This blog is inspired by @Babetv, a long time live babeshow fan. This blog was originally published to his now deactivated Tumblr account. This blog is centred around Bang Babes – a babe channel that was shut down by Ofcom.
Regulatory action has been a worry for as long as the UK TV babeshows have been around. The possibility of the babe channels ever becoming legitimate on British television seemed remote at one point. Before September 2010, there was no legal justification for sexually-themed babeshows to exist in Britain, and a lot of what they were doing went against rules and regulations. But earlier in the late 1990s, advertising violations were not just matters of nudity or suggestive mime.
The Babe Channel Night Shows were forbidden by the BCAP Advertising Standards Code from advertising their own adult phone chat service on any unencrypted TV channel, and in 2008, Ofcom made it clear that enough was enough. The nighttime babeshows would be thrown off the air for violating the BCAP code if they did not encrypt their output.
At that time, Ofcom proposed the concept of classifying babeshows as Teleshopping in an effort to let the shows continue airing. There was no discussion about adult babeshows evading compulsory encryption in 2008, as this only applied to programmes with non-sexual phonelines.
“Those who remember the Freeview night shows of the late noughties will recall that they implemented a dubious workaround for the above rulings, whereby they promoted their sex chat service without actually telling viewers what it was.”
Words like "cheeky," were used in place of direct or overtly sexual language in advertisements, such as "dirty" and "sex." Even while it was obviously much harder to market an adult chat service without ever directly disclosing what it was to viewers, at least the workaround allowed the channels to continue operating while Ofcom thought it over and decided whether or not the workaround was appropriate. Ofcom did however continue to poll the general public to gauge their opinions on the babeshows.
Unexpectedly for some, the results revealed that, as long as adult chat was appropriately labelled and inaccessible to children, there was little to no public hostility to its promotion on TV. This altered the regulator's plans for requiring adult babeshows to be encrypted, and it was determined that both day shows and night shows could be justified by reclassification. As a result, the babeshows received permission to enter the Teleshopping broadcasting category in September 2010.
The Teleshopping classification had a drawback in that Ofcom could now issue official guidelines to the babe channels, basically dictating what was and wasn't permitted. But the fact that babeshows were becoming a common kind of broadcasting was by far the best thing. The constant fear of being grounded was gone as long as they adhered to the rules.
The blogger noticed that visual content of the babeshows had considerably changed since the reclassification. On daytime shows, bikinis and underwear sets were swapped out for more clothing, and almost all physical contact has been eliminated from both daytime and evening performances. "Hand-thongs" were no longer used, and a variety of suggestive mimes were no longer around.
While Ofcom has always seen most of the aforementioned as problematic and offensive, things have changed since 2010 because the programming category of babeshows has now been recognised, allowing the regulator to formally state its position in a set of detailed recommendations. The channels will naturally abide by government requirements far more strictly than they will monitor their material, therefore it might look like the regulations have become significantly stricter since 2010. But in reality, the fundamental guidelines, which are very straightforward, have remained constant over the course of the babeshows.
Many people believe that sex and explicit nudity are forbidden on television. It's not. Offensive content is prohibited. Therefore, if sex is portrayed in a setting that the general public accepts as unoffensive, it can be scheduled and broadcast, and Ofcom cannot stop it from being screened. However, it cannot be screened if it is presented in a setting that is thought to be likely to offend, hurt, or corrupt. Due to this, excessively graphic sexual imagery is not acceptable in anything that can be classified as merely "perv fodder.”
The simplest method for a TV network to make sexual content acceptable is to temper it with a worthy context. Even shows about sex on the major networks have justified and gotten away with using fairly graphic sequences. For instance, Sexcetera advertised itself as a film about the sex industry but it was presented in an educational way.
The babe channels, however, have hardly ever attempted to portray their adult programming as anything other than pure "perv fodder," which has been a major disadvantage for them when it comes to defending their work against criticism. The only thing the babe networks can say is, "Yep, it's a fair cop," but other channels can say, "Ah, but it was an instructive documentary, and the graphic scenes were necessary in the audience's full comprehension of the issue. The regulator's prejudice is not the issue. The babeshows' lack of a strong defence is the problem.
A channel would be sensible to at least appeal a regulator's decision if it is founded on a misperception, and this has been done in the past with success. However, it would be quite foolish for a channel to try and sue Ofcom when it has been determined that the channel has plainly broken the rules and the only issue at hand is the rules themselves. The channel would spend a lot of money, almost definitely lose the lawsuit, and court actions need a LOT of information to be disclosed, typically under media scrutiny.
“Would the average premium rate adult service want to be asked a series of tough questions about the full detail of its operations, under the scrutiny of the media? I’m guessing not.”
No, in a nutshell, is the response. While some of Babestation's programming is licensed overseas and can therefore avoid Ofcom's more "nitpicky" requirements, other Babestation output is UK licensed and subject to the same amount of policing as every other TV babe channel, as noted on forums in the past. However, a discussion of licences actually misses the point. The babeshows can make money without contesting Ofcom because things are working out for them now. They are quite legitimate as advertising of adult services, and there are many alternatives to using hand thongs or girl-on-girl groping to promote those services.
Babe channel viewers adore the most compelling visual content, but because the shows can effectively advertise without it, any calls to "Take Ofcom to court!" are pointless. The rules governing broadcasting now are ideal for babe channels. The babeshows would almost certainly have a lot more competition from alternative adult programming, that just couldn't exist under the current regulations, if Ofcom allowed unrestricted sexual content on TV. Ofcom only permits the right amount of adult content to support and market babeshows while preventing the creation of competing porn channels and the loss of that revenue.
“Whether the babe channels are monetised in the right way, and how effective their advertising is over the long term, is another debate but the regulators should be considered no more of a hindrance to the babeshows’ progress, than to the progress of any other TV channel.”
