should peadohpiles be allowed to live ?

[Atheistisaweirdword]

You don't need to quote an entire  thread. Just cut out the relevant parts.

You don't think it's logical enough to say that children are not meant for porn?

Nobody here, including me, has said children were meant for porn. Nobody has even said that the production of child pornography should be legal.

How can you compare gays to liking child porn? I just don't get your point.

Homosexuality and pedophilia are both involuntary sexual orientations that are misunderstood and discriminated against.

Just because something's legal in other countries doesn't make it right.

This is absolutely true. But it does demonstrate that your definition of right is not universally held.

I get your point of unvolintary sexual preference, but let's say people see it your way, which I can understand they can't help it, but why would a child even want to do porn? Children at that age just don't have the idea nor the will to want to do porn. Child porn is usually forced without them wanting to do it or not. Wouldn't that be detrimental to a child mind being forced to do? Very few would ever want to do it, and even if they did their parents would never allow it.

[Gnu Ordure]

Children at that age just don't have the idea nor the will to want to do porn. Child porn is usually forced without them wanting to do it or not.

It seems to me that you haven't read this whole thread; Joe has clearly said that the production of child porn should be a crime.

Though, now that I mention it, I'm not sure why Joe thinks that. If he believes that some 11-year-old girls can consent to sexual activity with a 30-year-old man, then surely those girls could also consent to being filmed in the act?

So tell us, Joe, why do you think the production of child-porn should be a crime?

[screwtape]

Hi Atheistisaweirdword

Please do not quote the entire post.  Just the parts relevant to your reply.  A link to the quoting tutorial is in my sig. Please read it and practice. Thanks.

Regards

[Atheistisaweirdword]

Children at that age just don't have the idea nor the will to want to do porn. Child porn is usually forced without them wanting to do it or not.

It seems to me that you haven't read this whole thread; Joe has clearly said that the production of child porn should be a crime.

Though, now that I mention it, I'm not sure why Joe thinks that. If he believes that some 11-year-old girls can consent to sexual activity with a 30-year-old man, then surely those girls could also consent to be being filmed in the act?

So tell us, Joe, why do you think the production of child-porn should be a crime?

I don't have a computer, so I usually just read the post responding to mine, but it goes for sex, there's no children at the age or 11 that would consent to sex with an adult without being talked in to it, kids just don't think 'damn that 30 year old guys attractive I could see him in my princess bedsheets'

[Atheistisaweirdword]

Hi Atheistisaweirdword

Please do not quote the entire post.  Just the parts relevant to your reply.  A link to the quoting tutorial is in my sig. Please read it and practice. Thanks.

Regards

Sorry won't happen again.

[One Above All]

Atheistisaweirdword, I'm going to give you a small tip:
Saying "it's obviously wrong" is an irrelevant statement, given that morality is relative. It's also irrelevant because just saying "it's obvious" doesn't prove anything. You have to show evidence for your claims.
EDIT: Here's an example.[1]
You said:

Often child pedophiles have tumors, orbitofrontal cortex tumor's have led to a man's sexual preference to turn to children, it's obviously not a natural thing that natural selection has given a man's brain the preference of a child, it's sickness.

Bold mine for emphasis.
Disregarding the fact that you have no idea what you're talking about after "children", do you have any evidence for your claim? I've yet to see a study linking brain tumors with pedophilia.

1.	Thanks to Quesi for pointing this out, as I had missed it.

[Timo]

If that is so obvious, then why isn't that logic applied to other illegal activities like say, celebrity sex tapes.

Pedophiles and celebrity sex tapes are 2 different things.
Often child pedophiles have tumors, orbitofrontal cortex tumor's have led to a man's sexual preference to turn to children, it's obviously not a natural thing that natural selection has given a man's brain the preference of a child, it's sickness. They can't literally be a mentally healthy person and like kids.

Just to chime in real quick.

Like a lot of people have said, you really need to read the full context in which an argument or comment is given before you can attempt to rebut it.  Your post is interesting.  I'd never heard about orbitofrontal cortex tumors and what not.  But it has absolutely nothing to do with the very narrow point I was making.

Welcome to the forum though.


Peace

[Quesi]

I've yet to see a study linking brain tumors with pedophilia.

Really?  There was one very famous case about 10 years ago.  Here is an exert from an article on the topic.  But if you google "brain tumor and pedophilia" you'll find lots more.   

In 2000, the man began collecting sex magazines and visiting pornographic Web sites, focusing much of his attention on images of children and adolescents.

Eventually he couldn't stop himself, telling doctors 'the pleasure principle overrode' everything else. When he started making subtle advances on his young stepdaughter, his wife called police. He was arrested for child molestation.

The man was convicted and failed a 12-step rehabilitation program for sexual addiction because he couldn't stop asking for sex favors, according to the case report.

The day before he was to be sentenced to prison, the man walked into the emergency room with a headache. He was distraught, Swerdlow said, and was contemplating suicide.

He also was 'totally unable to control his impulses,' Burns said. 'He'd proposition nurses.'

An MRI revealed the tumor, and it was cut out days later. The man's behavior began to improve. Swerdlow said the judge allowed him to complete a Sexaholics Anonymous program. The man eventually moved back home with his wife and stepdaughter.

About a year later, Swerdlow said, the tumor partially grew back and the man started to collect pornography again. He had another operation last year, and his urges again subsided.

'That's one of the interesting things about frontal lobe damage,' Swerdlow said. 'This guy, he knew what he was doing was wrong, but he thought there wasn't anything wrong with him, and he didn't stop.' http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/releases/4022.php

Here is another story about “late onset pedophilia" about a guy whose sexual interest in children started when he was 70 years old.  Brain concerns were cited as well. 

Paraphiliac behavior has been reported secondary to temporal lobe epilepsy, post-encephalitic neuropsychiatric syndromes, septal lesions, frontal lobe lesions, bilateral temporal lobe lesions, multiple sclerosis, and tumors in various sites.7 Recent reports have noted the concurrence of emergence of pedophilia in late life and brain disease. One report described 2 patients with pedophilia who had temporal lobe hypometabolism as revealed by positron emission tomography; 1 patient had frontotemporal dementia and the other had bilateral hippocampal sclerosis.4 No evidence of structural brain lesion, however, was evident in our patient.  http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1911163/

And here is an interesting piece on a man with temporal lobe damage caused by epilepsy, who, after undergoing brain surgery and a whole host of chemical interventions, became an pedophile, and was subsequently arrested and imprisoned for possession of child pornography.  The article questions  the ethics of his imprisonment, given that his behavior was clearly related to an ongoing brain problem, for which he was receiving treatment.  http://neuroskeptic.blogspot.com/2009/11/brain-damage-pedophilia-and-law.html  I’m guessing that Joe and I can agree on this one.  Prison does not seem to be the appropriate solution to this man’s problem. 

The article that Pianodwarf linked talked about brain differences in pedophiles, but I think that it oversimplified the issue, ignoring some of these cases, but more importantly ignoring environmental factors, such as childhood sexual abuse, social environments with innate power imbalances (such as war zones, disaster areas, refugee camps, illegal border crossings, etc.) where incidences of rape of women and children increase exponentially.   

But I did want to comment on Joe's articles and links.  First of all, the first one is about internet usage and rape statistics, and has nothing to do with child pornography or pedophilia.

I continue to stand by my statement that

  There are no comprehensive, global studies that track child sexual abuse period.  And there are certainly no longitudinal studies that track pre-porn cultures to post-porn cultures.

No one knows how many children are sexually abused, because most sexual abuse is not reported.  I could get on the phone right now and call up a dozen women I know personally who were sexually abused as children, by uncles at family barbeques, by step brothers throughout their tween years, by husbands in arranged (forced) marriages that would not be legally recognized in most parts of the world, by employers, by security guards at refugee camps where they sought protection, by coyotes who were paid by their parents to get them safely across a border, by traffickers who promised them a better life, and by soldiers who burned their villages.  There is no data on these women.  They are not included in anyone’s study of the sexual abuse of children. 

There are no reliable numbers that capture the reality of child sexual abuse this year or last year or 20 years ago or a hundred years ago because that data has not been collected.  So let’s not pretend that there are studies that say that child pornography (internet or otherwise) has decreased the incidence of child abuse.  There is no reputable study that could make that claim. 

[One Above All]

Really?
<snip>

I was unclear. I have yet to see a study regarding brain tumors and pedophilia on the scale that Atheistisaweirdword suggested. I know brain damage can result in a variety of effects, such as a change in sexual orientation/preference, but Atheistisaweirdword's wording suggested/implied/inferred that most pedophilia was due to brain tumors. If that is so, I'd like to see evidence for that, and for him to retract his statement that it's "wrong" (regardless of the "obviousness" of the morality of a sexual attraction). He can't have it both ways.
EDIT: Still, even if he is wrong about the "most" quantifier, which I suspect he is, his statement that an involuntary sexual attraction is somehow immoral is both illogical and wrong, and thus should be retracted, regardless.

There are no reliable numbers that capture the reality of child sexual abuse this year or last year or 20 years ago or a hundred years ago because that data has not been collected.  So let’s not pretend that there are studies that say that child pornography (internet or otherwise) has decreased the incidence of child abuse.  There is no reputable study that could make that claim. 

Sorry, but that goes both ways. To say that most sexual abuse goes unreported means that no study with that variable will ever be conclusive either way.

[Quesi]

There are no reliable numbers that capture the reality of child sexual abuse this year or last year or 20 years ago or a hundred years ago because that data has not been collected.  So let's not pretend that there are studies that say that child pornography (internet or otherwise) has decreased the incidence of child abuse.  There is no reputable study that could make that claim. 

Sorry, but that goes both ways. To say that most sexual abuse goes unreported means that no study with that variable will ever be conclusive either way.

I agree completely.  I've maintained from the beginning of this conversation (and for much of my adult life) that pedophilia is usually about power imbalances.  There is ample evidence that a significant percentage of pedophiles (in the contemporary first world at least) are consumers of child pornography. 

But more importantly, there is no doubt that the child porn industry exploits children. 

I think the brain stuff is really interesting, and I believe it.  But in my experience, many (most?) victims of child abuse were abused because of the abusers' exploitation of power imbalances.  That is why I said that I believe environmental factors play a sigificant role.  Soldiers who rape a group of young girls while pillaging a village, might never have been rapists if they had not been sent to war.  Plantation owners in the pre Civil War US might not have been rapists if they had not had access to so many young girls who they considered "property."  But Uncle J who pulls little Polly into the back room during the 4th of July barbeque?  There is already a power imbalance there.  He is the uncle and she is the little girl.  Did her pony tails remind him of the video he watched on the internet last night?  I don't know.  And neither does Joe. 

In terms of any cause/effect relationship between child pornography and child sexual abuse, I have said repeatedly that there IS NO CONSENSUS AMONG EXPERTS IN THE FIELD.  There is simply not enough data, or sufficient methodology to collect accurate data.  The most interesting study that I cited compared the use of child porn among repeat child abuse offenders, compared to those who were not charged with repeat offenses.  However, even that data is not necessarily accurate, because it is possible that the control group continued to sexually abuse children, but just didn't get caught.   

[jaimehlers]

^ That's part of why I'm so adamantly opposed to child porn.  Because we don't have enough information about how it affects pedophiles, and I do not feel it's acceptable to risk the damage it can do if it does actually increase the likelihood of child sexual abuse.

[One Above All]

^ That's part of why I'm so adamantly opposed to child porn.  Because we don't have enough information about how it affects pedophiles, and I do not feel it's acceptable to risk the damage it can do if it does actually increase the likelihood of child sexual abuse.

jaimehlers, what if its absence is what increases the likelihood of sexual abuse? Can you honestly say that you can find one argument that can't be used for either side?

[Chronos]

My daughter will tell me things that most kids won't tell their parents.

Then that by your own words would make your relationship an exception, and doesn't invalidate Ricky's point that most children don't tell their parents when they have sex.

That's not what he said:

I dont know your kid but you do realize that kids dont actually tell their parents when they have sex, right?

I saw no qualification of most.

[joebbowers]

I think I need to see verifiable proof that the existence of child pornography reduces the cases of child sexual abuse, not simply a "consensus of experts".

Have you actually read the studies I cited in their entirety?

Pornography was strictly prohibited in the Czech Republic between 1948 and 1989.

The ban was lifted with the country's transition to democracy and, by 1990, the availability and ownership of sexually explicit materials rose dramatically. Even the possession of child pornography was not a criminal offence.

Diamond and his team looked at what actually happened to sex-related crimes as it moved from having a strict ban on sexually explicit materials to the material being decriminalised.

Results from the Czech Republic showed that rape and other sex crimes have not increased following the legalisation and wide availability of pornography.

Most significantly, the incidence of child sex abuse has fallen considerably since 1989, when child pornography became readily accessible – a phenomenon also seen in Denmark and Japan.

They also found that the number of cases of indecent exposure and other, less serious, sex crimes fell dramatically in the wake of pornography becoming more readily available.

The researchers say: ‘As with adult pornography appearing to substitute for sexual aggression everywhere it has been investigated, we believe the availability of child porn does similarly.’

Read the entire study. Please explain how you think they are wrong.

[joebbowers]

Currently, those convicted of possession of child pornography serve an average of 6 months longer in prison than those convicted of actually forcibly raping a child, and nearly twice as long of those convicted of statutory rape (consensual sex with a minor). In fact it is nearly as long as the average murder sentence (currently just under 10 years).

Do you believe the sentence should be :

A.) No punishment. (ie. legalized possession.)
B.) Reduced to a fine with no prison time. (ie. decriminalized possession.)
C.) Reduced to a misdemeanor with probation,  community service, and mandatory counseling.
D.) Reduced to a misdemeanor with less than 1 year sentence.[1]
E.) Increased to a minimum of 20 years.
F.) Increased to life in prison.
G.) Increased to the death penalty.

1.	Realizing that this would still mean the loss of career, income, family, etc.

[Zankuu]

B.

[MadBunny]

Joe,

The problem here is that you're trying to use a 'reasonable' argument.
Normally I'd applaud that, in fact I think you've done a pretty good job of defending what my personal ethics consider an unreasonable thing.
I'm impressed that you would even try considering what you know about how people feel about it.

Therein lies the problem.
Even though, to a point I agree with you on some of the 'gray areas', I can't get past that.
Where explicit child pornography, or hard[1] pedophilia is concerned I don't see myself budging ever.  On the gray areas I already agree, there are people who may be able to handle what happens with no problem.  Heck empirically I know they can since for much of human history ages have been much lower than they are now in the US for sex.

I still can't get past that roadblock.

Let me give an example.

Imagine a 14 year old girl, takes 'naughty' pictures and sends it to her 14-15 year old boy/girl friend and we assume ONLY that person will ever see it.
Am I ok with that?  I'm a little uncomfortable, but I can live with it.

Imagine a 14 year old girl, takes 'naughty' pictures and sends it to her 35-40 year old boy/girl friend and we assume ONLY that person will ever see it.
Am I ok with that?  No, not really.




** this posted while I was writing**

Do you believe the sentence should be :

<list>

I know this probably wasn't directed at me, but my own answer is: it depends.
I recognize there is a difference between a 17 year old and a 9 year old, as well I recognize there is a difference between rape porn and topless posing, the law may not.


There was a man who was arrested for having and taking pictures of underage girls who were FULLY CLOTHED who was charged with child pornography, so clearly the issue can be a witch hunt.  Based on that,  sort of thing I'd say yes the law may need to be revised or clarified greatly.

1.	meaning very young children

[jaimehlers]

jaimehlers, what if its absence is what increases the likelihood of sexual abuse? Can you honestly say that you can find one argument that can't be used for either side?

To be blunt, it's the job of those advocating child porn who need to be able to prove that it's going to be able to reduce or at least not increase the incidence of child sexual abuse.  And to be even more blunt, any child porn that involves an actual child already does too much harm, in my opinion - because that's a kind of child sexual abuse.

Have you actually read the studies I cited in their entirety?

I haven't been following this topic all that closely.  Perhaps you could link them again (or at least the posts where you originally linked them from)?  I don't really want to look through sixteen pages of posts to find the ones you posted earlier.

As far as the snippet you just quoted, that doesn't look like a scientific study, it looks like a statistical analysis.  And based on what you posted here, I don't see there being a causative link between the availability of pornography and the reduction in sexual crimes.  Czechoslovakia was part of the USSR during that time; how do you know that the decrease in sexual crimes (and perhaps other crimes as well) wasn't due to other factors, such as the change in government or the presumably increased trust in authorities who were accountable to the people of that country, rather than to a foreign government which conquered and annexed them?

If you want to show that the one reduces the other, you have to be able to cite a study that isolates the two.  Otherwise, you end up with the usual problem with statistics, coming to incorrect conclusions because of problematical methodology.

[joebbowers]

Czechoslovakia was part of the USSR during that time; how do you know that the decrease in sexual crimes (and perhaps other crimes as well) wasn't due to other factors, such as the change in government or the presumably increased trust in authorities who were accountable to the people of that country, rather than to a foreign government which conquered and annexed them?

Would that explain why Denmark and Japan also saw reductions in sexual crimes against children after legalizing child pornography?

Read the studies before you attack their methods and results.

From Clemson professor Todd Kendall
http://www.law.stanford.edu/display/images/dynamic/events_media/Kendall%20cover%20+%20paper.pdf

From University of Hawaii Ph.D. Milton Diamond
http://www2.hu-berlin.de/sexology/BIB/DIAM/effects_pornography.htm

[Traveler]

Re: sentence for posession (assuming posession is their ONLY offense) ...

Somewhere between A and D, depending on how serious the porn it is I think. As others have said ... 15 year old topless is different than actual sex with a 12 year old, which is different than violent sex with a 5 year old. I can't imagine long jail time being fair unless it was directly tied to the person being a maker or distributor.

[jaimehlers]

Joe:  Neither of the two studies focus on child pornography or child sexual abuse/assaults.  You should link the study you cited in your earlier post so that I can actually review its methodology rather than your summary of its methodology.

Kendall's study makes it very clear that he is talking about rape, which may or may not cover sexual assaults on children.  He also states that the under-reporting of rapes in general makes his conclusions preliminary.  Furthermore, he shows that his conclusions are only valid for 15-19 year olds, and that the differences for other groups are statistically insignificant.  I guess your presumption here is that since making pornography available to that age group, when it was previously restricted, also applies to child pornography and child sexual abusers?  The problem here is that this is an assumption piled on an assumption; that you can apply the conclusions from one set of statistics (which are notably stated to not be conclusive) to a substantially different crime and have them be valid.  This is not the case.

While Diamond's study covers pornography in general, and he states that it extends from potentially-offensive pin-ups to XXX-fetish and child porn, I consider it highly questionable whether his conclusions can be considered any more conclusive than Kendall's.  Furthermore, as his study covers pornography in general, I do not think it is appropriate to apply his general conclusions to specific kinds of sexual crimes.

Simply put, if you want to show that child porn decreases child sexual crimes, you have to cite studies that focus on that specific issue and statistics that are related to it, not studies which cover pornography and sexual crimes as a whole.

[joebbowers]

I'm curious, if you don't consider child porn to be in the same class of general pornography, then what is? Would you insist on seeing seperate studies conducted for each fetish? Grannies, BDSM, feet, butts, big tits, small tits, black chicks, asian chicks, anal, etc. Why are studies on pornography not valid for a subset of pornography?

Sex drive is sex drive, and pornography tailored to our desires gives us an outlet for out sexual energy. Anyone who has ever seen porn knows that. I don't see how you think what is obviously true for every other sexual orientation would prove different for pedophiles.

[Timtheskeptic]

I'm curious, if you don't consider child porn to be in the same class of general pornography, then what is?

It's not the same because the adults in porn are doing they they want to do consensually, the children did not and/or could not consent. I'm sorry, but they are two completely seperate things. We do have our own personal likes in porn, but children in them isn't one of them.

[joebbowers]

Yes thanks Captain Obvious for pointing out something we've all said a hundred times. You misunderstood my question.

How is it any different to the users? Can you explain why the effect of child pornography on relieving sexual energy would be any different than any other type of pornography?

[rickymooston]

Yes thanks Captain Obvious for pointing out something we've all said a hundred times. You misunderstood my question.

How is it any different to the users? Can you explain why the effect of child pornography on relieving sexual energy would be any different than any other type of pornography?

Because allowing users to own it may encourage its future production

The reasononhg is the same as that of using jewish body parts from the halocaust for medicine.

All the other fetishes you mentioned involve consenting adults.

[rickymooston]

Yes thanks Captain Obvious for pointing out something we've all said a hundred times. You misunderstood my question.

How is it any different to the users? Can you explain why the effect of child pornography on relieving sexual energy would be any different than any other type of pornography?

Because allowing users to own it may encourage its future production

The reasononhg is the same as that of using jewish body parts from the halocaust for medicine.

Porn involiving adults role playing is legal.

All the other fetishes you mentioned involve consenting adults.

[rickymooston]

:
Saying "it's obviously wrong" is an irrelevant statement, given that morality is relative.

This is untrue. While morality is relative some assumptiions are pretty well universally held inn our society and era as to be obviously wrong

The halocast was obviously wrong. Sure the Nazis claimed otherwise and other eras existed without the values we had but for all practical purposes, its obviously wrong.

You may stillask why our morality evolved that way.

[One Above All]

This is untrue. While morality is relative some assumptiions are pretty well universally held inn our society and era as to be obviously wrong

Clearly not. Do you see joebbowers complaining about the ownership of child pornography? Do you see the X countries (according to the chart he posted) complaining about it?

[Gnu Ordure]

Joe, are you ignoring me? I'd like an answer to my last two posts to you (432 and 436).