Re: (fwd) GIFs--Now it can be told

[tcmay@netcom.com (Timothy C. May)]

(I'll only make a few comments.)

Ed Carp writes:

>> There are some quasi-legitimate issues surrounding the area of child
>> erotica. Was the child coerced? Was consent meaningful? Etc.
>
>There are no quasi-legitimate issues surrounding child pornography in the
>United States.  It doesn't matter, legally whether consent was obtained or
>not, etc.  Child pornography is not legal.  To make, sell, possess, distribute,
>or conspire to do any of the above is a crime.

I meant "quasi-legitimate" in the sense of being at least a real criminal
issue. By contrast, merely discussing the issues cannot possibly be a
crime, nor can, IMHO, the creation of such a group absent actual evidence
of criminality. Sort of like shutting down "alt.drugs" on the grounds that
illegal drugs are often discussed. (We can all think of several dozen
newsgroups that touch on subjects illegal in many states of the U.S., in
many countries of the world, etc.)


>In the US, it doesn't matter what their actual ages are - if they are
>depicted as being under the age of consent, they are illegal.

Ah, but what if no mention is made of the age? If I happen to have a
collection of pictures of 19-year-olds-who-look-15, because of my own
esthetic standards, is this illegal? It sounds totally legal to me, and I
think a court opinion will ultimately be rendered that so long as the
models actually are over 18, no matter how young they look, no crime as
ocurred.

(Actually, the various "cheerleader porn" films cater to this fantasy and
are not classed as child porn, so long as the actresses are 18 or older.)

On purely computer-generated images:

>Not at all.  It's not an issue of exploitation in that case, nor is it an
>issue of "thoughtcrime", since the thought has produced an actual image
>that can be viewed by others.

I strongly disagree. A computer image that never involved an actual child,
cannot reasonably be viewed as child porn. Can a computer-generated "snuff"
film be viewed as murder? (I see acted-out murders every day on t.v.)


>Nothing in this email should be construed as a personal attack against you,
>Tim.  I'm just trying to relate the laws and the facts as they are.

I don't take it as a personal attack. Ed's comments were thoughtful, even
if I disagreed with some of them. 


By the way, I agree with some comments I've received that this subject is
somewhat far afield from the "Cypherpunks charter," such as it is, but I'm
finding the hundreds of highly repetitive and arcane postings about the
same old remailer issues, and the internals of obscure mail programs, not
all that close to the charter either. (I'm not saying they shouldn't be
posted, and some have been well-written summaries, but I am saying they're
highly-detailed nuts-and-bolts issues which probably are meaninful to only
a few readers.)

Part of the Cypherpunks approach is to "monkey wrench" the "Surveillance
State" by flooding the comm lines with encrypted junk, with
suspicious-looking files that will soak up surveillance time, and with
various other subversive things that will push the boundaries.

-Tim May



--
Timothy C. May         | Crypto Anarchy: encryption, digital money,  
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