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Possession of Violent Pornography Outlawed in UK
An anonymous reader writes "The BBC is reporting that possession of violent pornography is now punishable by three years in prison. This decision was handed down in response to a campaign waged by a grieving mother who lost her daughter to someone obsessed with violent pornography." From the article: "Shaun Gabb, director of the anti-censorship organization the Libertarian Alliance, said: 'If you are criminalizing possession then you are giving police inquisitorial powers to come into your house and see what you've got, now we didn't have this in the past.'"
Steganography is getting more and more attractive every day...
Pictures don't cause people to commit crimes. Might as well blame crime on convenience stores. Or blame poverty on lotto tickets. It's all a bunch of political bullshit meant to make the middle class feel "safe" while wasting resources investingating pseudo-crimes.
“Common sense is not so common.” — Voltaire
There have been plenty of sick creatures such as the Boston Strangler and too many others I've read about and forgotten and who were active BEFORE the internet.
This is a waste.
We have always been at war with Eurasia!
People obessed with Grand Theft Auto have gone on killing sprees. Should violent video games be outlawed as well? What about violent movies? There will always be sick individuals out there, does that mean we have to ban everything that may have inspired their acts? Get real. Violent pornography isn't my thing, but when it comes to goverment censorship or banning of any content, there ought to be a damn good reason behind it and the death of one girl who's killer might have been inspired by a certain type of movie doesn't cut it in my book.
'If you are criminalizing possession then you are giving police inquisitorial powers to come into your house and see what you've got, now we didn't have this in the past.'
There are already things that are illegal to possess. I don't see how adding another thing to that list somehow now grants law enforcement scary inquisitorial powers. As far as I can tell, the only thing that grants law enforcement inquisitorial powers is actually granting law enforcement inquisitorial powers.
Rarely results in the solution we want, only the solution we can describe. This mother's witch hunt to blame her daughter's death on the internet instead of on the idiot who strangled her is creating far more than she hoped for.
SJW: a person who perceives an injustice, and while correcting it, commits a greater injustice.
Does this person not realise that possession of an unlicensed firearm and possession of certain psycho-active chemicals are already illegal? The police can't enter your house and search it without a warrant to search for these, why should violent pornography be any different?
The problem I have with laws like this is that we are treating symptoms of psychoses as crimes. Possession of violent pornography is not, in itself, a bad thing. It can, however, be a symptom of a serious mental imbalance, as was almost certainly the case with the murderer in the article. Now we are making it even harder for people with problems like this to get professional help. We are driving them even further underground, where they are forced to become even more repressed, and even more likely to snap and kill someone.
I would much rather see mentally ill individuals treated before they harm someone than imprisoned afterwards.
I am TheRaven on Soylent News
Gee, I think this would eliminate an entire class of movies, the teenage sex and slasher movies. Not that that would be any great loss, except to the producers. But I really don't understand the menality. Posessing a hammer should not be against the law. Bashing a head in with the same hammer should be. Having a tool like nmap should not be against the law, but breaking into a place you have no authorization should be. Having violent porn should not be illegal. Murder with or without violent porn should be.
He doubtless would have been a fine, upstanding member of society without the capacity to hurt a single hair on anyone's heads.
Criminal law should not be a knee jerk response to any one event but rather a disspassionate evaluation of deterrent, punishment, rehabilitation and public safety (based on logic and evidence!) made in order to maximise the net gain to society. That is how just laws are written and the biggest benefit is gathered.
Think of the Children; Sleep with your Sister
The really sneaky thing about this sort of law is that it's so subjective. Drugs, you can send to a lab, and radar guns are pretty darned accurate most of the time, but this sort of thing? Who decides?
For example, suppose you have a video tape with graphic killing, violence, blowing up buildings and stuff as well as sex scenes. Is it violent porn? What if you accidentally taped a few minutes of the playboy channel over a bunch of network news? Or a Hollywood blockbuster? If you say the people have to actually doing the violence while having sex there would be almost nothing that fits the definition. On the other hand, if you say that anything that contains both elements counts, than almost anything could be called "violent porn" with enough twisting.
And even if you could get the definition down, do you suppose they'll actually release the images in question when someone is publicly accused under this law, or just say "Trust us, it was violent porn."
Of course, laws like that never get abused, so this is really all just theoretical.
--MarkusQ
because before viewing the violent porn, this guy was obviously a choir boy...
Last time I checked, killing someone is still illegal. Why is this law needed? It's not like it's child porn is it? The 'actors' know exactly what they're getting signing up for the job, being adults and all...
Reminds me of a quote by that evil-incarnate W. Axl Rose (Guns n Roses) in reponse to people wanting to ban some GNR songs:
"If you're going to ban something, ban the Bible. More people have been killed because of/in the name of that any of our songs"
People in cars cause accidents....accidents in cars cause people
Well, if the study Porn Up, Rape Down is correct... then no. The author shows a strong correlation between increased access to pornography and a statistical reduction in reported rapes. Further, the author showed geographical correlations within the US whereby locally reduced access to pornography occurred in the same locations as areas with high rape rates.
Things that make you go Hmmmm....
First, this law would simply be unconstitutional here in the US. Second, I keep hearing arguments that people who end up being violent criminals were into pornography/violent video games/heavy metal/etc. first -- and all such arguments are logically flawed. Could it simply be that people who enjoy real murder also enjoy simulated murder? Let's see a cause-and-effect relationship proved before we even consider knocking holes in civil rights.
Revive the Constitution.
Repeated kneejerk reactions over time don't make this a non-kneejerk issue.
Somehow I doubt the sincerity of these signatures. Approach someone in a public place and just start off "Excuse me, sir, do you like violent pornography?" What the hell can you say, even if that's your bag? "Why certainly, stranger. Nothing like a good snuff video while I bugger myself with a coke bottle, yessiree!"
And of course, an MP (I assume that's a politician) coming out in favor of pornography period would be political suicide. That's an even less rational standard.
The problem with this is the question of a clear line. What exactly makes an image violent? The linked article mentions strangulation, what about BDSM? Do we distinguish between "heavy BDSM" and "light BDSM"? What are the defining characteristics? Is spanking allowed or disallowed? Or do we distinguish between "violent spanking" and "play spanking"?
While this may sound silly this law makes it necessary for those questions to be answered. Over time court cases will come up and, lacking any standards, the police will choose between punishing noone unless they commit some other "real" crime (like murder), or punishing anyone whom they don't like. The latter seems a more likely route. This also then raises the issue of costs. Will this bill be enforced or will it fall by the wayside? If it is enforced how will much money will be spent on that?
This is why one needs to be careful when making law, even though few politicians are. Such laws don't solve anything, they typically raise more questions then they answer and pass the actual problems off to others. It's not that I don't believe that people shpuld be protected from such preadators. They should. I'm just skeptical of this law's ability to do so on the face of it.
Repeat after me:
There are no bad ideas, only bad actions.
There are no bad ideas, only bad actions.
There are no bad ideas, only bad actions.
Preventing people from having certain information for moral reasons (assertions that the information is "bad") not only fails, it is harmful to the ideas of an open, accepting society that promotes health.
Ideas are just information, and all information has positive value. Once governments get into the business of dictating what people think, totalitarianism becomes possible.
That's funny alright, but you make a valid point there: how would they know you're in posession of such material and, more inportantly, where would you draw the line between porn, violent porn, fetiche, abuse, S&M?...
Don't want to be pessimistic (or optimistic, depends on which side of the fence you're at), but if a law can't be enforced, or it's not worth being enforced, then it never will.
Uncopyrightable: The longest word you can write without repeating a letter.
Maybe Jack The Ripper and the Boston Strangler would've had their needs satisfied by violent porn and hence never gone out on their killing sprees.
Aw, man... I can't remember... what was that violent video game that Hitler always played...
Posession of violent pornography *is* a bad thing. Anyone who thinks otherwise is seriously bent. Posession indicates that a pleasure is obtained from having or viewing it, and anyone who obtains pleasure at the expense of others is partaking in a B-A-D thing.
By that argument, wouldn't you have to outlaw BDSM?
Right. Because now that the porn is illegal, he'd just have killed her according to whatever fantasies he was capable of creating in his imagination. That's such a better outcome.
This sounds like his defense lawyer's wet dream: "the porn made me do it! It was the porn!"
This makes about as much sense as if the city of New York had decided to ban dogs after the Son of Sam said his dog told him to kill people. Maybe the problem is just that people are occasionally psychopaths? Like terrorists, there's very little that you can do to stop them, and there's a very great risk that any attempted "cure" can be worse than the "disease." (E.g., an erosion of civil liberties and freedoms in the face of a very small threat.)
"Ladies and gentlemen, my killbot features Lotus Notes and a machine gun. It is the finest available."
And that's why this petition is skewed. You'll get all the people who are both anti-pornography and pro-politics signing up because their position is favorable to society.
No one could get the pro-pornography and pro-politics segment of the population to sign a petition because it would be ludicrous to stand in a supermarket, stopping people with "You aren't going to let them take away your bondage mags, are you?"
If we're going to ban dangerous forms of sexual imagery, can we please get rid of the starving anorexics in clothing advertisements inside of women's magazines? Your child is almost definitely not going to get killed from internet pornography, but they have a surprisingly high chance of developing an eating disorder thanks to this crap.
The ______ Agenda
The only reason anyone can have for opposing this ban is that the belief that people have the right to look at this kind of material. I don't agree, but it's an understandable position of principle. Waffling about its being impractical (like that matters with child porn) or being an unwarranted intrusion on privacy (because the police have been given *such* extended new powers) misses the point. Fundamentally, they don't see any problem with people producing, distributing or using such material. As I say, that's an understandable position of principle, but of course, it would lose anyone their hearing as soon as they tried to articulate it in public.
i never understood why people get hung up on this issue. it is utterly academic to me at this point: if i watched 10 days straight of ultraviolent movies straight, then went out and punched someone, it would be my fault. if wacked off for 10 days straight to hardcore rape porn then went out and raped a woman, it would be my fault. if i played 10 days straight of ultraviolent videogames, then went out and shot someone, it would be my fault. 100% no grey area whatsoever. why?
the principle of personal accountability... isn't this a concept social conservatives should be familiar with? if it comes out of my mouth, or my hand, it is MY responsibility. "the devil made me do it" is a blame game, an attempt to avoid guilt, and it is a mode of defense as old as rape and murder (which never needed porn, videogames, or movies to happen going back to he dawn of time)
if you play GTA, and then kill a cop in the EXACT same scenario as GTA, GTA BEARS NO RESPONSIBILITY WHATSOEVER. because YOU were the fucked up person to do that, not GTA. if you never played GTA, some other stupid pursuit would give an idea to do something incredibly retarded, get it? YOU ARE THE GUILTY PARTY, AND YOU ALONE. media cannot enable the well-balanced to commit crimes, media can only enable the previously fucked up to commit crimes, and even then, putting retstraints on media means nothing: the previously fucked up will be set off by some other factor you have no control over!
so the point is you lay blame where blame is 100% due: THE FUCKED UP ASSHOLE WHO COMMITTED THE CRIME. if i am psychologically well-balanced, NONE OF THIS MEDIA WILL SO MUCH BREACH THE TINIEST BIT OF MY SENSE OF RIGHT AND WRONG. in fact, in the mid-1990s, when i was quite young, i might add, i must have played hours and hours of doom for weeks on end. and i'm a rabid anti-gun nut
how's that work? it works just fine! in me and 99.99999% of the rest of the well-adjusted population on questions of simple right and wrong... dylan klebold is the fucked up asshole, NOT DOOM!
now, the most amazing thing to me is how the people pushing for controls on videogames, porn, movies: these are the same social conservatives who talk so highly, with such vigor and passion, about the concept of personal responsibility. and yet they defile it with their censorship attempts. THEY DON'T FUCKING GET IT
in fact, i propose we have MORE access to porn, violent movies, and violent videogames. i'm dead serious! the principle of catharsis, the theory of the safety release valve: violence we are complicit to on a video screen is violence we would not have committed in real life. in fact i would wager, if such a study would ever done, that rape and violence is static across all time and history... to think that it is increasing over time is hystorically myopic of you. really
in fact, i might wager violence has gone DOWN slightly over the course of recent history as our access to more realistic media, and would go down even MORE, if people were exposed to more violent and sexual media, and would go down even MORE if our media gets MORE violent and MORE VR full immersion realistic. i really believe that 100%!
do you want people to be more peaceful? well people are inherently violent and sexual, so beam all of those pressures up on a screen in front of them, and voila: release. have you ever looked at your average 3 year old toddler? people are NOT born vessels of purity that are corrupted by exposure to bad things. people are born little demons with no impulse control and a lot of selfishness and are taught to channel those impulses into proper channels
not that i'm going all clockwork orange on y'all and tying people down and prying their eyes open and force them to watch violence and sex, but at least stop trying to PREVENT people from pursing violent and sexual media as a natural instinctual desire to release that which if did not get released harmlessly on videoscreen, would build up and be released in real life. in other words, it all depends upon how
intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it or sabotage it
Can we at least have a follow-up to this after three months, six months, a year, to see if levels of violent crime are affected by the ban? If these people are so attached to the idea that outlawing violent porn will reduce violent crime, we should at least be able to test the hypothesis now, right?
Laws do not persuade just because they threaten. --Seneca
People often sign these petitions because they are too embarrassed to say no. If someone is stopped in the street and asked "if you don't approve of violent pornography, would you please sign our petition" and refuse, it looks as if they've just said "Nope. I love my violent porn.". And anyway, 50,000 isn't exactly a huge amount - there were over a million signatures on petitions presented to parliament in protest at the invasion of Iraq, yet the government took no notice (and in the case of fox hunting, there were over 1.5 million signatures on petitions either for or against the ban).
Evidence from criminal psychologists that can show strong evidence of otherwise normal people who have become violent criminals as a result of looking at images of violent crime (rather than vice versa), and that this is likely to be higher than the number of people who might get the urge to carry out their violent fantansies if they couldn't get their fix from looking at pictures instead, would be a good reason to defend the law. The fact that victims back the law and that 50,000 people have backed it is neither here nor there.
Sorry, I have to point out that this defence could also be used for child pornography.
Yes kiddy porn gives them gratification without them actually kidnapping a child themself, but for the film to be made some child would have to have been violated. The viewer is just (financially) encouraging the makers to violate children.
IIf I am honest cant see how this law is a that bad a thing. People often ask "Where do you draw the line", IMHO any film that is intended for one's gratification should have the line drawn at what is legal. If it is legal to do, it should be legal to film and distribute.
Dont be too suprised about this law, in a democracy a law that is the pushed under the banner of "banning Violent porn films after the murder of a girl" is going to get passed, no politician is going to get in the way of that one.
Although, this does make me wonder, how many censors are serial killers, considering they get to see all of the really bad (good) stuff.
If this were really happening, what would you think?
Should knives be banned? It's a very difficult area with no clear anwsers. Many murderers, when given access to a knife, may use it to stab someone. However, billions of people use knives safely every day to prepare food.
Should we limit everyone's ability to use a knife to avoid the few people who are on the border from going across and murdering someone?
Obviously anyone who has had a family member murdered with a knife will feel one way.
Sometimes, you need to accept that bad things will happen. Now let's move on with our knives... I mean lives.
Spoon not. Fork, or fork not. There is no spoon.
Everyone declaring so much of this "sick" "disgusting" etc etc.
Please stfu.
Are people being harmed against their will in such images/videos? Any reputable studio has documentation on file showing this not to be the case.
The performers are doing these things without being coerced (a lot are even into it! imagine that).
How long ago was it that people would refer to homosexuality as "sick, disgusting" et al? If I was to start saying those sorts of things I would get modded into oblivion so fast my head would spin. There is an extremely broad range of what people refer to as "violent pornography"
Is violent pornography rough sex?
bdsm related things?
simulated forced?
no one can answer can they? Why? Because it's all so incredibly vague, and it's intended to be that way. The more vague the description is the more the folks enforcing it can cite things like snuff films (without noting of course that posession of snuff porn and the sites serving it are ALREADY illegal because they involve an actual MURDER) whilst shutting down sites that people who happen to be a little kinked like, sites that are harming no one.
This is pure idiocy, and a move by the morality gestapo to push, more and more, "deviants" out to the edge.
Isn't anyone the least bit bothered that this is basically another "mothers against $HORRIBLEVILTHINGTHATWILLSURELYDESTROYSOCIETY" group?
It gets to where I think the US and UK are in a race to see who can come up with the most rediculous legislation the quickest.
Happiness does not come from having much, but from being attached to little.
I believe that producing this kind of pornography has been illegal in the UK for a while, but possession of it wasn't until now.
The kiddie-porn is illegal not because people will go out and do bad things after watching it.
;-)
It's illegal because a child was 'hurt' in the making of the kiddie-porn in the first place.*
*Traci Lords not withstanding
People in cars cause accidents....accidents in cars cause people
Incorrect comparison.
Child pornography is illegal due to the fact that a child cannot consent to sex. The video therefore becomes evidence of an illegal act.
Violent pornography (assume the actors are adults) displays actions of cosenting adults.
and a 2nd analogy:
We should ban *any* anti-abortion group because people who go to those meetings, and watch their literature might kill doctors who perform abortions.
You can't ban things based on what people do after the fact. Can 'environment' increase a 'bad' persons tendencies? sure. But I don't want my choices restricted to only the lowest common denomenator safe for everyone. We wouldn't be able to do anything.
People in cars cause accidents....accidents in cars cause people
The actions of a few sick and twisted individuals is not typical of the standards of society. Was dear old Jack the Ripper a typical 19th century gentleman?
The problem with your line of reasoning is the incontrivertable fact that violent crime rates have been steadily progressing downwards for decades, especially in areas like youth crime. It's not that there weren't sick and dangereous criminals in decades or centuries past, it's that they weren't as high profile. The fact that we have tabloids, CNN and legions of hungry journalists out looking for the next Manson/Jack/Son of Sam only means that we hear about such individuals more often.
It isn't lack of standards in our society that's the problem, it's an overabundance of boogeymen.
Erotic is when you use a feather. Exotic is when you use the whole chicken.
Golly! Porn _does not_ "fead the beast", if anything it quenches it! Imagine the frustration of those million wankers and the resulting mess if not for the porn industry!
The labour gov't in the UK usually make knee-jerk responses promising to do something, and actually take action quite a while later. If the action benefits the people, it's usually postponed many times, if it benefits those in power or the machinery of gov't, it happens more quickly.
I expect this to be argued into the ground, stalled, and then some replacement and probably useless unenforceable idiotic law to replace it, under the guise of protection of children/vulnerable people with the effect of taking away more liberty and achieving NOTHING except incurring big costs for the taxpayer.
That's a bad analogy--owning a gun doesn't make me want to kill someone (I own two rifles). Gun ownership stirs no desires. In fact, my guns are about 4 hours away at the moment and I feel no loss whatsoever. On the other hand, pornography stirs the emotions--the whole point of watching it is to get excited, isn't it? And you fantasize about about it and it gradually turns into an obsession. And emotional people do bad things, like the Colombine shooting or those spikes that environmentalists drive into trees in order to decapitate the people who are paid to cut them down. I believe that our Aussie friends, who banned guns a few years back, experienced an increase in violent crime--after all, when the good people can't defend themselves, the bad are emboldened. The Swiss, on the other hand, have a machine gun in every house--and they have a much lower crime rate. Why risk breaking into a house when you know the owner can blow you away? So please, don't blame guns for causing violence. Guns are a method, not a motive.
Battlemaster--Game with friends in medival realms
Golly! Porn _does not_ "fead the beast", if anything it quenches it! Imagine the frustration of those million wankers and the resulting mess if not for the porn industry!
Yes, because as we all know, once you go to a porn site, you're totally satisfied and have no need to see it again. :-/
And no one advocated criminalizing all porn.
If you've never been modded as "flamebait" or "troll," you've never tried to argue a minority viewpoint here!
However.
How could you possibly illegalize simulated child porn in the form of two young-looking adults of legal age? Forget what it looks like; it's still two adults doing their thing. Maybe it fuels pedophiles, but so do food and air.
Dewey, what part of this looks like authorities should be involved?
Pit Bulls are popularly trained to fight because they're large, strong dogs, not because they're inherently vicious. Any dog of any breed can be made nice or mean. I used to own a German Shepherd Dog that could easily bite your arm off, but she thought she was a little lapdog and would roll over for a tummy-scratching if she saw you looking at her. I've also had a neighbor with a Pomeranian that would bite the crap out of your leg if it had the chance. "Man Bitten By Toy Dog" doesn't make the headlines, though, because the subheading of "Man Reacts By Punting It Into Street" takes away the dramatic impact.
Your neighbor was a scummy person who raised his dog to fight, and yet you're holding it against the breed? Honestly, that's the animal kingdom equivalent of rounding up all the African Americans because some of them commit crimes.
For what it's worth, I own two Malteses and a Boston Terrier. Your stupid proposal wouldn't affect me one bit, but you're still not going to get my support.
Dewey, what part of this looks like authorities should be involved?
How could you possibly illegalize simulated child porn in the form of two young-looking adults of legal age?
Easy, we just kill off all the flat chested women. If men see flat-chested women, they will obviously be driven to screw little girls since they're incapable of telling them apart. If you don't have a C cup by your 18th birthday, off you go to the gas chamber to save our children.
Of course, before we start selecting for early bloomers, we'll have to kill off all the girls that develop a C cup before their 16th birthday, just to make sure the men don't get any "bad ideas". Eventually we'll evolve into a species that develops all sexual characteristics right at the age of consent, and it will finally cease to be an arbitrary number. Until it gets raised again, anyways.
If I have been able to see further than others, it is because I bought a pair of binoculars.
But tell me that DOESN'T fuel the pedophile to eventually want to go out and get some real action on a kid?
I don't buy the "feeding the beast" argument. Do you run out and buy a Budweiser everytime you see their commercial? Of course not. You have will power and a measure of self-control over your urges. You could eliminate all the child porn, real or simulated, and you would still have pedophiles. A person can feed his or her own beast through the limitless possibilities of the human imagination. There were pedophiles prior to the internet, the TV, and even the photograph. How did they feed the beast?
"Feeding the beast" is a convenient and completely unsubstantiated argument against something. Almost anything is capable of working on our baser instincts and influencing our behavior. People are responsible for their own actions, regardless of the motivation or catalyst. As another poster pointed out, the Bible has been used to inspire and justify horrific acts of violence and subjugation over the four millenia. Even today, those extreme anti-abortionists who murder OB/GYN doctors for performing abortions use the Bible as inspiration and justification for their behavior. Would you support calls to outlaw the Bible for "feeding the beast" in those cases?
While I find simulated child-porn to be offensive, as a true freedom-loving American (not the Bush variety), I cannot think of a reason it should be outlawed. If no "actual" children are involved, the fact that most of us find it disgusting is not sufficient reason to criminalize it.
We want some answers and all that we get
Some kind of shit about a terrorist threat
- Ministry
This is anything BUT kneejerk legislation based on media headlines, its coming up from grassroots victims of crime.
No, it isn't. There has been one victim of crime and no evidence at all showing that his perusal of violent porn caused him (or anybody else) to become a murderer. Yet, the proposed law will criminalize probably millions of people and it will give yet more ill-defined powers to a police that is already highly intrusive.
It's a bad law, and it's passed without significant. And your knee is jerking just as much as that of the 50000 people who signed.
What? I'm all for freedoms of just about everything, and whatever porn you want to watch is your business. I also drink, and I'm all for freedom to drink. Because no one's getting harmed. Look at the number of deaths every year from drunk drivers. Completely different thing.
I mod down pyramid schemes in sigs.
Marijuana is illegal because of the same stupid "think of the children" rhetoric that has inspired this bit of legislation. Funny though; alcahol is legal, despite the fact that people do some pretty awful things after using it.
The Cheese Stands Alone.
Personally, I don't know if freer access to porn has anything to do with lower rape rates. Personally, I think it has to do with the increasing importance of women in society, access to civil and criminal systems to prosecute people, sex education in schools, etc. etc. Although people who have just whacked off are probably about the least likely segment of society to rape someone--I do give you that. Maybe it's just removing the taboo of sex from the public means that more people are going to want to have sex, women and men both, and are going to want to do it the right way and not the wrong way. Once we stop looking at it as a gross animal thing to do, it becomes a beautiful human thing and it's less stressful for all involved.
Cool! Amazing Toys.
By your logic we should only go to the bathroom once in our lives. And if we see to many toilets we're all gonna start pissing on each other.
Actually, here's your standards:
It is acceptable for a person to watch or imagine any type of fictional scenario that appeals to them. It is not acceptable for a person to commit a violent or harmful act against another person.
That an easy enough standard for you, or would you like some clarification?
To fight the war on terror, stop being afraid.
Everyone - from the victim's family to the posters in /. - seems to be focusing on the murderer and how there was something wrong with him, I would never do that, yada yada yada.
What about the girl? She wasn't some random rape victim, she was his girlfriend. That would suggest to me (though it's not certain) that this violent-sex tendency was something she already knew about at the least, and probably willingly participated in to some degree. Who here, having such tendencies, would deliberately murder their partner in consensual violent sex? Isn't it more likely that this was an accident of recreation, rather than an act evil?
Please understand, I have every sympathy for the girl's family, and I can certainly see why they would want to pursue this course. However, I think the fact that this crime involved sex, and association with internet pornography, has hit some big buttons in those of a reactionary nature. I couldn't say for certain, but isn't it a reasonable possibility that this man's tendencies were also hers?
On a personal note, I have enjoyed, and occasionally still do, similar practices with my consenting partner. Is it dangerous? Well, it can be painful, even dangerous - as can bouldering, white-water rafting (these aren't sexual terms, as far as I'm aware!) and various other recreational activities. When I go climbing, I and my partner are aware of and accept the risks and, most importantly, trust one another enough to not seriously endanger each other deliberately or carelessly. We may die, it's true, but we're prepared for that and we take safety precautions where possible.
People are talking about this case as though this was an act inflicted upon an unwilling victim - and by association it is implied that all such acts have a similar element. I don't know if that's true or not in this particular case, but to make a sweeping, generalised law that restricts the actions of (I can't stress this enough) responsible, consenting adults in their pursuit of what they enjoy is legal folly at its worst.
I, for one, will continue to enjoy all manner of kinkiness. I will enjoy watching the occasional film clip of such acts, if I come across them, and if that means evading the law with simple steganography then so be it. I know that I'm responsible (and experienced) enough not to seriously endanger another's life in this activity, and certainly not against someone's will!
If (as it may be) the girl was not a willing participant, and (as it certainly seems) the guy was not responsible enough to treat her rights and wishes with care and respect, then socially and psychologically speaking he is a dangerous individual. This has nothing to do with his sexual preferences, however. I enjoy kinky sex, rock-climbing, riding fast on my bicycle without a helmet and so on. If I ever think I'm seriously endangering someone else's rights or liberties (or indeed my own) with my actions, I will stop - whatever it is I'm doing. He didn't. That's his problem - nothing to do with sex - and as such he should be treated as an amoral murderer or a deeply irresponsible manslaughterer (Murder 2, for you Americans), not a sex fiend who is a product of the evil interweb tubes.
In any case, I hardly think it is for parliament to decide to restrict everybody's right to enjoy themselves because one or two socially undeveloped individuals are unable to do so responsibly. They should be watched and guarded where possible, but anything else smacks of suspected-guilty-until-proven-otherwise. Aside from anything else, people who disregard the rigths and safety of another in spite of the law will continue to do so, whatever their fancy, even with this law in place.
As another poster said: Treat the causes, not the symptoms. It's our society that's churning out irresponsible people, not our laws.
Meta will eat itself
No, we had a _small_ rise in overall violent crime.
We had a drop in the number of violent crimes where a gun was used. We also had a HUGE drop in the number of accidental shootings.
If you want to bring the Swiss into it, sure they have a gun in every home, along with someone who has been trained to use it in a professional manner.
I'm not saying it's the guns' fault that people use them to commit crimes but when there are stacks of them out there and they're very easy to get hold of...well, it makes it just that much easier, doesn't it?
One of my favourite quotes from the West Wing:
"if you combine the populations of Great Britain, France, Germany, Japan, Switzerland, Sweden, Denmark and Australia you've got a population roughly the size of the United States. We had 32,000 gun deaths last year and they had 112. Do you think it's because Americans are more homicidal by nature? Or do you think it's because those guys have gun control laws."
towards the end there - surely it's f'in obvious that media doesn't cause this level of behaviour, it's the behaviour creates the demand that creates the media.
For example look at a magazine rack in a huge store - huge variety of magazines covering every topic under the sun. If you asked a random person why they were buying a particular magazine (let's say Steam-powered touring caravan monthly) - it'd be because they were interested in Steam-powered touring caravans. I think it's highly unlikely they'd say they have no interest - but suddenly feel the inexplicable desire to develop one.
If you like something, you're attracted to media about it. It may introduce you to something related, suggest something you hadn't thought of - but that's it.
And I would counter-argue that without compelling evidence showing that viewing certain types of entertainment material causes one to become a criminal and engage in particular criminal acts or behaviors, the state has no business banning any particular type of content.
As you pointed out, everyone seems to have heard the argument that viewing certain types of [kiddie|violent] porn causes one to go out and [abuse|kill] other people -- but there seems to be scant hard evidence besides the circumstantial: there do seem to be a lot of criminals who have abused kids or raped women and have also enjoyed porn, but correlation isn't causation. The substantial number of people who do like certain kinds of "deviant" porn and who don't become criminals, suggests to me that in fact the cause of the criminal behavior is separate, and it that it may lead people to both like the porn and to do the behavior later. Similarly, Jack Thompson and his associates have told everyone that violent videogames are "murder simulators" and cause people to lead lives of crime, but there's little convincing evidence of this and much to the contrary. The argument for banning violent pornography and simulated "child" pornography is the exact same argument for banning certain violent video games.
Now, there is a separate argument for banning true child pornography: by making it illegal to possess, you cut off the demand for it, which in turn means there's less of a motivation for people to make it. Since making it inherently involves the abuse of children, this is a Good Thing. Understand that this is a completely separate argument from banning violent porn that's made using consenting adults (or merely actors who simulate violence), or porn that looks like children but doesn't actually involve any (e.g. hentai, CG, or using particularly youthful-looking-but-legal actors).
If at some point there is some convincing and widely-accepted (by the scientific and subject-matter educated communities, not just 'man on the street' "wisdom") evidence showing that viewing certain types of entertainment actually causes criminal behavior, then perhaps we could have a discussion on how best to regulate that type of material. However, in the absence of such evidence, this whole issue is nothing but a political red herring, something that's being created as a "feel good" piece by desperate politicians trying to capitalize on the emotions of people who don't know better.
"Ladies and gentlemen, my killbot features Lotus Notes and a machine gun. It is the finest available."