I am a big advocate of Free Speech. However, I think the line must be drawn someplace, and child pornography is definitely across the line. My argument always has been if it victimizes someone, I mean, it forces someone to do something they don’t have a voice in, then it is wrong (like children in pornogrophy).
A person I was having a discussion with said, “Well, then virtual child porn is OK since no cartoons were actually forced to have sex?” I had to admit I was not certain. I looked at some virtual porn on the net, and I still don’t know.
Her argument against it was that it (simplisticly put) makes men lust after children after seeing them as cartoon sex objects. I told her I thought this was a sexist statement because I was no more aroused than she probably was after looking at the cartoons. And why should anyone make that leap from cartoon to real life. Still, some of the images were very disturbing, but my stand on Free Speech has always been, disturbing should not necessarily make it illegal.
IIRC, it’s legal for this very reason. I recall a brouhaha in the news about this several years ago. It doesn’t harm anyone to produce virtual porn, so there’s little reason to legislate against it, even if the subject matter is in very bad taste.
I suppose that some argument might get floated out that if virtual child porn was about as “mainstream” as regular (consenting adult) porn, the potential pediphile might get the idea that pedophilia is more acceptable, permissable, or whatever.
But I hesitate to legislate morality, as it seems to become a slippery slope sometimes.
That’s a severely flawed arguement. Child porn, like all other porn, does not “make” lust in the viewer that wasn’t there to begin with. I’m not attracted to child porn, and I wouldn’t even know where to find it. However, I have seen depictions of things in porn that I had no lust for (“rape” scenes, and sex with pain, for example.) All they did was spoil my mood.
Yeah, like feet porn, or whatever the heck you call it. How someone gets off by watching women’s feet is beyond me. I’ve seen some and it freaks me the heck out. I mean, come on, it’s someone’s feet. ::blech:: Why would anyone want that anywhere near their junk?
Anyway, by the logic of the OP’s acquaintance and others, by looking at feet porn, I should miraculously become attracted to feet which, I gotta tell ya, aint gonna happen.
Looking at “virtual child porn” doesn’t make someone want to have real-life sex with children, anymore than playing Grand Theft Auto makes someone want to light real-life hookers on fire.
In my view, as long as there’s nothing real involved it’s free speech. It’s just a fantasy on a screen or paper, not reality; no one is hurt. As far as any argument about it’s morality goes, that kind of argument reeks of thought crime. Who doesn’t have fantasies ( sexual or otherwise ) that it would be immoral or stupid to actually indulge in ?
Well, if you have those kind of perverse fantasies, it’s probably better that you be allowed an artistic outlet, rather than sublimating it. It definitely should not ever be condoned as a normal part of society however. Social Pressure is powerful. If they ever cross the line from the virtual to the real, they should be nailed.
The whole Two Girls One Cup phenomenon backs this up. We have not seen a new fad of people copying the action of the video. It just made people feel sick.
I hate answering questions without a cite to hand, but I’m fairly certain someone got prosecuted and convicted for exactly this. If memory serves it was a young lady with a web cam who was distributing pictures of her breasts.
Edit:
Some careful googling (god was I scared what I might have turned up) yielded
This case Not what i remember, but certainly matches the criteria.
IANAL, so I don’t know how to look for cites. However, a few years ago, it was made explicitly illegal (in the US) to distribute pix of underagers, even if it was yourself. I know that, with the ever-greater ease of photography, there are some people out there with some amazing childhood memories…Hell, I know of a few who have images from before digital cameras…
Virtual kiddie porn? Why not? It’s virtual. Virtual murder is everywhere, and has been for a while. Actually, letting the creators of this shit sell it might make it harder to get, since buyers would have to pony up their CCs, letting interested parties find out their deviant tastes.
I’m surprised that no one has brought up this recent SC ruling. Basically, if I understand correctly, it establishes that marketing something as child porn is still a crime, even if it isn’t really child porn. So, if I have a giant zip file of walrus pictures (taking a cue from my current desktop background) and say, “psst, hey, buddy, $100 and I’ll send you a .zip file with all of my child pornography,” you can still be prosecuted even if you’re only sending pictures of walruses. Obviously, this has significant implications for individuals that distribute virtual child pornography marketed as real child pornography; I’m less certain how this would affect someone marketing virtual child pornography as virtual child pornography.
So your point is that people cannot be enticed into wanting something at a higher level if exposed to the suggestion? Advertisers would disagree with you. while you might not want little children your mouth would salivate at the suggestion of your favorite food when you’re hungry.
So how would you feel if someone made a computer generated image of your daughter being raped by other computer generated images? Free speech? How about if they animated her school?