So Whats The Next "I Can't Believe This Got An Uncut BBFC Rating" Anime That Has No UK Release Yet

IncendiaryLemon said:
I have yet to actually watch A Serbian Film (I don't know if I even plan on, but I have been tempted) but I'm pretty sure I saw something floating around that the whole thing is meant as some sort of allegory. I don't know if said scenes are crucial to the film-makers broader meaning, but would you count that under satire?
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It is an allegory for the state of Serbia. That was my point, satire or not, I'm not sure the world needed explicit depictions of baby rape. I've not seen it, but I'm sure they could have feasibly just implied it if they felt it necessary to their work (and indeed that's apparently what the cut passed by the BBFC did).
 
Neil.T said:
You see, I don't understand it. I just can't wrap my head around the supposed logic of that one.
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I think the idea is that people are way more likely to think "****, I could do that too" if they see a child doing it. It's not necessarily the technique or content that's at issue, it's the fact it showcases how easy it is.
 
Buzz201 said:
It's not necessarily the technique or content that's at issue, it's the fact it showcases how easy it is.
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Hmmm... Yeah, I follow what you're saying. It's just... as someone who's no stranger to such thoughts, I just cannot see its potential to influence.

I can only speak for myself, of course.
 
Neil.T said:
Hmmm... Yeah, I follow what you're saying. It's just... as someone who's no stranger to such thoughts, I just cannot see its potential to influence.

I can only speak for myself, of course.
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Yeah, given the BBFC passed "Suicide as Revenge: The TV Show" (I've not seen it, maybe that's an unfair summary of it), I'm a little baffled as to why they suddenly care about the easily impressionable.
 
Neil is quite right in identifying I would get involved in this topic no matter what as I definitely have opinions about the BBFC... Damn I'm getting predictable.

Buzz201 said:
A "wasteful" effect appreciated by parents and cinemagoers.
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As I'm sure are the voluntary MPAA ratings in the US. But they don't have the power to mandate cuts. The most they could do is rate something NC-17 (apparently a kiss of death for films in the US, which is weird as it's no different from an 18 rating here. Not really sure why cinemas wouldn't show such films when adults can apparently take kids into an R rated film over there...). The voluntary nature enables distributors to not pay the MPAA's ratings fee and release "unrated" versions to cinema or for home video if they so wish, which may bring its own problems, but at least they have the option.

I don't think the argument against the BBFC is that they provide ratings, it's that they have the power to mandate cuts and that the charges they levy for ratings are unavoidable given that having a BBFC rating to release a film or home video is also mandatory. On the point of mandatory cuts:

Buzz201 said:
No, the idea is that "even a child can commit suicide using technique", and if a child can you can! That's what they don't want people doing, seeing a suicide technique that's "so easy a child can do it".
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That is the BBFC infantilising adults. It's one group of adults with power sitting in a room and deciding that the rest of the population are so stupid and impressionable that watching a cartoon might make them commit suicide, so they can't ever be allowed to see it. That's Lady Chatterley trial "not the kind of book you'd wish your wife or servants to read" stuff. This is the biggest problem I have with the BBFC - That they have the power to cut material, even material intended for adults. It strikes me as a holdover from the days of patronising elitism.

I think they'd have a point if they were discussing children, as we have seen sad occasions where children have copied something they've seen on TV or in a film and been hurt or killed. But if the title already has an 18 rating then kids already aren't allowed to see it. What's the argument, that kids are going to see it anyway? Then why do the BBFC allow gore porn horror films to be released at 18? If the argument really is that adults are that impressionable, then why aren't all such films banned? It's totally inconsistent.

Buzz201 said:
I think we can all agree that the scenes of baby rape in A Serbian Film are not needed in pleasant society.
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Probably not needed no, but in the context of fiction I don't see why anything shouldn't be allowed. Obviously real horrible harm to real people should never be filmed and distributed, but there is plenty of fictional rape and murder in 18 rated films. I don't see why anyone should have the power to say one specific rape or murder scene (or flat chested cartoon girl covering her boobs in the background) is too much for the plebs to see.

Buzz201 said:
But the guidelines have changed since then, and I suspect both would now be passed uncut or have their cuts substantially reduced. You're talking about titles that were submitted over a decade ago now.
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This is a fair point. Things clearly have been changing which is at least some consolation for those of us who thought many of their previous decisions ridiculous.
 
ayase said:
As I'm sure are the voluntary MPAA ratings in the US. But they don't have the power to mandate cuts. The most they could do is rate something NC-17 (apparently a kiss of death for films in the US, which is weird as it's no different from an 18 rating here. Not really sure why cinemas wouldn't show such films when adults can apparently take kids into an R rated film over there...). The voluntary nature enables distributors to not pay the MPAA's ratings fee and release "unrated" versions to cinema or for home video if they so wish, which may bring its own problems, but at least they have the option.
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I would suggest that this comes down to the differences in mindset between Europeans and Americans. Americans value freedom, Europeans value safety. Obviously, there are trade-offs in inherent in both of those opinions. If you choose freedom, you limit your ability to have safety. You choose safety, you limit your ability to have freedom.

I would suggest that our continuing election of relatively conservative (small c) governments, would imply the public is very much in favour of this safety over freedom stance. In the case of the video world and artistic expression that means sometimes we might be banned from saying or seeing things which people feel potentially compromise safety, even though in reality they probably don't. I would go as far as to say that society has looked at the state of America and the state of Europe, evaluated things and decided that it would have limited freedom and perceived safety, effectively society has implicitly asked for the BBFC and asked not to have the unrated option through its continuing political decisions and opinions. As more explicitly shown through the lack of BBFC-related outrage outside of more cineliterate circles and a complete disinterest in obscenity law from everyone.

All of that waffle effectively boils down to us being at odds with the rest of society.

ayase said:
I don't think the argument against the BBFC is that they provide ratings, it's that they have the power to mandate cuts and that the charges they levy for ratings are unavoidable given that having a BBFC rating to release a film or home video is also mandatory. On the point of mandatory cuts:
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I'm not going to debate where the lines should be drawn because obviously, that's different depending on who you ask and when you ask them. I happen to think the girl in Code Geass looks underage, lots of people disagree. The area of "potential to harm" cuts is difficult, because I understand sometimes there are things you don't want vulnerable people to find out, but where that intersects with the right to expression and the fact that some (or all) of the audience will already know this difficult information is hard to place. The simple truth that there is no easy or agreeable answer to that question.

But I would like just to be a colossal pedant and mention that the BBFC can be circumvented using private members screenings and again you don't need the BBFC's approval to show a film, what you need is a licence from a local council *or* a BBFC certificate. You could simply apply to every local council with a cinema for a licence and show it that way. Although obviously, they're so impractical as to not be an option, and there have been cases in the past where local councils have refused to issue licenses without the BBFC certificate (see the cancelled London Frightfest screening of aforementioned A Serbian Film), and the private members screening was closely watched by the local council. So on a practical level, yes it's impossible to get round them at scale, but it's not quite impossible altogether.
 
That may be, but it's still impossible to get around the BBFC if you want to release on home video in the UK, because it's written into law that releases have to be certified by them.

Buzz201 said:
effectively society has implicitly asked for the BBFC and asked not to have the unrated option through its continuing political decisions and opinions
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I understand where you're coming from, but I can't buy the idea that the BBFC in its current form (something brought into existence by a moral panic stoked by tabloid newspapers in the mid 1980s and which has now just become "normal" for today's generation) operates with the explicit blessing of the people. I feel that argument could be used to justify any government decision there isn't significant opposition to - If anything, I think it's even more important to oppose something you think is unfair or unnecessary which has become an accepted norm.

And yes, I lean heavily towards the Ben Franklin school of thought when it comes to freedom vs. security. Especially in the case of fiction, because I see censorship of fiction as attempt by authorities to protect individuals from themselves, which I don't think anybody has any place doing.

My issues with the Geass cut are twofold: Firstly, I disagree with the Video Recordings Act 1984 which gave the BBFC that power and secondly, I disagree with the Coroners and Justice Act 2009. These acts together constitute an assault on freedom of expression in my opinion. I think she looks like a cartoon character personally, and is pretty far removed from any realistic depiction of a human, let alone a child. But it's my (admittedly, probably unpopular) belief that even if she was covering her chest with a birthday card reading "I am 13 today" there's no reason that shouldn't be allowed in the realm of stylised cartoon fiction. And on this I'm perfectly happy to be at odds with "society", it's where I usually am.
 
ayase said:
I understand where you're coming from, but I can't buy the idea that the BBFC in its current form (something brought into existence by a moral panic stoked by tabloid newspapers in the mid 1980s and which has now just become "normal" for today's generation) operates with the explicit blessing of the people. I feel that argument could be used to justify any government decision there isn't significant opposition to - If anything, I think it's even more important to oppose something you think is unfair or unnecessary which has become an accepted norm.
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I would suggest that, if the public were truly opposed, it would never have become an accepted norm? BBFC guidelines are updated and reviewed based on public feedback. Perhaps I have too much faith in the system, but I think if the public were truly pro-freedom of expression, that would have resulted in much more lenient guidelines, instead the guidelines became more liberal at "adult" categories (words like "mother****er" and "****sucker" became permissible at 12) and less liberal at "children's" categories.

I do appreciate this is the same line of reasoning Osama Bin Laden used though, so I'm clearly not in good company on this one.
 
I think it's more likely most people don't consider or aren't aware on anything more than a superficial level of the BBFC's existence or mandate at all. Just like they no longer think about all the CCTV and number plate recognition cameras keeping a watch on us every day, or consider the degree to which it's possible for corporations and governments to spy on what we do online, which would have seemed like some kind of horrifying Nineteen Eighty-Four nightmare only a few decades ago. That's no reason not to oppose these things in my view, as I have next to zero faith in the system.

At the possible expense of undermining one of my own earlier points about the impressionable nature of adults, I think the public at large are in favour of whatever the largest circulation newspapers and news channels tell them to be in favour of. I think if I owned NewsCorp I could probably destroy the BBFC just as the tabloids helped create it.
 
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ayase said:
I think it's more likely most people don't consider or aren't aware on anything more than a superficial level of the BBFC's existence or mandate at all. Just like they no longer think about all the CCTV and number plate recognition cameras keeping a watch on us every day, or consider the degree to which it's possible for corporations and governments to spy on what we do online, which would have seemed like some kind of horrifying Nineteen Eighty-Four nightmare only a few decades ago. That's no reason not to oppose these things in my view, as I have next to zero faith in the system.
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I'm tempted to argue you're infantilising the public just as much as you claim the BBFC are. Who's to say the reason they stopped considering all of society's so-called protection systems isn't that they decided to trust the machine. Why can't people choose to live in the bubble, if they so wish?
 
Buzz201 said:
I'm tempted to argue you're infantilising the public just as much as you claim the BBFC are.
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Heh, see my edit above. Honestly, I don't really know if the public at large are impressionable idiots or not, but if they are the sort of people who'll hang themselves after seeing it in a cartoon then my answer is to let them.

Buzz201 said:
Who's to say the reason they stopped considering all of society's so-called protection systems isn't that they decided to trust the machine. Why can't people choose to live in the bubble, if they so wish?
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Because I don't think anybody should be forced by law to live in the bubble with them. If people want to never go outside for fear of witnessing or suffering something they don't want to, they can stay inside with their TVs turned off. Isolation from Bad Things is something individuals can personally choose to do without passing laws that restrict everybody else from being able to see or create the things they personally (and subjectively) think are bad. The Amish do a pretty good job of that without needing laws, I think.
 
ayase said:
But it's my (admittedly, probably unpopular) belief that even if she was covering her chest with a birthday card reading "I am 13 today" there's no reason that shouldn't be allowed in the realm of stylised cartoon fiction. And on this I'm perfectly happy to be at odds with "society", it's where I usually am.
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smdh
 
As for Paranoia Agent, I was under the impression it was due to a child attempting to kill herself. Regardless of who the content was aimed at, it was still a suicide attempt that (if I remember correctly, I haven't watched this in a long time) was played off as a joke, the girl was laughing, jumping around and saying she wanted to do it as well... all while two other people were.... Yeh

If the content was more serious and gave a clear /This is what I want to happen, this is what would have been the outcome if you'd died, how everyone would react/ then I would be defending the scene.. but as it is... No

I'm not defending the BBFC on this one saying /oh cut things bla bla bla/ but I'm also not saying they were wrong in this instance.

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As for the scene in Code Geass. I think this was rated either just after a backlash, or just after a change of rules regarding such content on DVD's. So I'd imagine the BBFC wasn't really looking to test the waters. As previously mentioned in this thread, if it was put through the BBFC now then it would likely pass uncut.

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Haven't watched DxD and its been a few years since MonMusu so I can't remember much about it.. I might reply at a later point

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Personally I would prefer a rating system like America but the amount of laws that would need to be changed, I doubt it would ever happen.

At this point in time I'm more concerned about BBFC vs Online Media, ISP's and content providers. Its usually been a case of websites dictating their own content, giving appropriate rating and such... Over the next 5 years I suspect this will be changing a lot and we won't be moaning over these few scenes anymore..
 
Shadow Cat said:
I'm not defending the BBFC on this one saying /oh cut things bla bla bla/ but I'm also not saying they were wrong in this instance.
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Then I'll offer to say it in your stead: "The BBFC were wrong in this instance." (In my opinion.)

As I keep offering, the scene in Paranoia Agent is clearly satirical in nature.
 
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