You must have a lot of child porn on your hard drive if you are in support of other people having it and support making child porn legal. Seems you're also an illegal narcotics user.
A classic! I am sure you use the same line on anyone who disagrees with you on any of your other fascist agendas! "How dares he to stand in my way!?! Pervert! Child Molester! Drug Pusher! Pimp! Heretic! Heathen! Burn him on the stake!!!!!" - followed by incoherent braying, frothing at the mouth and running in circles with arms flailing.
If you two-bit fascist thugs think that you can intimidate me into silence with your inane insinuations, you've got another thing coming.
Which "fix" will of course render television coverage of war impossible and thus the whole idea that the Empire is back at colonial conquests somewhere will be conveniently muted and replaced with happy images of smiling soldiers handing candy out!
Note that they do not attempt to make the actual violence the UK itself and its upper rulling classes are perpetrating on others (including women and children) to disappear, nope. Only the images of it. And while at it to provide yet another club the nascent fascists will gladly use on the populace to keep them in line. Orwell would have been sooo proud!
1) Few people would bother with illegal (quite probably poisonous) moonshine in times when legal and safe alternatives were available, as they were in 1910 and 1934.
Yes, that is why only "Big Corporate Geniuses Inc, Ltd." can make booze. It was so from the times immemorial, first note in recorded history from way back when Seagrams started to supply the Egyptian Empire, 3000BC or so.... eh wait...
2) Our picture of prohibition is biased towards the images given by F. Scott Fitzgerald and other chroniclers of the elite set in the Roaring 20's. Sure *wealthy* people had access to speakeasys and such, but they didn't let just random riff-raff in.
Yes, the "still busting" raids did not occur all over the country in the "War on Booze", neither did get the local denizens locked up and persecuted for being drunk, nooo sir! Since there was no booze anywhere but for the super-rich... right!
Man, you "War on X" appologists are quite amusing.
They weren't. Alcohol was legal in 1910 (pre-prohibition) and in 1934 (after prohibition), the two years mentioned. As a method of social engineering, prohibition was a success. The point is making something illegal for a time gives it a negative stigma that remains.
Err, you are kidding, right? You mean after you've got people forced to make their own booze and after they had the ample time to get good at it, then you restore commercial sales and lo and surprise! The sales are not the same as when every house did not have a fully operational still somewhere! Shock! Horror!
LOL. You've apparently missed the whole discussion about the inherent self-contradicitons and illogic of this hypocritical approach of making the pictures of sex acts "illegal" versus the actual child abuse and mass murder of chidren (all gleefully and "legally" filmed) and thus the inherent stupidity and self-contradictory nature of these very laws which prescribe so.
True, and possibly they would be expected to subject the owners to questioning as any other potential witness would be, in order to try to ascertain where and when the murder occured. But as any other long-distance witnesses of a murder these people would have been promptly released, never you mind prosecuted. If the evidence from their possesion was used to nab the actual maker, they might have been expected to testify in court as to the process of obtaining the movie. If they paid the author for the movie, they might be found to be accessories to the crime. But not in the reverse order as these insane "child protection" laws prescribe (which is really the result of them having nothing to do with children and everything to do with religious lunacies and Puritanical ideas about sex).
Erring on the side of 'what the majority thinks is reasonable' may not be entirely reliable, but it beats the alternatives that you've proposed. Oh wait, you haven't proposed sweet fuck all. Its pretty easy to be critical of our legal system. Its riddled with holes, and I'm all for improving it any way we can. But what do you bring to the table:
You did not ask for me to propose anything, you merely asserted that various forms of illogical bullshit are "good enough" because the majority of people seems to support them.
Yeah, that's constructive. Thanks.
If I keep on saying that 2+2 does not equal 7, even though I havn't provided you with the correct result of the addition, it still does not change the truth of my statement.
Illogical premises can only result in illogical laws, whose only purpose is empowerment of some authoritarians of various stripes to get on with lording over the "little people". This is the pretty patently obvious fact that I keep pointing out.
As to a "solution", the first step would be to put some serious effort into determination of what constitutes "consent" and when it is valid (i.e. the person is able to give coherent one) and go from there. This addresses the core isue of "abuse" and also targets a variety of other inane laws which presently use bone-headed measurements as a replacement and does not restrict itself to the issue of sex.
This of course will never happen because at the core of these laws is in fact a puritanical hypocrisy about sex itself, and they stem from various Christianist religious dogmas involving anything sexual. The "Child Protectors" who scream and whine and moan about the "poor children" actually do not give fuck all about children but are mostly concerned with imposing their bigotted, delusional form of denial of their own sexuality on others, an activity which extends far beyond anything to do with children, although "child porn" is a very powerful and convenient club to bash others on the head with. Most would be opponents simply run away fearing being accused of pedophilia (as I already have been on this thread). That is how authoritarian thugs "win" these battles getting their fascist illogic rammed through. It is as simple as that.
I'd have thought someone as clever as you might have managed not to conflate genuinely 'protecting the children' with exploiting the idea of 'protecting the children' to accomplish other causes.
See above. The reason that I know these people are not about protecting children is because they make no effort whatsoever in attempting resolve the central questions at the core of the issue and are instead opting for knee-jerk, feel-good but wholly irrational, hysterical "laws". And various authoritarians are only too happy to play along with this stupidity. These "Child Protectors" then are actually harming the children because in the long term the children will grow up robbed of their fundamental rights as adults, in order for these Protection Crusaders to never have try to ansewer any complicated questions.
I don't condone any of that, most people don't. In my opinion those are genuine miscarriages of justice, of laws used inappropriately.
Then you are being hypocritical and/or illogical (a surprise there). These kinds of court cases are the inevietable and direct consequence of the laws you insist on being "good enough". Judges have no choice but to either find the whole pile of shit invalid (and suffer the wrath of hysterical "Child Protectors") or to convict. It is no surprise they chose the latter. Even in the corrupt American "justice" systems the judges are not likely to start applying high-profile laws willy-nilly as you are apparently suggesting, not only having abandoned any pretense of logical foundations of these "laws" but now even all pretenses of inpartiality in their application!
But aren't the social structures for educated people to find rewarding and secure employment already in place?
In short: no.
The Western capitalist societies are in essence also a sham. A more successful, less obvious type of sham then the Soviet system used to be but a sham (and a scam) nonetheless.
Humanity has simply not yet evolved to the point where such a societal structure is possible. And so all sorts of kludges and cheap substitutes abound. None of them even close to what one could describe as "rewarding and secure" to educated people. At best you get a lottery roller-coaster where you get to be tossed about at the whims of business moguls, vast majority of whom never finished high school.
Frankly, in a Western capitalist society, when looked upon objectively, education, particularly a high-effort technical or scientific one is a truly lousy bet, with a truly horrid return on investment potential. A party-going slicker trying to befriend the right people on Wall Street seems to be a far, far, far better reward/risk/effort ratio. Never mind a talentless, mindless "entertainment" star. I could go on.
The rest is not taking care of itself very well.
See above. It is not a surprise, the preconditions are not met.
We, slashdot, know that the TSA/Customs are exceeding their jurisdiction playing moral police, we know that laptop searches are ineffective in stopping terrorist plots, we know the huge window for abuse, scape-goating and plain old fascism this opens, but the population at large can only guess there is a reason for practice, they lack solid arguments against it, and when they hear a foreign complain about it they actually turn defensive of their government!
This is not a result of bad education (although it does not help). It is a result of the way US society functions, a deep, structural set of gigantic flaws, running through the cultural core.
To wit: I know many engineers (supposedly educated people) who are truly Gung Ho for the whole PATRIOT Act/War On Terra bit and they applaud all of this, including fingerprint scans and so on. Wouldn't be appaled if anal probes were instituted at airports. They bought the whole "Terrists are out to get us from under every bed!" sales pitch hook line and sinker. As I said, so much for education.
That is because education is incapable of instilling the basic pre-requisite for a good society member: the critical thinking and societal awarness. That is why education in itself is doomed to failure, something far more comprehensive, starting at the early age and in every household is required.
Perheaps this is a difference of definitions, but I would call that "a societal spirit" or some such, but whatever it is it cannot be taught in school. It must come from the whole of ones life experiences and surroundings and from the way the society works.
Given that American schools are still debating -actually- have begun debating whether ID most be tough as an equally valid theory as modern evolutionary theory, it seems obvious to me that good education is the thing we are missing here. I'm not talking about math and physics, many religious fundamentalist actually have good a grasp of hard sciences.
Again, this is the result of the fact that American society is dominated by religious lunatics. Thus all education will be crippled by them to suit their agenda, by any and all means. In the past they confined themselves to quiet indoctrination in private schools until they amassed enough forces to stage a forceful takeover of the US societal apparatus. They could do that because the core elements of the society had become so wholly beholden to purely greed motivated interests that they lost their checks-and-balances functions which in the past limited and/or prevented such forays. I personally think the USA is doomed and due for a catastrofic economic collapse
The religious doctrines I speak of are also a "modern" concept. Religions have adapted their authoritarian ways with the times, or they have perished. I am sure that no "Christian" circa 2 AD would have even recognized any of the today's brands of "Christianity". Every one would have been nearly wholly alien to him. The adherents of the Old Testament would have been even more apalled (if you think children have it bad now, check out Leviticus and its instructions on selling one's daguthers into slavery).
As to a solution, the only point I can see here which could be examined for criminality is the issue of consent. This means that the effort should be on establishing a clear, testable and scientific guideline as to what constitutes valid consent, which would also help a myriad of other laws, not specific to children, and not specific to sex (such as making children into work slaves). It is where all of these Child Protection Crusaders should have focused their attentions, that is if they were really about "protecting children", which they are of course not.
Education is, at best, only an element in this whole mess we call Humanity.
Less educated society with a better societal structure would soon evolve into a well-educated society with a better societal structure. A well-educated society with a lousy societal structure does not follow the same pattern.
Case in point: Russia. Soviet education system was well known to be superior (at least in sciences) at most levels, was wholly funded by the state and accessible to anyone. Education was really big with Lenin and then Stalin, others having followed in their footsteps. It was one of the core principles behind the Bolshevik Revolution, to grant the children of peasants and factory workers the access to education. Yet the USSR collapsed and the post-Soviet Russia underwent an economic and societal catastrophe, despite of a hugely disproportionate section of its society holding the equivalent of the Masters and PhD degrees and nearly everyone else having gone to some sort of college-like insititution (equivalents of which do not exist in the West). am sure you remember the pathetic handouts by the US to Russian nuclear scientists, so that they do not go work for some Emir or another. So much for education.
So my point is: in the grand scale of things education is not at the top of the priority list. Societal structure in which educated people find rewarding and secure employment, is. The rest will take care of itself.
In any case better, dogma-free education is bound to help.
That is what the Marxists figured. That the education will lead people to cooperative life style where all would be given according to their needs, where all would work to their best ability and the whole society would move with a common, not just democratic but concensus-driven purpose.
Maybe I missed it, but i've heard it did not quite work out that way....
On the other hand anything but simplistic bureaucratic idiocy would lead to rather arbitrary definitions of what it legal regarding this issue.
That is the result of attempting to make laws based on religious doctrines. Illogical, wacky, self-contradictory bullshit insues. Which is my whole point.
Come up with some sane criteria (after first having explained the evils of consensual sex past puberty) to measure who is and who is not a victim and then we will talk. But of course you cannot since most of this thing is pure demagougery-driven boloney, the main purpose of which is for some charlatans to obtain power and influence. Sell also under: War on Drugs.
There is a global market for pictures/movies showing underage teens naked or performing sex. If it was legal there would be a higher incentive to produce said content, resulting in more underaged involved. Just for this reason there has to be a global consensus regarding minimal age. Otherwise some nations would deliberately set the barrier lower in order to drive their exports up.
Unless the teens are driven to it by hunger or their performance results in unwanted pregnancies, I am not quite sure where the problem is. You see all of this blabber about sex is really the hypocritical Western, Victorian attitudes re-asseting themselves (along with other insane ideologies which we thought long left buried, such as fascism). Explain to me, again, what is wrong with sex amongst willing and consenting individuals? What sort of damage will there be? Why?
Furthermore I believe that 18 is a quite low barrier for porn based on the mental state of the participants. The older I get the more I'm convinced that young people don't have a clue what they are doing;)
Funny, they say the same thing about you! (and I am beginnging to worry they might be on to something)
Well then the problem is, as it was repeatedly explained, the part about consent! Not about sex or pictures or volcanoes! Make laws about consent and means of determination of its validity then, not about pictures! Its rather simple, no? This avoids all sorts of logical fallacies such as that case of a 16-year old rotting in jail for making pictures of himself and thus ending up being a registered sex predator of minors (he being his own "victim")!
There is gotta be some end to all of this hypocritical religious bullshit of yours! That is all that I am asking!
But then of course the Victorian hypocrites do not really give a flying fuck about children, but rather about their religious bigotries. If some "children"'s (by their own legal definition) lives get wrecked so be it! Its all for the greater cause of self-aggrandisment of egomaniacal "officials" and buildup totalitarian power!
We've deemed that children cannot consent to sex with adults. That the entire nature of being a child is that they are not qualified to make these decisions. This is why they have parents or gaurdians who are responsible for them. If you'd like to debate that point, fine, but its a completely separate debate.
No, it is not a "whole separate debate". It is an intrinsic part of this one: you cannot "deem" something to be "so" based upon some arbitrary, illogical criterion, and then refuse to debate the criterion itself because... you "deemed" it so. Only truly inane, authoritarian, religious nonsense can even try to operate that way. This is like saying that "the society" (whomever that might be) "deemed" that ownership of black slaves is an all-right thing to do because they are not quite human and then refuse to discuss the supposed criterion used to decide their "inhumanity". "It so because we say it is so, and we say so because it is so!" - type of argument.
Again: We've deemed that children cannot make that decision for themselves. Porn stars are adults. They can make their own decisions.
And I keep pointing out that just because you repeat the phrase "we deemed that something is so" it does not make it true. You do not even have a coherent definition of a "child" at hand for this purpose, never you mind being able to prove any of your assertions in regards to decision making at, say, the age of 16.
Again, that is the context. I was specifically discussing child pornography involving children.
No, you merely keep using the phrase "child pornography", which as I pointed out repeatedly includes these days anything from actual videos of children to fantasies in someones' head. That is what "you deemed" it to be, as per the courts.
There are no logical terms.
Ergo there is no way to produce logical laws. QED. My entire point.
If we permanently throw away logic in favour of some "gut feeling", emotional, sometimes clearly delusional, self-contradictory "system" of "laws", just because some demagouges are sucessful at whipping the masses into frothing hysteria about one thing or another, such a "society" is not worth continuing.
Children mature at different rates in different ways. A 13 year old maybe mature enough to be an adult; I've met 20 year olds who were not. The only reasonable definitions to use are the ones we have, that delineate the transition from child to adult at specific arbitrary age thresholds. I don't think they are particularly GOOD definitions either, but its what we have, and its mostly adequate.
All of which is inherently illogical and arbitrary. Just as religious dogmas are. Again, my point. And no it is not "good enough", just like the various unassailable in their time religious dogmas of the past proved fleetingly not "good enough".
I don't think there is anything in that paragraph even worth responding too. Totalitarian states? Moral Purity Police? Who's making dogmatic assumptions here?
Dogmatic?! This entire discussion is in response to your Moral Purity Police already performing totalitarian activities of the sort the ole Soviet Union would be proud of, and in the process setting the "legal" stage for searches for other "suspicious" information in peoples laptops! Think Of The Children!!!
I argued that amongst the crowd of 'pervert sickos' there are *some* who might not be able to take care of themselves. And if they snap, children are the victims.
Really? Then, it logically follows that amongst the audiences of the "Chain Saw Massacre XVII" would be some who "might not be able to take care of themselves". And snap! Dismembered female bodies in shower stalls all over! No? Your own argument. Self-contradictory. Just as I said.
Skippig for the second the highly esoterical possibilities of actually "proving" verbal coertion (of he-said, she-said variety), in this case it would be the coertion+sex that might be harmful, not merely sex. I say "might" because it appears that there are perverts out there who actually like being coerced into sex. The world is a strange place.
Not to mention the fact that these "statistics" are patently bogus: they do not include the alcohol produced by every still in the woods, nor I imagine the Mafia was busy compiling sales figures and submitting them to the government. And these became the primary booze supply sources for the thirsty citizenry!
Per capita alcohol consumption in the states dropped from 2.6 gallons in 1910 to 0.97 gallons in 1934.
This would be really funny if it wasn't so pathetic: how in the world were these statistics compiled when alcohol sale was illegal and thus everyone involved had in their utmost best interest not to appear in the statistics!?
I am sure that every still in the hills was duly observed and its output acccounted for!
Not.
The modern version of this trully imbecilic self-justification being: "Hey the sale of Cocaine in the corner drug stores has dropped to near 0! Our War on Drugs must be working 100%!"
True, one can use coercion. But we gotta draw a line somewhere as it comes to one's responsibility for one's decisions, since if we accept an idea that we can be "coerced" or "pressured" into all and any thing, the whole idea of being responsible for one's actions disappears!
"No, your Honour, I did not really kill all those people at the mall, that gangster next door pressured me into it! Not my responsibility, its all his fault!" is only one step removed from "The voices in my head made me do it!"
Child pornography is the rape of a child for the sexual entertainment of an adult.
That is what you assumed, i.e. that the dude in article was arrested for possesion of pictures of an actual physical act, that the person in the picture was a "child" (since at age of puberty a wee problem of determination of who is a "child" arises), and that the act was not consensual.
You hold in your hands the evidence of a real-life sexual assault - in many societies, a capital offense.
Oh really? And this is a defense of your argument?! That many "societies" are stupid enough, illogical enough, hypocritical enough to kill for sexual assault?! That they find death to be the lesser of two evils?! That they find exhibitions of death and killing in some religion-inspired slaughter to be something "educational" for children while seeing a female tit utterly horrid and abominable!
Also, since when do you lock up people for possessing evidence of a crime commited by others?!
You were damn lucky to have been caught at the American border and not elsewhere.
It is not all unlikely that you have paid for these photos and videos - and it is not beyond possibility that you commissioned these photos and videos.
Oh really? I was caught!? I paid?! LOL! This is how you authoritarian thugs operate: if someone opposes your march to a fascist utopia, he must himself be a child molester! Arrest him! Think Of The Children!!!!
You know, at this point the discussion pretty much ends, as there is no discussing logic with certifiable fascists.
Err, what are you on about? We are talking about the movies resulting form illegal acts themselves being illegal! A possesion of a movie, which in order to make some idiot burned a forest down is not (yet, thankfully) illegal. Yet posession of a wholly imaginary cartoon of a child molestation is, never you mind photographs or movies of actual molestation!
So you missed the point completely.
Also if the "society" finds some crimes so abhorrent, then perheaps it should figure out laws which actually make some sense, instead of essentially frothing at the mouth screaming "Think Of The Children!!! Get them all and let God sort the innocent out later!!!"
Got to love the miss mash of antiwar, anti religion and anti media all in one when none of that has anything to do with it. If you really believe that kiddie porn is no worse than a Rambo movie than I suggest you try and get people to vote to change the law. I think you will find that majority will not agree with your stand.
As I already explained repeatedly, I am pointing out what is illogical, hypocritical and self-contradictory. "Democracy" and how many people you can get to vote for something is wholly irrelevant to the discussion. History is full of instances where "the people" turned out to be a mob of a bone-headed idiots, a fact that "the people" only discovered long after the fact.
As to logic, if you consider what I say "silly" then by all means, show me: define in logical, objectively testable terms what is a "child" for the purpose of this discussion. Then define what is and what is not "porn".
When you are done with that, I have some more tests of logic for you. That is if you do not come back with a bag of religious dogma, hot air, and "everyone knows..." and similar non-sequiturs.
The viewing of child porn further degrades and humiliates the victims.
Each viewing is a further violation of their rights and their basic human dignity.
Your dogmatic assumptions are showing, you should watch that!
You assumed that: 1) there is a "victim" i.e. the act was not consensual or not wholly fabricated via computer graphics, 2) that the "victim" considers that a violation of their dignity (which is a decision they must make and which might not come out to your liking, see also under "porn stars").
Then you assumed that the person (if any) in question is a "child". For bonus points: define "child" for the purpose of this discussion in some logical terms.
Making real children have 'simulated sex' is still abuse. It should still be a crime.
Since you've made more assumptions, I have never claimed that making children do hurtful to them things is all right, merely that the laws which some would-be "do gooders" try to create to forbid this activity are nonsensical, hypocritical and self-contradictory.
That said, I don't have any particular desire to see it legalized. I'm not personally affected by the fact that it might not be legal, and I don't have any empathy for those who do. I still think its sick and demented. So at the end of the day even if I believed you were right that cg child porn is 'harmless' I'd still be disinclined to legalize it.
Your thoughts are the bricks of which totalitarian states are built. You find what some perverts fantasize about "icky" and "disguisting" and thus are willing to ignore rampant illlogic to see them punished for their "immoral ways". And in the process you enable far more serious crimes to be commited by those whom you empower to be your Moral Purity Police.
And maybe Rambo III does affect some small percentage of people. Maybe some movie did feed into some killers psyche and motivate a real world murder. I don't think its much of a risk myself, but more importantly, adults can take the responsibility for the risk, its up to us to accept and defend ourselves against the risk some wacko wearing a hockey mask is going to try and massacre them thanks to the influence of Jason vs Freddy. Adults can care of themselves.
This directly contradicts your point above, in which you argued that pervert sickos cannot take care of themselves after watching their version of pornography.
But as cliche as it may sound, I'm willing to do something extra when children's welfare is involved, to err on the side of caution. They are defenceless, so I don't feel its inappropriate or irrational to take an extra step to defend them. They didn't choose to accept the risk and they can't defend themselves.
And of course you do know better then everyone else what is good for children. Sex at age of 3: no good, granted. Sex at age of 14? 16? 18? 20? Who the hell but the "child" knows?
What about exposure to sexual images at the age of 7? What about exposure to images of violent death rained on some foreigners, at the age of 7 (and the dead foreigners at the same age) while your smiling your parents go "two thumbs up" while at dinner watching TV?
Clearly you, the self-appointed "Bearer of the Sword of Unerring Justice, Child Defender" do know better then I how this mind-boggling hypocrisy is supposed to work, so do tell!
Child porn is real evidence of underage children being victimized.
As I already pointed out, not necessarily. "Child porn", by the current legal "definition", includes things such as 3D animations, hand drawn cartoons, Photoshopped photos etc. All of which is illegal.
Furthermore, by the time it reaches some random laptop after circling the bowels the Internet for years, the odds of it being useful in tracking down the source are slim at best. And since when do we lock up people who are merely in posession of an "evidence" of a crime, almost certainly commited by another person?
Also, define "underage" in some logical terms not involving a "child" becoming and "adult" in a less-then-millisecond interval at the midnight of one of his/her birthdays.
Rambo is a fictional movie, in case you weren't aware, maybe it was your own fantasies that got a little bit out of control if you thought for a second they were the same.
Insulting me will not change the fact that these "laws" (and those who make and defend them) are utterly hypocritical and illogical.
I defend logic. That is all that I am defending here.
But would you know, as soon as I do some Flaming Holy Crusader appears out of the mist to show me the error of my immoral ways. A shocking, I say Shocking, surprise!
Speaking of logic. If logic was being used in this, then complete fantasies, such as 3D simulations and what not would be legal, right? Only the actual molestation would be a crime, surely?
Not if the "Think Of The Children!", Flaming Holy Crusaders have anything to say about it!
Also, as to movies and TV programs, they themselves are not illegal, or else you did not watch the orgy of death that was CNN's coverage of the invasion of Iraq, complete with pictures of Iraqis' brains being splattered on asphalt. It appears that only an act of killing of an American citizen in the process of making a show is "illegal". Otherwise the laws would get in the way of the Holy Wars of Morally Superior Ideological Purity and the like.
As others have already pointed out, that is not true.
Furthermore, all "child pornography" (whatever the definition) is "illegal". In some places that definition includes fantasies such as hand drawn cartoons and stories.
Also, while on the subject of "child pornography", what is it exactly? When does a subject cease to be a "child" and become an "adult"? Most countries use a self-contradictory, hypocritical and obviously (to any thinking person) bogus scheme: one day you are a feeble-minded minor who is to be protected from evils of tobacco, alcohol and sex and just about a millisecond later (at the stroke of a clock on your birthday) you are a full-fledged, strong-willed, responsible "adult" who can participate in a televised orgy while boozed out of his/her mind. Logical, no?
Not to mention that in many countries you are old enough to serve in the army, go slaughter other people, witness unspeakable horrors of war and be subjected to them... and yet you are not old enough to bang someone 5 years older then you. Say nothing of alcohol.
"Hypocrisy" is a word too weak for this nonsense, which most people accept without blinking or giving a second thought about it.
"Think of the children!" was always a rallying cry of every description of scoundrel and authoritarian since times immemorial.
In my view the problem of child abuse is far more complicated then this simplistic bureaucratic idiocy is trying to make it out to be and it revolves around a definition of consent and an ability to consent. But that is a whole other discussion. Pictures and other forms of information have very little to do with any of this, other then to serve as a focus of wrath of various power-hungry political charlatans and authoritarians (many of whom are secretly collecting the very pictures).
That's a pretty weak straw man you have there. No one is actually killed in those movies, but actual children are violated in child porn.
The strawman is all yours: the abhorrent act is the abuse, not the viewing, just like thr chain-saw murder would be, not the movie (or a TV report about it). So if the porn was "simulated" (via 3D computer graphics and what not) there would be no crime, right?
It is if you are hypocritical enough! Which is the case presently.
In some places (such as Canada) even complete fantasies, such as drawings and stories, are treated on par with the actual child molestation.
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A classic! I am sure you use the same line on anyone who disagrees with you on any of your other fascist agendas! "How dares he to stand in my way!?! Pervert! Child Molester! Drug Pusher! Pimp! Heretic! Heathen! Burn him on the stake!!!!!" - followed by incoherent braying, frothing at the mouth and running in circles with arms flailing.
If you two-bit fascist thugs think that you can intimidate me into silence with your inane insinuations, you've got another thing coming.
Which "fix" will of course render television coverage of war impossible and thus the whole idea that the Empire is back at colonial conquests somewhere will be conveniently muted and replaced with happy images of smiling soldiers handing candy out!
Note that they do not attempt to make the actual violence the UK itself and its upper rulling classes are perpetrating on others (including women and children) to disappear, nope. Only the images of it. And while at it to provide yet another club the nascent fascists will gladly use on the populace to keep them in line. Orwell would have been sooo proud!
Yes, that is why only "Big Corporate Geniuses Inc, Ltd." can make booze. It was so from the times immemorial, first note in recorded history from way back when Seagrams started to supply the Egyptian Empire, 3000BC or so .... eh wait ...
Yes, the "still busting" raids did not occur all over the country in the "War on Booze", neither did get the local denizens locked up and persecuted for being drunk, nooo sir! Since there was no booze anywhere but for the super-rich... right!
Man, you "War on X" appologists are quite amusing.
Err, you are kidding, right? You mean after you've got people forced to make their own booze and after they had the ample time to get good at it, then you restore commercial sales and lo and surprise! The sales are not the same as when every house did not have a fully operational still somewhere! Shock! Horror!
LOL. You've apparently missed the whole discussion about the inherent self-contradicitons and illogic of this hypocritical approach of making the pictures of sex acts "illegal" versus the actual child abuse and mass murder of chidren (all gleefully and "legally" filmed) and thus the inherent stupidity and self-contradictory nature of these very laws which prescribe so.
But thanks for playing anyway.
True, and possibly they would be expected to subject the owners to questioning as any other potential witness would be, in order to try to ascertain where and when the murder occured. But as any other long-distance witnesses of a murder these people would have been promptly released, never you mind prosecuted. If the evidence from their possesion was used to nab the actual maker, they might have been expected to testify in court as to the process of obtaining the movie. If they paid the author for the movie, they might be found to be accessories to the crime. But not in the reverse order as these insane "child protection" laws prescribe (which is really the result of them having nothing to do with children and everything to do with religious lunacies and Puritanical ideas about sex).
You did not ask for me to propose anything, you merely asserted that various forms of illogical bullshit are "good enough" because the majority of people seems to support them.
If I keep on saying that 2+2 does not equal 7, even though I havn't provided you with the correct result of the addition, it still does not change the truth of my statement.
Illogical premises can only result in illogical laws, whose only purpose is empowerment of some authoritarians of various stripes to get on with lording over the "little people". This is the pretty patently obvious fact that I keep pointing out.
As to a "solution", the first step would be to put some serious effort into determination of what constitutes "consent" and when it is valid (i.e. the person is able to give coherent one) and go from there. This addresses the core isue of "abuse" and also targets a variety of other inane laws which presently use bone-headed measurements as a replacement and does not restrict itself to the issue of sex.
This of course will never happen because at the core of these laws is in fact a puritanical hypocrisy about sex itself, and they stem from various Christianist religious dogmas involving anything sexual. The "Child Protectors" who scream and whine and moan about the "poor children" actually do not give fuck all about children but are mostly concerned with imposing their bigotted, delusional form of denial of their own sexuality on others, an activity which extends far beyond anything to do with children, although "child porn" is a very powerful and convenient club to bash others on the head with. Most would be opponents simply run away fearing being accused of pedophilia (as I already have been on this thread). That is how authoritarian thugs "win" these battles getting their fascist illogic rammed through. It is as simple as that.
See above. The reason that I know these people are not about protecting children is because they make no effort whatsoever in attempting resolve the central questions at the core of the issue and are instead opting for knee-jerk, feel-good but wholly irrational, hysterical "laws". And various authoritarians are only too happy to play along with this stupidity. These "Child Protectors" then are actually harming the children because in the long term the children will grow up robbed of their fundamental rights as adults, in order for these Protection Crusaders to never have try to ansewer any complicated questions.
Then you are being hypocritical and/or illogical (a surprise there). These kinds of court cases are the inevietable and direct consequence of the laws you insist on being "good enough". Judges have no choice but to either find the whole pile of shit invalid (and suffer the wrath of hysterical "Child Protectors") or to convict. It is no surprise they chose the latter. Even in the corrupt American "justice" systems the judges are not likely to start applying high-profile laws willy-nilly as you are apparently suggesting, not only having abandoned any pretense of logical foundations of these "laws" but now even all pretenses of inpartiality in their application!
In short: no.
The Western capitalist societies are in essence also a sham. A more successful, less obvious type of sham then the Soviet system used to be but a sham (and a scam) nonetheless.
Humanity has simply not yet evolved to the point where such a societal structure is possible. And so all sorts of kludges and cheap substitutes abound. None of them even close to what one could describe as "rewarding and secure" to educated people. At best you get a lottery roller-coaster where you get to be tossed about at the whims of business moguls, vast majority of whom never finished high school.
Frankly, in a Western capitalist society, when looked upon objectively, education, particularly a high-effort technical or scientific one is a truly lousy bet, with a truly horrid return on investment potential. A party-going slicker trying to befriend the right people on Wall Street seems to be a far, far, far better reward/risk/effort ratio. Never mind a talentless, mindless "entertainment" star. I could go on.
See above. It is not a surprise, the preconditions are not met.
This is not a result of bad education (although it does not help). It is a result of the way US society functions, a deep, structural set of gigantic flaws, running through the cultural core.
To wit: I know many engineers (supposedly educated people) who are truly Gung Ho for the whole PATRIOT Act/War On Terra bit and they applaud all of this, including fingerprint scans and so on. Wouldn't be appaled if anal probes were instituted at airports. They bought the whole "Terrists are out to get us from under every bed!" sales pitch hook line and sinker. As I said, so much for education.
That is because education is incapable of instilling the basic pre-requisite for a good society member: the critical thinking and societal awarness. That is why education in itself is doomed to failure, something far more comprehensive, starting at the early age and in every household is required.
Perheaps this is a difference of definitions, but I would call that "a societal spirit" or some such, but whatever it is it cannot be taught in school. It must come from the whole of ones life experiences and surroundings and from the way the society works.
Again, this is the result of the fact that American society is dominated by religious lunatics. Thus all education will be crippled by them to suit their agenda, by any and all means. In the past they confined themselves to quiet indoctrination in private schools until they amassed enough forces to stage a forceful takeover of the US societal apparatus. They could do that because the core elements of the society had become so wholly beholden to purely greed motivated interests that they lost their checks-and-balances functions which in the past limited and/or prevented such forays. I personally think the USA is doomed and due for a catastrofic economic collapse
The religious doctrines I speak of are also a "modern" concept. Religions have adapted their authoritarian ways with the times, or they have perished. I am sure that no "Christian" circa 2 AD would have even recognized any of the today's brands of "Christianity". Every one would have been nearly wholly alien to him. The adherents of the Old Testament would have been even more apalled (if you think children have it bad now, check out Leviticus and its instructions on selling one's daguthers into slavery).
As to a solution, the only point I can see here which could be examined for criminality is the issue of consent. This means that the effort should be on establishing a clear, testable and scientific guideline as to what constitutes valid consent, which would also help a myriad of other laws, not specific to children, and not specific to sex (such as making children into work slaves). It is where all of these Child Protection Crusaders should have focused their attentions, that is if they were really about "protecting children", which they are of course not.
LOL, no.
Education is, at best, only an element in this whole mess we call Humanity.
Less educated society with a better societal structure would soon evolve into a well-educated society with a better societal structure. A well-educated society with a lousy societal structure does not follow the same pattern.
Case in point: Russia. Soviet education system was well known to be superior (at least in sciences) at most levels, was wholly funded by the state and accessible to anyone. Education was really big with Lenin and then Stalin, others having followed in their footsteps. It was one of the core principles behind the Bolshevik Revolution, to grant the children of peasants and factory workers the access to education. Yet the USSR collapsed and the post-Soviet Russia underwent an economic and societal catastrophe, despite of a hugely disproportionate section of its society holding the equivalent of the Masters and PhD degrees and nearly everyone else having gone to some sort of college-like insititution (equivalents of which do not exist in the West). am sure you remember the pathetic handouts by the US to Russian nuclear scientists, so that they do not go work for some Emir or another. So much for education.
So my point is: in the grand scale of things education is not at the top of the priority list. Societal structure in which educated people find rewarding and secure employment, is. The rest will take care of itself.
That is what the Marxists figured. That the education will lead people to cooperative life style where all would be given according to their needs, where all would work to their best ability and the whole society would move with a common, not just democratic but concensus-driven purpose.
Maybe I missed it, but i've heard it did not quite work out that way ....
That is the result of attempting to make laws based on religious doctrines. Illogical, wacky, self-contradictory bullshit insues. Which is my whole point.
Come up with some sane criteria (after first having explained the evils of consensual sex past puberty) to measure who is and who is not a victim and then we will talk. But of course you cannot since most of this thing is pure demagougery-driven boloney, the main purpose of which is for some charlatans to obtain power and influence. Sell also under: War on Drugs.
Unless the teens are driven to it by hunger or their performance results in unwanted pregnancies, I am not quite sure where the problem is. You see all of this blabber about sex is really the hypocritical Western, Victorian attitudes re-asseting themselves (along with other insane ideologies which we thought long left buried, such as fascism). Explain to me, again, what is wrong with sex amongst willing and consenting individuals? What sort of damage will there be? Why?
Funny, they say the same thing about you! (and I am beginnging to worry they might be on to something)
Well then the problem is, as it was repeatedly explained, the part about consent! Not about sex or pictures or volcanoes! Make laws about consent and means of determination of its validity then, not about pictures! Its rather simple, no? This avoids all sorts of logical fallacies such as that case of a 16-year old rotting in jail for making pictures of himself and thus ending up being a registered sex predator of minors (he being his own "victim")!
There is gotta be some end to all of this hypocritical religious bullshit of yours! That is all that I am asking!
But then of course the Victorian hypocrites do not really give a flying fuck about children, but rather about their religious bigotries. If some "children"'s (by their own legal definition) lives get wrecked so be it! Its all for the greater cause of self-aggrandisment of egomaniacal "officials" and buildup totalitarian power!
No, it is not a "whole separate debate". It is an intrinsic part of this one: you cannot "deem" something to be "so" based upon some arbitrary, illogical criterion, and then refuse to debate the criterion itself because ... you "deemed" it so. Only truly inane, authoritarian, religious nonsense can even try to operate that way. This is like saying that "the society" (whomever that might be) "deemed" that ownership of black slaves is an all-right thing to do because they are not quite human and then refuse to discuss the supposed criterion used to decide their "inhumanity". "It so because we say it is so, and we say so because it is so!" - type of argument.
And I keep pointing out that just because you repeat the phrase "we deemed that something is so" it does not make it true. You do not even have a coherent definition of a "child" at hand for this purpose, never you mind being able to prove any of your assertions in regards to decision making at, say, the age of 16.
No, you merely keep using the phrase "child pornography", which as I pointed out repeatedly includes these days anything from actual videos of children to fantasies in someones' head. That is what "you deemed" it to be, as per the courts.
Ergo there is no way to produce logical laws. QED. My entire point.
If we permanently throw away logic in favour of some "gut feeling", emotional, sometimes clearly delusional, self-contradictory "system" of "laws", just because some demagouges are sucessful at whipping the masses into frothing hysteria about one thing or another, such a "society" is not worth continuing.
All of which is inherently illogical and arbitrary. Just as religious dogmas are. Again, my point. And no it is not "good enough", just like the various unassailable in their time religious dogmas of the past proved fleetingly not "good enough".
Dogmatic?! This entire discussion is in response to your Moral Purity Police already performing totalitarian activities of the sort the ole Soviet Union would be proud of, and in the process setting the "legal" stage for searches for other "suspicious" information in peoples laptops! Think Of The Children!!!
Really? Then, it logically follows that amongst the audiences of the "Chain Saw Massacre XVII" would be some who "might not be able to take care of themselves". And snap! Dismembered female bodies in shower stalls all over! No? Your own argument. Self-contradictory. Just as I said.
Logic bi
Skippig for the second the highly esoterical possibilities of actually "proving" verbal coertion (of he-said, she-said variety), in this case it would be the coertion+sex that might be harmful, not merely sex. I say "might" because it appears that there are perverts out there who actually like being coerced into sex. The world is a strange place.
Not to mention the fact that these "statistics" are patently bogus: they do not include the alcohol produced by every still in the woods, nor I imagine the Mafia was busy compiling sales figures and submitting them to the government. And these became the primary booze supply sources for the thirsty citizenry!
The thing is just laughable.
This would be really funny if it wasn't so pathetic: how in the world were these statistics compiled when alcohol sale was illegal and thus everyone involved had in their utmost best interest not to appear in the statistics!?
I am sure that every still in the hills was duly observed and its output acccounted for!
Not.
The modern version of this trully imbecilic self-justification being: "Hey the sale of Cocaine in the corner drug stores has dropped to near 0! Our War on Drugs must be working 100%!"
True, one can use coercion. But we gotta draw a line somewhere as it comes to one's responsibility for one's decisions, since if we accept an idea that we can be "coerced" or "pressured" into all and any thing, the whole idea of being responsible for one's actions disappears!
"No, your Honour, I did not really kill all those people at the mall, that gangster next door pressured me into it! Not my responsibility, its all his fault!" is only one step removed from "The voices in my head made me do it!"
That is what you assumed, i.e. that the dude in article was arrested for possesion of pictures of an actual physical act, that the person in the picture was a "child" (since at age of puberty a wee problem of determination of who is a "child" arises), and that the act was not consensual.
Oh really? And this is a defense of your argument?! That many "societies" are stupid enough, illogical enough, hypocritical enough to kill for sexual assault?! That they find death to be the lesser of two evils?! That they find exhibitions of death and killing in some religion-inspired slaughter to be something "educational" for children while seeing a female tit utterly horrid and abominable!
Also, since when do you lock up people for possessing evidence of a crime commited by others?!
Oh really? I was caught!? I paid?! LOL! This is how you authoritarian thugs operate: if someone opposes your march to a fascist utopia, he must himself be a child molester! Arrest him! Think Of The Children!!!!
You know, at this point the discussion pretty much ends, as there is no discussing logic with certifiable fascists.
Err, what are you on about? We are talking about the movies resulting form illegal acts themselves being illegal! A possesion of a movie, which in order to make some idiot burned a forest down is not (yet, thankfully) illegal. Yet posession of a wholly imaginary cartoon of a child molestation is, never you mind photographs or movies of actual molestation!
So you missed the point completely.
Also if the "society" finds some crimes so abhorrent, then perheaps it should figure out laws which actually make some sense, instead of essentially frothing at the mouth screaming "Think Of The Children!!! Get them all and let God sort the innocent out later!!!"
As I already explained repeatedly, I am pointing out what is illogical, hypocritical and self-contradictory. "Democracy" and how many people you can get to vote for something is wholly irrelevant to the discussion. History is full of instances where "the people" turned out to be a mob of a bone-headed idiots, a fact that "the people" only discovered long after the fact.
As to logic, if you consider what I say "silly" then by all means, show me: define in logical, objectively testable terms what is a "child" for the purpose of this discussion. Then define what is and what is not "porn".
When you are done with that, I have some more tests of logic for you. That is if you do not come back with a bag of religious dogma, hot air, and "everyone knows ..." and similar non-sequiturs.
Your dogmatic assumptions are showing, you should watch that!
You assumed that: 1) there is a "victim" i.e. the act was not consensual or not wholly fabricated via computer graphics, 2) that the "victim" considers that a violation of their dignity (which is a decision they must make and which might not come out to your liking, see also under "porn stars").
Then you assumed that the person (if any) in question is a "child". For bonus points: define "child" for the purpose of this discussion in some logical terms.
Since you've made more assumptions, I have never claimed that making children do hurtful to them things is all right, merely that the laws which some would-be "do gooders" try to create to forbid this activity are nonsensical, hypocritical and self-contradictory.
Your thoughts are the bricks of which totalitarian states are built. You find what some perverts fantasize about "icky" and "disguisting" and thus are willing to ignore rampant illlogic to see them punished for their "immoral ways". And in the process you enable far more serious crimes to be commited by those whom you empower to be your Moral Purity Police.
This directly contradicts your point above, in which you argued that pervert sickos cannot take care of themselves after watching their version of pornography.
And of course you do know better then everyone else what is good for children. Sex at age of 3: no good, granted. Sex at age of 14? 16? 18? 20? Who the hell but the "child" knows?
What about exposure to sexual images at the age of 7? What about exposure to images of violent death rained on some foreigners, at the age of 7 (and the dead foreigners at the same age) while your smiling your parents go "two thumbs up" while at dinner watching TV?
Clearly you, the self-appointed "Bearer of the Sword of Unerring Justice, Child Defender" do know better then I how this mind-boggling hypocrisy is supposed to work, so do tell!
As I already pointed out, not necessarily. "Child porn", by the current legal "definition", includes things such as 3D animations, hand drawn cartoons, Photoshopped photos etc. All of which is illegal.
Furthermore, by the time it reaches some random laptop after circling the bowels the Internet for years, the odds of it being useful in tracking down the source are slim at best. And since when do we lock up people who are merely in posession of an "evidence" of a crime, almost certainly commited by another person?
Also, define "underage" in some logical terms not involving a "child" becoming and "adult" in a less-then-millisecond interval at the midnight of one of his/her birthdays.
Insulting me will not change the fact that these "laws" (and those who make and defend them) are utterly hypocritical and illogical.
I defend logic. That is all that I am defending here.
But would you know, as soon as I do some Flaming Holy Crusader appears out of the mist to show me the error of my immoral ways. A shocking, I say Shocking, surprise!
Speaking of logic. If logic was being used in this, then complete fantasies, such as 3D simulations and what not would be legal, right? Only the actual molestation would be a crime, surely?
Not if the "Think Of The Children!", Flaming Holy Crusaders have anything to say about it!
Also, as to movies and TV programs, they themselves are not illegal, or else you did not watch the orgy of death that was CNN's coverage of the invasion of Iraq, complete with pictures of Iraqis' brains being splattered on asphalt. It appears that only an act of killing of an American citizen in the process of making a show is "illegal". Otherwise the laws would get in the way of the Holy Wars of Morally Superior Ideological Purity and the like.
As others have already pointed out, that is not true.
Furthermore, all "child pornography" (whatever the definition) is "illegal". In some places that definition includes fantasies such as hand drawn cartoons and stories.
Also, while on the subject of "child pornography", what is it exactly? When does a subject cease to be a "child" and become an "adult"? Most countries use a self-contradictory, hypocritical and obviously (to any thinking person) bogus scheme: one day you are a feeble-minded minor who is to be protected from evils of tobacco, alcohol and sex and just about a millisecond later (at the stroke of a clock on your birthday) you are a full-fledged, strong-willed, responsible "adult" who can participate in a televised orgy while boozed out of his/her mind. Logical, no?
Not to mention that in many countries you are old enough to serve in the army, go slaughter other people, witness unspeakable horrors of war and be subjected to them ... and yet you are not old enough to bang someone 5 years older then you. Say nothing of alcohol.
"Hypocrisy" is a word too weak for this nonsense, which most people accept without blinking or giving a second thought about it.
"Think of the children!" was always a rallying cry of every description of scoundrel and authoritarian since times immemorial.
In my view the problem of child abuse is far more complicated then this simplistic bureaucratic idiocy is trying to make it out to be and it revolves around a definition of consent and an ability to consent. But that is a whole other discussion. Pictures and other forms of information have very little to do with any of this, other then to serve as a focus of wrath of various power-hungry political charlatans and authoritarians (many of whom are secretly collecting the very pictures).
The strawman is all yours: the abhorrent act is the abuse, not the viewing, just like thr chain-saw murder would be, not the movie (or a TV report about it). So if the porn was "simulated" (via 3D computer graphics and what not) there would be no crime, right?
It is if you are hypocritical enough! Which is the case presently.
In some places (such as Canada) even complete fantasies, such as drawings and stories, are treated on par with the actual child molestation.