Call For Movie Ban After Somali Pirate Attacks

A pirate ship at sea. Most pirates are probably below deck studying Hollywood movies.

The group, calling itself 'Campaigners for Christian Family Values, Absolutely No Sex Whatsoever For Anyone, But Plenty of Big Guns For All', claims Pirates of the Carribbean is among the movies that have spurred impressionable Somalis into their illegal activities on the high seas.

"You have to think of these foreign-types as being like kids, they can be so easily influenced by anything they see on TV", says campaign leader Wesley Huck III, "and those lefty-communist-brainwashing-types in Hollywood are making them hijack our ships and hold crews to ransom."

He's calling for a complete ban on Pirates of the Carribbean and all associated movies and merchandise, saying that modern day pirates wouldn't have got the ideas into their heads if it wasn't for the adventures of Captain Sparrow and his men.

"The problem is that they've glamorised piracy, and now every Somali thinks he can be Johnny Depp. I bet they're even trying to get hold of some of that faggot make-up as we speak."

But he vehemently rejected my suggestion that restricting the pirate's access to guns would do more to solve the problem:

"Huh? You're one of those commie-lefty's aren't you? Someone commits a crime and just happens to have semi-automatic weapons with them and you think access to guns is the problem! You leap on that straightaway in order to try to restrict our freedoms to exercise our right to heavy armaments. You can't see that what you really need to ban are the words and the pictures that put these ideas into people's heads.

"I bet if these lefty university professors stopped their commie activities for a moment to do some proper research they'd find that most people who watch a pirate movie of some kind go out and hi-jack international shipping within 24 hours - yet there'll be almost no link between guys having some innocent fun out in a boat with heavy weapons in a busy shipping lane off the coast of a lawless country and pirate activity. They might just have hi-jacked the ship on the way back from a pleasant weekend's hunting, as is their right. The guns aren't the problem, the movies are - ban them now.

"What drives me crazy is that Hollywod knows this. I copied a DVD off a friend the other week, and when I watched it there was this announcement that Pirate movies are illegal. So they know that what they are doing is wrong, but they don't do nothing about it."

Wesley's campaign seems to be gaining momentum, and has even found some support in the UK, with christian groups here saying that Captain Pugwash should also be added to the banned list.

As the restrictions on such movies are expected to get tighter following such pressure, the international community will be watching with baited breath to see what impact it has on the Somali pirates.