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This week a modelling website I’ve been using for decades suddenly demanded I upload my passport to prove my age. Me. The wrinkliest model in town!
I giggled, then realised they weren’t kidding, and got grumpy.
It turns out that the UK, once a sensible isle, is now pioneering a new national pastime: legislating the internet into oblivion.
The latest entrant into this noble tradition is the Online Safety Act, which aims to make the web safer for children by demanding adult sites implement industrial-strength age verification.
It sounds reasonable. After all, no one wants kids stumbling onto triple anal fisting when they’re innocently trying to get their homework done.
More seriously, there’s no doubt we should be doing all we can to protect children from the dangers of social media.
But like many well-meaning policies, this one seems to have been cooked up by people who understand the internet the same way Victorian physicians understood female hysteria.
How do you prove someone’s age online? The government’s answer is ‘upload ID’, which, in porn terms, translates to: please send a picture of your driver’s license to a company whose business model is tits.
I mean, maybe we’ll look after it and not tell everyone… unless your preferences are totally hilarious.
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Porn is one of the few areas where people universally do not want their personal data stored. Do we really want some anonymous third-party age verifier compiling a database of who’s watching what, and when? That’s not a regulatory measure — it’s a blackmailer’s wet dream.
There’s also the illusion of effectiveness. The idea that teenagers — the most technologically savvy and hormonally motivated demographic on earth — will be stymied by a login screen would be charming in its innocence, were it not so irritating.
Adult content producers now face a labyrinth of compliance hell. They must become data custodians, biometric bouncers, and security experts, lest they be slapped with gigantic fines.
A clips site is demanding I remove videos of my mother because I didn’t obtain a model release form for her when they were uploaded many years ago. It wasn’t obligatory then, and now I can’t, her being dead. These are the only videos I have of my mother. I hope society feels its moral well-being is saved if they’re destroyed.
The law doesn’t just affect the mega-sites; it hits indie producers, like me and many of my chums.
If we don’t adhere to these rules we risk being shut out of our own audience. This isn’t regulation, to me. It’s gentrification and class war.
Plenty of women dream of turning pictures of their feet into a side hustle – but these new rules could spell an end to that.
People won’t stop consuming porn, either — they’ll just get it from sketchier places. It’s like prohibition… the drinkers kept on drinking.
The assumption that all pornographic content is generated by some evil sleaze machine aimed at corrupting youth is nonsense.
Much of modern adult content, including everything I make, is inclusive, ethical, and joyous. The law punishes the people trying to do it right, while shady operators just change servers and keep streaming.
If the UK really wanted to help, maybe they’d teach proper digital literacy, invest in real sex education, and talk to actual experts in online safety.
Sadly none of those options make for a snappy soundbite.
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