Posts by Brian Ribbon 11 publicly visible posts • joined 10 Jun 2007
"Child pornography is a problem issue and clearly identifiable".
That's not true. Most laypeople believe that "child pornography" automatically refers to pictures of children being molested, when in fact many countries also prohibit any material which involves children in sexual poses or in a state of simple nudity.
Something which is not clearly defined is not "clearly identifiable".
"You are spouting plain nonsense - cleanfeed is, as quite clearly stated, to prevent accidental exposure to cp images. Regardless of who hosts them."
No. According to the IWF, their "Mission & Vision" is:
"To work in partnership with internet service providers, telecommunication companies, mobile operators, software providers, the police, Government and the public to minimise the availability of online illegal content, particularly child sexual abuse images." [ http://www.iwf.org.uk/public/page.114.htm ]
The claim that they are trying "to prevent accidental exposure to cp images" was invented during the Wikipedia fiasco, but it is not one of their stated aims. Considering their history of misleading people into believing that "indecent images" automatically means "child abuse images", I am not inclined to believe their claims.
The fact that the IWF are allegedly blocking access to indecent images in the Internet Archive suggests that they are a moralistic organisation rather than one which wishes to protect children. The dubious claim made by organisations such as the IWF is that simply viewing indecent images "creates a demand". While this claim is already flawed due to the fact that most producers take illegal images for profit/trade, the claim is undoubtedly wrong in the case of images on an archive which is almost certainly not operated by people who create indecent images. Just how would a producer be aware of the "increased demand" when he doesn't even know that the images are being viewed?
"I am OK with them filtering genuine child porn, but as with the previous album cover case, someone needs to exercise a bit of common sense and only filter the obviously illegal stuff."
"Genuine child porn" in the UK includes images which contain no sexual activity, and sometimes even naturism. In 44% of Irish child pornography cases which were analysed by Garda - between 2000-2004 - the *worst* offending images depicted no sexual activity whatsoever. Irish laws against "child pornography" are very similar to those of the UK.
The IWF is almost certainly spending much of its time censoring pictures of naked children who are not engaging in sexual activity, regardless of the consequences for websites such as Wikipedia and the Internet Archive.
Under UK law, an image of a naked child is usually considered child pornography; context is irrelevant. Garda (the Irish police) reported that, between 2000-2004, 44% of "child pornography" cases in Ireland involved images which depicted no sexual activity whatsoever. Child pornography laws in Ireland are very similar to those of the UK.
In a strict legal sense, this censorship is justified; the problem is the law itself, which should not define nudity as "pornography". The term "child abuse images" is used to invoke strong emotions and discredit those who disagree with the current laws. Don't forget that if the IWF fail to maintain outrage over child pornography, they'll lose their funding.
See http://newgon.com/wiki/Indecent_images_of_children#Indecency for a detailed summary of child pornography laws
The attempt to mainstream the term "child abuse images" - led by the IWF and CEOP - is manipulative and deceitful. A Garda study revealed that the majority of images which form the basis of convictions under UK/Irish law are not images of children engaged in sexual activity, rather they are images of children in naturist settings, in "erotic" clothed poses, or in nude poses. That's why the legal term is "indecent images", not "child pornography".
The USA was once declared the primary host of "child abuse images" by the IWF, as the majority of "child abuse" websites on the IWF list were considered legal under US law, but illegal under UK law. This area of UK law is moralistic, not protective.
I don't believe that journalists should use terminology invented by organisations whose funding relies on inciting hysteria over the issue in question.
"Anyway, the Australians are way ahead of us. Police just removed two pictures of naked children from an art gallery. Not sexual pictures, just pictures. The artist who took them may be "charged with obscenity"."
Non-sexual nude pictures of children are already illegal in the UK, in most cases. An image of a child is indecent (and therefore illegal) if it "offends the recognised standards of propriety", even to an insignificant extent. Clothed images can therefore be illegal too. See http://newgon.com/wiki/Indecent_images_of_children#Indecency
The Ministry of Justice have made some misleading comments. Firstly, Maria Eagle claims that,
"paedophiles could be circumventing the law by using computer technology to manipulate real photographs or videos of abuse into drawings or cartoons."
She neglects to mention that it is already illegal to do this or to possess any image derived from an indecent photograph of a child, under Section 69 of the recently enacted Criminal Justice and Immigration Act.
Secondly, Ms Eagle claims that,
“This is not about criminalising art or pornographic cartoons more generally, but about targeting obscene, and often very realistic, images of child sexual abuse which have no place in our society."
Photo-realistic images have been illegal under the Protection of Children Act for thirty years. This law will actually only target the possession of virtual child pornography for which no real child has ever been abused.
Luke, Graham,
Being a paedophile is not a crime. Clearly you don't understanding the meaning of the term.
Now, as regards this decision....
Nobody should be convicted for merely viewing (known as "making," under UK law) or possessing images. The people responsible for abuse - if the image is actually abusive and not just a picture of a kid in the bath - are the people who produce the images, not the people who view.
The UK does not realise this.
The old argument which states, "The images are only produced because John Smith wants to view them" are not true when describing people who view child pornography *without purchase*. It's like saying that musicians create music for people to download for free from file sharing networks.
If the UK government imposed tougher penalties for production, the people who ARE abusing children would be imprisoned.
At the moment, you're more likely to go to jail for a conviction of "making" child pornography, than you are for a conviction of child molestation.
I noticed people suggesting that paedophiles should receive "therapy." While this is rather more polite than many comments posted elsewhere, it still somewhat misses the point that an attraction to children is just as natural for a paedophile as an attraction to adults is for adult-attracted people.
It may seem like a weird or abnormal attraction, but unless that person actually engages in sexual activity with children (or is intent on doing so), there is no need for therapy, especially considering that therapy involves little but dehumanisation and destruction (I've chatted with people who have been through such "therapy.")
Brian Ribbon,
anu.nfshost.com
The Register 
Biting the hand that feeds IT
Copyright. All rights reserved © 1998–2024
