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IWF Backs Down On Wiki Censorship
jonbryce writes "The Internet Watch Foundation, guardians of the Great Firewall of Britain, have stopped censoring Wikipedia for hosting what they considered to be a child porn image. They had previously threatened to block Amazon for hosting the same image." Here is the IWF's statement, which credits the Streisand Effect for opening their eyes: "...in light of the length of time the image has existed and its wide availability, the decision has been taken to remove this webpage from our list. Any further reported instances of this image which are hosted abroad, will not be added to the list. ... IWF's overriding objective is to minimize the availability of indecent images of children on the internet, however, on this occasion our efforts have had the opposite effect."
We humbled Kany... WE humbled the IFW!
Let's get it right; the IWF didn't say the page was porn; they said it was "potential illegal child sexual abuse." Most people seem to have assumed this was because the album cover artwork on the Wikipedia page included an image of a naked girl, but the reality is that IWF only wanted to protect children from the horrors of having to listen to anything released by the Scorpions.
omeone better start blocking this bit of smut from that den of molesters at Wikipedia:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Raffael_030.jpg
Sick, I tell you, sick!
The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.
Makes me wonder if they would block an identical image released next week. Considering how absolute they seem to be in their judgment of these types of images it seem surprising that they would care about the age of the image (child porn is child porn). Anyway, good news for manga artists and readers everywhere.
huh, a censorship organisation that's capable of acquiring new information, and using that to change their actions.
I didn't think that I'd live long enough to see the day where such a thing would happen.
Isn't there someplace in Revelations where they mention this?
"And yea, look ye unto the people running the anti-child porn organizations on the intertubes. For they shall learn the error of their ways (temporarily) and it shall be a sign that the end of all things is upon you."
They still didn't admit it was wrong, they said their plan didn't work.
They are also admitting that kiddie porn images can be copied and transferred all over the world with no effort.
Unfortunately, I bet they still think it's possible to censor thoughts out of existence.
No, it's pretty tasteless, and probably was at the time too. However, I don't consider it child porn, otherwise I think the band would have not been allowed to release it and several people would have been arrested.
This particular situation was so ridiculous, I'm glad they realized what fools they were making of themselves. I mean, if the image had been hurting anyone in any way at all, I would have a different opinion. But as we have heard, the girl in question has stated herself that she's fine with it, was fine with it back then, and her parents were fine with it back then. Plus the fact that it's been available since the 1970s, in my opinion, means that it is actually a culturally significant work of art. Etc. Censorship is such an old issue, you would think people would realize when these policing agencies are crossing the line.
Yes, and banning the image now would be like going back to sensor re-runs of television shows from the 70's. That's awesome! Perhaps we can get rock-a-billy music censored out of existence?
Support NYCountryLawyer RIAA vs People
I thought she was a bit of a dog frankly. Not a patch on the Olsen twins. But seriously, it's not supposed to be erotic is it? Surely it's just an artistic message about the social construction of gender identity?
The only thing that I find hilarious about this is that the people behind groups like the "Internet Watch Foundation"
are from the same social strata that regularly gives us child molestors of the likes such as Marc Dutroux in Belgium
along with his cronies in the Belgian Government.
But of course the child pornography / pornography / minority rights etc. etc. debate is just the right orbital slot
for the popular indignation needed to fuel the underlying agenda which is to monitor and restrict free thought
and free speech, I think many of us not so profane anymores have already realized this.
...not in this instance anyway. These people were effectively forced to see the light and had to defend its indefensible actions. Finding that they could not and that, as the streissand effect goes, causes more attention to the matter than they were seeking.
I'm not sure what a better tag might be, but the image of cockroaches running away hiding from the light might be more apt in this case. These people seeking to censor too much find themselves in indefensible positions when light is shined on them.
...but they were all underdeveloped.
No folly is more costly than the folly of intolerant idealism. - Winston Churchill
What else have they censored that dont have the "name recognition" like Wiki or Amazon?
Thanks to file sharing, I purchase more CDs
Thanks to the RIAA, I buy them used...
Great! An image which was defined as child abuse is no longer so, and I can resume Wiki editing without going through a technical rigmarole.
This will be presented as a victory over the IWF, but I do not think that is true. FWIW, I think the IWF did it's job correctly.
That doesn't mean I support them - I feel that people like the IWF are best dropped in a swamp with an anvil tied to their legs - but by their lights they have behaved correctly. The UK law on pornography and child abuse is so widely drawn that almost anything can break it, and almost certainly people have been convicted under it for holding images similar to the Virgin Killers cover. The image was NOT child abuse, but WAS probably against UK law. Now, magically, it is not, and the law is an ass...
The problem here is with the law, and the whole idea of criminalising people in possession of porn. There was, and is, no need for any law of this kind. If children are raped or abused for gain, there are perfectly good laws against rape and abuse, and no doubt the fact that a crime was committed against a minor will be reflected in the sentence if someone is found guilty of such an offence.
It is the people who abuse that should be sought out and dealt with. Attacking those who possess pictures is an easier task, but just sweeps the problem under society's collective carpet.
It looks like Big Government is making a mess of the war on nudity, like they have with the war on drugs and the war on terror.....
I don't think I ever advocated banning the image in my post, though you can correct me if I'm wrong. Lots of things are tasteless but not illegal, and it should probably remain that way.
...that an internet organisation that's been around since 1996 would understand the internet and would've realised the storm that censoring Wikipedia would cause and the resultant effect.
But frankly, to me there's a more important issue here- the IWF has accepted they're wrong which raises the question as to whether procedures need to be put in place to prevent mistakes happening again. The IWF is in a position of immense power and failures to perform their duties correctly need to have repercussions.
There have been various conspiracy theories as to whether the IWF was testing the water in light of Britain's new extreme porn law which makes BDSM and such illegal and hence whether the IWF was seeing what the response would be if they were to start filtering this out- particularly as scenes that could be deemed to be extreme porn exist in many common and publicly accesible places. To filter extreme porn as they do child porn they'd most certainly have to go after a lot more mainstream sites, it would no longer be a case of simply filtering out underground sites that only a small minority of people who are already classed as criminals visit.
Whatever the real aim of this was, whether it was simply a blunder or not, I hope for one thing- that the IWF now ensure they concentrate on what they're supposed to concentrate on, helping prevent child abuse and access to sites that really do gain money and so forth from such abuse and also that this has put to sleep any ideas of a power grab or increase in censorship to other, arguably harmless areas for the IWF.
Before the efforts of Internet Watch Foundation, I had never seen the image they were all worked up about, which is at:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Virgin_Killer.jpg.
And now, thanks to their tireless efforts to protect me from myself, I have seen it.
Good work, IWF!
.....
but the reality is that IWF only wanted to protect children from the horrors of having to listen to anything released by the Scorpions.
Than and all they had to do is make a press release, and garner worldwide attention. Some of it negative, but think of all the increased support by religious types. This was just an elaborate marketing ploy on their behalf that is sure to increase donations to their coffers while providing free media coverage over such a nonstarter of a band, issue and picture.
On the Oregon Cost born and raised, On the beach is where I spent most of my days
In a later statement the IWF said 'Don't you worry, this is a minor setback. Rest assured, wherever there are naked children, we'll be watching, ready to pounce'
I have nothing compelling to say
Thoughts are easy to censor out of existance, trivially easy - it's called a 'bullet'.
how about "suddenbricktothehead"?
Now the only censorship of wikipedia is done by:
1. Wikpedia admins
2. Jimbo Wales personally
3. Cabals
4. The marketing and legal teams of Corporations
5. Governments
Still, one censorer less is something I suppose.
Not all pictures or movies of naked people are porn.
I wouldn't call it tasteless, sure the little bastard is ugly as sin but its just an imagine of a naked human. As tasteless as any other, maybe less so as the wrinkles and jangly bits have yet to drop to the floor.
On the Oregon Cost born and raised, On the beach is where I spent most of my days
"The Internet Watch Foundation, guardians of the Great Firewall of Britain...
Wouldn't that be "Hadrian's Firewall" in this case?
Proverbs 21:19
the Internet is much, much older than they are aware of, and for a reason. The Internet has always been a "nasty" and "krass" place. During most of its existence, as text only, maybe there was more left to the imagination? Its great to have all the added bandwidth, but not the added hassle of "do-gooders".
Nobody is going to "regulate" or enforce their religious convictions here. Leave us alone!
IWF has decided to make an exception for this particular image, but the underlying attitude that led to its blocking remains the same. If not for the public scrutiny this particular decision has prompted, the image in question would still be blocked. I find that very disturbing.
The biggest problem I see with this sort of filtering is the fact that, at least for borderline cases, you rarely know whether the image being blocked is actually illegal. Usually it takes the due process of law to determine that a person producing an image has done something illegal, but with filtering all it takes to block an image is for the image to seem like child pornography. Whether it is or not is irrelevant. All that matters is the judgment of a private party.
"In prison you just have to shut your eyes and take it. Here you have to shut your eyes and give it."
The local council wants to close the Nudist beach because many the other beaches have been washed away by coastal erosion.
As there is no law in England about having to wear clothes on a Beach I'd expect that once the beach goes mixed and pictures of Little (add childs name here) appear on the internet will be labelled Child Porn even if they were taken by their parents and all of the family are naturists.
This is an interesting dilema. If it is not illegal to go around naked and it is not illegal to take pictures of said naked people how could it be illegal to post those 'LEGAL' pictures on the internet?
I'd like the IWF to explain that one.
These people seeking to censor too much find themselves in indefensible positions when light is shined on them.
Does that imply that there exists a line where it is alright to censor things? I only ask because it seems like the rest of your post is in general suggesting that there is not. After all, if there was a reasonable line where censorship can be applied, then this could accurately be called an outbreak of common sense when they realize that they stepped past that line, right?
However, I don't consider it child porn, otherwise I think the band would have not been allowed to release it and several people would have been arrested.
So something is child porn if you get censored or arrested for producing it?
Interesting metric.
Back in the 70s, everyone had a much more relaxed attitude to this sort of thing. According to wikipedia, there was even a spread of a naked 11-year-old girl in the Italian edition of Playboy in 1976. It is only in the last few years that activists have spread the idea that it is bad to look at pictures of naked children.
So, the picture was legal when it was first released, but may well be illegal now, at least in the UK.
... that is the short of it.
I host a number of websites for myself and others at a commercial hosting company. After the report of Wikipedia being blocked, I polled all of my customers, telling the story of Wikipedia and censorship. I recommended blocking the UK from accessing their websites until the UK relented. What I got was an earful. My first call resulted in all of RIPE, APNIC, AfriNIC, LANic being blocked ... forever. He said that his comments were spammed daily from offshore and that if they never saw his site again it would be too soon.
I related that story in all subsequent calls. All but one responded similarly. Block 'em all, forever. They were trying to reach a US and/or Canadian audience anyway.
So, that's that.
"Who controls the past controls the future. Who controls the present controls the past."
- George Orwell, 1984
My blog. Good stuff (when I remember to update it). Read it.
I'm over eighteen - let me collapse the wave function for myself, willya? Oh, and someone please let the damned cat out of the box - the meowing is driving me nuts!
o That the people trying to censor net access in this country are not just idiots, they're incompetent idiots.
o That the "blocks" that the major ISPs have in place are effectively useless; either they're incompetent as well, or (more likely) are paying lip-service to the whole idea by saying "yes, we subscribe to the IWF block-list" while using mechanisms a five-year-old could bypass.
o That Chris Morris was right.
Sometimes (as in the case of dodgy 70s album covers), this seems just a bit of a joke; but sometimes it isn't. During the early 90s spokesmen for the political wings of the terrorist organisations in the North of Ireland had to be re-voiced by actors, making interviews essentially impossible. I remember one occasion, after a particular gruesome bombing (many innocent people killed) when the spokesman concerned was able to hide behind the actor to get his message across without answering WHY his organisation supported this indiscriminate slaughter - the "censorship" rules had the exact opposite effect to what was intended.
If you are not "notable" enough, and you don't have enough "significant" coverage from "reliable sources" you can be "salted", "A7"d, "prod"ed, "AFD"d, and also added to Wikipedia's own blacklist.
This is to say that Wikipedia's hands aren't exactly clean when it comes to censorship issues, and remember that Wikipedia is a top 8 website acording to multiple sources, and frequently is the number one on Google. This makes it that wether you are on Wikipedia or not makes a huge difference.
Remember when you donate, to remind them to combat deletionists, who do like to censor things in the name of "notabillity"
You mean a BootToTheHead.
(Now with a choice of cultural variants!)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J5kGUW6M7W0
or
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C_Y6231uAmo&NR=1
My first Journal Entry ever, in 8 years! http://slashdot.org/journal/365947/aphelion-scifi-fantasy-horror-poetry-webzine
Of course there's a line where it's alright to censor things. The telemarketing industry, for instance, tried to play the censorship card to trump do-not-call list legislation. It didn't work.
Its great to have all the added bandwidth, but not the added hassle of "do-gooders".
I really wish people would stop calling them "do-gooders". That's exactly what they want to be called. It gives them the moral high ground before the conversation even starts. And it's insulting to those who actually strive to do good online. Call them censors or something equally specific.
I still find a bitter taste in my mouth over this whole episode. I think I'd rather have seen this come to a conclusion with more judicial overview so that there is a clearer decision on what responsibilties the IWF should control, how the public should be made aware of blocks, and what appeals process exist. As it stands we just have to keep our fingers crossed and hope the IWF dont screw something else up.
I'd also prefer this to come to a larger debate about the merits of censoring images that are clearly not intended to satisfy the cravings of pedophiles. The recent judgement in Australia where some poor guy was fined for cartoon porn shows that we're losing all sense of proportion.
Today from work (instead of working) I decided to check out the IWF website.
Turns out Getbusi content filtering proxy is blocking their site as "porn"
If you wanted to get cynical over this, that's not the best approach to take.
IWF is organization set up by ISPs. I believe their remit is to flag and block anything possibly illegal, allowing the legal/illegal argument to then be made (and any action taken). Their REAL purpose is to keep governments off the backs of ISPs - we're regulating ourselves, so you can leave us alone.
Now.
New bit of law just rolling out (Jan '09) outlaws 'extreme porn' in the UK. Complete and utter knee-jerk, poorly thought out crap we've come to expect from my government - for example, a clear definition of 'extreme' might have been thought be some to be a pre-requisite to such a law. We've now got some wooly f'in mess where a sizable chunk of the internet could be considered 'extreme'.
So who's going to be involved in this stupid law - IWF. Poor fuckers, don't envy them at all. Anyway.. if you were in the IWF's position of having to prevent people downloading 'extreme' material with the following options:
1) Arrest everybody who looks at anything vaquely offensive.
2) Allow everybody to look at everything and get government regulation applied (How's that going Australia?).
Just sort of suggesting that our collectively national focus even being very slightly brought to this issue, can do nothing but improve the current situation.
For the uninitiated:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Streisand_effect
Homonyms are fun!
You're driving your car, but they're riding their bikes there.
just needs to get a hold of their list to access all these "morally dangerous" sites? I presume they also added a few strategically placed honey pots to their blocked site lists, but then again maybe they haven't. Personally I am against censorships, because even in the best of cases they detract from the user the right to judge for himself, and in the worst they only create a false sense of security. I wonder if this made their list as well (be warned, explicit nudity) http://www.mondomostre.it/images/caravaggio/cat_caravaggio_03.jpg
I wonder how much of an impact all the UK traffic to Wikipedia being proxied through their servers may have had, and whether that impact played any part in this sudden reversal. Wikipeda was certainly the highest traffic page they've tried to filter to date.
This is likening art to porn which would send any artist into a frenzy. Artwork of naked children is not child pornography.
The original IWF press release suggested that the "web page" at the blocked URL "was" a potentially illegal image. Whereas in reality, the main URL only contains HTML text -- and the image in question was only linked in and actually resided at another URL. This means material was blacklisted which was not alleged to be illegal in the UK. This wasn't just a side effect -- the HTML page was intentionally added to the list as well as the image itself.
As a Wikipedia and Media Wiki contributor, I wrote to the IWF complaining that the HTML text page was blacklisted (and not just the image). To their credit they have replied, but making no reference to the point I made.
If the IWF intends in future to blacklist text content which is not alleged to be illegal or abusive, this greatly changes the nature of the blacklist. In which case the public, legislators and industry should reconsider the high levels of co-operation which have been afforded to the IWF to date, offered on the understanding that it is purely trying to prevent crime and abuse.
perl -e 'fork||print for split//,"hahahaha"'
IWF's overriding objective is to minimize the availability of indecent images of children on the internet, however, on this occasion our efforts have had the opposite effect.
This fiasco only shows the true intent of the IWF. They should make the blacklist available so people are aware of what other non-violent, and non-pornographic images, text, etc are being censored.
For the uninitiated:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Karma_whoring
Do not attribute to malice that which can be easily explained by incompetence.
Wikipedia says they do not censor. Yet they'll remove videos of male masturbation from -- the page on masturbation. They'll even remove images of people having sex and replace them with ridiculous drawings or drawings. They don't do that for other pages. Go to the page on a lion and they'll show you a big image, in colour, of a lion. No one says: "Well, a big image showing all the parts of the lion, and in colour, is just not necessary. Everyone knows what a lion is: A detailed image is not necessary to get the point across." But go to the Talk pages for fellatio or ejaculation and you'll see this exact argument used there. I would say they do censor. I think it's duplicitous of them to say that their official policy is "Wikipedia is not censored." And of course they censor child pornography from their pages, because it is illegal in Florida, where their main servers are.
Why stop with the albums of decedant rock bands, Wikipedia is full of images of naked children.
I just attempted to view the Wikipedia entry for "Virgin Killer" (the Scorpions album), and my employer's proxy content filter (supplied by Blue Coat) still lists this particular Wikipedia page as blocked:
Not sure if Blue Coat updated their records yet, but I'm about to complain to them about the content filter. This is the first time, incidentally, that I've seen any Wikipedia page blocked, though I've seen plenty of other asinine filters set up for other sites.
And for the record, I'm nowhere near the UK -- this is in Phoenix, Arizona. Nice to see how someone else's "community standards" are being enforced on me, across national boundaries.
Normally, I wouldn't reply to myself, but Blue Coat's site to report pages that are mis-categorized claims that the Wikipedia page for "Virgin Killer" is now only classified as "Reference." So either the IWF filtered category doesn't get set by users (likely, since it's not selectable in their drop-down menus), and thus the user-accessible site review page doesn't show that category, or else there's a substantial delay in Blue Coat getting the latest blacklist from the IWF.
"So you think that people that pay for images of this stuff don't contribute to the perpetuation of it?"
I agree with the AC. If the images are just of naked children (almost half of the child pornography cases in Ireland relate solely to pictures depicting no sexual activity whatsoever), that question is irrelevant, unless a child is actually forced to pose naked.
You're also making the assumption that everyone who is arrested for possessing child pornography has actually purchased child pornography. Many child pornography offenders are caught after taking their computer to a repair shop, having their IP address logged and traced, etc. They probably haven't harmed anyone, yet their life is now damaged beyond repair.
There should be a law against producing, purchasing, selling, requesting and trading pictures of children being molested (mere nudity should not be criminalised), but laws against accessing and possession do nothing to protect children; they simply provide an easy excuse for the government to exert control over citizens.
"To the future or to the past, to a time when thought is free" ~ Nineteen Eighty-Four
The IWF are the net nanny for the UK and EU. What gives them the right to 'censor by edit'? Their view of what is illegal is being imposed globally, which to my mind is an act of vandalism. Just because they don't approve doesn't mean every county does. If every county was to follow the IWFs lead, I suspect there wouldn't be too much content left on the net...
Regarding BlueCoat, there are two issues at play: (1) Not only do you have to wait for BlueCoat to update their list, but then you have to wait for your company to update from BlueCoat. (2) Your company has CHOSEN to block "IWF-Restricted", and they can remove category from blocking, or exempt a page from it.
On a side note, this is simply a work-issue, I'm sure if you can show your IT department your business need for reading the Scorpion's Wikipedia entry, especially if you can show a quantitative loss, it will be fixed quickly by them!
Do you have a link to the article where it has that Playboy fact? It sounds like trolling.
Parent raises a very good point, linking to a picture of a naked child on wikipedia. It's not off topic, it's not flamebait or a troll. Fucking useless moderators we have here.
I'd like to start a petition to have the Great Firewall of Britain renamed Hadrian's Firewall. I think it's more authentically British that way. Who's with me?
Conservation of angular momentum makes the world go round.
are you an FBI agent trying to lure me in? well, I don't give a fuck. I thought it was pretty hot also, but it didn't really do anything amazing for me. it should be pretty obvious to anyone WITH A DICK that kids that age (10-12, 13-14, whatever) can be quite sexual, and there's absolutely jack fucking shit wrong with that. when I was 15 or 16, I knew a 10 year old girl who basically showed ME the ropes, so it's hilarious how many so-called "open minded" or "liberal" people are quick to jump on the "it's child porn and it's terrible!!" bandwagon. whatever?
but, then again, I'm an "insane libertarian" and don't see a problem with viewing child pornography in the first.
So given that image is legal (and she's clearly under age) then any new modifications of that image are legal, right (except for maybe the naughty bits hidden by the cracked glass).
So you could modify her hair... or skin color... etc. for a million different legal photos.
And then what about a new photo that is very similar.
At the least- either it is child porn and should be censored or nothing involving a completely naked sub teen female alone that hides that tiny piece is child porn. The piece is obviously salacious.
Ah well.. stupid laws.
She was like chocolate when she drank... semi-sweet at first and then increasingly bitter.
Lots of things are tasteless but not illegal, and it should probably remain that way.
I think exceptions can be made for rock-a-billy music. I wouldn't want anybody, much less a child, to be accidentally exposed to it. In fact, I've just put the Wikipedia page about rock-a-billy on the IWF site so that Britain's, at least, can be protected. Since the IWF mandate goes beyond banning merely pictures of children, thank goodness, people can be protected from all sorts of nasty stuff. Activist citizens like me should report other such disreputable Web sites to the IWF so that they can be banished forever. Hopefully rock-a-billy will be a thing of the past; banished from history and memory.
Do you have a link to the article where it has that Playboy fact? It sounds like trolling.
Here's the link: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eva_Ionesco
It took me less than a minute to do a search for that.
Try doing a Google Search for this sequence [ viet nam war news picture girl running screaming ] Notice "naked" is not on the list. Nevertheless, the first result is this link http://www.lakeland.edu/studentservices/news.asp?article=4354 A quite famous picture (won the Pulitzer Prize) is on that page. With a naked girl-child in it. Of course, you would probably tear off your clothes and run screaming/naked too, if you had a really close encounter with napalm. I'm pretty sure I recall complaints about the original publication of that picture. Probably by relatives of the same idiots who objected to that album cover.
The girl's name is Phuc. How long do you expect to be able to search for such an obscene word? Obviously, such a search could only be seeking evil images, and the nannies must prevent it...
Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities. - Voltaire
that's it. You can go to their web page, report something you believe is illegal and if they agree it could be illegal it gets added to the list.
ISPs can then choose to use that list for blocking. Pretty much exactly the same as the open-relay blacklists. Somebody reports an issue. Somebody adds it to the list. Other people can choose whether they use the list as a filter.
IWF would surely want all ISPs to join - as otherwise the alternative is the government in charge of the big UK Internet Off switch.
As for censorship, I agree with you mainly. I'm not trying to argue what should be censored, but if there's a legal definition, I'd expect IWF to follow it. If I find the fact that I can sit down with a pencil, draw a picture, upload it and 'become' a padophile quite utterly retarded, then I agree, but it's the law I want changed.
Taking it to the other extreme. Imagine you find an image you find offensive (use your imagination). If it came through your letter box you'd report it to the police. If it comes through your internet, then what are you currently supposed to do? I don't think there's a right solution I can think of, but should be something.
You're right. I'd never thought about it before - first time I'd ever realized there was something sitting between my page requests and the rest of the internet.
I'd love to get my hands on their complete block list - just intersting to see if there are any patterns in what gets selected for blocking and when.
The sooner the IWF is stripped of its charity status the better.
"the little bastard is ugly as sin" - First, I don't even agree with you. She's a normal-looking little girl who - for some reason - has some really shiny hair. Second, how irrelevant and insulting to criticize this girl's looks! You must be trolling. But just in case you weren't, stop being stupid. /rant
"If God wanted us to be naked, we'd be born that way" - Oscar Wilde.
There is nothing wrong with nudity, of oneself or others.
There is not much wrong with censorship of oneself.
There is everything wrong with censorship of others.
Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities. - Voltaire
All in All it was just another brick in the firewall.
alias possession='chmod 666 satan && ls
...does nudity=pornography? I mean, I see naked babies on American television ads all the damned time. Naked infants aren't porn... Is it just pictures of nude adolescent girls that are porn? Topless 14 year old girls are porn, topless 14 year old boys aren't porn...this makes absolutely no sense, even for Brits.
Article does not cite sources.
Let start at the top.
"* appear to have been produced primarily for the purpose of sexual arousal, and include an act that:"
'Appears' - appears to who? Not a straight 'produced primarily for the purpose of sexual arousal' - if it were there'd be a heated argument along the lines of "you made it for sexual arousal", "no I didn't - prove it". How do you even defend yourself from 'appears'? Even if you could categorically prove it wasn't (somehow) it wouldn't matter - as it 'appeared to' to the prosecution. You've just been arrested for 'appears' - please tell me how you're going to convince the prosecution, that wants a prosecution, that it 'doesn't appear'? (begging doesn't count)
"(a) appears to be likely to kill the subject,
" Oooh lets look at this one. Killing subject, that would be bad. Yes I agree. Likely to kill.. well what are we talking here. Balance of probabilities? What % death would 'likely' be reached at. Would a video of Russian Roulette be OK, until after the third click therefore bringing the scene total to 'likely death', or maybe it'd all be OK until the 5th shot was unfired.. Not that it really matters and I notice 'Appears' at the front again. Hey - this doesn't even have to be real, it just has to 'appear' - no idea why I was getting all hung up on reality when appearance is all that matters.
How about I film myself, throttling myself whilst cracking one off? Reading the above somebody could start watching, decide I 'Appeared likely to kill the subject' and then pop around to arrest the healthy happy me.
"(b) appears to be likely to result in serious injury to the subject's anus, breasts or genitals,"
Personally if I want to film myself hammering nails through my scrotum, I personally don't see why I can't and then share video with other consenting adults. Just kidding, I don't actually have to do it, I just have to 'appear' to again... Oh and before I leave this point, what's the fascination with anus,breasts and genitals? I'm allowed porn where I'm punching somebody in the face, but not the breasts? Are male beasts included? (If Ridley Scott got the horn when filming gladiator, he is in so much trouble). And one last thing.. 'Serious Injury' - we talking amputation, or a bruise (sorry, an act which may occur likely to cause a bruise)? Oh Oh and before I leave this paragraph, would dismemberment or a slightly more extreme death mutilation be counted? I mean I'm pretty sure suicide bombers mutilate pretty much everything on the list, but nobody seems to focus on precise body parts in that situation.
"(c) involves a sexual act on a human corpse, or (d) involves a sexual act on an animal."
I'm lumping these together as they're just standard necrophilia/bestiality is 'bad' bollocks (and I'm reasonably sure they were illegal previously as well) - still does no harm to add them here and make the list look somewhat less cobbled together. In fact I'm quite sure they started with the first 3 points and had to add these at the end to stifle the guffaws (although personally if I were pitching this, I'd have closed on the necrophilia). Bestiality surely isn't too bad? I mean I'm not rushing off to the fields every weekend myself, but the fact that somebody else wants to screw a cow doesn't upset me that much. I mean placing myself in the animals point of view I'd prefer to be fucked than killed and eaten. I mean what's the worst that can happen a hoof in the knackers...actually now I think about it, rule b by itself would probably outlaw the larger animals.
Time for a summing up (if you made it this far). More I think about this, the more I get annoyed.
Not quite sure where I stand politically/socially. erm.. Libertarian, Do No Harm, pro choice, anti-death penalty, Welfare state, federation of countries - well you get the idea. I have no issue with certain things being declared illegal. I have no issue with a block/warning being assigned to certain URLs - IF there was a list, publically available stating what was blocked and why.
My main g