Now, obviously one big difference between deciding if the right suspect has been identified in a lineup, and deciding whether an image constitutes child pornography, is that the question of a suspect's identity in a lineup is a question about objective reality, while the question of whether an image is "child pornography" is a matter of opinion and consensus about an imprecisely defined English phrase
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Objective reality? Hardly...Anyone ever read about the failings of "eyewitness testimony"? Often there is no better convincing evidence than the crying victim dramatically pointing to the defendant and saying "That's who raped me (or what have you)." Dr.Gary Wells has been studying eyewitness testimony for the past 20 years or so (and I saw him on 60 minutes in an (I'm told) rerun of a segment on it, but I digress), and basically said it is highly influenced by outside influences because of how memory works: A lot of people think it's like a tape, and you press record. That's untrue. It's a procedural, systematic building block that leads to whatever memory and such is available (For more on it, visit http://www.psychology.iastate.edu/faculty/gwells/homepage.htm)
On the actual case itself: This judge is clearly a Moral Guardian (in the most literal sense of the word) and is blinded by emotion and the "For The Children (tm)" argument. It's despicable to be honest.
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Now, obviously one big difference between deciding if the right suspect has been identified in a lineup, and deciding whether an image constitutes child pornography, is that the question of a suspect's identity in a lineup is a question about objective reality, while the question of whether an image is "child pornography" is a matter of opinion and consensus about an imprecisely defined English phrase _______________________________________________ Objective reality? Hardly...Anyone ever read about the failings of "eyewitness testimony"? Often there is no better convincing evidence than the crying victim dramatically pointing to the defendant and saying "That's who raped me (or what have you)." Dr.Gary Wells has been studying eyewitness testimony for the past 20 years or so (and I saw him on 60 minutes in an (I'm told) rerun of a segment on it, but I digress), and basically said it is highly influenced by outside influences because of how memory works: A lot of people think it's like a tape, and you press record. That's untrue. It's a procedural, systematic building block that leads to whatever memory and such is available (For more on it, visit http://www.psychology.iastate.edu/faculty/gwells/homepage.htm) On the actual case itself: This judge is clearly a Moral Guardian (in the most literal sense of the word) and is blinded by emotion and the "For The Children (tm)" argument. It's despicable to be honest.