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Rick Falkvinge: Why free speech is harmed by the ban on child porn

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Re: Rick Falkvinge: Why free speech is harmed by the ban on child porn

#121

Post by MartinCron »

guard-of-terra wrote: post #98
objclxt wrote: post #95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is a really terrible argument. You say "if you find yourself pressing your "moral values" on somebody over, quit", but then impose your own moral values upon everyone else. I'm an atheist, but I also accept that religion isn't necessarily the cause of all moral problems, but merely a conduit through which they flow. Find me a Catholic who's against abortion and I'll find you an atheist who feels the same way. A…

The problem with Catholics lies not in the fact that they are against abortion, but in the fact that they are against somebody else's abortion. They somehow got the idea that instead of helping poor raise their children, talking to pregnant girls, all the good stuff - they can just take a big stick and make things illegal. As if it helps anybody. This is where we have a problem, as you can see. Mentoring people to no…

I am neither Catholic nor pro-life, but if you see abortion as murder (as many do) it makes sense to be morally outraged by anyone's murder, not just their own.

I don't even know you, but I am against the idea of anyone murdering you. See how that works?

Re: Rick Falkvinge: Why free speech is harmed by the ban on child porn

#122

Post by darklajid »

Klinky wrote: post #117
darklajid wrote: post #99

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Excuse me, I don't mean to accuse or judge. Why are you checking that database in the first place? In my world your access to this information is the reason for its right to exist in your social context. I doubt that it's possible to check these lists and criticize them at the same time. What lead you to check it out?

It is not strange for someone moving to an area to check out the sex offender registry here in the US, especially if someone has children. Anyone can check the registry out at anytime @ http://www.nsopw.gov as well as other websites. There are legitimately dangerous people on the sex offender registry. There are also people who are on there due to dubious reasons, e.g. being drunk and peeing in public or having sex w…

Okay, this 'not strange' is obviously something tied to local social norms and values, I guess.

I retract the implied contradiction between checking the list and complaining about the content. That said, it probably is impossible to understand the reasons for its existence or the need to check out a neighborhood like this without growing up in a culture like that.

Re: Rick Falkvinge: Why free speech is harmed by the ban on child porn

#123

Post by rprasad »

Falkvinge wrote: post #53
macchina wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's actually not a true strict liability offense, at least in the United States. For example, 18 USC § 2252A(a)(2)(A) criminalizes " knowingly receiv[ing] or distribut[ing] any child pornography." § 2252A(a)(5) requires " knowingly possess[ing], or knowingly access[ing] with intent to view, any book, magazine, periodical, film, videotape, computer disk, or any other material that contains an image of child pornograp…

Thank you for this additional information about specifics of the United States. The described case with accidentally recording and realizing you accidentally recorded still makes you culpable under the "knowingly", though. Cheers, Rick

No, it does not. You have to intend to film child pornography to satisfy the mens rea element. Filming something accidentally, by definition, will not satisfy mens rea.

Re: Rick Falkvinge: Why free speech is harmed by the ban on child porn

#124

Post by Klinky »

objclxt wrote: post #110
Falkvinge wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Thank you for this additional information about specifics of the United States. The described case with accidentally recording and realizing you accidentally recorded still makes you culpable under the "knowingly", though. Cheers, Rick

I have a real problem with your argument here - as I suspect many lawyers would. I'd go so far as to call your hypothetical example completely laughable. The idea that if I stumble across someone raping a child they would "point and laugh" is completely ridiculous. It's somewhat ironic that given one of the arguments for strict liability laws was "won't someone think of the children" you're basically making the same…

Most of Traci Lords' pornographic videos were produced when she was under the age of 18. It is unclear exactly how many people knew this or facilitated it. The company that produced her videos was prosecuted and practically all of her films have been banned in the US.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Traci_Lords#Porn_career

Re: Rick Falkvinge: Why free speech is harmed by the ban on child porn

#125

Post by [deleted] »

guard-of-terra wrote: post #85

The real problem is not the child porn. The real problem is "morals", "christianity" and "religion". Only by slaying these you can fix the problem in the long run. So: - If you happen to be religious, quit it right now please. - Press everybody to do that. - If you find yourself pressing your "moral values" on somebody over, quit. - Press everybody to do that. It's pointless anyway since gods aren't real. And your mo…

[deleted]

Re: Rick Falkvinge: Why free speech is harmed by the ban on child porn

#126

Post by mintplant »

Falling3 wrote: post #108
sophacles wrote: post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Shock video sites that feature murders, dismemberment and other forms of crime on video for voyeuristic pleasure are a pretty big business. Perhaps not as big as child pornography woud be/is, but big enough that your distinction is a bit questionable. Further, videos of people getting murdered raise enough of an outcry that they get investigated/prosecuted much harder. Instances of child molestation are hidden, so th…

I almost commented about this... but then I realize I had no evidence whatsoever for any of those claims. Do you? http://www.snopes.com/horrors/madmen/snuff.asp

> All the fretting about it aside, not so much as one snuff film has been found.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Luka_Magnotta

Re: Rick Falkvinge: Why free speech is harmed by the ban on child porn

#127

Post by bentoner »

birdcircle wrote: post #74
drcube wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In this case both destroying the evidence and possessing the evidence are crimes. What are you supposed to do?

I challenge anyone to find actual foundation for the claim that unwittingly recording a child rape in the park is a crime even if the witness reports it and provides the video evidence. Seems to me that this is the "slippery slope" argument taken to unreasonable extremes.

Here's a description of a similar case that discusses the catch-22 that the witness is in: http://books.google.com.au/books?id=2xkDvMQlh-YC&pg=PA23...

Re: Rick Falkvinge: Why free speech is harmed by the ban on child porn

#128

Post by lotharbot »

drcube wrote: post #63
birdcircle wrote: post #55

"So imagine a scenario ten years down the road, as you’re taking a stroll in the park." .... "WHAM. You are now a criminal, guilty of recording, distributing, and possessing child pornography." I find this highly implausible. Hypotheticals like this damage the argument. Crimes are caught on camera everyday. Seems to me the crime here (aside form the rape) is to knowingly destroy evidence of the crime, which the innoc…

In this case both destroying the evidence and possessing the evidence are crimes. What are you supposed to do?

possessing the evidence is a crime, unless you can make an "affirmative defense" (I've commented about it elsewhere on this page.)

One form of "affirmative defense" is "contact law enforcement and turn over the recording". This is what you are supposed to do (standard disclaimer: I am not a lawyer, this is not legal advice.)

Re: Rick Falkvinge: Why free speech is harmed by the ban on child porn

#129

Post by rprasad »

jwatte wrote: post #115
Cushman wrote: post #12

Presented as a reductio at the end of the article: It’s not illegal to film a murder. It’s not illegal to possess a film of a murder. But one has to wonder: What if it were? What if YouTube had a button for "Report Illegal" that forwarded the video to law enforcement, hid it, and cleared it from your cache? What if people who watched video evidence of a crime and didn't report it to the authorities were treated as ju…

Most movies in history would be illegal, because most of them depict murders. Note that it being an /actual/ murder or abused child is not a requirement.

There is a difference between an actual murder and a depiction of a murder. In the former, someone actually dies. In the latter, an actor falls over.

The actual crime is very much an element to the illegality of a snuff film. Snuff films are illegal precisely because someone actually dies. Child porn is illegal because a kid actually gets raped.

There are a few rare situations involving "fake" child porn. Should these be illegal? The Supreme Court has said that virtual child pornography might not be illegal but that either way such content was justification for holding a person in a mental institution as a danger to others. There is an extremely high (as in, greater than 80%) correlation between willing viewership of child pornography and attempts to abuse/molest/rape a child or acquire actual chil porn. With pedophiles, child porn isn't just an abstract media form like a TV show; it's like going to a Ku Klux Klan rally with a snuff film showing a black man get lynched and exhorting the crowd to do the same.

Re: Rick Falkvinge: Why free speech is harmed by the ban on child porn

#130

Post by guard-of-terra »

MartinCron wrote: post #121
guard-of-terra wrote: post #98

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The problem with Catholics lies not in the fact that they are against abortion, but in the fact that they are against somebody else's abortion. They somehow got the idea that instead of helping poor raise their children, talking to pregnant girls, all the good stuff - they can just take a big stick and make things illegal. As if it helps anybody. This is where we have a problem, as you can see. Mentoring people to no…

I am neither Catholic nor pro-life, but if you see abortion as murder (as many do) it makes sense to be morally outraged by anyone's murder, not just their own. I don't even know you, but I am against the idea of anyone murdering you. See how that works?

Okay, but if you, specifically outlaw murdering me, this will surely draw attention at my person and might harm me.

You might be outraged, but you should only be confined to measures that 1) are proven to work, and 2) can be enforced consistently.

It looks like a law against abortion does not usually work: abortion is illegal in africa but they do much more abortions per one person than in europe where it is generally okay. So if you really care you should take good parts from what europe is doing and work on that. But if you are religious, you take pride in acting irrationally but faithfully, and you will jail people up, spread unsafe illegal abortions and hurt the bottom line (no of abortions per person in your country). You know, Jesus died so you can do all of that and still feel saved.

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