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Court OKs child porn prosecution of minors distributing pictures of themselves

washingtonpost.com

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Re: Court OKs child porn prosecution of minors distributing pictures of themselves

#71

Post by stevenwoo »

StavrosK wrote: post #60
jfaucett wrote: post #7

What is the rationale behind defining child porn age The first case is something that actually happened to a friend of mine. He was 23 and dating a 17 year old, got convicted, sent to prison, and is now labeled a sex offender for life. Are there any countries out there that take a sane approach to this moral conundrum?

> He was 23 and dating a 17 year old, got convicted, sent to prison, and is now labeled a sex offender for life. What third-world country would send someone to prison for dating a 17 year old? I doubt even Iran or some other theocracy would do that. Where was this?

Dating as practiced in the Western world is illegal in Iran as far as internet searching shows me. One has to be married to have sex legally.

https://news.vice.com/article/irans-government-is-worried-th...

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2008/dec/29/iran-gender

Re: Court OKs child porn prosecution of minors distributing pictures of themselves

#72

Post by jliptzin »

mediocrejoker wrote: post #56
bsder wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So, child porn is legal as long as both parties are involved? That doesn't work either. All you will wind up doing is having people magically always have only two people involved. And "teen sexting" isn't even uniform: a 10-year-old sexting a 16-year-old is generally a problem while a 17-year-old sexting an 18-year-old likely isn't. Your opponents in kiddie porn are two different sets of people: 1) the egregiously st…

Which is better, to have a few horrifically competent go free or have a few innocent teenagers on the sex offender registry?

To have a few horrifically competent go free.

Re: Court OKs child porn prosecution of minors distributing pictures of themselves

#73

Post by glogla »

StavrosK wrote: post #60
jfaucett wrote: post #7

What is the rationale behind defining child porn age The first case is something that actually happened to a friend of mine. He was 23 and dating a 17 year old, got convicted, sent to prison, and is now labeled a sex offender for life. Are there any countries out there that take a sane approach to this moral conundrum?

> He was 23 and dating a 17 year old, got convicted, sent to prison, and is now labeled a sex offender for life. What third-world country would send someone to prison for dating a 17 year old? I doubt even Iran or some other theocracy would do that. Where was this?

You already know the answer - only US has something as barbaric as "sex offender registry".

Re: Court OKs child porn prosecution of minors distributing pictures of themselves

#74

Post by bsder »

mediocrejoker wrote: post #56
bsder wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So, child porn is legal as long as both parties are involved? That doesn't work either. All you will wind up doing is having people magically always have only two people involved. And "teen sexting" isn't even uniform: a 10-year-old sexting a 16-year-old is generally a problem while a 17-year-old sexting an 18-year-old likely isn't. Your opponents in kiddie porn are two different sets of people: 1) the egregiously st…

Which is better, to have a few horrifically competent go free or have a few innocent teenagers on the sex offender registry?

That's a really interesting question.

I'm always on the side of "convicting innocents is wrong" because I consider it a pure civil liberty issue subject to abuse.

However, you are going to have to defend against people doing a "damage amount" calculation. The malicious individuals are so vile and cause so much damage and exploitation while teenage sexting cases are generally sufficiently rare that the calculus probably doesn't come up in your favor.

In addition, I have see firsthand from a bystander position that prosecutors are generally pretty good about teen sexting. I watched as a prosecutor patiently explained to an idiot mother that if he managed to convict the boy in the sexting case, he was also paving the way to convict her daughter of exactly the same thing. So, she could go along, and both of the involved parties would get some relatively innocuous conviction that would go away for both when they became 18, or she could make a big fuss and both of them would be sex offender registrees (the DA was clearly going to uncover evidence of statutory rape along the way--the boy and girl were obviously having sex with each other).

The DA really didn't want the case to go very far. Of course, the DA involved didn't have to bow to religious nutcases to get elected.

The relatives of the mother finally browbeat her into submission, but it was unclear which way it was going to go for quite a while and it could have gone very badly for all parties involved.

Re: Court OKs child porn prosecution of minors distributing pictures of themselves

#75

Post by phkahler »

mjevans wrote: post #57
dcow wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> There's a quote about doing the same thing and expecting different results... It's the definition of insanity. The abortion topic is interesting because we're talking about how we socially define a human life in a realm where science can't help at all (or at least has failed to give a concrete answer thus far). If it was an accepted truth that human life begins at conception, then abortion is murder. Even our laws…

It'd be so much easier if as a society we agreed that everyone should have healthcare, and that reproduction should be a choice positively made, instead of the default consequence of sex.

>> reproduction should be a choice positively made, instead of the default consequence of sex.

Wait what? Reproduction is the default consequence of sex. That's basic biological fact. You can't legislate that away.

Re: Court OKs child porn prosecution of minors distributing pictures of themselves

#76

Post by kakarot »

ikeboy wrote: post #46
kakarot wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Came into this thread kinda pissed, but after reading more about the case... it's wrong to send unsolicited nudes of yourself to someone no matter how old you are. The kid should definitely receive some kind of reprimanding. Jail? I don't think institutionalizing someone's mind over something like this is healthy... maybe just counseling? And that being said, one must imagine how differently the case might have been…

What they did was wrong, but it shouldn't be prosecuted under child porn laws. They should get whatever punishment they'd get if they did the same at 18, under whatever harassment laws apply.

I think on one hand you are correct, but if the court wants to claim that a child is not old enough to consensually produce pornographic imagery of themselves, they must also admit that a child who takes and sends the images to another has not fully developed their reasoning skills.

Same reason that minors usually get a break from the law when committing vandalism, assault, etc.

So they should not get the same exact punishment, which is why I suggested counseling because unnecessary institutionalization of children is a predatory method of creating repeat offenders.

Re: Court OKs child porn prosecution of minors distributing pictures of themselves

#77

Post by kakarot »

thaumasiotes wrote: post #65
kakarot wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Came into this thread kinda pissed, but after reading more about the case... it's wrong to send unsolicited nudes of yourself to someone no matter how old you are. The kid should definitely receive some kind of reprimanding. Jail? I don't think institutionalizing someone's mind over something like this is healthy... maybe just counseling? And that being said, one must imagine how differently the case might have been…

Girls get prosecuted for producing "child" pornography of themselves too.

Well what I mean is, I just wonder at the likelihood of the situation being reported in the first place, as well as whether the sentencing would be the same. This isn't any attempt at making a point but just general curiosity.

It's like that episode of Seinfeld where they learn a sex offender moved into the neighborhood and went to confront the person, then found out it was a woman and immediately (and somehow understandably) lost their vitriol.

Re: Court OKs child porn prosecution of minors distributing pictures of themselves

#78

Post by etplayer »

astura wrote: post #31
cperciva wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Never mind adults pretending to be children. In some jurisdictions, child pornography includes cartoons . In one case, Simpsons fanfic.

But TFA says otherwise >In Free Speech Coalition, the Supreme Court struck down a law that banned sexually explicit depictions of minors, as well as depictions that appeared to be minors. These included computer generated images and depictions of legal adults pretending to be minors. The Court recognized that the First Amendment “does not embrace certain categories of speech, including … pornography produced with rea…

It was stricken down at the federal level. I believe that laws still exist against it at the state level. Their validity, to my knowledge, has not been questioned as of yet.

However there are such laws which remain, and in fact have been recently introduced, in Canada, England & Wales, Northern Ireland, Rep. of Ireland, New Zealand, Australia, and various European countries.

What's perhaps even more concerning is that even stories are illegal in Canada. The mere possession of the material, i.e a drawing that you made yourself is illegal in England. Publishing a story or even sexual roleplaying with another adult over the Internet might find you sentenced under the Obscene Publications Act.

It's hideous in my view and such laws deserve to be stricken down with ferocity.

Re: Court OKs child porn prosecution of minors distributing pictures of themselves

#79

Post by rhcom2 »

glogla wrote: post #73
StavrosK wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> He was 23 and dating a 17 year old, got convicted, sent to prison, and is now labeled a sex offender for life. What third-world country would send someone to prison for dating a 17 year old? I doubt even Iran or some other theocracy would do that. Where was this?

You already know the answer - only US has something as barbaric as "sex offender registry".

That isn't true.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sex_offender_registry#Sex_offe...

Re: Court OKs child porn prosecution of minors distributing pictures of themselves

#80

Post by trhway »

dcow wrote: post #54
thanksgiving wrote: post #44

I'll be the bad guy here and say that these laws should all just go away. It is just too convenient to plant "evidence" be it alcohol, drugs, or this. The idea that minors cannot consent is correct. Children are not a scaled small version of adults. They need to develop not just grow physically and children are vulnerable. We need to protect vulnerable members of our society. However, like with so many things in life…

> There's a quote about doing the same thing and expecting different results... It's the definition of insanity. The abortion topic is interesting because we're talking about how we socially define a human life in a realm where science can't help at all (or at least has failed to give a concrete answer thus far). If it was an accepted truth that human life begins at conception, then abortion is murder. Even our laws…

Science didn't fail and actually helps a lot here. We know the brain development level of fetus at different stages. As a society we're generally ok with killing fish, reptiles and most of the society is ok with killing mammals. That places abortion cut-off anywhere between 3 and 6 months for the current state of the society moral development. And that is what most of the states have when they aren't dominated by anti-science organizations, ie when it isn't the situation of Catholic Church and Ireland for example.

Basically it boils down to what intelligence level we're ok to kill. Those pro-lifers chewing that juicy steak can't be more oxymoronic and hypocritical.

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