For mature audiences: Australian media classification and sexual violence on screen from 1983 to 1995

Abstract

ABSTRACT This article documents governmental response to ‘sexually violent’ material in Australia between 1983 to 1995 through the lens of media classification. Three major changes will be discussed that span the introduction of two new classification categories: the X category for sexually explicit materials (SEMs) in 1983, the MA15+ category for Mature Adults over 15 in 1993, and the establishment of a National Classification Scheme (NCS) in 1995. These events concern three different genres and mediums, two as they emerged in Australian homes: sexually explicit video, mainstream thriller films for public exhibition, and ‘violent’ video games. This article tracks how ‘sexual violence’ emerged within a field of discourse that incorporates institutions, technologies, morals, and political and commercial interests. Drawing upon the classification treatment and textual analysis of mainstream films from the early 1990s, The Silence of the Lambs (Demme, 1991) and Cape Fear (Scorsese, 1991), this article further documents how classification shifted from acting on the principle of child protection, to address young people as the future instigators of gendered violence, a policy discourse which would prove salient in a context anxious of new media and media change.