| gabriel rosenkoetter on 12 Feb 2004 04:42:02 -0000 |
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On Wed, Feb 11, 2004 at 08:21:18PM -0500, William H. Magill wrote: > Running a "news server" is not unlike running a "newstand" on the > street corner. The newsie is not responsible for the materials sold at > the newstand -- until somebody complains. I don't think this is true, especially in the case of the content at hand. The fact that the newsfeed is, in fact, stored for retrieval on systems they maintain means that they are responsible for certain aspects of it. They're not necessarily responsible for keeping minors out of "adult" material; they are responsible to check on claims that they're storing child pornography and "reporting it", as Jon says. In the case that they *only* report it, but don't remove it from their systems, the accusation that they're then in possession of child pornography will probably stand up in court (the laws being against both possession and also distribution, in this case). > The child pornography laws are an attempt to legislate morality -- not > unlike prohibition -- and as such are subject to emotional > interpretation, both pro and con. At the moment, they enjoy popular > support, as did prohibition when it was enacted, provide absolute > definitions and so prosecution is "easy." I'd say that laws against child pornography will enjoy more lasting support than did prohibition (of alcohol). The principle being that a lot of people like to drink alcohol, and a minority of people like to look at children in the nude. The same principle applies to tobacco being legal while certain (arguably less destructive) substances are at least "controlled" if not outright illegal. (This, including this parenthetical statement, is about as objective about this issue as I can get. I *do* disapprove of what a majority of the population would call child pornography. I also think that there exists imagery of individuals under the age of eighteen that qualifies as Art or merely family photography and, thus, not as Pornography. I think that there are plenty of things that fall clearly into one category or the other, and plenty of things it would be hard to separate. Intent is, unfortunately, drastically important... and not just intent of the artist/pornographer, but also intent of the distributer and the viewer. It's an incredibly difficult issue.) > Will that attitude last? Only time will tell. It's my completely unscientific opinion that it will last longer than Prohibition did (scary thought: "will"?). > I'm old enough to remember the attitudes of the 50-60s before "Eros," > "Screw," and "Hustler" (Ginzberg, Goldstein and Flint, respectively) ... only one of which still exists in the public eye, notably. > There is nothing "absolute" about the Law. I don't think that I agree with that, as written. The Law is *precisely* absolute. The Law changes, however, discretely over time, rather than continuously. (A change, even in interpretation, doesn't happen gradually. It happens immediately.) -- gabriel rosenkoetter gr@eclipsed.net Attachment:
pgpQFD4GXG5Kf.pgp
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