David Cameron admits that there will be 'problems down the line' in war on porn

Following up to a strong speech that set up a number of reforms to protect children from “poisonous pornographic websites which were corroding childhood”, Prime Minister David Cameron is now trying to answer some serious questions over his plans to install automatic Internet porn filters in every British home.

Soon after the statement, interviews saw the UK Prime Minister looking uncertain about which legal websites may also be affected by these new filters. According to the Independent, Cameron was seen saying that topless images such as those used on The Sun’s page three would still be available online. These statements have since been pulled up by sections of the populace who are accusing him of hypocrisy.

The first to criticise his proposal were anti-censorship groups, who stated that even sites that talk about sexual health and sexuality could get caught in the net. In response to these statements, Cameron has admitted that there would be “problems down the line” with the system. Oddly enough, “soft” pornography as well as written pornographic content finds no mention in his proposals. 

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UK PM David Cameron retreats from strong stance on war on porn (Image credit: Gizmodo)

While talking about this issue, the former head of the Child Exploitation and Online Protection centre (CEOP), Jim Gamble was reported saying that “Cameron’s plan to tackle child abuse images by removing results from search engines like Google would be laughed at by paedophiles.”

Rationalising his stance, Gamble said, “There are 50,000 predators…downloading abusive images on peer-to-peer, not from Google, yet from CEOP intelligence only 192 were arrested last year. That’s simply not good enough.”

Another part of Cameron’s proposal dealt with the possession of the most extreme forms of adult pornography, which would become a criminal offence. In accordance with the proposal, search engines have also been told that they will have to censor results from specific searches and also display a message for anyone trying to access websites shut down by the police warning them that what they were doing was illegal. The fact that such filters will only limit the accessiblity of such material but do nothing about its availablity has been ignored.

One of the most important points raised was the kind of impact these filters will have on families. When asked if the “opt in” system would force a husband to admit to his partner if he wanted to look at porn, the UK Prime Minister finally said, “Yes, it does.”

The core point that all critics agreed on, is that such a ban may prove useless in the long run. While the filter may prevent some people from accessing child porn, the real culprits will find ways around them, because the material still exists and continues to be made, thus leaving the root problem unchanged.