Earlier this month, the British Board of Film Classification started policing paid online pornography as well as DVDs. Following this change, all commercial pornography produced or distributed in Britain will not be able to include sex acts that the organisation deems unacceptable.

As reported by The Independent, these acts may include:

• Spanking
• Caning
• Aggressive whipping
• Penetration by any object “associated with violence”
• Physical or verbal abuse (regardless of if consensual)
• Urolagnia (known as “water sports”)
• Role-playing as non-adults
• Physical restraint
• Humiliation
• Female ejaculation
• Strangulation
• Facesitting
• Fisting

Murray Perkins of the British Board of Film Classification revealed the thinking behind this ban a few years ago: “Sex work shouldn’t be in breach of the criminal law; participants must be adults; it shouldn’t encourage an interest in sexually abusive activity — rape or child abuse; it should be consensual; there’s limited scope for role play; but it should be non-harmful and there shouldn’t be any infliction of pain beyond mild consensual activity. Strong sexual threats or abuse are unlikely to be acceptable.”

But how many people really share these “unacceptable” fantasies? It may be more than the BBFC would like to admit.

A paper published last month in the Journal of Sexual Medicine revealed the frequency of different fantasies as determined by interviewing 1,517 adults in Quebec.

The paper found that 52% of women and 46% of men fantasized about being tied up in order to obtain sexual pleasure. That’s about 25 million British adults who won’t be able to indulge their fantasy through UK-sanctioned pornography.

A further 36% of women and 29% of men fantasized about being spanking or whipped to obtain sexual pleasure . That’s about 17 million British adults whose ability to enjoy these fantasies will be restricted.

Only 4% of women and 10% of men fantasized about a sexual partner urinating on them, but that’s still about 3 million British adults whose urolagnial fantasies will be restricted.

Here’s how common other fantasies other, including a few others that will be indirectly limited by the British rules:

Brits will still be able to view restricted pornographic content by looking up material online that was produced in other countries.

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