Danish experiment
From The Art and Popular Culture Encyclopedia
|
Related e |
|
Wikipedia
Featured: A Scheme for abolishing all Words is one of the wittiest and smartest comments on semantics. (Illustration: extreme close-up from the movie "The Big Swallow" (1901), produced and directed by James Williamson (1855-1933) |
On June 4, 1969 Denmark lifted all restrictions on pornography, and sex crimes declined. For example, between 1965 and 1982 sex crimes against children went from 30 per 100,000 to about 5 per 100,000. Similar evidence was found for rape rates.
There can be no doubt that the illusion of success which has created an aura around the 'Danish Experiment' has had a profound effect upon the thinking and attitudes, not only of commentators and individuals, but on governments across the free world. I myself found - to my amazement and dismay - during a visit to the Home Office in 1975, that all considerations of pornography and its possible effects upon society had stopped short in 1969 following the publication of Dr Berl Kutchinsky's trivial, now outdated, research into the effect of the repeal of many of the obscenity laws in Denmark. Mary Whitehouse, Whatever happened to sex? , 1977?
Bibliography
- Mary Whitehouse (1977) Whatever Happened to Sex?, Wayland, ISBN 0-85340-460-7 (pbk: Hodder & Stoughton, ISBN 0-340-22906-3)
