The Forbidden Media: A Lesser Recognised Threat to Freedom of Expression Part 1

On March 20, a Sydney based erotic author under the pen name of Tori Woods published a pre-release batch of her book named Daddy’s Little Toy. This is a work of fiction depicting the relationship between a barely legal 18-year-old girl and her friend’s creepy father, who had been obsessed with her since the age of three with depictions of his disturbing thoughts about her as a child in flashbacks.

Due to the book’s controversial subject matter, the book faced backlash. Instead of simply not reading her book, her critics reported her to the NSW Government which proceeded to charge her with possession, production and distribution of child abuse material. As of now she has entered a plea of not guilty, and the case is still working its way through the courts. Her next court appearance is on 5^th June.

The definition of child abuse material in Australia is a lot broader than many Australians realise. Rather than just media that shows sexual abuse of real children under the age of 18, the legislation covers all media that depicts those who appear to be under the age 18 or under the age of consent in a sexual way regardless of whether an actual child is involved.

That can include art, cartoons and, in this case, literature. Even media of adults 18+ that the government deems of youthful appearance can be classified as child porn. There is apparently a bias against young small breasted women although twinks still seem for now.

In my previous article The Slippery Slope: When To Be Concerned? I discussed factors that cause legislation to be more prone to the slippery slope and eroding individual rights. Some of those factors include policies that are subjective, leave room for interpretation, impact an essential liberty, and allow government exploitation.

Given this, I believe this legislation poses a high risk to freedom of expression and will have a chilling effect on art and literature in Australia. An author who wishes to include more confronting story elements with regards to grooming or child sexual abuse, or a fiend of offensive satire who was to write down their own edgy rendition of The Aristocrats joke or their equivalent of The Tale of Scrotie McBoogerballs, could find themselves on the wrong side of the law regardless of paedophilic intent.

Despite legal defences for media with apparent artistic value and that it must offend a ‘reasonable person’, this will not protect those who write controversial and non-mainstream subject matter or prevent the government from arresting someone when it takes issue with something they wrote. The subjectivity of the criteria is especially problematic when used to judge art and literature. Even a person who is legally in the right will still have to shell out time and money to fight their case in court.

The government will most likely decide the outcome unless there is a large enough backlash. This hasn’t occurred, which isn’t surprising given most people have a reluctance to be perceived as being soft on ‘child protection’ or perceived as child predators, regardless of how unreasonable or lacking in common sense the legislation may be.

Tori Woods is certainly not a paedophile despite efforts by her critics and the NSW Government to depict her as one. She is a married mother of two who worked for a Christian charity and secretly wrote erotic fiction on the side. Her intended audience was readers of dark romance, not paedophiles.

Her critics and the NSW Government seem have fallen for a common modern fallacy of equating writing about a character with assumptions about the author, including bigoted views, violent behaviour and in this case paedophilic fantasies, and of promoting or living those qualities. This fallacy has become quite common with the rise of woke cancel culture and reduced empathy towards different points of view.

As for the book’s content, I consider it is similar to Lolita with one major difference - the male protagonist in Lolita starts sexual contact with the female protagonist at the age of 12, rather than at the age of 18 in Daddy’s Little Toy. And there is no sex or sexual contact until the female protagonist is 18.

Lolita is not currently classified as child abuse material, and I currently have it in a cupboard in my apartment. I bought it about six years ago because it was controversial. I read about a third before getting bored and leaving it on the bookshelf. The book is still legal for now although I would certainly be pissed off if I was obliged to throw out a piece of classic literature, or indeed any book because the government suddenly deemed it objectionable.

Even though I have no interest in continuing Lolita or ever starting Daddy’s Little Toy, I believe that should be a decision made by me and not the government. In the next two parts of this series, I will discuss some of the other bizarre and concerning applications of the current legislation.