Part III

["L. Bird" <pkeets@xxxxxxxxxxx>]

> After having a look at the set-up, I don't much like the way the laws are 
> being framed, interpreted, and enforced on this.  I'll have to think a 
> little bit on what might be a better way to go about it.
Okay, I've thought for a day or so, and I've got some initial observations.  
These are personal, BTW, and I'd expect others to have different views, so 
feel free to comment.  The laws should take reality more into account.  As 
Jon says, this appears to be a strong component of human nature, and you're 
not going to legislate it away--that is, control it from the demand side.  
Thus the laws applying to the demand side should be about regulation.

First, about porn in general: I've heard that more people are doing it 
alone.  The sharp rise in sexually transmitted diseases and other 
difficulties associated with real sex have caused a recent boom in the porn 
and erotica markets.  Along with this is a drop in the number of births to 
teen mothers (likely based on changes in welfare laws), which indicates 
either less sexual activity, or better pre-planning, one or the other.  
Thus, there might be a basis to believe that an increase in the use of porn 
indicates a drop in the actual rate of sex with teens, or else the two are 
unrelated.

Next, about child porn: It's a mistake to lump all types of child porn 
together.  There's soft-core and hard-core, and the age of the children 
depicted should make a big difference in how it's treated.  The anti-child 
porn advocates make a big deal about child porn, and then when it turns out 
the fuss is about a fifteen year old girl in a bikini, it's like, huh?  
They've lost their cause with the public.

The definition of "child" is arbitrary.  In the porn laws, it seems to be 
sixteen and younger, but our age of consent is eighteen.  However, puberty 
these days starts more like at age eight.  We try to protect people from sex 
for about ten more years in order to give them some maturity to handle it 
and an economic base to raise a family.  A few years back, Newsweek magazine 
reported research that indicated men and women both have a strong tendency 
to prefer younger sex partners.  The researchers thought this had to do with 
survival of the species--younger partners are more likely to be healthy and 
to produce healthy offspring.  Thus, there is a lot of interest in the 
young.  The natural tendency is for older people to have sex with them early 
and often, but we try to control this to reduce the associated problems.  
Different cultures handle this in different ways.  We're trying to legislate 
a waiting period, but in Muslim culture, children are married off at age 
twelve.

This natural tendency for early sex is why there's such a demand for what 
we've defined as child pornography by setting the cut-off age at sixteen.  
There IS some cause for concern that children are entering puberty at an 
earlier age.  It may be that it has to do with pollutants that mimic 
hormones or the use of hormones in cattle feed or whatever, but still, once 
children have entered puberty, they are in a different category from 
children who haven't.  Below this line is where the actual "perversion" 
lies--in the desire for very young children who haven't any awareness of 
sex.

It's obvious that soft-core porn that depicts somewhat older children is 
tolerated, at least in the US.  I personally think it's questionable to 
sexualize children in this way, and to allow them to imitate adults in 
clothing and manners, but the majority rules.  If there were a strong 
reaction against it, it wouldn't happen.  Accordingly, I think it's a poor 
choice for us to prosecute anyone who collects this type of media.  If we 
allow children to be shown publicly and enticingly in adult clothing, 
make-up and manners, then we shouldn't complain that they aren't 
sufficiently protected by law.

Hard core porn is more questionable.  I don't care for this in general 
myself, but I know that many people do like it.  I would personally vote for 
it to be illegal to show an actual boy or girl in explicitly sexual 
situations, but okay to fake it up, which turns out to be currently legal in 
the US.  I gather that there is also a real demand for the explicit 
depiction of babies.  Use of any porn that depicts actual children in this 
situation should be STRONGLY prosecuted, but I would still allow the use of 
faked porn, as the demand for it indicates a real need.

Porn laws that allow faked pictures should be balanced by STRONG laws and 
STRONG ENFORCEMENT of laws protecting real live children.  I've been getting 
the idea this last week or so that we've been doing things the other way 
around--that thousands of law enforcement manhours have been expended on 
tracking down and prosecuting users of porn on the ASSUMPTION that these are 
actual child molesters, while fourteen year olds are having sex with Mick 
Jagger and R. Kelly without much comment.  There is an instant jump from 
porn to action in the public mind, and this is an error that Pete's case 
should point out.  I'd like to see the statistics after this investigation 
is over about how many actual child molesters were identified and 
prosecuted.  I think I'll even ask my congresspersons to find out for me.

Next: Control of the supply side.


keets






_________________________________________________________________
MSN 8 helps eliminate e-mail viruses. Get 2 months FREE*.  
http://join.msn.com/?page=features/virus