board77

I've been wrestling with this for a while. The technology will soon exist, indeed exists in a limited way already, to create child pornography with non-existant virtual kids.

Is this ethically or morally the same as more traditional kiddie porn? Does the evil lie in the creation or the intent? And if the latter, how is prosecuting it different from prosecuting a thought crime?




I have a strong visceral reaction that it shouldn't matter, but an equally strong one that if no kids are involved, none are harmed. There is an argument that using the stuff makes one more likely to commit physical acts of abuse, but that's a very, very insidious path to tread, since the causality is probably more parallel than linear, and because it would be an unfortunate precedent. What if one "proves" that people who do legal activity X are more likely to do illegal activity Y later?

It's a tangled issue in my mind, and that itself makes me twitch. Thoughts?

The very idea repulses me, but if it means that "real" child pornography ceases to exist... then I'd (reluctantly) welcome it.

That's something I hadn't thought of. More layers....

Maybe Virtual Child Pornography would only make "the real thing" sort of... more exclusive?

It's a difficult issue. But if people get "inspired" to sexually abuse children because of child porn, virtual or not, it's a bad thing in all forms, I think.

That's the crux. Let's say there's a clear connection, statistically speaking, such that a user of virtual child porn is 30%, or 70%, or 100% more likely to abuse a child.

There is probably just as much evidence that drinking makes one significantly more likely to abuse a child. Do we then ban drinking? No, because the link is not causal, but only contributory. Drinking makes it more likely that someone predisposed to do something wrong will actually do it, since it lowers inhibitions. The predisposition has to be there already.

But we can't convict people of having a predisposition. That's thought crime land. We can only prosecute and convict for someone _doing_ something that's actually harmful.

I don't think that we, as humans, can devote our attention to something without it becoming incorporated into our character. It is indeed a slippery slope to say that TV violence and virtual porn lead to the real thing, and yet we know that in every important sense this is true.

I also think that the 'legislate and enforce it into hell' approach has never worked and will never work, and that a society which beats its head against that wall as long as we have trying to work the unworkable deserves every failure it experiences.

Pedophilia is deviant. Unlike homosexuality, which is the dominant form of sexual behavior in all mammalian species, pedophilia occurs only among humans, and the maladaptiveness of this behavior should be obvious to everyone. A species that fucks its own children will not long endure.

We have to go right to the source and have a social consensus to remove children from homes in which abuse is happening and/or tolerated. Everyone thinks that we do that now, but we don't. We bend over backwards to honor property law - children as property of their parents - and care not one whit for the emotional and physical wellbeing of our children. I've seen this dynamic up close and personal and I can tell you that in the US at least there is a grand conspiracy of silence where pedophilia is concerned ... schools do not keep written records so that they won't have to testify in court; doctors and paramedics fail to report so that they won't have to testify in court; psychologists and social workers simply refuse to be hired for court-ordered evaluations, and court cases drag on for years and years and years while the pedophile fucks away and clogs up the system with legal motions.

Here's a charming statistic for you. In divorce cases, only 30% of fathers actually request custody of their children. In those cases where fathers request custody, 70% of the time they get in on the basis of superior income. Of those, 70% have already been convicted of sexually abusing their children. This is from a 1980s study done by sociologist Phyllis Chesler based on some 10,000 custody hearings that she and her assistants researched.

I view child porn, and virtual porn, and all the violence and negativity - not just on entertainment TV but also on the news - I view all of this as the basest corrupt pandering to a society run amok, a people collapsing from social exhaustion, a climate of feeling that the problems are just so large and so impersonal that we cannot bear to deal with them anymore. Pawn the problems off on the police, on an overworked and corrupt court system; scapegoat school principals if the media shows up; when that child next door runs to your house for protection, turn out all your lights and pretend you're not at home. That's who we have become.

In Nicaragua, there were two cases of pedophilia that reached the news during the time I was working there. One was a guy out in some rural community, and the very occurrence of something like that was so extraordinary that it was front page news all over the country. The other concerned former president Daniel Ortega and led to the collapse of his political party. No White Owl cigars down there - nope. So far he has escaped prosecution, but eventually someone will shoot him for it. And frankly, he deserve it.

To answer your question, Ax ... I think that child pornography of any sort should be (1) illegal, but far more importantly it should be (2) appalling. If we know someone who is sexually abusing their child (and if you know five children, then you know one who is being sexually abused) we have to say to that parent - "I know what you are doing, and you disgust me, and I will not speak to you or let me children visit your house, and I will tell everyone I know what you are doing."

That's worth one hundred times more than a court case with sealed records that gets concluded finally when the kid is eighteen and can bring charges on their own.

Jn

I think this could be very dangerous on a large scale. I sound overly dramatic when I say it would degrade society, but it's the logical conclusion.

Certain behaviours which are harmful, like abusing children, violence, abuse of substances, theft & all the things that our society eventually outlaws need to be kept at the border of what we consider 'okay'. That's why they're outlawed-it's not someone's whim, it's the majority, shall I say the human race itself which recognises them as harmful, and strives to move away from them. Like certain obvious poisons have a repulsive taste, so certain actions must be repulsive to society in order for it to evolve healthily.

The argument that virtual child pornography, virtual violence, virtual murder can stop people from commiting these things in real life is heavy. But while they stop individual acts they promote the ideas as acceptable to the whole of the human race. It's just a matter of taking them a notch higher, and time can do that. We all know the world was a LOT tamer 50 years ago.

I too indulge in virtual violence in computer games. It is harmless at this level-it can't be confused with reality....but soon we may have games where you can torture people and it feels real. And that will start being dangerous.

DAMN YOU JNYUSA!!!!! For once I thought I was posting something smart and innovative and there you go making a bigger, better point of it...and snuck in under me too.

I would say it already is, Rodia. Have you seen what you can do to people in some of these games?

jny--

Here's one that just occured to me...if no child was actually involved in any production of a piece of virtual child porn, how does one legally demonstrate that it is child porn? An 18 year old and a 17 year old are often, even usually, not notably different visually...but if they are real, you have something to measure the legality of the activity by. If they aren't, what is there? What is the difference between a virtual rendering of a short, flat-chested 18 year old and a 14 year old? One could use proportions to determine if prepubescent kids were being depicted, but adolescents...I don't see any way to enforce it.

Okay so I play old games. :p

Okay...not true. I play new games.

I just...sound like a real hypocrite when I talk about the degradation of society and yet have fun with the cause of it.

I guess I am a hypocrite. Level 27 Archmage hypocrite.

" We all know the world was a LOT tamer 50 years ago. "

We know nothing of the kind. The 20th century was the bloodiest, most violent century in the history of human kind. More men, women and children were killed, maimed, or harmed in some way in the 20th century than ever before. EVER.

What does this have to do with Pedophilia? Just this: it has always existed. It is NOT a modern aberration. The modern aberration is to speak up and try to stop it. In earlier decades and centuries it was kept secret, silent, covered up, avoided, denied: and accepted and perpetrated by enormous numbers of (mostly) men. Sadly, it still is.

Without the active involvement and collusion of powerful men, it could not go on to the extent that it does. Judges, police officers, school teachers, priests and ministers and rabbis and imans, state governors, mayors, prison guards, reform school supervisors: there is no office that has not been occupied by pedophiles.

Violence is violence, whether it is the sexual abuse of children or the murder of children in war or the genocides and atrocities of the past.

To imagine that there was some era in our past when children were "safe" is to put on dangerously thick blinders. Most children are abused by their own parents, whether that abuse is "only" violence or if it is sexual abuse. If not their parents, then a close relative or friend of the family. Or a school teacher or Sunday school teacher. Where do you think kids meet the people who are going to hurt them?

This myth of the nasty pervert stranger is just that: a myth. Yes, there are vile strangers who prey on kids. But kids are in far, far, far more danger in their own homes than on the streets.

As for the subject at hand, I can't decide. If it is "virtual" then it is out of our hands. We have no right to interfere.

But is it harmless? I don't know.

There is a pretty famous case in BC of a man who writes violent fantasies about sexually abusing kids, and his defense is that it is all imaginary, so how can he be charged with any crime?

I don't know. It's a tricky issue.

And that's exactly why I never went to Manwe. I can't argue my point.



Let me try and rephrase that.

50 years ago people were had different habits than today. Stuff became more a...ah screw it.

I just can't.

Sorry. Nothing personal. I just don't know how to say what I mean.

It's always been and will continue to be around. Technology just kinda caught up to it. Is that good or bad?

Damn grey areas. I don't really think I contributed to this thread, but you've got a good discussion going here.

There is a case being trialled here at the moment that involves a whole community.

'Pitcairn Islands" where the abuse (child/sex/incest) has gone on for generations and a proportion of the islands population is now facing charges. The idea that their behaviour was acceptable is so ingrained that they have for the most part 'all ' fought the Justice system. All to the extent where some of the women on the island have defended their men.

http://www.theage.com.au/articles/2004/ ... click=true

This is what comes of acceptabilty of immoral behaviour being achieved over time.

to answer your question: Virtual Child Pornography should not be allowed.
will try to come up with some thoughts to support this later.

PoohBear tells me its ''not Politically Correct '
If a series of books (Noddy) can be banned because of the ideas they may introduce to our children's minds, then this is another case where the ideas are planted and from small seeds behaviours become formed.

Rodia: DAMN YOU JNYUSA!!!!! For once I thought I was posting something smart and innovative and there you go making a bigger, better point of it...and snuck in under me too



It wasn't a bigger and better point, it was just different point. (But I did sneak in under you, hee-hee)

This is the one social problem I would be willing to devote the rest of my life to fixing, it is so abominable. The entire domestic court system has to be eliminated in the United States. It was designed to decriminalize domestic issues and unclog the court system from endless domestic disputes but in practice all it has served to do is bereave children of the civil and human rights.

Ax: The fact that virtual pornography cannot be prosecuted because no actual minor is involved is the best argument for why social problems can only be handled by a change in social attitude. It's like trying to legislate equality - you can eliminate the 'whites only' water fountain with legislation but you can't eliminate the glass ceilings. Legislation can't launch social change but only a whole society working towards that end can accomplish it.

In a way it's like traffic laws ... .... if drivers decided en masse that they were not going to stop at red lights, you would need one cop tailing every driver all the time. The system only works because the majority of people agree that it makes sense and comply voluntarily.

Vison: The 20th century was the bloodiest, most violent century in the history of human kind. More men, women and children were killed, maimed, or harmed in some way in the 20th century than ever before. EVER.

This is an interesting consideration, Vison, and sort of goes to the question of what is human nature. No argument that the 20th century was inhumane, but Rodia has a point that certain social mores have changes visibly in the past 50 years, and certainly sexual behavior is one of them.

One of the things I'm fond of pointing to is the Ten Commandments. They compel us to respect our parents, but not our children. That tells me that abuse of the elderly - probably leaving them to die in the desert when they were beyond contributing - was a more serious problem that child abuse. And that quite makes sense in a society where children began working very young and were expected to support their parents in old age. The parent was more likely to value the child than the reverse.

Today, I think - at least in terms of the political consensus within the United States - the reverse is true.

Tigg: This is what comes of acceptabilty of immoral behaviour being achieved over time.

Yes, 'acceptability' is the key, I think. We find things acceptable today that would not have been acceptable to our parents and grandparents if they knew it was going on.

Jn

(OOC Tigg...Noddy was banned? What? How? WHY???)

TIGG wrote:

If a series of books (Noddy) can be banned because of the ideas they may introduce to our children's minds, then this is another case where the ideas are planted and from small seeds behaviours become formed.

Books should never be banned. Period. End of story. The problem with labelling any idea as being so objectionable as to make it illegal is that it sets the precedent, and then other people's ideas of objectionable become illegal too, and soon you have empty shelves and bonfires.

The Piticairn thing is very strange, but you can see how it came to be. Isolated human populations do odd and sometimes disturbing things, and they do get all defensive when it's pointed out that what they're doing is not acceptable.

Jnyusa wrote:

Ax: The fact that virtual pornography cannot be prosecuted because no actual minor is involved is the best argument for why social problems can only be handled by a change in social attitude. It's like trying to legislate equality - you can eliminate the 'whites only' water fountain with legislation but you can't eliminate the glass ceilings. Legislation can't launch social change but only a whole society working towards that end can accomplish it.

In a way it's like traffic laws ... .... if drivers decided en masse that they were not going to stop at red lights, you would need one cop tailing every driver all the time. The system only works because the majority of people agree that it makes sense and comply voluntarily.

Jn

An excellent analogy, up to a point. There is no twist in brain chemistry that causes people to run red lights. Pedophiles, on the other hand, seem to have a physiological problem that we can't fix right now...the recidivism rate for them approaches 100% over time.

I would like to make some distinctions in the discussion...in Manwe we had a related thread where a distinction was made between pedophilia, that is, sexual attraction to prepubescent children, and pheobephilia, that is, sexual attraction to underage adolescents. The former is a clear biological issue, while the latter is a cultural construct (look at the wide range in ages of consent across a single country like the US if you don't believe me). This isn't to say that the latter isn't a valid problem: few things are more powerful than a culture's ideas of right and wrong, perhaps especially when they are not shared with other cultures.

Noddy books were banned in schools and I think from Libraries, Bookstores, until they were 'changed'.

no more BAD Golliwogs: that leads to children seeing people of colored skin as criminals.

no more Noddy and Big Ears sleeping together: Children will become Homosexual.

But this is a seperate issue really. I can see where PB is coming from though in using it as a way of trying to express why this is not so much a 'thought crime' as it is a 'conditioning of the human psyche'. - he said it in a slightly facestious way (Pooh Facetious I hear you say! ...he is ..where else did I learn from but at the feet of the master , BUT I digress.) But what he was in effect saying is they set these precedents in some area's., so surely this can be transferred into being used in a situation like this. (Although I doubt you can be jailed for looking at old Noddy books :mrgreen: ).

the ramblings of a tigger wiht not enough online time to formuilate her thoughts coherently

I have been thinking about this issue since November, when a US Attorney prosecuting Internet viewers of child pornography came to speak to one of my classes and mentioned this very issue. Thus, I do not feel conflicted in the least. Here are my thoughts.

(1) Child pornography, whether virtual or real, is reprehensible in the subject matter it portrays. There may be some questions at the line (e.g. is it REALLY reprehensible to fantasize about a 17 1/2 year old but not an 18 year old?) - but, for the most part, I think we can all agree on, say, a 13 year old. Here is the bottom line for me: there is some age below which a child does not have the capacity to consent to sexual intercourse - does not have the knowledge, the wisdom, the developmental growth, the sense of consequences, etc - that we deem necessary for someone to have before deciding to have sex. And to fantasize about having sex with a child incapable of consenting is unacceptable in our societal view.

(2) Many people have reprehensible thoughts. Point of fact, I can guarantee you that most of us have even had some. We don't punish people for those. We don't punish people for writing them. We don't punish people for talking about them. We don't punish people for reading about them. You may not want people to have reprehensible thoughts, but guess what? You don't get to dictate that. This is the United States of America, and we pride ourselves on free thought - and on respecting others' rights to free thought, no matter how nauseating we may find those thoughts (and trust me, I find child pornography so revolting that I can scarcely allow myself to think what it must be depicting). Sorry for that nation-centric thought - but I hope I am speaking for most free nations here.

(3) The reason that child pornography is worthy of punishment is that it exploits children who cannot possibly consent to being used for such...productions. It harms and injures them, certainly emotionally and perhaps physically as well.

(4) Thus, to punish "virtual" child pornography is not to punish the exploitation of any individuals under the age of consent. It is to punish people for the thought, the idea of having sex with others who cannot consent. This is impermissible. In my view, it is a violation of First Amendment rights (well, depending on which side of the obscenity line it falls under, which would vary depending on the specific nature of the work). Think about it. What thoughts, what ideas, do you want to punish people for promulgating? I do not know how many countless men and women are stimulated by the thought of dominance and submission scenarios (all versions, M/M, M/F, F/M, F/F). Others find these horrendously offensive, particularly the very common M/F, which some allege lead to higher incidences of rape/sexual assault, which are also illegal. Shall we ban those depictions and punish the people who produce or enjoy them? What of the people who advocate sheer violence of one form or another, which also leads to greater violence. What next? Does it matter if we write it in a nice book vs. if we make a movie?

(5) Once we start to censor ideas based on their potential harm, we are driving down a very dangerous road fullspeed ahead. Not sliding down a slope, but driving with the accelerator jammed to the floor. Let's protect the children, but let's not move to suppress only those ideas we find nauseating. Who knows what the next people in charge will find nauseating and threatening to the well-being of someone?

For some reason, I feel tempted to make a vineyard analogy, but I'll cease and desist.

- TP