Child Pornography

[athoughtfulman]

Yes, you read correctly. My apologies if this is against the rules, though I don't think it is. I was on the WikiLeaks site and came across a long article written by a guy who used to be involved with the child porn industry.

http://www.wikileaks.com/wiki/My_life_in_child_porn

I haven't read it thoroughly but there were some interesting points.

- There is no universal agreement as to what age a child becomes an adult. In some countries it is 18, in others 16, and in others such as Germany, a child becomes a 'minor adult' (or something like that), and then a proper adult at 18. If there is no universal agreement on the age a child becomes an adult, then how can we have a universal agreement on what exactly constitutes as child porn?
- The majority of the child porn that you hear about in the media where a child is abused/raped/etc is caused by family members, not commercial sites. Not sure why this is, but I think he goes into greater detail in the article. In contrast, the commercial sites portray girls enjoying what they are doing, namely, exploring their sexuality which is an entirely natural thing.
- As for the commercial websites where child porn is hosted, there is no way to trace them. They are extremely smart in the way they set it up, and it is virtually impossible for them to be prosecuted. However there was one magazine in the Netherlands (I think, one of those countries at least) where the legal age was 16. They had nude 17 year olds in the magazine and transferred the magazine to the internet. However, though it was legal in the Netherlands, it was not in the United States, which then caused the US to put pressure on the Dutch Government to prosecute those involved with the site. However, isn't this interfering in matters outside it's jurisdiction, authority and culture?


Another thing it brought up (which is why I thought to post this here) is what this guy said about the child protection agencies. While they claim their mission is to protect children from child porn and abuse, they are in fact overstepping their boundary by pushing their religious agenda. For example if you read the news, you may have head a mention about 'sexting'. Basically sexting is teenagers sending pictures of themselves naked to each other. While some may think this is inappropriate before they are an adult, wouldn't you agree that part of growing up is exploring one's sexuality, rather than suppressing it all until you hit 16 or 18?

Here's an excerpt regarding that the child protection/religious agenda issue:

Child protection has become a real industry. There are numerous organizations dedicated to the protection of the child - their administration, programs and staff must be funded - which means many job opportunities. I am particularly worried about the relationships between large and politically important global organizations such as the National Center for Missing & Exploited Kids and fundamentalist-totalitarian-oriented religious groups. If you visit their website (http://www.missingkids.com) there is a CYBERTIPLINE. There is an opportunity to select a REPORTING CATEGORY. Under "Unsolicited Obscene Material Sent to a Child", there is a link to http://www.obscenitycrimes.org. This organization is, in turn, operated by Morality in Media, Inc. and is an essential partner of the Center. I quote here a few of the interesting arguments that this organization wants to spread and enforce (below, I have collected arguments from various pages in http://www.obscenitycrimes.org):

* The police must do God's work (ie. the police becomes the executive branch of the Bible)
* Pornography leads to violence and must be banned
* Pornography leads to homosexuality and child abuse
* Sexuality in marriage must be regulated (oral, anal and masturbation are against nature and are punishable)
* Homosexuality should be criminalized
* Adultery must be punishable
* Adulterers are predetermined to abuse children

I stop here because otherwise I would burst with anger and bloodthirst. I noticed that these are the same religious fundamentalists that welcomed cruel punishment on children with rods, whips, etc. based on Bible verses such as Hebra 12:6-7 or 1 Book of Kings 12:13-14 and 12:18. The Western world hardly has to worry about the Talibans but more about Christian fundamentalists crawling in through the back door of "Child protection".

Thoughts?

[Kyuuketsuki]

Thoughts:

• Morality varies from culture to culture so global policing & standards are difficult.
  
• I have no particular problem with pornography involving consenting adults regardless of whether that is hetero, gay, lesbian, solo, animal or whatever (I like hetero, lesbian and solo women).
  
• As a parent I believe that children must be protected (and not just my own) to whatever is the legal age limit of a country and I don't just mean from paedophiles.
  
• That teenagers are exploring sexual issues is entirely natural, probably is with younger children too.
  
• Religions have no right to claim any moral high ground on account of they behave more like vultures than humanitarians.
  
• Religions should be kept away from controlling any legal mechanisms or government.
  
• Religions should be kept out of issues involving sexuality and personal adult choices.
  
• Religions should be kept away from children.

Kyu

[athoughtfulman]

Exactly. I'm at the same point as you.

I think we put undue focus on child pornography, when what we should be doing is introducing measures to ensure no one, regardless of age is taken advantage of. However in matters where both parties are consenting, I do not think there is anything at issue, at least down to a certain age, though I think that age will differ from person to person and parent to parent.

- As a parent I believe that children must be protected (and not just my own) to whatever is the legal age limit of a country and I don't just mean from paedophiles.

Interesting you avoid trying to push a universal age for child-adult which I think a lot of people do. I'm with you here though.

[Kyuuketsuki]

Interesting you avoid trying to push a universal age for child-adult which I think a lot of people do. I'm with you here though.

Ultimately it's an arbitrary distinction especially when you consider that some children have such a mature mental outlook that they are more adult than the adults (my youngest daughter for instance) and vice versa (some people may be physically adult but psychologically very immature). It's like voting & jurors, at 18 we all get to vote and be jurors, to make decisions that affect other people's lives in the most profound fashion but, as a fictional character of Heinlein's observed, "I have never been able to see how a thirty-year-old moron can vote more wisely than a fifteen-year-old genius"

Kyu

[athoughtfulman]

Yeah I know what you mean.

It's a hard area to be specific about, especially with the way you described it. People are unpredictable and they are different, so how can we thrust a certain rule/worldview on an entire group of people? It's unethical, and not conducive to personal growth or the growth of our society.

But then comes the question, if we cannot generalise when it comes to maturity in kids and teenagers, what rules/guidelines should we impose? Or is it a decision to be made by a parent? And if the parents are incapable of making a responsible decision, who will?

[Giff]

Don't like the threads title it should be changed

[Tiberius]

Don't like the threads title it should be changed

Eh? A title of "Child Pornography" seems quite relevant to a thread about...what was it again?...oh yes...Child Pornography.

[Giff]

Understand Adrian. But I dont like the sound of it. It's like they're in to it or something.

[Tiberius]

Understand Adrian. But I dont like the sound of it. It's like they're in to it or something.

At which point a person can either decide to read the thread and find out that this is a discussion or ignore it. I hardly see why controversial topics should be hidden away; nobody is demanding people read them.