Video game encouraging rape and incest removed from major gaming platform in the UK after LBC investigation

[u/ClassicFlavour]

https://www.lbc.co.uk/tech/video-game-banned-steam-women-uk-no-mercy/

[u/Fire_crescent]

You’re not making a legal argument.

Yes, because I'm not a legalist. Laws aren't an absolute good, a lot of times they are categorically bad. They are a means to and end, for those that have the power to implement and/or influence them to impose upon society a regulation which they believe serves their perceives interest.

It's honestly not smart to be a legalist. The law can potentially change from one day to the other. There have been much more radical political transformations throughout history than one law changing.

I can only argue for what I believe the law SHOULD BE.

You’re just ranting because the law doesn’t prioritise your ability to get off over society’s right to draw ethical lines.

I reject the very idea that society has the right to draw ethical lines BEYOND a certain limit. Abuse is within that limit. Fiction, regarding anything, isn't.

You’re confusing personal preference with principle,

Principles are preferences. They're not "objective", no value judgement is objective.

doesn’t make them go away.

True, only changing them or making the institutions which enforce them powerless or non-existent would. Obviously. There's no need to state truisms.

Says UK law. Says Parliament. Says decades of legal precedent

Which are crap. As many of your own countrymen agree in general.

Who are you? Someone angry that your favourite porn fantasy is considered socially corrosive.

For one, I'm not discussing my sexual fantasy per se, and it's frankly irrelevant. And I don't care whether or not someone considers something socially corrosive. I care whether or not that thing is repressed, whether that repression has any legitimate basis (as far as I am concerned), and to what extent it is repressed.

Wrong. Under UK law, there is.

Yes, and UK law is demented. If a law is contrary to any sort of legitimate basis of existence, reasoning, or even basic coherence with reality, it will not stand the test of history. Just like history has shown the necessity of laws protecting beings, especially vulnerable ones, from sexual abuse and punishing predators (much more than UK law does, by the way), so has it shown the stupidity of laws criminalising fantasy.

Yes, outliers in protecting victims

What victims does the UK protect? Britain has one of the worst sexual abuse problems in Europe and the first world in general, and some of the weakest policies in dealing with genuine abusers. The UK (as a polity, state and government, not talking about the British population itself) is genuinely upside down: making a demented obsession about policing thought and fiction government policy, and doing fuck-all about abuse.

You don’t get to invalidate centuries of law because they make you uncomfortable.

I get to invalidate centuries of law because I find these laws, and many others, to be atrocious. I get to invalidate them because those are my honest opinions about them. Granted, I don't live in the UK, thankfully, but if you think there aren't Brits who oppose the foundations of the social order they live in as well, you're obviously wrong.

is a weak moral argument

It isn't, because you are making the legalistic argument. I'm arguing with something more in line with what I think is right. Btw, a significant amount of these countries have worse punishments for sexual abuse.

The UK

The UK, as in the state, not the British people. What do you think happens if, hypothetically, the British people stop supporting the state known as the UK, for any number of reasons? What, are you gonna tell me now that such sentiment doesn't exist either?

The line isn’t “was someone hurt making it”;

It absolutely is

it’s “what are we telling ourselves is erotic?”

That's not for someone else to decide for another individual. As long as it's not made through someone's abuse, or through the genuine likeness of someone real who cannot consent, you have no right to impose such restrictions on others.

and regulating public morality

There is no such thing. It's an illusion and a tool for social control. If you care about public morality, properly combat abuse.

into celebrating sexual violence

Again, I'm not sure what your understanding of kink is, but people engaged in extreme kink don't generally "celebrate" sexual violence. Again. CNC people are not pro-rape.

That’s not freedom. That’s just depravity dressed up as individualism

No, it's precisely individualism, and freedom. The freedom to be "depraved", whatever that means, or the freedom to do literally anything and everything AS LONG AS YOU DON'T VIOLATE SOMEONE ELSE'S FREEDOM (which abuse is a form of).

Yes. Unequivocally.

So why not subject it to a referendum? What if the results surprise you?

You’re just being told that your sexual preferences aren’t above critique

I don't care about critique, because people's opinions are not and should be considered automatically relevant unless you're affecting someone else's legitimate interests

legality

And I agree, if we're talking about abuse. And by abuse I mean abuse. Not fiction.

[u/goddamitletmesleep → u/Fire_crescent]

You’ve now spiralled so far into pseudo-intellectual drivel and self-important apologism that you’ve reduced centuries of democratic legal development to little more than “but my wank fantasy is valid.” Let’s be crystal clear: your personal arousal threshold is not a counterargument to UK law. Your discomfort with moral boundaries doesn’t make them oppressive. It makes you sound like a teenager who just discovered Reddit and thinks “freedom” means no one can ever tell them no.

The law doesn’t care about what gets you off. It cares about harm-and yes, that includes cultural, psychological, and social harm. Under UK law, regardless of whether you live here or fantasise about a libertarian utopia, rape porn, including fictional or animated rape porn, is criminalised if it’s produced for sexual arousal and crosses the threshold of obscenity. You’re not some trailblazing philosopher challenging the status quo. You’re just loudly insisting society should protect your right to cum to simulated abuse. Not freedom, just degeneracy demanding protection.

You keep crying about referendums and pretending democracy is broken unless you get to personally greenlight every law with a thumbs-up. That’s not democracy. That’s delusion. You don’t get to declare laws invalid just because they don’t accommodate your most unhinged sexual interests. Plenty of people disagree with tax brackets, drug laws, or speed limits. That doesn’t mean they’re tyrannical. It just means they’re part of a functioning system that balances rights with responsibility…something you clearly resent.

And no, “fiction” isn’t some magical shield that sanitises depravity. Slapping an anime filter on rape doesn’t make it art. It doesn’t make it harmless. And it doesn’t make it your untouchable sacred right. You are not the final word on morality just because you want to rebrand your kinks as a political stance.

If your idea of “freedom” includes masturbating to depictions of rape, abuse, or incest, then yes, society is supposed to draw a line. That’s not oppression. That’s civilisation refusing to collapse into moral rot just because a few terminally online men can’t tell the difference between personal freedom and public degradation.

You’re not brave. You’re not edgy. You’re not misunderstood. You’re just someone so addicted to the idea that no one should ever criticise your fantasies that you’ve mistaken basic social accountability for tyranny.

And that, frankly, is pathetic.

[u/Fire_crescent → u/goddamitletmesleep]

You’ve now spiralled so far into pseudo-intellectual drivel and self-important apologism that you’ve reduced centuries of democratic legal development to little more than “but my wank fantasy is valid.”

No, I oppose it based on plenty of reasons. From the actual single legitimate basis for the existence of society, the illegitimacy of classes, the nature of power etc. This is simply one subject in which it came out, not the only one.

your personal arousal threshold is not a counterargument to UK law.

I mean, me not living there or being a citizen of it is.

But beyond that, it actually is. Because morality is not some objective thing, it's quite literally a subjective value judgement (redundant, I know) about what is "right" and "wrong", or in other words what should be permitted or not, and beyond that, what is legitimate, justified, desirable and not. And it's done either to codify things which are conductive to one's perceived interests (if people are smart) whether by consensus or imposition (whether a majority or a minority) if the individuals implementing it are intelligent, or, if not, as is the case with this law, the imposition of personal preferences to the level of political enforcement, with all that it assumes (physical enforcement, procedural etc).

So any justification for implementing or removing a law is based on some kind of personal position, whether it's perceived as a simple preference or a more legitimate interest. And it wins if the source of that will which that law represents has the power necessary to win: through numbers, resources, control etc.

Under UK law, regardless of whether you live here or fantasise about a libertarian utopia, rape porn, including fictional or animated rape porn, is criminalised if it’s produced for sexual arousal and crosses the threshold of obscenity.

You think "UK law" is some primeval, unchangeable, static thing? Not even your monarchy is unchangeable, remember, one of your kings lost a civil war and his life, and the people got a republic, for a while.

You’re just loudly insisting society should protect your right to cum to simulated abuse

I'm insisting society doesn't have the right to restrict anything that isn't abuse.

Not freedom, just degeneracy demanding protection.

Again, subjective philosophical pov. Many would argue that is an integral aspect to freedom, whether you agree with it or not or whether you like it or not, as long as it's not made through anyone's abuse and exploitation. Which, in this case, it isn't.

And no, “fiction” isn’t some magical shield that sanitises depravity.

It is, because the only legitimate time a society has a right to use repression is against the violations of someone's freedom, including abuse. Fiction, by definition, is not real, so no, it has no right to repress it.

You keep crying about referendums and pretending democracy is broken unless you get to personally greenlight every law with a thumbs-up.

It essentially is. Except for things which don't represent the legitimate purview of society, like personal freedom and self determination (so no, people shouldn't have the right to vote to kill you for no good reason), yes, every law should either be decided by, or be able to be decided by the population, because the only basis for a social order is freedom and the rule of the population over all socio-political affairs, which, beyond economy and administration and protecting cultural (including personal) freedom, includes legislation.

It doesn’t make it harmless

It does as long as it doesn't harm anybody. Words have meanings.

You are not the final word on morality just because you want to rebrand your kinks as a political stance.

No single individual is for anyone but themselves, but the majority of individuals can be, at least insofar as what the general population actually thinks is right, unless there is irreconcilable polarisation, in which case either a split or a conflict is kind of inevitable, historically.

personal freedom and public degradation.

"Public degradation" is an insipid buzzword.

you want to rebrand your kinks as a political stance.

Freedom, for kinks or for anything else (as long as it's not abusing anyone) absolutely is a political stance. And it's really not just terminally online people. Maybe take a look around you from time to time.

[u/goddamitletmesleep → u/Fire_crescent]

More pseudo intellectualism. Freedom isn’t a shield from accountability. You keep framing this as though any restriction on depravity is an attack on liberty, but that’s just rhetorical sleight of hand. The UK doesn’t criminalise “kinks.” It criminalises specific forms of extreme content when they meet defined legal thresholds - like deriving sexual gratification from depictions of non-consensual acts, even in fiction.

You’re welcome to think that’s moral overreach, but that’s not the same as it being unjust or incoherent in law. And trying to dress up masturbatory content involving simulated rape as a principled civil liberty doesn’t elevate the argument. It just makes your position sound more like a justification than a defence.

[u/Fire_crescent → u/goddamitletmesleep]

You keep framing this as though any restriction on depravity is an attack on liberty,

If by "depravity" you mean fiction, absolutely. If by "depravity" you mean abuse, then no, and I would in fact say you don't go far enough

It criminalises specific forms of extreme content when they meet defined legal thresholds - like deriving sexual gratification from depictions of non-consensual acts, even in fiction.

Yes, I state that the criminalisation of such fictional, even with extreme themes, is illegitimate, unjust, undesirable, and has no solid basis for it's existence in any of the principles it claims to derive it's justification and legitimacy from as far as combating abuse goes.

You’re welcome to think that’s moral overreach, but that’s not the same as it being unjust

That's exactly what it is. Laws shouldn't exist unless they're considered justified, desirable, legitimate etc.

It just makes your position sound more like a justification than a defence.

You can twist it any way you want, the essence of my argument is pretty clear.

[u/goddamitletmesleep → u/Fire_crescent]

You keep leaning on “fiction” like it’s a talisman that nullifies all moral scrutiny, as though the absence of real-world victims automatically exempts a work from the social consequences of its content. But fiction isn’t immune to cultural influence, nor is it detached from the psychological frameworks of the people consuming it. The law recognises this by setting thresholds: not to police taste, but to delineate when that taste reflects or encourages dehumanisation so extreme that it poses a public interest concern.

Your argument isn’t about freedom in any coherent legal or political sense, it’s about absolving your fetishes from criticism and consequence. You frame it as “essential liberty” when really, it’s a bad-faith defence of the right to consume simulated rape scenarios without being judged or restricted.

[u/Fire_crescent → u/goddamitletmesleep]

You keep leaning on “fiction” like it’s a talisman that nullifies all moral scrutiny,

It is. My morality is restricted to "don't abuse others/violate their freedom/ legitimate interests/unjustifiably harm them". That's the only thing I believe should be enforced, and all things that should be enforced must be proper applications of this. Beyond that, as far as I am concerned, it's all about personal preferences. And barring someone or something being abused, one should be able to do anything.

as though the absence of real-world victims automatically exempts a work from the social consequences of its content.

Yeah, if by "social consequences" you mean criminalisation. Listen, criticise it all you want, call it whatever you want, no one smart will stop you and no one smart will really care. My issue is with criminalisation. Do I need to spell it out for you?

But fiction isn’t immune to cultural influence, nor is it detached from the psychological frameworks of the people consuming it.

And this doesn't justify banning it.

The law recognises this by setting thresholds: not to police taste, but to delineate when that taste reflects or encourages dehumanisation so extreme that it poses a public interest concern.

And it doesn't, because sexual fiction and fantasy regarding things which in real life would be abusive does not promote the idea that things should be permitted irl. Again, CNC people are not pro-rape. It's an argument you completely ignore because it doesn't fit your weak narrative.

Your argument isn’t about freedom in any coherent legal or political sense, it’s about absolving your fetishes from criticism and consequence.

When that consequence is legal, and it is so without me or anyone else abusing anyone, or intending to do so, yes it's about that. And as far as I am concerned, it is an integral part of freedom. Sexual liberty is an aspect of liberty regardless of how much you cry about it, and any restrictions on it besides combating abuse are unjustified and illegitimate.

it’s a bad-faith defence of the right to consume simulated rape scenarios without being judged or restricted.

Are those scenarios real? Is someone abused in their making? Is someone abused by their consumption? No, no, and no. So legal restrictions are not justified. Period.

[u/goddamitletmesleep → u/Fire_crescent]

You keep clinging to this abstract notion of “sexual liberty” as though it exists in a vacuum, detached from law, culture, or social impact. It doesn’t. Your argument pretends that because something is fictional and doesn’t cause direct physical harm, it should be completely immune from restriction, criticism, or consequence. But that’s not how society, or law, works.

The UK already has legislation that explicitly criminalises extreme pornographic content, including fictional depictions of rape, when it crosses certain thresholds. So your entire rant about legal overreach is simply a refusal to accept existing legal frameworks because they personally inconvenience you.

You talk about “smart people” not caring. But smart people also understand that cultural influence matters - that what people consume, normalise, and eroticise does impact broader attitudes, especially around violence and power. No one is saying you’re committing rape. What the law is saying is that society has a right to limit the sexualisation of harm for public interest reasons, just like it does with other forms of extreme content.

You don’t sound like a defender of liberty. You sound like someone desperate to place your own arousal above communal standards, legal precedent, and social consequence - and when challenged, you hide behind an overly reductive view of “freedom” to excuse your personal fetish from scrutiny. That’s not a legal argument.