In case you haven’t heard the news, the British authorities have taken the entirely ridiculous step of banning the movie The Human Centipede II.

I won’t go into detail about the film and its predecessor, because the content of the films is not terribly important to what I wish to discuss.

Suffice it to say that the films are shock horror, where the idea is to overwhelm the audience with scenes of violence, sexual perversion, torture, death, dismemberment, and so forth in order to try to generate a visceral reaction in the audience by shocking their sensibilities as much as possible.

If you want to know more, just read the wikipedia entry about it.

This “shock” phase is something art simply needs to go through from time to time. The last time was the 70’s. Film is the perfect medium for shock art because it provides such a rich and visceral experience, easily the medium that provides the closest thing we have with our current technology to a completely immersive art experience. No matter how blood spattered your installation art piece seems to be, it is still clearly art, and the audience can remain outside it and view it dispassionately. Film, especially as seen in a darkened theater, challenges that detachment.

Part of the artistic intent of shock horror and other, similar genres is to create a sensation not just in the audience but in society at large by presenting society with something that violates their sensibilities so strongly, it’s almost daring them to abandon their free speech ideals in order to suppress it.

In censoring the movie, then, the British authorities have played their part in the auteur’s drama. They rose to the bait and gave Tom Six, the fellow behind both movies, all the publicity and ammo for self-righteous pomposity he could ever want.

Personally, I find his outrage a tad disingenuous. I bet when he got the news that the British had banned his movie, he could not have been happier. And not just for cynical, profit and ego driven reasons. The whole intent of shock horror is to throw everything you have into something in order to force people to react, and censorship, from that point of view, would be the best kind of reaction.

I consider this a perfectly artistically valid approach, though not one I would necessarily take myself (at least, not with all the violence and pain… not my cuppa), and I applaud Tom Six for successfully getting the reaction he wanted by making a film that makes even very liberal people question their dedication to freedom of speech and opposition to censorship.

Thanks to the British, and the stir the original caused as well, Tom Six can sit back and watch as his movie stirs up global controversy and prompts pundits and thinkers all of the world (including little old me, obviously) to talk about his movie.

But to me, the issue is quite clear, because when it comes to freedom of speech (and all other forms of communication), I am somewhat of a hardline extremist.

I would legalize everything.

That’s right, everything. There should be no restrictions on art and/or communication whatsoever. The basic principle of freedom of speech is that it is immoral to prevent others from making up their own minds about a given media work, and that does not allow for exceptions. To me, there is no form of art, however much it may offend people, which warrants suppression and punishment. If you do not want to be offended by offensive art, don’t go looking for it.

It really is that simple.

Every form of horror, pornography, or what have you should be equally free and unfettered. They are, after all, only objects of the imagination. No matter how horrific The Human Centipede II’s visuals might be, nobody is actually getting hurt. It’s all make believe.

So the only reason to censor it is because it offends you, and you don’t want other people to be offended by it. But that is quite simply not your call to make. Freedom of speech requires us all to suppress the perfectly natural and in some ways even laudable urge to protect our fellow humans from things which offend us.

It is natural to attack that which has hurt us. When offended by something, our natural urge is to want to destroy it. But that is not how freedom of speech works.

Civilization requires us to restrain out natural urges in many ways.

Resisting the urge to censor is simply one of them.