This was inspired by recent newspaper articles about censorship. I felt that either: a) they were the usual badly informed colour supplement journalism, or b) they were a bit theoretical - none I read included people who'd been involved in anti-porn campaigns. At the same time, its a good opportunity to grumble about the sort of people who tend to organise these things!

I WAS A TEENAGE 'OFF THE SHELVES' CAMPAIGNER

Ah, I remember it well. A group of us standing outside WH Smiths one Saturday afternoon with placards proclaiming 'Porn is the theory - rape is the practice', trying to get passers-by to sign our petition demanding that WH Smith stop selling any publications degrading women. To get the attention of the crowds of shoppers, our leader (a man, of course) shouted "Off the Shelves!" through his megaphone.

I was 18 and well-versed in the polemic: I'd read the books - Andrea Dworkin, Catherine MacKinnon, and supported the campaigns - like Clare Short's anti-Page 3 bill...

A couple of years later I went to another get-together. This time a representative of the Campaign Against Pornography was talking about the Off The Shelf campaign. Looking around the room, the usual faces were there - all the politico careerist types (y'know, all those who used to be on student committees, run things, nothing could ever happen without their blessing. Most of them are now well on their way to glittering parliamentary careers). Actually, I think that's all who were there.

Ms CAP spoke at length about the Evils of Pornography, and we all gasped at the terribleness of it all. Then we went home, secure in the knowledge that we were against porn and we were going to do something about it.

This was around the time that the Off the Shelf campaign was starting up - where a group of people would charge into a newsagents and take down all the porn mags (years later this was repeated at - of all things - the Anarchy in the UK festival. Weird)

I cant remember if the two were linked, but MP Dawn Primarolo (now one of New Labour's rising stars) introduced a bill in parliament calling for porn only to be sold in licenced shops specifically set up for that purpose. (But what is porn?) Presumably, this would have also included all sexual material. Even I thought something was wrong with that.

As usual, it seemed the main players were the predictable activist-careerist types: straight outta boarding school, having a bit of a rebellion before settling down into a nice job in Law or PR (and, hey, all this ordering about is good training). Of course, these are the same people who come out as gay the minute they get to college and then shut themselves back in the closet as soon as they leave. I knew an anti-porn dyke who, in the grand tradition of student politicos, became welfare officer at the student union. When not ordering the masses to boycott porn, she spent her time taking the piss out of those who came to her for help and writing abusive replies to personal ads.

As if to get away from the 70s/80s stern anti-everything politics, the Campaign Against Pornography and Censorship (?! is that possible?) was launched by - you've guessed it - a group of writers, lawyers and trade unionists. If I remember right, they were in favour of certain types of porn... erm, I mean erotica and wanted to ban all that wasn't to their taste.

Meanwhile, Serious Pleasure - one of the first British dyke erotica books - was fast selling out, no doubt bought by the same rad fems who were pulling down heteroporn in the shops. At the same time, some dykes brought out the first issue of Quim (!), a British version of US dykeporn like Bad Attitude and On Our Backs. On a softer level, Rouge magazine started featuring photos by someone called Della Grace...

Confusing! Taking in all the arguments against porn but at the same time getting wet at the possibilities! I mean, dykes getting off on it is different from other people looking at porn cos they're, like, men, right! (erm...)

Of course, the feminist press went ballistic about the emergence of Quim et al. Everywoman magazine had published a book called Pornography and Violence: Evidence of the Links - extracts from hearings in Minneapolis. Surely the ultimate proof that Porn is Bad for You...?

This led to the MacKinnon-Dworkin ordinance which was based on the US constitution's 14th amendment of equality and freedom from discrimination. They were arguing that porn was sex discrimination. Up to now, whenever that ordinance has been put into operation it's been used to ban gay male porn - and nothing else. In Canada it's been used as an excuse to prosecute gay bookshops and dyke magazines.

There were also rumours of a new group, set up in opposition to CAP and supported by the evil big business pornographers themselves, Feminists Against Censorship. Whaaat? Calling themselves feminists? That was the property of the anti-porn camp... how dare they! Reports, too, came in about their inaugural conference in London - where women dressed in suspenders were giving out pro-porn leaflets. Obviously in the pay of the mainstream porn industry!

By this time I'd dropped out of moralising campaigns, pissed off with the general bossiness of most anti-porn/political types.

One of the things that originally spurred me to take action was Clare Short's campaign against Page 3. Not long ago the Independent on Sunday did a feature on breasts, taking the stance that adverts like the one for Wonderbra portrayed women unrealistically. They had pictures of 'real' women's breasts - well, the biggest was around 34B..... Later, an article appeared about how looking at Page 3 made women feel inadequate as the models' breasts were unrealistically big. I really wish these self-appointed spokespersons for women would learn that women come in all shapes and sizes - we're not all bony superwaifs. Yeah, it pisses me off that there's so many semi-naked women in daily newspapers - but isn't this linked to the position of women in society as a whole?Surely it's better to tackle issues like low pay and violence rather than blame everything on porn