Canada Supreme Court Broadens Internet "Luring" Offense

An anonymous reader points out this report that a Canadian Supreme Court has broadened its interpretation of an existing law designed to punish adults who attempt to meet children online for criminal purposes; under the court's interpretation, says the article, that would now "include anyone having an inappropriate conversation with a child — even if the chats aren't sexual in nature and the accused never intended to meet the alleged victim." The story quotes Mark Hecht, of the organization Beyond Borders, thus: "If you're an adult and if you're having conversations with a child on the Internet, be warned because even if your conversations aren't sexual and even if your conversations are not for the purpose of meeting a child and committing an offence against a child, what you're doing is potentially a crime."

Comments

go and walk near a nest of crocodile eggs

[circletimessquare]

try to reason with the six foot scaly mother that shows up to defend those eggs. you have just as much chance of defeating the "think of the children!" irrational impulse of homo sapiens. because as members of the ancient order of crocodilians has discovered, like many mammalians, is that if you invest in only a few offspring (as opposed to the fish and amphibian strategy of "fire and forget" 10,000 eggs), then it is a survival advantage to be overprotective of your children

the irrational desire to protect children from the various dangerous scenarios of adult IS an irrational desire. much like the irrational desire to feed. or the irrational desire to fornicate

in other words: not so rational from a point of view of principles and concepts, but very rational from the point of view of the preservation of and continuation of life: take care of your children

biological imperatives trump all high minded concepts. principles and concepts work only when they aren't interfering with biological imperatives. as an example: every right, freedom, and sense of decency you hold dear and valuable in your mind is just one food riot away from being completely violated without any recourse to justice

no police, court system, or government body can remain coherent when those police, judges, and government bureaucrats are busier trying to procure some food

so pay attention to biological imperatives, they matter a hell of a whole lot. ignore them at the peril of losing all progress we've ever made in human society

one of which being: "think of the children!" there is a very real biological rational reason to protect your offspring from the real world until they are able enough physically and mentally to protect themselves. evolution favors the survival rate of organisms that actively protect their offspring, where that set of offspring is small, such as us humans. so "think of the children!" is an overbearing, overwhelming, messy, intrusive impulse that cannot be reasoned with. and yet it makes 100% sense biologically

all i'm saying is that "think of the children!" might be the butt of every slashdot joke, but it is also an irrational "hysteria" that you need to make peace with and accept, because it is simply never, ever going away. because it actually makes a hell of a lot of sense, but from a completely different point of view, a point of view that trumps all other points of view: the biological imperatives

look at it this way: without children, all the arguments you could ever have about rights and freedoms won't matter one bit if there's no one here to inherit the society and the government you tried to improve. the health and well being of the generation that comes after you is all you leave in this world, on an individual and a societal level. so it really is of the highest importance that you do your best to protect children until they can fend for themselves

this simple, brutal logic defeats and overrules all other arguments you can possibly make on the matter

"think of the children" reigns supreme. it is your job to simply accept this biological imperative, as messy and intrusive as it is, as messy and intrusive as the need to visit the bathroom, the desire to fornicate, and the need to shove sustenance into your mouth: creatures that have few offspring and act protective of their children have an evolutionary advantage over those that don't

no matter how overzealous that protective instinct is, it will persist due to the laws of evolution, and you need to make peace with it and accept it: its never going away