These things have always been banned or at the very least strongly discouraged in UK-produced adult content that is permitted to be shown on TV or sold in a UK sex shop. What the UK is doing is using the exisiting EU legislation to bring adult video streaming services under the regulation of Ofcom and BBFC (this is significant outside adult content as it hints that Ofcom may be further encouraged and empowered to regulate online content, which doesn’t surprise me one bit).
Other North European countries are discussing introducing such regulation or have already done so (usually against content which glorifies violent sex) – the British list of banned subjects is unusual (especially as it reads may still permit whipping that is non-aggressive) – but given our culture and a combination of recent incidents added to angst over the historical child abuse issues I can see how it arose. Spanking and caning in British and Commonwealth adult content are often associated with a 1950s-1970s high school environment – Bear in mind the kind of people who work for the BBFC are middle aged men and women who mostly likely attended these kinds of schools in their own youth.
Added to which the economic crisis, global troubles and the current bunch of idiots elected to Government (by other idiots who begrudge paying the slightest extra in tax) have put the UK 30 years back in time (there are people here who would gladly see the return of the 1980s as it brought a certain amount of prosperity and power to Britain along with the civil and global conflicts). Hence why most UK films of this nature are still more like “Confessions of a Window Cleaner” type stuff (BTW one of the actors is Tony Blair’s father in law :laugh_at: )
