by Keith Richmond
ACTIVISTS angry with what they describe as “the Government’s increasingly puritanical attitude to sex” marched through Westminster this week. They watched as Ben Westwood, photographer son of flamboyant fashion designer Dame Vivienne Westwood, took a chain of “slaves” for a walk and then took photographs of them.
Those pictures will be illegal after January next year when the Criminal Justice and Immigration Bill becomes law, as such images will be classified as “extreme pornography”. Mr Westwood’s sexual chain gang included models and campaigners from the Consenting Adult Action Network – all bound and gagged in protest at legislation restricting adults’ sexual choices.
The photographer said: “The Government gets away with murder when it comes to legislating about our sexual behaviour because we are a straight-laced nation and far too many of us are embarrassed talking about sex.”
A CAAN spokesperson added: “We are saying enough is enough. The fact that Harriet Harman finds something uncomfortable or ‘icky’ is no reason for clamping down on personal freedom. Criminalising the possession of images depicting perfectly legal sexual activity is an erosion of our civil and sexual liberties and intended to try and micro-manage our sexual activity.”
