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NEWS: Virginia Man's 20-Year Sentence for Anime Child Porn Upheld

This isn't like violence, which is neutral in and of itself.

I really think people are stretching to say that any regulation about obscenity is the same as regulation over everything.

That being said, I don't think it's good to promote such work, and I think someone should be forced to seek help if they are doing this.

1) Yes, it's true that child-porn animation doesn't cause people to act out anymore than heterosexual porn causes rape, but constant entertainment of wrong thinking is certainly not beneficial.

There is no such thing as good child sexuality.

And I don't think anyone can deny that media has influence on some people. Sure, I'll grant that it may not hurt most, but if the media truly has no redeeming value then why defend it?

(If you are saying it has redeeming value of any kind, you are definitely defending the media and going beyond the slippery slope argument)

2) Slippery slope arguments abound here. The argument seems to be that any regulation is too much, which is honestly a quick way to get no hearing at all from the other side. If the most important thing is that the punishment is too harsh, go after the logic behind lowering the punishment (there is no direct harm), rather than proceeding onto discussions of how this limits all freedom when it clearly does not do that. You can only say that when they are actually coming after you for "Haruhi porn" and if you can find me an example of someone being put in prison for that for 20 years.. please do. I think I'll be waiting awhile. We all know these 2 things aren't the same.

My thoughts concerning this are based on the belief that such individuals who are into child-pornography can be cured. I'm not certain this is true in all cases. If they cannot be, then I would seek more study on whether or not this actually causes them not to commit crime or doesn't have any affect. I tend to think though that people can control their desires as long as they don't focus on what they know to be wrong.

Xanas wrote:

This isn't like violence, which is neutral in and of itself.

Huh? Real people shouldn't hurt other real people. I understand there are exceptions such as when force needs to be used to stop someone from causing harm to others. But generally, violence is bad.

Actually it is.

In order to ban something, you need to define what it is you want to be banned and that will mean you will have to draw a line. If the line is unclear you will have a gray area with material that MIGHT be illegal.

Tell that to all the teenagers having sex.

The material itself does not need to be defended on the basis of any kind of redeeming value. It merely needs to be defended on the basis of free speech. Speech does not need a redeeming value to be free.

There's been three studies i know on that deal with the effect of pornography on crime statistics.

Study A: Showed no correlation
Study B: Showed a slight decrease in sexual crime as porn availability increased
Study C: Showed that the more porn was available, the lower the rape frequency became

Xanas wrote:

I really think people are stretching to say that any regulation about obscenity is the same as regulation over everything.

Actually it is.

In order to ban something, you need to define what it is you want to be banned and that will mean you will have to draw a line. If the line is unclear you will have a gray area with material that MIGHT be illegal.

Ganryu wrote:

Tell that to all the teenagers having sex.

I'm not referring to teenagers here, and I think most people discussing "child porn" don't have consenting teenagers in mind when they refer to it.

Ganryu wrote:

There's been three studies i know on that deal with the effect of pornography on crime statistics. Study A: Showed no correlation Study B: Showed a slight decrease in sexual crime as porn availability increased Study C: Showed that the more porn was available, the lower the rape frequency became

And these studies, did they deal specifically with child pornography? If not this is really a strawman argument.

The point the court will try to make is that it makes no difference, because the drawn vision causes the same satisfaction to the one looking at it as the real one would.

Jedi Master wrote:

Xanas wrote: This isn't like violence, which is neutral in and of itself. Huh? Real people shouldn't hurt other real people. I understand there are exceptions such as when force needs to be used to stop someone from causing harm to others. But generally, violence is bad.

Violence is present in all kinds of things that aren't bad, the exceptions are probably more prevalent than what you call "general" here. Violence is shown and used every second on the planet for things that aren't bad.

Hmm, strange that you took my comment about "any" to mean that I'm in support of some kind of very generic obscenity law. That's not what I said though. I said I'm not against a law, I never specifically said I thought it should be left gray or undefined. I do think it should exclude animation as a rule, except insofar as the animation is explicitly about children within it's own context.

I don't think the law needs to get into trying to have judges determine how young an animated character looks. I do think this area is one that judges should avoid. If they have an offender with real child porn and animated, then they should really ignore the latter for the former. I don't like the decision that was made in the article because it focused on both as though they were the same and they most certainly are not.

Ganryu wrote:

Tell that to all the teenagers having sex.

I'm not referring to teenagers here, and I think most people discussing "child porn" don't have consenting teenagers in mind when they refer to it.

Ganryu wrote:

The material itself does not need to be defended on the basis of any kind of redeeming value. It merely needs to be defended on the basis of free speech. Speech does not need a redeeming value to be free.

There are already exceptions to what speech is free on other grounds. Should society agree that this speech has negative effects, then "free" would exclude this just as it includes shouting "fire" to cause a panic. If you or someone else has a study that shows that animated child pornography makes these crimes occur less, then I'd be interested in that, but I think what you refer to later on is much more general than that.

Ganryu wrote:

There's been three studies i know on that deal with the effect of pornography on crime statistics. Study A: Showed no correlation Study B: Showed a slight decrease in sexual crime as porn availability increased Study C: Showed that the more porn was available, the lower the rape frequency became

And these studies, did they deal specifically with child pornography? If not this is really a strawman argument.

Ganryu wrote:

Xanas wrote: I really think people are stretching to say that any regulation about obscenity is the same as regulation over everything. Actually it is. In order to ban something, you need to define what it is you want to be banned and that will mean you will have to draw a line. If the line is unclear you will have a gray area with material that MIGHT be illegal.

That is what courts are for. These things will be judged one way, or another, and when all appeals are exhausted a precedent will have been set for future trials to reference to. One has to keep in mind that it's not just the technicalities of the matter that is judged, as many here are arguing over, but also the morality and ethics of it as well. Say someone somewhere produced a live action child porn video, but instead of distributing directly to the world, took the bother to trace each frame with a graphics programme then colourise it to make it look like a drawn animation, and then distributes it. Would that arguement that it's "not real" still hold true, if no one knew it was traced from real material? The point the court will try to make is that it makes no difference, because the drawn vision causes the same satisfaction to the one looking at it as the real one would. One can not say "I like looking at a child porn manga , but not a live action version," and not expect the majority of people to look at them with some sort of revulsion, when one could quite easily be made from the other. I'm replused by both, and therfore find both obscene. And before those who have only scanned the recent pages, start railing again, I'll reiterate that I believe 20 years for a conviction is far too harsh in this situation.