press releases with fearful anticipation. If they were contacted, I want to know what was said, and how their attorneys are responding.
From observing federal obscenity prosecution in the past, porn vets have seen that the gov't specifically targets materials that combine kinky, or what they imagine is shocking behavior (anal sex, "inter-racial" sex), with hardcore imagery.
For example, many companies who issued fetish films over the years took care that their fetish films never included intercourse, oral sex, or any kind of penetration. It's been a surreal body of work, to be sure, because in real life, lovers often like to combine their fantasies with actual intercourse, masturbation, oral sex, etc. And yet this was the "workaround" to facing obscenity trials. Porn has been retarded, literally, for decades, because of these dodges.
From what I see, Suicide Girls is softcore, right? Or the public pages are, in any case. I've never been a member to see what's behind the curtain! Which brings up another issue: why would the Feds go after subscription-only hardcore? The bondage photos I've seen in on SG's public pages are similar to what you could see in a lot of fashion, music, and art photography zines. If SG is self-censoring softcore bondage, that's a huge leap in defensive action, and that's why it would be worth it to know the details.
I haven't heard from SG yet. I hope they come out with an ADULT, as in GROWN-UP statement about this. It's no time to be cute.
