War on Pornography: Another Failed War In The Works.

[TempestMagister]

8 year olds get scarred from seeing those nasty things that you get in the mail? That may be true, but I remember when I was 8, I knew what sex was, broadly, and I don't have any mental scarring from knowing what it was at that age. Hell, we had fricken sex-ed in 4th grade when I was 9 years old, and by that time, every child basically knew the concept. Althoguh irrelevant to the really bad stuff on the web, alot of people do have responsible adults that tell their children gradually and appropriately about that stuff.

Now, I also remember when I was either 8 or 9 years old, my friends and I found this magazine that had sex stories, and pictures of people having sex, and the stories, well, were pretty ronchy. Still, we were able to dissociate that stuff and we knew that those were adult things, and we were told how to respond to similar material. I remember my cousins showing me fake celeb-porno of Nicole Kidman when I was 9 years old, and my parents didn't give one toots, because they knew I could handle myself. I saw some ronchy stuff at the same age. Albeit, I wasn't on the computer that much, as I didn't get a good ol' Gateway until I was 9 years old, as alot of youngins' are now on the internent alot more.

I can probably remember my childhood alot better than alot of people on this board because I am younger than alot of people on this board. I remember, the real nasty stuff we would see we all knew were disgusting jokes that just needed to be ignored. I can remember, and I think alot of parents really try to hold development of a child's knowledge of society, because they do not think they will comprehend it. This is true, that children cannot comprehend sex, but parents must know that any average child has the capability to handle porno, and know simply not to get any ideas from it. Some may disagree with me here on this point, but I believe that this point generally applies to children who are mentally-average or above.

Parents can be overprotective of their children in some respects, and probably feel that they can't be looking over their children all the time; children don't want uncool and nosy parents. Parents can talk about all the dangers like child abductors and bad halloween candy, but they can't talk about approaching porn for some reason, which makes them feel that they must be the higher brains for their children, when they can't all the time. Some parents, like fundemental zealots, don't want to impure the cheeldren's minds, and they want society to conform to their little what they call perfect pious world. This "War on Pornography" is both over retroreactive, completely impractical, and totally unecessary.

[Crown]

Mike, most of this is a he-said/you-said bullshit. I am trying to clear the air, you can choose to believe what I say at the begining of the post as sincere or backpeddeling. I couldn't give a shit. The only part of the post that is actually at all relevant to my belief on the issue is that last two segments. Make of that what you will.

I would also advise that you read the thread carefully, and that most of the 'dipshit' / 'moron' stuff was rather cathargic. Oh and if/when you do reply look out for 'hidden text' *dundt-dundt-DUNDT!*

I have tried to be patient, but your bizarre explosion of hostile bullshit today makes me wonder if somebody put shit in your coffee this morning:

You did, when you called my a 'sophistic cunt', and then not only placed words in mouth, but assigned motive to my arguements which werenn't there. What, is that just your way of saying; Oh you!? Although I 'guess' I should feel honoured that 'you tried to be patient'.

I read it more than Einy did you moron, or you would have missed where the only point I actually involved myself with Einy's stupidity was to point out where this person got his evidence from; or are you incapable of reading a fucking thread? Or how about I agreed with him on the whole fucking 'more addictive than nicotine/illicit drug' claim.

Yes, I saw that, and you did NOT show where he got any scientific evidence for pornography causing direct harm. That was not scientific evidence. But feel free to pretend that you did; it seems to make you happy.

* Nine in 10 children ages 8 to 16 have viewed porn online -- most of them by accident.

Scientific study to prove this?

UK News Telegraph, NOP Research Group, 1/07/02 QED

Nothing like missing the mark, is there Mike? I showed where the guy was getting his 9 out of 10 claim, which is what I refered to, but you are correct to claim that I haven't [conclusively] proven the harm bit, and more on that later.

And go fuck yourself you self righteous bastard. Spyder not once, not twice but THREE FUCKING TIMES made it abundantly clear that my point of arguing that it was illegial to distribute pornographic material to minors WAS AN INVALID ARGUEMENT BECAUSE LEGALLITY DIDN'T NECESSARILY SATISFY JUSTICE.

Yes, which is exactly what I was saying, you twat. I said that Spyder's line was appropriate because your logic consisted of the imbecilic notion that you can prove something is harmful by simply showing that it's illegal.

No, he's saying that the so-called "War on Pornography" and its call to censor the Internet and revive the fucking CDA is moronic and wrong.

Really, I must be the epitome of slow for not understanding, what you really meant is that the law prohibiting the exposure of minors to pornography is un-just.

So what fucking thread are you reading?

Same one, but I'm not reading it like an idiot.

No shit, you employing your almighty clairvoyance skills and crystal ball, with a pinch of telepathy. Jee, no wonder I feel left behind.

Mass spam emails = sunday school now? Give me a fucking break.

Yeah, you're right. Sunday school is far more destructive.

*fap, fap, fap* Watch as I get a hard on attacking religion to a guy who is athiest *fap, fap, fap*

Are you fucking impaired? One is unsolicited -- taking away the parents right to raise their child as they see fit -- and the other is where the parent chooses to expose the child. You harp about parental responsiblity, I would hadly think this would need to be explained to you.

Hey dipshit, my kid is 8, and I don't let him wander around unsupervised in public places. Any parent that does is risking a lot worse than their kid accidentally seing some Internet porn.

That's wonderfull Mike! No seriously you are an aware, mature, responsible parent who recognises the dangers out there, and acts accordingly to protect his children. Unfortunately [size=0]***Hidden text***Or fortunately as the mood now strikes me that I am arguing with you ... Suprise!***Hidden Text***[/size] not all kids have you as a parent. Now I know that came as a bit of a shock to you, but there it was.

Your next point will undoubtabley be that I still haven't [conclusively] proven the harm bit, but again bear with me and see the end of the post.

Yes we hope that these are protected, but for fucks sake there was actually an automatic vending machine here in Australia and it took for ages for someone to realise that it didn't ask to see ID when you ordered an R rated movie, and the children were buying them!

R-rated movies are not pornography, moron, and they're certainly not child pornography.--

No shit, did you figure that out for yourself? Or was my point perhaps that R rated movies shouldn't be distributed to minors period?

-- Moreover, there are limits to how much imposition the state should place on the populace in search of this "protect the children" mantra. I believe in the physical protection of children, but aggressive measures meant to protect them from "harmful" images will cause more harm than good.

Certainly an un-restrained 'all or nothing push' (like the act that the Supreme Court struck down because it was too vague and civil liberty groups claimed posed restrictions on adults and children alike), but the fact of the matter is (again) that not every adult is as aware of the issue as you, and this is a problem that needs to be combated. Why not even look at some kind of censorship, or even classification, on the internet? But again, this isn't something that you need to respond to directly, my evidence on the harmful nature of porn to young children, and the amazing rates of how young children are being left unsupervised will be posted - again - below.

The analogy is valid: the only form of "harm" identified in the quote you cited was precisely applicable to violent movies and videogames, thus showing how bankrupt the underlying logic of criminalizing Internet distribution is. Don't blame me if you can't understand that.

Fair enough, that makes sense (obviously didn't get it the first time). You are, of course, right. There is just as likely an ability to cause harm via violent movies and videogames. The difference being, you don't really get the same distribution of them via the Internet. In fact, the way they are distributed the ease with which pornography can be obtained, now via the Internet, outstrips a parent's ability to censor their childs exposure to it. What is so difficult to understand about this?

But you support it in principle, which is fucking stupid as well.

I do not support the CDA. I only support the law which states that distribution of pornography to minors is illegal, and that minors should be protected from it. If this means an age verification, or 'childrens only world wide web' better parental vigilance or education. The more the better. But I guess I didn't mke it clear enough here;

First; Red Herring/Strawman. Neither the author - nor I - are suggesting a ban of pornography on the internet (I read the article, and his website), all that they appear to be campaigning for is anti-spam legistlation at this point, everything else is vague.

Quite clearly his website (waronporn) doesn't emphaitcally outline his desire to remove all porn from the internet, or indeed launch censor the internet, or I didn't find it. Which means that I am quite possibly wrong about the former, but please don't be an ass like Spyder and try and tell me what I was really thinking.

The analogy to violent videogames is accurate because it shows why the underlying logic is broken. Your attempt to tie this to the fact that kids can't rent them from Blockbuster is what's irrelevant. Criminalizing Internet distribution of porn would be analogous to criminalizing distribution of conventional porn at the DISTRIBUTOR rather than the STORE, using the rationale that store owners can't be bothered to stop kids from buying it. Conventional porn is only regulated at point of sale, not distribution, because regulation at the point of distribution would effectively amount to total censorship, in case you were too fucking stupid to figure it out.

Well that would be stupid, and I take it you assumed I meant that from my post discussing movie ratings and who we let in; 'I just responded with the obvious example that it is up to the distributor to obey the law -- or face the penalty'. Yes you are right, but as my place of employment (cinemas) is the exhibitor and not the distributor, and was the basis of the previous analogy, then I used the wrong word. And I apologise.

It would be quite easy for malls, libraries and Internet cafes to simply disallow 8 year olds from using Internet kiosks unsupervised (just as a variety store simply tells kids not to reach up to the top shelf and grab the porno mags), schools could easily orient their library Internet computers so that their screens are easily visible to library staff. the end point-of-sale, and home computer use can be monitored. There is no need to cut it off at the source and stop the distribution process.

Unfortunately Mike, this isn't happening, and the measures already inplace (where available) are already proven to be insufficient for the task.

I'm not propossing a solution you dipshit, I'm not even taking the opposite side on the debate. This whole thing started with an assumption of yours, that will now (most likely) take five posts to drum through your head!

Oh really? You claimed that Internet pornography HARMS CHILDREN by linking to websites discussing the sexual exploitation of children in child porn (hint: red herring) in an attempt to attack Einy's point that the "War on Pornography" people have utterly failed to make their case for censoring the Internet.

Rubbish, I linked to a [loosely] related article on the affects of pornography on young minds, on Spyder's ridiculous assertation that it wouldn't affect them at all! But again, I ask that you read the end of the post for a discussion of the affects of pornography on a child's mind.

OK, fine. From your first post:

And how does this demonstrate harm? Oh wait, they're TEENAGERS! THEY WANT SEX!

There is a law in each country that specifies the minimum age at which a person is allowed to be exposed to pornography. Usually this is set around 18. There is more than enough evidence that exposure to highly graphic sexual material before maturity to comprehend such material (say at age eight) is damaging to a child.

Oh and nice little strawman there jerk off. This is to stop porn beign distributed to minors, WHICH IS ILLEGAL. There was no 'teenagers and sex' claim.

Right there, you responded to a demand for proof of harm by citing the law books. Then you went on to say that "exposure to highly graphic sexual material" will actually DAMAGE a child. How? Do you realize that throughout most of human history, children were aware of sex from a young age because most families lived in one-room domiciles? How old do you think kids were before they figured out what sex was, moron? Then, you defended the "War on Pornography" by saying that their objective was to "stop porn from being distributed to minors", which you seemed to consider perfectly reasonable "because it's illegal", a ridiculous circular justification if I ever saw one (ie- "it's a good law because it's legal").

1. Distribution of porn to minors is illegal.
2. It is illegal because it is mentally disturbing (see below).
3. An appeal to fucking the past isn't a valid fucking arguement (not to mention the mating between a husband and wife is lightyears fucking removed from the gang banging/BDSM/shit eating fetishes that children can and are being exposed to on the internet).
4. We aren't discussing 'finding out what sex' is, we are discussing the shear fucking depravity of what is available at a child's finger tips, which is again fucking lightyears removed from your rosey little analogies.

The objective of stopping Internet-based distribution of porn IS the SAME THING as saying you want to censor the Internet, moron. Go accuse somebody else of strawman distortions, because this is exactly what you defended.

Again, you haven't proven *jack* about me wanting to censor the internet. Make it harder for kids to get to porn, oh yes, go around with the moronic Obscenity laws, no. If I defended it, I did so in ignorance, and I would think that with a man of your intelligence it would be apparent within my responce.

See above. I don't know what crawled up your ass today, but when you say something that's just plain stupid or wrong, you can't cover it up by going apeshit on anyone who calls bullshit on you.

More like when morons fail to look beyond the end of their nose.

Then they have a FUCKING OBLIGATION TO LEARN. When it's your child, it is YOUR RESPONSIBILITY to get off your lazy fat ass and learn whatever it is that you need to learn in order to adequately raise your child, not to mention not letting your 8 year old kid wander around unsupervised in public. I know PRECISELY what kind of supervision an 8 year old normally requires, because I have an 8 year old son RIGHT FUCKING NOW, so don't give me some bullshit about how I can't control whether he's sitting in an Internet cafe somewhere watching porn. And if other parents can't be bothered, it is not society's responsibility to censor all public avenues of information exchange in order to make up for their goddamned negligence!

*Golf Clap*

Yes Mike, you tell 'em! Hey moron, 90% of this world is populated by idiots. Why should the children suffer by being exposed to porn because their parents are unable, unwilling or incapable of doing so? But again -- I need to demonstrate that porn can harm young minds -- soon, be patient.

It's pretty ironic that you started your wild-eyed ranting in this thread by accusing someone else of a strawman distortion, and then you pull bullshit like this. Sex ed is not BDSM porn, but it will tell you what you need to know in order to recognize what BDSM is and what's wrong with it. Not that such a rational approach is apparently appropriate for you, since you've apparently gone off the deep end and are now resorting to screaming at people and making ridiculously obvious distortions of their points.

How is it a 'distortion point'. Porn isn't sex-ed, unless it includes; discrimination of women, BDSM, etc. You do know that this is one of the fucking major gripes of porn (that you yourself have no less made about it being a turn off when women aren't being treated respectfully in porn, and you are Rebecca prefer more 'couple porn'). The sad truth that all of this is available, freeliy, and very easily on the internet to anyone. So please spare me the 'distortions' bullshit. If you didn't realise that this is apart of the fucking arguement (indeed if you took the ridiculously naive line of Einy; 'They don't want teenagers to masturbate !!!!!ONEONEONEShift+1Shift+1!!! then I really have to wonder how in touch you really are with the reality of the issue). And if your child at the age of eight is capable of distinguishing the difference between what is depicted as right/wrong/good/bad more power to him. He is a smart kid and will do well in life.

Unfortunately NOT ALL CHILDREN ARE AS WELL CLICKED ON! Indeed, most if not all (with your one super child as the exception) are incapable of it!

Already done earlier in this post. Once more, and for the record, you angrily dismissed Einy's complaint against the "War on Pornography" as a "strawman", and said that Internet "distribution of porn to minors" is wrong, using the idiotic rationale that kids might be able to get ahold of it due to delinquent parents. You also attempted to tie "pornography" to "sexual solicitation" in your second post: an obvious red-herring fallacy.

Actually it isn't, there are links of 'viewing pornography' and sexual solicitation of minors. I promised you evidence, and now it is time to anti up. The following has been canvased from a range of online medical journals, child protection agencies, and internet safety guides for parents;

The Harmfull Effects of Pornography on a Child

It goes without saying that;

1. Not every child will be affected the same way.
2. Because of the ethical and procedural problems surrounding research on children exposed to pornography, ideal research designs may never be possible.

All youngsters are at some risk from exposure to televised pornography, as described above. At particular risk for harm, however, are the most vulnerable children in our society--children in single-parent homes, children with mental and emotional disturbances, mentally challenged children, children who have been physically and/or sexually abused, and children in dysfunctional families. Youngsters for whom television serves as a babysitter or parental surrogate unfortunately are exposed to few competing influences to television viewing. In addition, parents in such homes are least likely to know what their children are viewing and to be able to pass on their own values about sex and sexual behavior. The main possible effects of televised pornography that must concern us as clinicians, educators, and parents are modeling and imitation of language heard and behaviors observed in televised pornography; negative interference with children's normal sexual development; emotional reactions such as nightmares and feelings of anxiety, guilt, confusion, and/or shame; stimulation of premature sexual activity; development of unrealistic, misleading, and/or harmful attitudes toward sex and adult male-female relationships; and undermining of family values with resultant conflict between parents and children.

Pornography's Relationship to Rape and Sexual Violence
According to one study, early exposure (under fourteen years of age) to pornography is related to greater involvement in deviant sexual practice, particularly rape. Slightly more than one-third of the child molesters and rapists in this study claimed to have at least occasionally been incited to commit an offense by exposure to pornography. Among the child molesters incited, the study reported that 53 percent of them deliberately used the stimuli of pornography as they prepared to offend.

Pornography's Relationship to Child Molestation
In a study of convicted child molesters, 77 percent of those who molested boys and 87 percent of those who molested girls admitted to the habitual use of pornography in the commission of their crimes.iii Besides stimulating the perpetrator, pornography facilitates child molestation in several ways. For example, pedophiles use pornographic photos to demonstrate to their victims what they want them to do. They also use them to arouse a child or to lower a child's inhibitions and communicate to the unsuspecting child that a particular sexual activity is okay: "This person is enjoying it; so will you."

Children often imitate what they've seen, read, or heard. Studies suggest that exposure to pornography can prompt kids to act out sexually against younger, smaller, and more vulnerable children. Experts in the field of childhood sexual abuse report that any premature sexual activity in children always suggests two possible stimulants: experience and exposure. This means that the sexually deviant child may have been molested or simply exposed to sexuality through pornography.

Replicated studiesx have demonstrated that exposure to significant amounts of increasingly graphic forms of pornography has a dramatic effect on how adult consumers view women, sexual abuse, sexual relationships, and sex in general. These studies are virtually unanimous in their conclusions: When male subjects were exposed to as little as six weeks' worth of standard hard-core pornography, they:

• developed an increased sexual callousness toward women
• began to trivialize rape as a criminal offense or no longer considered it a crime at all
• developed distorted perceptions about sexuality
• developed an appetite for more deviant, bizarre, or violent types of pornography (normal sex no longer seemed to do the job)
• devalued the importance of monogamy and lacked confidence in marriage as either a viable or lasting institution

There are more out there, do you require them or have we established that there is *harm* to allowing a minor unfettered access to porn? (Not that this is really every an issue of contention between me and you, as you have cleverly avoided and sidesteped the issue of whether you believe that 8 year olds should have access to porn, rather quite rightly pointed to your parental vigillance which is shielding them from it)?

The Relationship Between Children Looking at Porn and Being Solicitated for Sex

Isabelle Michelet, director of consulting firm Prasena, which designed the questionnaires, revealed that more than 71 per cent of the youths (aged 12 to 25) surveyed had visited a pornographic website at least once, while 45 per cent of them have been repeat visitors.

Surprisingly, 30 per cent of children (aged seven to 11) and 52 per cent of youths said they have no problems with trading naked pictures of movie stars via computers.

A total of 73 per cent of the porn site regulars were undeterred by the "inconvenient" consequences of visiting those sites, including facing dozens of porn-related commercial pop-up windows and having their homepage settings changed. However, 43 per cent of children and 63 per cent of youths admitted that they have faced some shocking websites containing distressing or "ugly" pictures, or bad language.

The survey found that 92 per cent of children and youths have been invited to talk about sex. Once faced with such situations, most of them opted to change the subject or switch off while 17 per cent continued the conversation, arguing the risk was minimal.

Most children and youths were aware of the possibility that their virtual friends or confidants could be impostors. They really did not care about that, however.

More astonishing, half of both children and youths have discovered that at least one of their "friends" on the Net was an impostor.

Thirty percent of parents don't know what their children are doing online, according to recent research by Ending Child Prostitution, Pornography and Trafficking (Ecpat) and the Prasena research company. And 50 percent of teachers also don't know what their students are doing.

Over 60 percent of children aged between seven and 11, and 80 percent of youths (aged 12 to 25) frequently use the Internet at home. A total of almost 40 percent of the younger group and 80 percent of the older group are alone while on the Internet.

<snip>

On chatlines, 20 and 55 percent of children and youths had experienced vulgar language, propositions to send sex or violent materials, or invitations to have sex.

Only one third of children said they would talk to their parents about this, and only four percent of youths would do so.

<snip>

He receives 50 to 60 emails a day reporting improper Web sites connected to pornography, gambling, the sex trade, crime and threats to national security. Charges are made in one or two cases a week.

<snip>

Pol Col Yanaphon's concerns about online sex encounters with strangers are echoed in the Ecpat research. Over 90 percent of children and youths who use chatlines have been invited to speak about sex. Only eight percent of children and seven percent of youths who have had a ``shocking experience in a chat room'' vowed never to chat again. Almost one third of children said they would merely try to change the subject. And 12 percent of teenagers and 17 percent of youths so propositioned said they would ``go for it''.

``Either through naivete or apathy, these youths could leave themselves open and vulnerable to `grooming' by paedophiles,'' explained Ecpat social worker Guy Thompstone.

He described this finding as a disturbing sign of what he called ``pseudo-maturity,'' meaning that youths believe they are adults when in fact they are not.

Another disturbingly high proportion of the respondents _ 24 percent of children and 37 percent of youths _ have had at least one meeting with someone they met on the Internet.

Of those who met their Internet correspondents face-to-face, 58 percent of children aged under 12 and 46 percent of youths were surprised by the identity of the person they met, while 25 percent and 32 percent, respectively, were shocked by the encounter, Ecpat disclosed.

``Most children and youths realised that their virtual friends could be imposters, but they found it exciting or didn't really care,'' said Isabelle Michelet, director of Prasena.

Nearly one-third of children and teenagers had parents and teachers who either did not care about or did not understand their Internet use. A third said they had no adult supervision and nearly half said that adult involvement was limited.

So _ who to blame in this matter? Parents blame schools for not teaching sex education. Teachers blame parents for not supervising their kids' use of the Internet, and the government for its lack of policies on the issue. Meanwhile, the government puts the blame on deteriorating family bonds and rapid technological advances.

<sniP>

But Ecpat found that while many respondents (44 percent of children, 67 percent of youths) reported having some type of screening mechanism on their computers, these appeared to be somewhat irrelevant as more than half of respondents knew how to get around the blocks.

Should we impose censorship, then? Wouldn't that go against the freedom of expression that's important to a democratic society like Thailand?

``Censorship is possible. But it won't solve the problem,'' said Dr Thaweesak Koanantakool, director of the National Electronics and Computer Technology Centre (Nectec).

Inappropriate Internet traffic such as excessive downloading of images, illegal music files and videos may be relatively easy to discover and stop at local networks in places like schools and companies. ``Filtering this traffic at the ISPs might lead to negative commercial effects. So ISPs aren't willing to censor anything,'' said Dr Thaweesak.

Sources

1. PubMed, a service of the National Library of Medicine, includes over 14 million citations for biomedical articles back to the 1950's
   1. Influence of unrestrained access to erotica on adolescents' and young adults' dispositions toward sexuality.
   2. No excuses: televised pornography harms children.
2. Enough is Enough
   1. How Pornography Harms Children
3. Ending Child Prostitution, Pornography and Trafficking (Ecpat)
   1. An online survey shows that Thai youths are ill-prepared for the Internet's dark side, and may be putting themselves in harm's way
   2. Almost three-quarters of Thai youths have visited pornographic websites, and 45 per cent of them have become the sites' regulars, ...
   3. Parents are underestimating the dangers children can encounter on the Internet, according to research ...
   4. The US SupremeRe Court has narrowly ruled that a law meant to protect children from online pornography is probably an infringement of free speech. ...

I believe I have satisfied the burden of proof for viewing pornography as being harmful to a child, both mentally and physically. It is almost revolting that I was actually asked to justify what should be a no brainer to anyone with two brain cells to rub together.

And then you said:

I note that you haven't established why pornography should be distributed to minors. Not meaning to ask you to prove a negative here, but the law is already in place, to onus is on you to prove that it is 'unjust'

Not only is this wrong in principle (you cannot criminalize something on the justification that it should be assumed harmful enough to criminalize until proven otherwise, nor can you use the fact that the law exists to justify a "shifting the burden of proof" fallacy), but any law which prohibits Internet-based distribution of pornography DOES censor the Internet, because the Internet is nothing but a distribution medium. If people aren't going to monitor their own kids or keep them from wandering around unsupervised in public places such as malls even when they're only 8 (the age you keep citing), , that can hardly be blamed on the Internet, yet that is precisely what you are doing.

1. The law prohibiting the distribution of porn to minors is already in place dipshit.
2. Unfortunately (as you rightly point out) the Internet is a distribution medium so it makes it difficult to actually enforce this law over it.
3. More parental vigilance is more than likely to solve 90% of all the world's problems that children are likely to encounter, unfortunately it isn't applicable in all cases, so we need another alternative to protect young minds.
4. Legistlation require Age Verification is one such alternative (off the top of my head) that can help stop children from finding porn on the internet.
5. Vicious prosecution of spam emailers, is another.
6. If this is sounding familiar, it should it is one if the techniques that the Utah Attorney General Mark Shurtleff and his staff are developing, which is also discussed in the article.

Let's recap; Pornography harms children psychologically, it is conduit through which sexual predators can and will attach a child given opportunity.

Parents/Teachers/Legistlators all play a role in protecting the young children. You will notice that not one or two is adequet enough to protect them, requiring a conserted effort. Mike's analogy about what a resposible parent he is, begs the facts that he is in a monogamous relationship where one parent doesn't work, and can safely monitor the kids when they are home. The sad reality is that a growing number of kids now come from broken homes, one parent families, or families where both parents are working and are not able to monitor their kids.

Saying legistlation to either restrict Internet access to pornography, or insist on somekind of age verification service is 'unwarrented' is akin to sticking you head in the sand and ignoring the problem.

Personally I am discusted that people actually asked me to verify that exposing a young child to pornography can cause harm like that isn't an instict that 99% of normal people will be aware of without requiring any kind of psychologists input. (If you disagree, ask Mike if he puts on porn for his kid to watch, the resounding answer is NO!, because Mike isn't a deviant (well you know), and he does have a brain cell or two).







Well that's it for my ladies and gents. I hoped we learned something, and I am off to the snow for the long weekend (self declared not actual for all you other suckers ). Anyone choosing to continue this debate with me will have to wait around 1 week, as I am working the first two days back. Take care and don't chaff your willies!

[Crown]

Fuck! Misspelt 'vicious' ... lets hope this thing doesn't crash when I edit it! *fingers crossed*

EDIT :: Worked, although I'll be fucked if I try and correct 'attach' to 'attack'

[The Yosemite Bear]

guys this is from the same idiots who think that playing computer games will make you re-enact them...

so by that logic I should be out pretending to be Saddam Heussan because I play Hearts of Iron,

[Darth Wong]

You did, when you called my a 'sophistic cunt',

Which you deserved at the time, since Spyder posted a response which was certainly no more incendiary than your attack on Einy and you responded by massively distorting his position into "not letting 8 year olds see porn is unjust": a rather virulent statement which you knew perfectly well to be a deliberate distortion for rhetorical attack purposes. Don't play dumb.

Nothing like missing the mark, is there Mike? I showed where the guy was getting his 9 out of 10 claim, which is what I refered to, but you are correct to claim that I haven't [conclusively] proven the harm bit, and more on that later.

He asked for proof. You admit that you did not provide any. How did my comment "miss the mark?"

No, he's saying that the so-called "War on Pornography" and its call to censor the Internet and revive the fucking CDA is moronic and wrong.

Really, I must be the epitome of slow for not understanding, what you really meant is that the law prohibiting the exposure of minors to pornography is un-just.

Exactly. And you can roll your eyes all you like, but it's a valid point. It is eminently reasonable to distinguish between an unjust law and the goal which the unjust law is intended to accomplish.

No shit, you employing your almighty clairvoyance skills and crystal ball, with a pinch of telepathy. Jee, no wonder I feel left behind.

And you wonder why I told you to stop being a sophistic cunt.

Yeah, you're right. Sunday school is far more destructive.

*fap, fap, fap* Watch as I get a hard on attacking religion to a guy who is athiest *fap, fap, fap*

Translation: you have no answer, so you resort to the Appeal to Motive fallacy and show once again why I say you've been acting like a sophistic cunt. If you honestly believe that Sunday School has less of a harmful indoctrinatory effect on society than spam E-mail, you're on drugs. One "exposes" kids to advertisements and pictures; the other comes with the implicit approval of community, parents, and supposedly God and tells kids how to think. Figure it out.

Are you fucking impaired? One is unsolicited -- taking away the parents right to raise their child as they see fit -- and the other is where the parent chooses to expose the child. You harp about parental responsiblity, I would hadly think this would need to be explained to you.

What part of "parents choose whether to let their kids use a computer" do you not understand?

Hey dipshit, my kid is 8, and I don't let him wander around unsupervised in public places. Any parent that does is risking a lot worse than their kid accidentally seing some Internet porn.

That's wonderfull Mike! No seriously you are an aware, mature, responsible parent who recognises the dangers out there, and acts accordingly to protect his children. Unfortunately [size=0]***Hidden text***Or fortunately as the mood now strikes me that I am arguing with you ... Suprise!***Hidden Text***[/size] not all kids have you as a parent. Now I know that came as a bit of a shock to you, but there it was.

So first you invoke parental privilege in justifying Sunday School indoctrination from childhood, and then you say that parents are idiots, so the decisions and responsibilities should be taken out of their hands? The funniest thing is that you honestly don't seem to recognize the logical inconsistency here.

R-rated movies are not pornography, moron, and they're certainly not child pornography.--

No shit, did you figure that out for yourself? Or was my point perhaps that R rated movies shouldn't be distributed to minors period?

Obviously, you don't get the whole concept of "red herrings are bad". In a discussion of pornography, the fact that a vending machine will let kids rent "Aliens" is not relevant.

Certainly an un-restrained 'all or nothing push' (like the act that the Supreme Court struck down because it was too vague and civil liberty groups claimed posed restrictions on adults and children alike), but the fact of the matter is (again) that not every adult is as aware of the issue as you, and this is a problem that needs to be combated. Why not even look at some kind of censorship, or even classification, on the internet?

Why not monitor everyones' phone calls too? Same reason: money and the fact that the worst threats posed by the Internet are person-to-person communications such as chatroom solicitations, rather than what you would characterize as "pornography".

But again, this isn't something that you need to respond to directly, my evidence on the harmful nature of porn to young children, and the amazing rates of how young children are being left unsupervised will be posted - again - below.

The fact that many parents do a shitty job of parenting does not mean that everyone else must compensate for their negligence by giving up their freedoms. I honestly don't see how that follows at all.

The analogy is valid: the only form of "harm" identified in the quote you cited was precisely applicable to violent movies and videogames, thus showing how bankrupt the underlying logic of criminalizing Internet distribution is. Don't blame me if you can't understand that.

Fair enough, that makes sense (obviously didn't get it the first time). You are, of course, right. There is just as likely an ability to cause harm via violent movies and videogames. The difference being, you don't really get the same distribution of them via the Internet. In fact, the way they are distributed the ease with which pornography can be obtained, now via the Internet, outstrips a parent's ability to censor their childs exposure to it. What is so difficult to understand about this?

Actually, violent videogames and movies are much easier to get than pornography via any means, including the Internet. Most of them aren't even R-rated, since movie ratings boards generally consider violence to be reasonably wholesome fare for children.

I do not support the CDA. I only support the law which states that distribution of pornography to minors is illegal, and that minors should be protected from it. If this means an age verification, or 'childrens only world wide web' better parental vigilance or education. The more the better. But I guess I didn't mke it clear enough here;

You seemed to be arguing that unsupervised kids = distribution to minors = illegal = justified, which is precisely what the CDA argued. If that's not what you meant, I retract the criticism.

First; Red Herring/Strawman. Neither the author - nor I - are suggesting a ban of pornography on the internet (I read the article, and his website), all that they appear to be campaigning for is anti-spam legistlation at this point, everything else is vague.

Quite clearly his website (waronporn) doesn't emphaitcally outline his desire to remove all porn from the internet, or indeed launch censor the internet, or I didn't find it. Which means that I am quite possibly wrong about the former, but please don't be an ass like Spyder and try and tell me what I was really thinking.

It's not obvious, but one of the petitions they want you to pass around bemoans the fact that the CDA was knocked down. From that, I concluded that he supported the CDA, and would again if something like it returned.

Well that would be stupid, and I take it you assumed I meant that from my post discussing movie ratings and who we let in; 'I just responded with the obvious example that it is up to the distributor to obey the law -- or face the penalty'. Yes you are right, but as my place of employment (cinemas) is the exhibitor and not the distributor, and was the basis of the previous analogy, then I used the wrong word. And I apologise.

Fair enough.

It would be quite easy for malls, libraries and Internet cafes to simply disallow 8 year olds from using Internet kiosks unsupervised (just as a variety store simply tells kids not to reach up to the top shelf and grab the porno mags), schools could easily orient their library Internet computers so that their screens are easily visible to library staff. the end point-of-sale, and home computer use can be monitored. There is no need to cut it off at the source and stop the distribution process.

Unfortunately Mike, this isn't happening, and the measures already inplace (where available) are already proven to be insufficient for the task.

So? Why does that mean they should go to the source and muzzle it, rather than simply creating an act which requires providers of Internet kiosks to disallow kids below a certain age from using them?

Rubbish, I linked to a [loosely] related article on the affects of pornography on young minds, on Spyder's ridiculous assertation that it wouldn't affect them at all!

I saw no post from Spyder in which he claimed it had zero effect on children whatsoever. I saw a post where he said that you need to justify the kind of actions that the "War on Pornography" cranks advocate.

1. Distribution of porn to minors is illegal.
2. It is illegal because it is mentally disturbing (see below).
3. An appeal to fucking the past isn't a valid fucking arguement (not to mention the mating between a husband and wife is lightyears fucking removed from the gang banging/BDSM/shit eating fetishes that children can and are being exposed to on the internet).
4. We aren't discussing 'finding out what sex' is, we are discussing the shear fucking depravity of what is available at a child's finger tips, which is again fucking lightyears removed from your rosey little analogies.

A) Not a justification.
B) Subjective. Also not a justification, nor does it establish harm.
C) So you feel that in the era discussed, every single child was damaged by this exposure?
D) Also not a justification or establishment of harm. The fact that it subjectively repulses you does not mean it will harm children. It will probably just repulse them too.

Again, you haven't proven *jack* about me wanting to censor the internet. Make it harder for kids to get to porn, oh yes, go around with the moronic Obscenity laws, no. If I defended it, I did so in ignorance, and I would think that with a man of your intelligence it would be apparent within my responce.

If you're going to say that "exposure" due to transmission on a medium which adult end-users should regulate but don't is active distribution to minors and should be stoppd, then you are indeed saying that the Internet should be censored. If you didn't want to say that, you should have looked more carefully at what you were writing.

See above. I don't know what crawled up your ass today, but when you say something that's just plain stupid or wrong, you can't cover it up by going apeshit on anyone who calls bullshit on you.

More like when morons fail to look beyond the end of their nose.

Speak for yourself. You have still failed to produce anything remotely resembling proof of harm.

Then they have a FUCKING OBLIGATION TO LEARN. When it's your child, it is YOUR RESPONSIBILITY to get off your lazy fat ass and learn whatever it is that you need to learn in order to adequately raise your child, not to mention not letting your 8 year old kid wander around unsupervised in public. I know PRECISELY what kind of supervision an 8 year old normally requires, because I have an 8 year old son RIGHT FUCKING NOW, so don't give me some bullshit about how I can't control whether he's sitting in an Internet cafe somewhere watching porn. And if other parents can't be bothered, it is not society's responsibility to censor all public avenues of information exchange in order to make up for their goddamned negligence!

*Golf Clap*

Yes Mike, you tell 'em! Hey moron, 90% of this world is populated by idiots. Why should the children suffer by being exposed to porn because their parents are unable, unwilling or incapable of doing so?

Take that argument, apply it to religion, we should outlaw religion. By every objective standard, it is a form of brainwashing to which kids are exposed only because the parents are stupid.

How is it a 'distortion point'. Porn isn't sex-ed, unless it includes; discrimination of women, BDSM, etc. You do know that this is one of the fucking major gripes of porn (that you yourself have no less made about it being a turn off when women aren't being treated respectfully in porn, and you are Rebecca prefer more 'couple porn'). The sad truth that all of this is available, freeliy, and very easily on the internet to anyone. So please spare me the 'distortions' bullshit.

How is it "bullshit" for me to point out that when you respond to the statement that sex ed is the solution to kids being unprepared for such images, I must think that sex ed is BSDM and scat? This is exactly the same kind of deliberate distortion you performed upon Spyder's post.

If you didn't realise that this is apart of the fucking arguement (indeed if you took the ridiculously naive line of Einy; 'They don't want teenagers to masturbate !!!!!ONEONEONEShift+1Shift+1!!! then I really have to wonder how in touch you really are with the reality of the issue). And if your child at the age of eight is capable of distinguishing the difference between what is depicted as right/wrong/good/bad more power to him. He is a smart kid and will do well in life.

It's instinctive. You can't tell me that a kid can't figure out on his own that tying somebody up and beating him is weird and probably unpleasant. But this has no bearing on my sex ed point. If the government wants to do something about parental negligence, they need to use the apparatus they already have in place (the school system) and educate the children themselves, so that they will know how to react to this stuff if they run into it.

Unfortunately NOT ALL CHILDREN ARE AS WELL CLICKED ON! Indeed, most if not all (with your one super child as the exception) are incapable of it!

Oh puh-lease, it does not take a "super child" to recognize on some instinctive level that people eating shit or getting whipped is fucked up, and say "ewwwww" rather than "hey, I wanna do that!"

Actually it isn't, there are links of 'viewing pornography' and sexual solicitation of minors.

"Links" like the "links" between pre-invasion Iraq and Al-Quaeda, no doubt.

I promised you evidence, and now it is time to anti up. The following has been canvased from a range of online medical journals, child protection agencies, and internet safety guides for parents;

The Harmfull Effects of Pornography on a Child

It goes without saying that;

1. Not every child will be affected the same way.
2. Because of the ethical and procedural problems surrounding research on children exposed to pornography, ideal research designs may never be possible.

All youngsters are at some risk from exposure to televised pornography, as described above. At particular risk for harm, however, are the most vulnerable children in our society--children in single-parent homes, children with mental and emotional disturbances, mentally challenged children, children who have been physically and/or sexually abused, and children in dysfunctional families. Youngsters for whom television serves as a babysitter or parental surrogate unfortunately are exposed to few competing influences to television viewing. In addition, parents in such homes are least likely to know what their children are viewing and to be able to pass on their own values about sex and sexual behavior. The main possible effects of televised pornography that must concern us as clinicians, educators, and parents are modeling and imitation of language heard and behaviors observed in televised pornography; negative interference with children's normal sexual development; emotional reactions such as nightmares and feelings of anxiety, guilt, confusion, and/or shame; stimulation of premature sexual activity; development of unrealistic, misleading, and/or harmful attitudes toward sex and adult male-female relationships; and undermining of family values with resultant conflict between parents and children.

No evidence or even an oblique reference to a proper study here; just an "expert" who says that it's true.

Pornography's Relationship to Rape and Sexual Violence
According to one study, early exposure (under fourteen years of age) to pornography is related to greater involvement in deviant sexual practice, particularly rape. Slightly more than one-third of the child molesters and rapists in this study claimed to have at least occasionally been incited to commit an offense by exposure to pornography. Among the child molesters incited, the study reported that 53 percent of them deliberately used the stimuli of pornography as they prepared to offend.

Again, no evidence: it merely cites "one study" with no name.

Pornography's Relationship to Child Molestation
In a study of convicted child molesters, 77 percent of those who molested boys and 87 percent of those who molested girls admitted to the habitual use of pornography in the commission of their crimes.iii Besides stimulating the perpetrator, pornography facilitates child molestation in several ways. For example, pedophiles use pornographic photos to demonstrate to their victims what they want them to do. They also use them to arouse a child or to lower a child's inhibitions and communicate to the unsuspecting child that a particular sexual activity is okay: "This person is enjoying it; so will you."

Red-herring. The deliberate use of pornography as an indoctrinatory tool by child molesters is entirely different from a child happening to chance upon porno on the Internet. Moreover, this specifically relates to child pornography, which is already illegal regardless of this "War on Pornography" or the CDA or any other associated movements.

Children often imitate what they've seen, read, or heard. Studies suggest that exposure to pornography can prompt kids to act out sexually against younger, smaller, and more vulnerable children. Experts in the field of childhood sexual abuse report that any premature sexual activity in children always suggests two possible stimulants: experience and exposure. This means that the sexually deviant child may have been molested or simply exposed to sexuality through pornography.

Anonymous "studies suggest" and anonymous "experts report". Nope, still no evidence.

Replicated studiesx have demonstrated that exposure to significant amounts of increasingly graphic forms of pornography has a dramatic effect on how adult consumers view women, sexual abuse, sexual relationships, and sex in general. These studies are virtually unanimous in their conclusions: When male subjects were exposed to as little as six weeks' worth of standard hard-core pornography, they:

• developed an increased sexual callousness toward women
• began to trivialize rape as a criminal offense or no longer considered it a crime at all
• developed distorted perceptions about sexuality
• developed an appetite for more deviant, bizarre, or violent types of pornography (normal sex no longer seemed to do the job)
• devalued the importance of monogamy and lacked confidence in marriage as either a viable or lasting institution

Are you attempting to prove that pornography harms adults now? The promotion of distorted impressions of real-life sexuality is no different than the promotion of distorted impressions of real-life interactions in other areas, such as conflict resolution (where movies generally advocate violence). And I recall this study being brought up before; IIRC, it was conducted by asking adults to watch porn and then fill out questionnaires immediately afterwards, rather than examining any actual statistics of marriage dissolution or infidelity or serious deviant behaviour and correlating them to pornography use.

There are more out there, do you require them or have we established that there is *harm* to allowing a minor unfettered access to porn?

Is there a possibility of harm? Of course. Is there sufficient evidence of harm to justify criminalization of the distribution mechanism? No, particularly when you shamelessly mix child porn use by molesters with inadvertent exposure to any pornography materials at all in your proofs, cite statements which contain useless statements like "studies show", and present only one real piece of evidence, which defines promotion of unrealistic ideas as harm, could easily be corrected with education rather than censorship, and which happens to be based on an absolutely laughable methodology unless I'm remembering a different study (yours came with no link).

(Not that this is really every an issue of contention between me and you, as you have cleverly avoided and sidesteped the issue of whether you believe that 8 year olds should have access to porn, rather quite rightly pointed to your parental vigillance which is shielding them from it)?

I don't think parents should give 8 year olds access to porn. That doesn't mean that porn should be eliminated from any venue where an 8 year old could conceivably run into it if allowed to run around loose, particularly when the most offensive and potentially dangerous form of porn (child porn) is already illegal regardless of the resolution of this question. What you're saying is that anyone who thinks the entire public domain does not have to be turned into Kiddie Korner must think it's good for 8 year olds to watch porn.

The Relationship Between Children Looking at Porn and Being Solicitated for Sex

Isabelle Michelet, director of consulting firm Prasena, which designed the questionnaires, revealed that more than 71 per cent of the youths (aged 12 to 25) surveyed had visited a pornographic website at least once, while 45 per cent of them have been repeat visitors.

Surprisingly, 30 per cent of children (aged seven to 11) and 52 per cent of youths said they have no problems with trading naked pictures of movie stars via computers.

A total of 73 per cent of the porn site regulars were undeterred by the "inconvenient" consequences of visiting those sites, including facing dozens of porn-related commercial pop-up windows and having their homepage settings changed. However, 43 per cent of children and 63 per cent of youths admitted that they have faced some shocking websites containing distressing or "ugly" pictures, or bad language.

The survey found that 92 per cent of children and youths have been invited to talk about sex. Once faced with such situations, most of them opted to change the subject or switch off while 17 per cent continued the conversation, arguing the risk was minimal.

Most children and youths were aware of the possibility that their virtual friends or confidants could be impostors. They really did not care about that, however.

More astonishing, half of both children and youths have discovered that at least one of their "friends" on the Net was an impostor.

So lots of kids watch porn, and lots of kids have been solicited. How does this prove that one causes the other?

Thirty percent of parents don't know what their children are doing online, according to recent research by Ending Child Prostitution, Pornography and Trafficking (Ecpat) and the Prasena research company. And 50 percent of teachers also don't know what their students are doing.

Over 60 percent of children aged between seven and 11, and 80 percent of youths (aged 12 to 25) frequently use the Internet at home. A total of almost 40 percent of the younger group and 80 percent of the older group are alone while on the Internet.

<snip>

On chatlines, 20 and 55 percent of children and youths had experienced vulgar language, propositions to send sex or violent materials, or invitations to have sex.

Only one third of children said they would talk to their parents about this, and only four percent of youths would do so.

<snip>

He receives 50 to 60 emails a day reporting improper Web sites connected to pornography, gambling, the sex trade, crime and threats to national security. Charges are made in one or two cases a week.

<snip>

Pol Col Yanaphon's concerns about online sex encounters with strangers are echoed in the Ecpat research. Over 90 percent of children and youths who use chatlines have been invited to speak about sex. Only eight percent of children and seven percent of youths who have had a ``shocking experience in a chat room'' vowed never to chat again. Almost one third of children said they would merely try to change the subject. And 12 percent of teenagers and 17 percent of youths so propositioned said they would ``go for it''.

``Either through naivete or apathy, these youths could leave themselves open and vulnerable to `grooming' by paedophiles,'' explained Ecpat social worker Guy Thompstone.

He described this finding as a disturbing sign of what he called ``pseudo-maturity,'' meaning that youths believe they are adults when in fact they are not.

Another disturbingly high proportion of the respondents _ 24 percent of children and 37 percent of youths _ have had at least one meeting with someone they met on the Internet.

Of those who met their Internet correspondents face-to-face, 58 percent of children aged under 12 and 46 percent of youths were surprised by the identity of the person they met, while 25 percent and 32 percent, respectively, were shocked by the encounter, Ecpat disclosed.

``Most children and youths realised that their virtual friends could be imposters, but they found it exciting or didn't really care,'' said Isabelle Michelet, director of Prasena.

Nearly one-third of children and teenagers had parents and teachers who either did not care about or did not understand their Internet use. A third said they had no adult supervision and nearly half said that adult involvement was limited.

So _ who to blame in this matter? Parents blame schools for not teaching sex education. Teachers blame parents for not supervising their kids' use of the Internet, and the government for its lack of policies on the issue. Meanwhile, the government puts the blame on deteriorating family bonds and rapid technological advances.

<sniP>

But Ecpat found that while many respondents (44 percent of children, 67 percent of youths) reported having some type of screening mechanism on their computers, these appeared to be somewhat irrelevant as more than half of respondents knew how to get around the blocks.

Should we impose censorship, then? Wouldn't that go against the freedom of expression that's important to a democratic society like Thailand?

``Censorship is possible. But it won't solve the problem,'' said Dr Thaweesak Koanantakool, director of the National Electronics and Computer Technology Centre (Nectec).

Inappropriate Internet traffic such as excessive downloading of images, illegal music files and videos may be relatively easy to discover and stop at local networks in places like schools and companies. ``Filtering this traffic at the ISPs might lead to negative commercial effects. So ISPs aren't willing to censor anything,'' said Dr Thaweesak.

Sources

1. PubMed, a service of the National Library of Medicine, includes over 14 million citations for biomedical articles back to the 1950's
   1. Influence of unrestrained access to erotica on adolescents' and young adults' dispositions toward sexuality.
   2. No excuses: televised pornography harms children.
2. Enough is Enough
   1. How Pornography Harms Children
3. Ending Child Prostitution, Pornography and Trafficking (Ecpat)
   1. An online survey shows that Thai youths are ill-prepared for the Internet's dark side, and may be putting themselves in harm's way
   2. Almost three-quarters of Thai youths have visited pornographic websites, and 45 per cent of them have become the sites' regulars, ...
   3. Parents are underestimating the dangers children can encounter on the Internet, according to research ...
   4. The US SupremeRe Court has narrowly ruled that a law meant to protect children from online pornography is probably an infringement of free speech. ...

Nice try, but this only establishes a correlation between unsupervised chatline use and solicitation (which is quite frankly a no-brainer anyway), not a correlation between exposure to pornography and solicitation.

I believe I have satisfied the burden of proof for viewing pornography as being harmful to a child, both mentally and physically.

Wrong. You haven't established squat. You cited a series of studies which either cited other anonymous studies in turn, equated promotion of unrealistic ideas with "harm" (refer back to violent game/movie nanalogy an sex ed solution) or proved something else entirely, like the correlation between chatlines and solicitation which is undoubtedly valid but also has precisely jack shit to do with this topic.

It is almost revolting that I was actually asked to justify what should be a no brainer to anyone with two brain cells to rub together.

Too bad you failed, then.

The law prohibiting the distribution of porn to minors is already in place dipshit.

"Making something available on a communications network" is not the same as active distribution to a particular target audience, moron. Try again.

Unfortunately (as you rightly point out) the Internet is a distribution medium so it makes it difficult to actually enforce this law over it.

More parental vigilance is more than likely to solve 90% of all the world's problems that children are likely to encounter, unfortunately it isn't applicable in all cases, so we need another alternative to protect young minds

Legistlation require Age Verification is one such alternative (off the top of my head) that can help stop children from finding porn on the internet.

Viscous prosecution of spam emailers, is another.

If this is sounding familiar, it should it is one if the techniques that the Utah Attorney General Mark Shurtleff and his staff are developing, which is also discussed in the article.

Yeah, that's much smarter than educating kids and dealing with the chatline issue which is not pornography and which your own cites show is a far more strongly correlated with child sexual exploitation than pictures of Jenna Jameson getting fucked on the Internet.

Let's recap; Pornography harms children psychologically, it is conduit through which sexual predators can and will attach a child given opportunity.

Let's recap: you have failed to establish the former, and if a sexual predator is already in a position to be showing porn to a child, the porn isn't the problem.

Parents/Teachers/Legistlators all play a role in protecting the young children. You will notice that not one or two is adequet enough to protect them, requiring a conserted effort. Mike's analogy about what a resposible parent he is, begs the facts that he is in a monogamous relationship where one parent doesn't work, and can safely monitor the kids when they are home. The sad reality is that a growing number of kids now come from broken homes, one parent families, or families where both parents are working and are not able to monitor their kids.

Actually, my wife has been working since David went into school. Try again.

Saying legistlation to either restrict Internet access to pornography, or insist on somekind of age verification service is 'unwarrented' is akin to sticking you head in the sand and ignoring the problem.

No, it's pointing out some facts which are inconvenient to your position, such as:

1. You have failed to prove harm.
2. The real problem is clearly chatlines, not porn.
3. Child porn, which I do not dispute as harmful, is already illegal in all its forms, regardless of where or how it is distributed and any age verification systems.

Personally I am discusted that people actually asked me to verify that exposing a young child to pornography can cause harm like that isn't an instict that 99% of normal people will be aware of without requiring any kind of psychologists input.

It's already clear that you made your conclusion based purely on subjective assumptions and beliefs and then tried to cook up support for it after the fact, but you're only making it too obvious with statements like this.

(If you disagree, ask Mike if he puts on porn for his kid to watch, the resounding answer is NO!, because Mike isn't a deviant (well you know), and he does have a brain cell or two).

I don't put on porn for my kids to watch, but they've seen images of naked men and women before, usually by accident. It's not a concern. If one of them were to find some porn and watch it, I wouldn't encourage this but I wouldn't fret that his mind has been damaged by it either. I would just talk to him about it.

Well that's it for my ladies and gents. I hoped we learned something, and I am off to the snow for the long weekend (self declared not actual for all you other suckers ). Anyone choosing to continue this debate with me will have to wait around 1 week, as I am working the first two days back. Take care and don't chaff your willies!

Maybe while you're off, you should look up the definition of evidence, as you seem to think you have provided ample amounts of it when you have in fact provided none. The only kind of "harm" for which you provided anything remotely resembling evidence was the notion that porn promotes unrealistic ideas. Promotion of unrealistic ideas is nowhere near what any normal person would call legally actionable harm.

[The Yosemite Bear]

yes, It's not about stopping children from being unsupervised, gee parents if they used their brains (what a uniquie thought) kids would not have problems, no these folks want to stop ME from being able to access sites I as an adult. I am 34 years of age, I don't want some fucked up blue nose telling me what I can watch so long as it's not pics of kids or involves people fucking animals then you should get the fuck out of my life.

[Crown]

Which you deserved at the time, since Spyder posted a response which was certainly no more incendiary than your attack on Einy and you responded by massively distorting his position into "not letting 8 year olds see porn is unjust": a rather virulent statement which you knew perfectly well to be a deliberate distortion for rhetorical attack purposes. Don't play dumb.

I'm not you annoying individual. The only thing Spyder said was 'laws aren't always just' and I responded with 'do you believe laws disallowing 8 year olds access to pornography as unjust', a perfictly valid question since Spyder failed to demonstrate how, and which, laws were unjust.

Your response, was in your failed misguided notion, that we were talking abou the CDA ... *looks around* ... the only person discussing the CDA, was you! In the post directly preceeding it. YOU HAVE NEVER SHOWED WHERE EINY, MYSELF OR SPYDER HAVE EVER EVEN COME CLOSE TO DISCUSSING THE CDA.

I don't even know what CDA means (is it an ancronym?), and the only fucking things I can think off that you would be reffering to is 'Senate Concurrent Resolution 77' and 'House Concurrent Resolution 298' or 'The Child Pornography Protection Act'.

Where on the page (for me who is either too fucking stupid to live or blind to function) is the 'CDA'. Link it.

He asked for proof. You admit that you did not provide any. How did my comment "miss the mark?"

fuck if I'm going to repeat myself. He asked for proof of where the 9 out of 10 claim came for, I provided the proof they cited (had he clicked on the fucking webpage he would have seen it). And then he claimed that it didn't demonstrate harm anyway so it didn't matter. What, you need a picture.

Exactly. And you can roll your eyes all you like, but it's a valid point. It is eminently reasonable to distinguish between an unjust law and the goal which the unjust law is intended to accomplish.

You need to prove that a law is unjust Mike, you haven't. (If you are taliking about the CDA, it isn't a law, and if you are talking about the prohibition of sale of porn to minors, it is just, as I proved your handwaving not withstanding).

But let me ask you; do you think the sale and distribution of porn should be made legal to minors?

And you wonder why I told you to stop being a sophistic cunt.

And you wonder why this fucking 'debate' continues, when all you do is attempt to 'show my inner thoughts' when they are written right there in black and white.

Translation: you have no answer, so you resort to the Appeal to Motive fallacy and show once again why I say you've been acting like a sophistic cunt. If you honestly believe that Sunday School has less of a harmful indoctrinatory effect on society than spam E-mail, you're on drugs. One "exposes" kids to advertisements and pictures; the other comes with the implicit approval of community, parents, and supposedly God and tells kids how to think. Figure it out.

What part of "parents choose whether to let their kids use a computer" do you not understand?

So first you invoke parental privilege in justifying Sunday School indoctrination from childhood, and then you say that parents are idiots, so the decisions and responsibilities should be taken out of their hands? The funniest thing is that you honestly don't seem to recognize the logical inconsistency here.

You are really trying hard for 'idiot of the year award' aren't you? A parent who takes their child to Sunday school has a pretty clear image of what their child is being 'indoctrined' into. A parent (who horros of all horros isn't computer savvy) isn't as prepared with the ramifications of what a child can find on the internet.

You call it a contradiction -- which only becomes one when you assign the same level of awarness to a parent (which I posted earlier doesn't fly). Too bad, so sad.

Obviously, you don't get the whole concept of "red herrings are bad". In a discussion of pornography, the fact that a vending machine will let kids rent "Aliens" is not relevant.

Oh I'm sorry Mikey -- did getting caught with your dick in the zipper hurt? You brought up 'Sunday school' a clear fucking red herring, I countered with censorship to protect children is already prelevant in society to protect children and used film classifications as one of my points, It wasn't a red herring then, but it is now? Kiss my ass.

Why not monitor everyones' phone calls too? Same reason: money and the fact that the worst threats posed by the Internet are person-to-person communications such as chatroom solicitations, rather than what you would characterize as "pornography".

Yes. That is the biggest threat of physical harm to a child, but the evidence also points at psychological harm to a child from viewing porn (you didn't refute jack).

he fact that many parents do a shitty job of parenting does not mean that everyone else must compensate for their negligence by giving up their freedoms. I honestly don't see how that follows at all.

So the fact that you conceed that parents can (and often do) shitty jobs at parenting, and the innocent child is the one that suffers, doesn't concern you? And would you stop with the fucking 'giving up freedoms' bullshit. Allow me to repeat it for the umpteenth time; I DO NOT ADVOCATE THE KIND OF PROPOSAL THAT WAS STRUCK DOWN BY THE SUPREME COURT. IT WAS A PIE IN THE SKY PROPOSAL AT BEST -- WITH NO CHANCE OF ACTUAL IMPLIMENTATION -- AND AT WORST IT ROBBED ADULTS OF THEIR FREEDOMS.

Should I engrave it in blood for you?

Actually, violent videogames and movies are much easier to get than pornography via any means, including the Internet. Most of them aren't even R-rated, since movie ratings boards generally consider violence to be reasonably wholesome fare for children.

Prove about 'violent vediogames and movies' being easier to get 'including the Internet' -- your opinion of such doesn't justify 'proof' as I have been soundly told many times in this thread. And your ratings classification spiel also requires some proof (and now general observation of your own analogies isn't proof). The classification's board lists it's standards, this shouldn't be hard.

You can view the Office of Film & Literature Classifactions' Guide Lines here (pdf file).

You seemed to be arguing that unsupervised kids = distribution to minors = illegal = justified, which is precisely what the CDA argued. If that's not what you meant, I retract the criticism.

I am arguing porn = bad/illegal for kids = measures should be undertaken to restrict their access to it. I have said emphatically that education/parental vigillance play a big role (I did ask you to read my reply in its entirity before you replied), I have demonstrated that porn is harmfull to children (presented medical journal reports, you want better, too bad disagree with Authorities on the matter or present you own 'expert' witnesses) but unfortunately there is an alarming inability of parents not doing what they are meant to do, ergo the government can step in and help take the fucking burden.

We use 'sealed' sections and 'discreet' covers in magazine newstands, why not a similar proposal for Internet sites offering porn. Some kind of Age Verification? Or a Child only webdomain? Something that while not 'censoring' the internet, does reduce the likelyhood of a child stumbeling accross porn?

It's not obvious, but one of the petitions they want you to pass around bemoans the fact that the CDA was knocked down. From that, I concluded that he supported the CDA, and would again if something like it returned.

Err, k then?

So? Why does that mean they should go to the source and muzzle it, rather than simply creating an act which requires providers of Internet kiosks to disallow kids below a certain age from using them?

so we went from agreeing that I misused the word 'distributor' and 'exhibitioner' and here we are again, you think that we are having a communication problem here?

I saw no post from Spyder in which he claimed it had zero effect on children whatsoever. I saw a post where he said that you need to justify the kind of actions that the "War on Pornography" cranks advocate.

Now there's an interesting argument. You say that they lack the mental maturity required to look at porn. I ask you, what exactly is the minimum required mental maturity for looking at porn and what exactly are the long term harmful effects of lacking it?

Well the first time I saw porn I was 16 and I turned out OK. Strictly speaking physiologically we are 'mature' enough once we past puberty and are able to reproduce. Would that also mean that mentally - psychologically - that we are also mature enough?

The best study was done by Sir Willian Utting in a report published in 1997 for the UK Ministry for Health. You can view a piece from Ecpat International wich is a society working to eliminate the commercial sexual exploitation of children.

Specifically this PDF file. I quote;

How sex offenders use child pornography
Utting20 suggests that exposure to pornography desensitises children and it can inflict other psychological harm. Child abusers show both adult pornography and child pornography to children as a means of “lowering their inhibitions”. They will show pictures in which the children have been forced to smile so that it can be claimed, especially to younger children, that they are “having fun”.

With older children pornography, both child pornography and adult pornography, is used to excite them and to show them that what is being done is ‘alright’.

Yes, of course this deals with the much crueler sexual predator angle, of how to brainwash a child and exploit them, but the fundamental underlining principal is the important distinction. That being; a child can be manipulated in such a fasion because they lack the mental maturity to be able to process such imagery.

You're right. He asked for the minimum age, and what are the harmful minimal affects were. That was the best I could do at the time.

A) Not a justification.
B) Subjective. Also not a justification, nor does it establish harm.
C) So you feel that in the era discussed, every single child was damaged by this exposure?
D) Also not a justification or establishment of harm. The fact that it subjectively repulses you does not mean it will harm children. It will probably just repulse them too.

A) It's a the law of the land, you don't like it, campaign to change it. In this case I posted evidence showing how the law is just, so your point is moot anyway.
B) Evidence of harm has been presented and your 'opinions' to the contrary don't change it. I referenced medical journals, publications by authorities on the matter. You are free to challenge their findings (or references) as much as you like.
C) Strawman. We are discussing the difference between children watching their parents have sex, to group gang bangs, BDSM, etc.
D) Probably? Nice air tight evidence there bucko. Oh and again, my sources have been sited challenge them.

If you're going to say that "exposure" due to transmission on a medium which adult end-users should regulate but don't is active distribution to minors and should be stoppd, then you are indeed saying that the Internet should be censored. If you didn't want to say that, you should have looked more carefully at what you were writing.

The only person who brought up 'censorship' on the internet was you when you pulled out a description of Spyder's post that isn't there. I was only discussing the harmfull affects of porn has on children. And one point of sexual solicitation (via online chat rooms and I rather fullishly and stupidly managed to tie that into porn latter with you, even though this wasn't something that I was ever linking to in my first or second posts, or indeed third if memory serves).

Take that argument, apply it to religion, we should outlaw religion. By every objective standard, it is a form of brainwashing to which kids are exposed only because the parents are stupid.

I wouldn't shed any tears over it, would you?

How is it "bullshit" for me to point out that when you respond to the statement that sex ed is the solution to kids being unprepared for such images, I must think that sex ed is BSDM and scat? This is exactly the same kind of deliberate distortion you performed upon Spyder's post.

Oh rubbish. Sex ed (or at least the last time I went through it) went like this; primary school (age about 11) talked about puberty, the developments the body goes through and how we change, our parents came along to help us feel comfortable and provide their own anecdotes of when/how it was for them. Second sex ed; high school (about 15-16), STD's, pregnacy, safe sex, resources for sexual counciling, sexual discrimination.

I sure as hell never covered BDSM and scat in between (unless I blocked it out). And I sure as hell don't know what kind of sex ed they put you through in Canada, but I highly doubt that you did either. Tell me I'm wrong.

Unless you were suggesting that increase sexual education and awarness would be one of the ways and means with which we can help arm and protect the children (which I agree with), with this statement;

Do you have kids? I do, and I know how to supervise them. If you haven't talked to your kids by age 11 about sex, you're a delinquent parent. Delinquent parents should not blame the world for not compensating for their own inadequacies.

So if you are suggesting that sex ed doesn't prepare kids for such exposure, and it should to help minimize their trauma, I would agree with you. If you are suggesting the level of sex ed that a kid is given at age 11 is sufficient, then well ...

It's instinctive. You can't tell me that a kid can't figure out on his own that tying somebody up and beating him is weird and probably unpleasant. But this has no bearing on my sex ed point. If the government wants to do something about parental negligence, they need to use the apparatus they already have in place (the school system) and educate the children themselves, so that they will know how to react to this stuff if they run into it.

Wonderfull solution there, except that the government can no more impose its self on the school system (for one, parents can remove their kids from it and 'home school' them, or place them in religious schools), with the necessary wieght required to prepare the children, as they could with the Internet (which would require an alomst CDA kind of action -- which isn't something as an adult who likes to look at porn wants to see, and which would be nigh impossible to impose).

And again, the ones who are harmed are; the children, through no fault of their own.

Oh puh-lease, it does not take a "super child" to recognize on some instinctive level that people eating shit or getting whipped is fucked up, and say "ewwwww" rather than "hey, I wanna do that!"

And yet there is a market for this porn out there, well you put me in my place there Mike, sorry I brought it up.

"Links" like the "links" between pre-invasion Iraq and Al-Quaeda, no doubt.

Self fullfilling profecy much?

No evidence or even an oblique reference to a proper study here; just an "expert" who says that it's true.

No rebuttle other than a weak attempt to imply an appeal to authority fallacy on my behalf, the experts in this case were published in a medical journal, I leave it up to you to decide if it holds any weight.

Again, no evidence: it merely cites "one study" with no name

The reference is a valid source, once again being published in a medical journal (The Journal of Sex Research). The author, date and page reference are clearly marked. Feel free to rebut their evidence.

Red-herring.

Too right. My mistake, appologese.

Anonymous "studies suggest" and anonymous "experts report". Nope, still no evidence.

Cited author, publication and page reference. Once again feel free to prove they are bullshitting.

Are you attempting to prove that pornography harms adults now?

Are you arguing that adults would have a less suseptablity to porn than children?

The promotion of distorted impressions of real-life sexuality is no different than the promotion of distorted impressions of real-life interactions in other areas, such as conflict resolution (where movies generally advocate violence). And I recall this study being brought up before; IIRC, it was conducted by asking adults to watch porn and then fill out questionnaires immediately afterwards, rather than examining any actual statistics of marriage dissolution or infidelity or serious deviant behaviour and correlating them to pornography use.

If I asked for evidence, would I be bad?

Is there a possibility of harm? Of course. Is there sufficient evidence of harm to justify criminalization of the distribution mechanism? No, particularly when you shamelessly mix child porn use by molesters with inadvertent exposure to any pornography materials at all in your proofs, cite statements which contain useless statements like "studies show", and present only one real piece of evidence, which defines promotion of unrealistic ideas as harm, could easily be corrected with education rather than censorship, and which happens to be based on an absolutely laughable methodology unless I'm remembering a different study (yours came with no link).

So now 'there is a possibility of harm' Mike? Seems to me I have medical journals that disagree, rather emphatically, with the 'possibility'. Show my 'proof' to be lacking.

And the source was stated; Exposure to Pornography Shapes Attitudes and Values. Or did you not click on my sources?

I don't think parents should give 8 year olds access to porn. That doesn't mean that porn should be eliminated from any venue where an 8 year old could conceivably run into it if allowed to run around loose, particularly when the most offensive and potentially dangerous form of porn (child porn) is already illegal regardless of the resolution of this question. What you're saying is that anyone who thinks the entire public domain does not have to be turned into Kiddie Korner must think it's good for 8 year olds to watch porn.

It already is censored in newsagencies, vedio stores, movie theaters, etc. And could we stop with the eliminated/banning bullshit that Spyder pulled and now you are pulling? Where have I advocated the 'elimination' of anyting?

What I'm saying anyone who is actually seriously arguing the point; prove that the law banning the distribution of porn to minor is 'unjust' needs to stand up and answer the question; should 8 year olds be given porn?

So lots of kids watch porn, and lots of kids have been solicited. How does this prove that one causes the other?

From my second post, Sir Willian Utting published a report for the UK Ministry of Health, demonstrating that porn is a tool which can be used to lower an child's inhibition. fill in the blanks.

Nice try, but this only establishes a correlation between unsupervised chatline use and solicitation (which is quite frankly a no-brainer anyway), not a correlation between exposure to pornography and solicitation.

No shit, although the arguement is presented that viewing porn actually reduces a child's inhibitions, and would increas the risk of them falling prey to sexual predators online. Had you done the shockingly original step of clicking on the links I presented as sources you would have realised that the <snip> was repeating the previous quote about the percentage of survee's (is that even a fucking word, god it's late) who voluntarily frequent porn sites. Don't say I never do anything for you, click me.

The article mentioned that only 1/3 of children would want to talk to their parents about this but in actuality only 4% do so.

Wrong. You haven't established squat. You cited a series of studies which either cited other anonymous studies in turn, equated promotion of unrealistic ideas with "harm" (refer back to violent game/movie nanalogy an sex ed solution) or proved something else entirely, like the correlation between chatlines and solicitation which is undoubtedly valid but also has precisely jack shit to do with this topic.

Gee, click on the fucking links sometimes. You have managed to do jack all, but to through thinly vield accusations of the evidence not being concrete enough for you. Although they have been pulled from medical and sex journals, from the National Library of Medicine Click Me, and you of all people should know the stringent requirements and varifications which things need to go through in order to be published there in the first place.

In short; bite me.

Too bad you failed, then.

See above.

"Making something available on a communications network" is not the same as active distribution to a particular target audience, moron. Try again.

It is with unsoliseted porn spam mails, or did we fail advertising restrictions and classifications 101?

Yeah, that's much smarter than educating kids and dealing with the chatline issue which is not pornography and which your own cites show is a far more strongly correlated with child sexual exploitation than pictures of Jenna Jameson getting fucked on the Internet.

MEDLINE is the NLM's premier bibliographic database covering the fields of medicine, nursing, dentistry, veterinary medicine, the health care system, and the preclinical sciences. MEDLINE contains bibliographic citations and author abstracts from more than 4,800 biomedical journals published in the United States and 70 other countries. The database contains over 12 million citations dating back to the mid-1960's.

Disagree's with you. Prove that the evidence is wrong. Don't pretend it isn't good enough, find something to contradict it with.

Let's recap: you have failed to establish the former, and if a sexual predator is already in a position to be showing porn to a child, the porn isn't the problem.

Wow, Mike blindly brushes aside the above without even the decensy to blush. The former is supported by evidence printed in Medical Journals, you have failed to refute them. Except, that you know it is, as porn is shown to reduce the inhibitions of a person.

Actually, my wife has been working since David went into school. Try again.

Your kids home alone?

No, it's pointing out some facts which are inconvenient to your position, such as:

1. You have failed to prove harm.
2. The real problem is clearly chatlines, not porn.
3. Child porn, which I do not dispute as harmful, is already illegal in all its forms, regardless of where or how it is distributed and any age verification systems.

1) Argumentum ad nauseam You failed to refute any of the evidence cited from legitamite sources.
2) Child porn is the outcome of an abused child, if I brought it up anywhere, then I apologise since it is the end result, not the precursor (unless we look at it as being used as a tool with which to corrupt other children).

It's already clear that you made your conclusion based purely on subjective assumptions and beliefs and then tried to cook up support for it after the fact, but you're only making it too obvious with statements like this.

Yeah. Would kinda suck for me, if I wasn't able to back it up no?

I don't put on porn for my kids to watch, but they've seen images of naked men and women before, usually by accident. It's not a concern. If one of them were to find some porn and watch it, I wouldn't encourage this but I wouldn't fret that his mind has been damaged by it either. I would just talk to him about it.

Naked men and women != BDSM, scat or any other perverse fucking representation. It doesn't even come close to depicting depravity or a disrespect for the 'sexual object'. You know this. And the fact that you wouldn't encourage it, suggest that you too have some kind of reservation of allowing your kids to watch porn un-fettered, care to share with the class?

Maybe while you're off, you should look up the definition of evidence, as you seem to think you have provided ample amounts of it when you have in fact provided none. The only kind of "harm" for which you provided anything remotely resembling evidence was the notion that porn promotes unrealistic ideas. Promotion of unrealistic ideas is nowhere near what any normal person would call legally actionable harm.

Yeah, or maybe you would actually drop this 'hollier than thou' bullshit, roll up your sleeves and PROVE MY SOURCES WRONG. They are cited, they come from medical journals, they have gone through peer review.

Oh and please read this;

Because of the ethical and procedural problems surrounding research on children exposed to pornography, ideal research designs may never be possible. Nonetheless, we hope that this article will stimulate further discussion and work. To devise public policy that protects children from potentially harmful material while at the same time respecting the media's First Amendment rights, such public discourse and responsible research are essential.

1AM Apologise for any kind of 'incoherent English' Four hours to ski time!

[Crown]

yes, It's not about stopping children from being unsupervised, gee parents if they used their brains (what a uniquie thought) kids would not have problems,

That exact same arguement can be used for drug use, or teenage pregnancy. If you are waiting for the parents to act, then be prepared for the kids to be fucked over.

no these folks want to stop ME from being able to access sites I as an adult.

Something which I disagree with. But if I may ask if they only wanted to stop you from accessing porn sites for free, or without any kind of age verification would you also (as a 34) year old be outraged?

I am 34 years of age, I don't want some fucked up blue nose telling me what I can watch so long as it's not pics of kids or involves people fucking animals then you should get the fuck out of my life.

Indeed, but even if the worse case scenario came to pass (porn on the internet was banned, and by a wave of the magic picture fairy it was actually enforceable), and you could still access porn through an adult shop, how would you react?

[BoredShirtless]

Crown, I've never seen you so aggressive before. You recently started going to the gym, so I gotta ask; you on the roids? Is this roid rage? Well whatever it is it's very entertaining...FIGHT! FIGHT! FIGHT! FIGHT!

[Plekhanov]

Crown just 2 quick questions

What is the link between pornography and minors being solicited online? As far as I am aware of people get solicited in chat rooms not when visiting porn sites. So what the hell has porn got to do with the problem?


You mentioned how abusers use pornography in their grooming of their victims do they not also use more “legitimate” films which include nudity and love/sex scenes. If all porn was magically removed from the planet wouldn’t they just switch to I don’t know maybe the love scene from “Don't Look Now” and the nude scenes from “La Double Vie de Véronique”? Do you just object to porn because it can be misused in this way or do you have a problem with any form of art that can be similarly abused?

[Darth Wong]

I'm not you annoying individual. The only thing Spyder said was 'laws aren't always just' and I responded with 'do you believe laws disallowing 8 year olds access to pornography as unjust', a perfictly valid question since Spyder failed to demonstrate how, and which, laws were unjust.

Irrelevant, since he was refuting your response to Einy's post, in which you cited the existence of a law as justification for shifting the burden of proof, ie- the mere existence of the law created its own justification, and now the other party must prove a negative to to show that it's unjust.

Your response, was in your failed misguided notion, that we were talking abou the CDA ... *looks around* ... the only person discussing the CDA, was you! In the post directly preceeding it. YOU HAVE NEVER SHOWED WHERE EINY, MYSELF OR SPYDER HAVE EVER EVEN COME CLOSE TO DISCUSSING THE CDA.

Wrong. Your entire argument is to demand that Internet distribution of porn be outlawed, which is what the CDA did: it demanded that servers be responsible for making sure it's impossible for minors to view their material.

I don't even know what CDA means (is it an ancronym?)

I think this is all I need to know about your strident insistence that you don't support it; you don't even know what it is, yet you're screaming at me that I'm an idiot for saying you support it. How can you know that your argument does not mirror the basic demand of the CDA if you don't even know what the CDA is?

fuck if I'm going to repeat myself. He asked for proof of where the 9 out of 10 claim came for, I provided the proof they cited (had he clicked on the fucking webpage he would have seen it). And then he claimed that it didn't demonstrate harm anyway so it didn't matter. What, you need a picture.

Obviously, you don't know what "proof" is.

Exactly. And you can roll your eyes all you like, but it's a valid point. It is eminently reasonable to distinguish between an unjust law and the goal which the unjust law is intended to accomplish.

You need to prove that a law is unjust Mike, you haven't.

Wrong. I have asked you to prove that there is harm, and your failure to do so is my proof. Without established harm, throwing people in prison or fining them heavily for something is clearly unjust.

But let me ask you; do you think the sale and distribution of porn should be made legal to minors?

Sale, no. "Distribution" is a loaded rhetorical term, since nothing is being given directly to minors; it is merely being made available in venues which are currently unregulated, and for some reason the act of making it available is being held up as a target for regulation rather than the end-use point.

And you wonder why this fucking 'debate' continues, when all you do is attempt to 'show my inner thoughts' when they are written right there in black and white.

Too bad it's not your inner thoughts which are at the heart of this issue; it's your failure to provide proof of harm, your sophistic attempts to substitute "child porn" for all porn, etc.

Translation: you have no answer, so you resort to the Appeal to Motive fallacy and show once again why I say you've been acting like a sophistic cunt. If you honestly believe that Sunday School has less of a harmful indoctrinatory effect on society than spam E-mail, you're on drugs. One "exposes" kids to advertisements and pictures; the other comes with the implicit approval of community, parents, and supposedly God and tells kids how to think. Figure it out.

What part of "parents choose whether to let their kids use a computer" do you not understand?

So first you invoke parental privilege in justifying Sunday School indoctrination from childhood, and then you say that parents are idiots, so the decisions and responsibilities should be taken out of their hands? The funniest thing is that you honestly don't seem to recognize the logical inconsistency here.

You are really trying hard for 'idiot of the year award' aren't you? A parent who takes their child to Sunday school has a pretty clear image of what their child is being 'indoctrined' into. A parent (who horros of all horros isn't computer savvy) isn't as prepared with the ramifications of what a child can find on the internet.

Nope, I don't intend to take your "idiot of the year" award away; it's quite clear that you're rather attached to it. And your argument IS self-contradictory: it is negligence for a parent not to learn anything about computers if he buys one for his kid to use (it's not as if the potential for exposure to objectionable material is a secret), and as a point of fact, most parents do NOT know exactly what is being taught to their kids in Sunday school, because they don't bother sitting in on the Sunday school classes to see what they're saying. They know only that it's "Christian", which is apparently good enough for them despite the vast array of different approaches to Christian theology and value indoctrination out there.

Obviously, you don't get the whole concept of "red herrings are bad". In a discussion of pornography, the fact that a vending machine will let kids rent "Aliens" is not relevant.

Oh I'm sorry Mikey -- did getting caught with your dick in the zipper hurt? You brought up 'Sunday school' a clear fucking red herring, I countered with censorship to protect children is already prelevant in society to protect children and used film classifications as one of my points, It wasn't a red herring then, but it is now? Kiss my ass.

Wrong. In fact, you provided an example where automatic censorship at the source is NOT employed, thus disproving your own argument. And Sunday School is not a red herring when your entire basis for "harm" is the teaching of unrealistic ideas. But feel free to pretend that really clever put-downs will somehow make your argument work despite the total lack of supporting evidence.

Why not monitor everyones' phone calls too? Same reason: money and the fact that the worst threats posed by the Internet are person-to-person communications such as chatroom solicitations, rather than what you would characterize as "pornography".

Yes. That is the biggest threat of physical harm to a child, but the evidence also points at psychological harm to a child from viewing porn (you didn't refute jack).

I don't have to refute that which does not exist. There was no evidence presented of psychological damage to children from merely viewing ordinary porn. Just a lot of handwaving on your part.

So the fact that you conceed that parents can (and often do) shitty jobs at parenting, and the innocent child is the one that suffers, doesn't concern you?

Since you have yet to show that any "suffering" is taking place, no. Show me the money.

And would you stop with the fucking 'giving up freedoms' bullshit. Allow me to repeat it for the umpteenth time; I DO NOT ADVOCATE THE KIND OF PROPOSAL THAT WAS STRUCK DOWN BY THE SUPREME COURT. IT WAS A PIE IN THE SKY PROPOSAL AT BEST -- WITH NO CHANCE OF ACTUAL IMPLIMENTATION -- AND AT WORST IT ROBBED ADULTS OF THEIR FREEDOMS.

Should I engrave it in blood for you?

Yes, since that way you might cover up your claims elsewhere that it would be "unjust" not to censor the means of distribution, which IS taking away adults' freedoms.

Actually, violent videogames and movies are much easier to get than pornography via any means, including the Internet. Most of them aren't even R-rated, since movie ratings boards generally consider violence to be reasonably wholesome fare for children.

Prove about 'violent vediogames and movies' being easier to get 'including the Internet' -- your opinion of such doesn't justify 'proof' as I have been soundly told many times in this thread. And your ratings classification spiel also requires some proof (and now general observation of your own analogies isn't proof). The classification's board lists it's standards, this shouldn't be hard.

I guess the freely downloadable, widely publicized demos of every first-person shooter game in the world somehow escaped your attention. Not to mention the PG ratings on James Bond films

I am arguing porn = bad/illegal for kids = measures should be undertaken to restrict their access to it. I have said emphatically that education/parental vigillance play a big role (I did ask you to read my reply in its entirity before you replied), I have demonstrated that porn is harmfull to children (presented medical journal reports, you want better, too bad disagree with Authorities on the matter or present you own 'expert' witnesses) but unfortunately there is an alarming inability of parents not doing what they are meant to do, ergo the government can step in and help take the fucking burden.

Sorry, but appeals to authority are not evidence, and "medical journals" from psychologists (a pseudoscience field if there ever was one) aren't worth shit. Peer review in the psychology field is a joke, and you know it. Not one of those quotes you provided even explained any sort of testing methodology or how it came to its conclusions; it just states them as fact. Some of them even use the pitiful phrase "studies show", without bothering to name these studies, never mind explaining their methodology.

We use 'sealed' sections and 'discreet' covers in magazine newstands, why not a similar proposal for Internet sites offering porn. Some kind of Age Verification? Or a Child only webdomain? Something that while not 'censoring' the internet, does reduce the likelyhood of a child stumbeling accross porn?

We already do all of those things; haven't you tried visiting a porn website lately? What does it have to do with the "War on Pornography"? They're all pissed off because of teaser images on pornsite frontpages. And I've seen those teaser images; they're not going to "damage" anyone's mind.

You're right. He asked for the minimum age, and what are the harmful minimal affects were. That was the best I could do at the time.

That's the point; you can't show these harmful effects. All you can do is point to psychologists saying that they think there should be harmful effects. Where is the study showing that people who first saw porn as children are more likely to divorce, for example? Oops: nada, zilch. Where is the study showing that people who first saw porn as children are more likely to be rapists, for example? Oops: nada, zilch.

B) Evidence of harm has been presented and your 'opinions' to the contrary don't change it. I referenced medical journals, publications by authorities on the matter. You are free to challenge their findings (or references) as much as you like.

I have already challenged them by simply pointing out that Appeal to Authority is a logical fallacy, and they do not show any source data whatsoever, nor do they even describe methodology. Some of them merely make vague reference to other unnamed studies as evidence. It's a joke.

Take that argument, apply it to religion, we should outlaw religion. By every objective standard, it is a form of brainwashing to which kids are exposed only because the parents are stupid.

I wouldn't shed any tears over it, would you?

I wouldn't shed any tears over the loss of religion if it happened through other means, but it would be severely unjust to criminalize all unrealistic beliefs.

Oh rubbish. Sex ed (or at least the last time I went through it) went like this; primary school (age about 11) talked about puberty, the developments the body goes through and how we change, our parents came along to help us feel comfortable and provide their own anecdotes of when/how it was for them. Second sex ed; high school (about 15-16), STD's, pregnacy, safe sex, resources for sexual counciling, sexual discrimination.

I sure as hell never covered BDSM and scat in between (unless I blocked it out). And I sure as hell don't know what kind of sex ed they put you through in Canada, but I highly doubt that you did either. Tell me I'm wrong.

You don't have to specifically cover it to know from sex ed class that normal people don't do it, nor do you need training to realize that eating shit (for example) is disgusting. Thnk about this. You're acting as though children as complete blank slates even at the age of 8-12, and can be programmed like an EEPROM by simply viewing a porn site, no matter what horrors its depicts. That is manifestly untrue; show a kid a picture of somebody eating shit and he'll recoil in horror, not say "oh, I guess that's normal. I'll start doing that now."

Unless you were suggesting that increase sexual education and awarness would be one of the ways and means with which we can help arm and protect the children (which I agree with), with this statement

Precisely.

It's instinctive. You can't tell me that a kid can't figure out on his own that tying somebody up and beating him is weird and probably unpleasant. But this has no bearing on my sex ed point. If the government wants to do something about parental negligence, they need to use the apparatus they already have in place (the school system) and educate the children themselves, so that they will know how to react to this stuff if they run into it.

Wonderfull solution there, except that the government can no more impose its self on the school system (for one, parents can remove their kids from it and 'home school' them, or place them in religious schools), with the necessary wieght required to prepare the children, as they could with the Internet (which would require an alomst CDA kind of action -- which isn't something as an adult who likes to look at porn wants to see, and which would be nigh impossible to impose).

What are you talking about? The government imposes itself on the school system all the time. Even private schools must meet certain academic standards. Their lily-livered refusal to add sex ed to these standards does not change the fact that it would be a good idea or that they could do it.

Oh puh-lease, it does not take a "super child" to recognize on some instinctive level that people eating shit or getting whipped is fucked up, and say "ewwwww" rather than "hey, I wanna do that!"

And yet there is a market for this porn out there, well you put me in my place there Mike, sorry I brought it up.

Your sarcastic remarks do not constitute a rebuttal. Do you think that a normal healthy child will be aroused by pictures of someone eating shit? Of course not; your attempt to show causality is a joke. The fact that some sickos out there like it does not mean that it will somehow magically make people who were not ALREADY inclined to like it into fans.

"Links" like the "links" between pre-invasion Iraq and Al-Quaeda, no doubt.

Self fullfilling profecy much?

How does this refute the point? You have failed to show that one causes the other.

No evidence or even an oblique reference to a proper study here; just an "expert" who says that it's true.

No rebuttle other than a weak attempt to imply an appeal to authority fallacy on my behalf, the experts in this case were published in a medical journal, I leave it up to you to decide if it holds any weight.

It does not. Psychology journal peer-review alone is a joke, and it IS an appeal to authority fallacy, regardless of whether you admit that.

Again, no evidence: it merely cites "one study" with no name

The reference is a valid source, once again being published in a medical journal (The Journal of Sex Research). The author, date and page reference are clearly marked. Feel free to rebut their evidence.

Appeals to authority are not evidence. Show me their "evidence". They don't even explain what methodology was used to come to these conclusions, nor do they show source data of any kind.

Anonymous "studies suggest" and anonymous "experts report". Nope, still no evidence.

Cited author, publication and page reference. Once again feel free to prove they are bullshitting.

See above.

Are you attempting to prove that pornography harms adults now?

Are you arguing that adults would have a less suseptablity to porn than children?

I'm arguing that "porn desensitizes people to more porn" does not constitute harm. You have still failed to show any objective proof of harm.

The promotion of distorted impressions of real-life sexuality is no different than the promotion of distorted impressions of real-life interactions in other areas, such as conflict resolution (where movies generally advocate violence). And I recall this study being brought up before; IIRC, it was conducted by asking adults to watch porn and then fill out questionnaires immediately afterwards, rather than examining any actual statistics of marriage dissolution or infidelity or serious deviant behaviour and correlating them to pornography use.

If I asked for evidence, would I be bad?

Yes, since you were the one claiming to provide evidence, and this quote, like all your others, fails to explain how they came to their conclusions. The fact that I point this out, and then suggest that it might have been a study I heard about before with pitiful methodology, does not obviate your responsibility to actually back up your claims. I don't have to prove there is no harm; you have to prove there IS harm. Demands to prove a negative don't wash.

So now 'there is a possibility of harm' Mike? Seems to me I have medical journals that disagree, rather emphatically, with the 'possibility'. Show my 'proof' to be lacking.

A possibility of harm is not a proof of harm, and appeals to authority don't wash. Or do we really need to go into the sordid history of psychology's peer-review system, as exemplified by the American Psychological Association continuing to endorse the Rorscach test despite decades of use in which no real evidence has been presented for its effectiveness and many psychologists acknowleding this outright?

And the source was stated; Exposure to Pornography Shapes Attitudes and Values. Or did you not click on my sources?

Yes, I clicked on it. Once again, it did not describe how these studies came to their conclusions. It merely said things like "according to one study". In order to prove something, you need to show data and reasoning; simply saying "well, a trained psychologist came to that conclusion" is not proof by any stretch of the imagination unless you're on drugs. By your logic, the Rorschach test is proven.

It already is censored in newsagencies, vedio stores, movie theaters, etc. And could we stop with the eliminated/banning bullshit that Spyder pulled and now you are pulling? Where have I advocated the 'elimination' of anyting?

You said it would be "unjust" NOT to eliminate it! You scream that if anyone says we should not censor the Internet, we must think it's wrong to keep porn out of the hands of kids, remember?

What I'm saying anyone who is actually seriously arguing the point; prove that the law banning the distribution of porn to minor is 'unjust' needs to stand up and answer the question; should 8 year olds be given porn?

For the umpteenth time, there is a difference between making porn available on the Internet and actively giving it to kids, but you seem bound and determined to ignore this.

So lots of kids watch porn, and lots of kids have been solicited. How does this prove that one causes the other?

From my second post, Sir Willian Utting published a report for the UK Ministry of Health, demonstrating that porn is a tool which can be used to lower an child's inhibition. fill in the blanks.

Bzzzt, try again. That only happens once the kid is already being solicited. It's a method that the solicitor uses to try and break down the kid's defenses, and the particular form of porn cited (kiddie porn) is already illegal, both on and off the Internet. This is very specific to kiddie porn and child molesters and has nothing to do with your claim that any graphic sexual depiction will harm children by simply being seen.

Nice try, but this only establishes a correlation between unsupervised chatline use and solicitation (which is quite frankly a no-brainer anyway), not a correlation between exposure to pornography and solicitation.

No shit, although the arguement is presented that viewing porn actually reduces a child's inhibitions, and would increas the risk of them falling prey to sexual predators online.

See above.

Had you done the shockingly original step of clicking on the links I presented as sources you would have realised that the <snip> was repeating the previous quote about the percentage of survee's (is that even a fucking word, god it's late) who voluntarily frequent porn sites. Don't say I never do anything for you, click me.

I already read it, thanks. And nowhere does it show that pornography leads to solicitation. It only says that lots of kids watch porn, and that lots of kids are solicited on the Internet, and it assumes that one causes the other without a shred of evidence. Must as you are doing now.

Gee, click on the fucking links sometimes. You have managed to do jack all, but to through thinly vield accusations of the evidence not being concrete enough for you.

They're not "thinly veiled" at all. There is no evidence in your links. Nothing but "a psychologist said so, so it MUST BE TRUE. OMG YOU'RE AN IDIOT FOR NOT BELIEVING EVERYTHING THEY SAY".

you of all people should know the stringent requirements and varifications which things need to go through in order to be published there in the first place.

The stringent requirements it takes for a psychology paper to get published? Hate to break the news to you, but they don't have the kind of standards that other fields of medicine do.

"Making something available on a communications network" is not the same as active distribution to a particular target audience, moron. Try again.

It is with unsoliseted porn spam mails, or did we fail advertising restrictions and classifications 101?

I've gotten lots of unsolicited spam porn mails; I know perfectly well what they look like. I have heard no reason to believe that they would "damage" anyone's mind, even a child.

MEDLINE is the NLM's premier bibliographic database covering the fields of medicine, nursing, dentistry, veterinary medicine, the health care system, and the preclinical sciences. MEDLINE contains bibliographic citations and author abstracts from more than 4,800 biomedical journals published in the United States and 70 other countries. The database contains over 12 million citations dating back to the mid-1960's.

Disagree's with you. Prove that the evidence is wrong. Don't pretend it isn't good enough, find something to contradict it with.

No evidence has been presented. All you're doing is saying that an Appeal to Authority is OK if you think it's a really good authority. Yet again, I must say that you're wrong. Even Stephen Hawking had to explain how he came to his conclusions, instead of just saying "I'm Stephen Hawking, I'm right". And he's not in psychology, where moronic things like the Rorscach test are still cited as valid by major associations. Don't be an idiot.

Wow, Mike blindly brushes aside the above without even the decensy to blush. The former is supported by evidence printed in Medical Journals, you have failed to refute them. Except, that you know it is, as porn is shown to reduce the inhibitions of a person.

Ah, so "reduce inhibitions" is harm now? Violent movies reduce inhibitions against violence; why are they still PG rated?

Actually, my wife has been working since David went into school. Try again.

Your kids home alone?

They're in school during the day.

Argumentum ad nauseam You failed to refute any of the evidence cited from legitamite sources.

[
"An expert says so without explaining how he came to his conclusions" is not evidence. Sorry.

2) Child porn is the outcome of an abused child, if I brought it up anywhere, then I apologise since it is the end result, not the precursor (unless we look at it as being used as a tool with which to corrupt other children).

Fair enough.

It's already clear that you made your conclusion based purely on subjective assumptions and beliefs and then tried to cook up support for it after the fact, but you're only making it too obvious with statements like this.

Yeah. Would kinda suck for me, if I wasn't able to back it up no?

Yes indeed, since you didn't. For the umpteenth time, "an expert says so without explaining how he arrived at his conclusion" is not evidence.

Naked men and women != BDSM, scat or any other perverse fucking representation.

Irrelevant, since you claimed that any graphic sexual depiction will harm children. You have failed to prove this, and moving the goalposts now won't change anything. Moreover, I will say again that images like that will cause normal people to recoil; it won't MAKE THEM LIKE IT.

You can say "experts say so!" all day long, and make yourself look like a raving idiot by being so aggressive in your defense of the Appeal to Authority fallacy all day long too, but it still won't be evidence.

[Darth Wong]

Crown, these messages become unwieldy for their length, so answer me this: Do you seriously believe that it is "evidence" to simply say that an expert says so? Or that psychology papers are as credible as, say, biochemistry papers? And what do you believe distinguishes this from the "Appeal to Authority" fallacy? Because that's precisely what you argued in your last post, many times over and very stridently with lots of smarmy put-downs, as if anyone who disagrees must be a lunatic.

[salm]

I just wonder what thier beef with porn is.

In Europe, Germany especally, we are not even remotely that hostile when it comes to porn. We know it is there, we maybe not watch it, but also we don't fight against it. To make it short, we accepted it as part of our society.

What can't that be also that way in America?

could you just quit that germany wanking? in every thread that´s about some fuck up in america there´s at least one tribun post explaining that it´s much better here in germany even though a comparison between america and germany isn´t even remotely up to discussion.

stuff like that adds nothing to the discussion and is annoying as hell if repetive.

[Darth Wong]

could you just quit that germany wanking? in every thread that´s about some fuck up in america there´s at least one tribun post explaining that it´s much better here in germany even though a comparison between america and germany isn´t even remotely up to discussion.

stuff like that adds nothing to the discussion and is annoying as hell if repetive.

Interestingly enough, the last time I talked to somebody from Germany about politics, he was pretty much the same way. Every other minute he seemed to mention how Germany was so much better than the US. I guess you could say it's national pride if you want to put a positive spin on it, or I suppose you could say it's anti-American bigotry if you want to put a negative spin on it. Either way, I agree it does get a little repetitive after a while.

[The Yosemite Bear]

yes, It's not about stopping children from being unsupervised, gee parents if they used their brains (what a uniquie thought) kids would not have problems,

That exact same arguement can be used for drug use, or teenage pregnancy. If you are waiting for the parents to act, then be prepared for the kids to be fucked over.

no these folks want to stop ME from being able to access sites I as an adult.

Something which I disagree with. But if I may ask if they only wanted to stop you from accessing porn sites for free, or without any kind of age verification would you also (as a 34) year old be outraged?

I am 34 years of age, I don't want some fucked up blue nose telling me what I can watch so long as it's not pics of kids or involves people fucking animals then you should get the fuck out of my life.

Indeed, but even if the worse case scenario came to pass (porn on the internet was banned, and by a wave of the magic picture fairy it was actually enforceable), and you could still access porn through an adult shop, how would you react?

well since I live in a redneck town in the middle of no-where, where the only access to porn is off the internet, come to think of it I bought Mikie and Corrina their wedding preseants off the internet. The nearest sex shop is over two hours away by car, and the selection there sucks, not to mention it's all overpriced being in redneck territory...

[Peregrin Toker]

Interestingly enough, the last time I talked to somebody from Germany about politics, he was pretty much the same way. Every other minute he seemed to mention how Germany was so much better than the US. I guess you could say it's national pride if you want to put a positive spin on it, or I suppose you could say it's anti-American bigotry if you want to put a negative spin on it. Either way, I agree it does get a little repetitive after a while.

Huh?

I thought their defeat in WW2 had left the Germans phobic of anything resembling nationalism?

[Howedar]

could you just quit that germany wanking? in every thread that´s about some fuck up in america there´s at least one tribun post explaining that it´s much better here in germany even though a comparison between america and germany isn´t even remotely up to discussion.

stuff like that adds nothing to the discussion and is annoying as hell if repetive.

Interestingly enough, the last time I talked to somebody from Germany about politics, he was pretty much the same way. Every other minute he seemed to mention how Germany was so much better than the US. I guess you could say it's national pride if you want to put a positive spin on it, or I suppose you could say it's anti-American bigotry if you want to put a negative spin on it. Either way, I agree it does get a little repetitive after a while.

Sounds like my English professor who was from Germany (go figure).

[Einhander Sn0m4n]

Wow, A porn/censorship thread that blew up into a huge Nuclear Flamewar and now is talking about German politics? This was definitely unexpected...

[Crown]

Crown, these messages become unwieldy for their length, so answer me this: Do you seriously believe that it is "evidence" to simply say that an expert says so? Or that psychology papers are as credible as, say, biochemistry papers? And what do you believe distinguishes this from the "Appeal to Authority" fallacy? Because that's precisely what you argued in your last post, many times over and very stridently with lots of smarmy put-downs, as if anyone who disagrees must be a lunatic.

An Appeal to Authority fallacy (as I know of it) is defined as follows;

Definition:
While sometimes it may be appropriate to cite an authority to support a point, often it is not. In particular, an appeal to authority is inappropriate if[/b]

1. the person is not qualified to have an expert
   opinion on the subject,
2. experts in the field disagree on this issue.
3. the authority was making a joke, drunk, or
   otherwise not being serious

Similar interpretations can be found here and here.

So if I were to say; Medical Journals say that quantum mechanics can best be described as monkey's juggeling bananas. Then this would be an Appeal to Authority (not to mention an absurd and moronic statement), because while Medical Journals are valid authorities on medical matters, they are not valid authorities on quantum mechanics.

In this case a medical journal talking about medical matters (in this case a Psychology matter discussed by Psychologists) is a valid authority, because;

1. The source is recognised as being qualified or an expert in its field
2. I myself haven't run accross any disagreement in this matter
3. While I don't know for certain, I think it is fairly certain that not all of these people were drunk or joking while making these claims

Of course if you can find any quotes that disagree, then we would have a problem, no?

As for your dislike of the Psychology field, it is a 'science' as it doesn't hold its self to dogma. All sciences have the same thing in common; peer review and constant challenges of 'accepted' facts. Are all sciences equal? No. Obviously a mathmatical science is far more precise science, certainly. But for an example, 40 years ago if you were schizophrenic a Psychologist could tell you exactly why you were schizophrenic; it was all due to your schizophrenic mother! And the best recommended action? Why a good old dose of shock therapy should fix you right up.

You will note that Psycologists now flatly reject the above, due to newer research. (This was quoted from memory by one of the leading Psychologists on schizophrenic disorders -- a schizophrenic himself, who has been fighting the disease since childhood, at a speach telecast on the ABC)

You might not choose to accept Psychologists as a valid scientists, fine, but who else would be a valid authority on the matter at hand?

Just to sum up (in order to clarify my thoughts); An 'Appeal to Authority' fallacy is more accurately described as an 'Appeal to [a False] Authority' fallacy.

Psychologists are valid authorities on the matter.

[HemlockGrey]

Frankly I would rather the government spend time, money, and effort doing something important, rather than trying their damndest to make sure I don't look at evil pornography.

I don't care who you are, but a child under 18 doesn't get into an R rated movie in Australia, parent permission/accompaniment ever. A child under the age of 15 cannot be allowed into a movie rated MA 15+ unless accompanied by a legal guardian, ever.

What the fuck? In America, I don't believe that you're legally required to follow the ratings - the MPAA isn't a legal organization. But in Australia, you have to? That's fucked up. So even if a parent deems their child mature enough to go see, say, Troy, they can't without inconviencing the parent? Good-bye concept of personal responsibility, hello nanny-state.

[Durandal]

What the fuck? In America, I don't believe that you're legally required to follow the ratings - the MPAA isn't a legal organization. But in Australia, you have to? That's fucked up. So even if a parent deems their child mature enough to go see, say, Troy, they can't without inconviencing the parent? Good-bye concept of personal responsibility, hello nanny-state.

Actually, I saw something very interesting at my AMC back home when I went to see Dodgeball, I think it was. It was a billboard ad that showed before the film about something called an "R Card." I guess that parents can give this card to a child under 17, and that child can get into R-rated movies.

Good concept, I think.

EDIT: It's not AMC; it's GKC. I must've remembered it wrong. Anyway, here's a link. Naturally, the MPAA is against the idea of putting responsibility in the parents' hands.

[DPDarkPrimus]

The R-Card is just an idea spawned by movie theaters wanting more money.

[Crown]

What the fuck? In America, I don't believe that you're legally required to follow the ratings - the MPAA isn't a legal organization.

You're right, the MPAA isn't a legal organization. The Office of Film and Literature Classification's though - is.

But in Australia, you have to? That's fucked up. So even if a parent deems their child mature enough to go see, say, Troy, they can't without inconviencing the parent? Good-bye concept of personal responsibility, hello nanny-state.

Troy was M (IIRC, sorry I work in projection now days not ticket box), but say a film like Silence of the Lambs or Fight Club was MA, the parents are more than welcome to buy a ticket and watch the movie with their children, but we as exhibitors cannot sell tickets to under 15 year olds alone (we have had parents ring up and complain to us, and the local newspaper when once we did, and quite a few times didn't), otherwise it gets ridiculous to enforce the law.

Also keep in mind R in Australia is a little worse that R in the US. Eyes Wide Shut or Chopper were R, while Kill Bill Vol 1 was MA and Kill Bill Vol 2 was M (IIRC).

[Mitth`raw`nuruodo]

I had a general idea of what sex was at the age of 7 or 8, when all of us elementry school kids discussed such things at recess and the lunch table. I had seen porn by 9.. when my dad caught me looking at it, he sat me down and explained it all. For the next few years, I heard more talk of sex and such from my elementry/middle/high school friends than I ever saw in any video, or read in any magazine. We're teenagers, we are curious about that kind of thing.

Honestly, I believe it causes more "harm" to suppress it than it does to allow it to be distributed, even to minors. We all remember the thread about the couple who went to a fertility clinic, wondering why they weren't having kids, without realizing that they had to have sex first.

(btw, I was watching porn while browing this thread )

[GySgt. Hartman]

So you believe that because you weren't harmed by it, it can't be harmful to anyone at all? Did you read the generous amount of scientific sources provided by Crown?
I think there is a big diiference between porn and nudity, so let's leave nudity and the depiction of sexual organs or acts as in a biology book, TV film or as accidentally seen in the parent's bedroom aside.
The major problem with children (age<12) viewing porn is that it often depicts women in a degrading manner, sometimes even enjoying rape. It can distort the views of reality of someone who has almost no other input on sex. It teaches kids that women enjoy being dominated and abused, that they enjoy pain and degradation.
No parent in their right mind would tolerate their kid viewing hardcore porpgraphy, so I think it is out of question that children shouldn't be able to view porn.

There certainly are methods of restricting cildren's access to porn without affecting adults too badly. Maybe ISPs could provide an alternative dial-up line where pornography isn't available, or they could offer the possibility of filling out forms for different local user accounts, where customers can state what they want to have blocked. Filtering will probably never be perfect, but it will be better than doing nothing.