Augmented by regulation

Australia remains a strange strange place.

The [Classification] Board has also started to ban depictions of small-breasted women in adult publications and films. This is in response to a campaign led by Kids Free 2 B Kids and promoted by Barnaby Joyce and Guy Barnett in Senate Estimates late last year. Mainstream companies such as Larry Flint’s Hustler produce some of the publications that have been banned. These companies are regulated by the FBI to ensure that only adult performers are featured in their publications. “We are starting to see depictions of women in their late 20s being banned because they have an A cup size”, she said. “It may be an unintended consequence of the Senator’s actions but they are largely responsible for the sharp increase in breast size in Australian adult magazines of late”.

From a press release from one of the less prominent, but certainly more interesting, Australian political parties: the Sex Party.

The results of this kind of regulation are fairly predictable and don't need ... explicit detailing here. But I am reminded of the old (ca 1993) Saturday Night Live sketch where Bill Clinton promises that, as part of his proposed national health plan, breast augmentation surgery would be covered while breast reduction surgery would not be. Can we infer that Jones and Barnett's preferences follow Clinton's?

Australia's also set to wreck internet access by running all browsing through a firewall blocking access to a secret list of verboten websites. I'll be curious to see how much the firewall increases latency on normal browsing.

HT: Puddlecote