Supreme Court strikes down child porn law...

I belive what the law addresses is situations where people think an adult is a child.

It seems that some pornographers were/are using adults who have immature looking bodies so that the images would appeal to people interested in child pornography.

Using actual children is still very much illegal.

As sick as it is for people to want to look at children or "children" having sex, I think the Supreme Court was right on this.

Pornography is not illegal and the people in question are all consenting adults.

Plus, if pornographers can operate within the law by not using actual children then perhaps they will be less likely to try and fewer children will be hurt.

Thin edge of the wedge issue here . . . if the Supremes hadn't struck this down, it would be a blow to foundation of the free speech portion of the first amendment.

I suppose we can now expect a Federal law requiring that adults not act like children....

Stay in the lines or go to jail!

I'm with boomerang on this one.

Personally I find it abhorrent that someone would even want to have "virtual" child porn, but this falls in the grey area where law and ethics/morals starts to get tangled up. When your there, we should lean towards law.

Free speech is too important to start this kind of content based restriction, especially when there are no real children who are at risk. Sure, an argument can be made that this will make it easier for some sickos to do this to a real kis, but that danger is too far separated from the act of possesing "virtual" child porn to justify such a restriction.

And the members of Congress would be the first to be in violation of the law.

Has anyone done more research as to what virtual child porn is? I was really hoping to get more opinions before i jumped back into this thread, its a real shame it seems to be dead though.
It seemed like it would be a hot topic *sigh*
Maybe its a little too controversial to get into?

I'm not real sure it is all that controversial. I am no supporter of porn in any format, but I think the court did the right thing here. Pornography is legal and as such I don't believe you can make it illegal just by a distributor of porn pretending that the models are under the legal age.

I think most reasonable people would view it this way, thus a lack of controversy about this decision.

In Britain, where I live, it is illegal to POSSESS images that show Children naked - like nudist family photos. (Parents have been taken to Court for taking photos of their toddlers in the bath).

Of course - like everywhere else - Child Porn. showing REAL Children is 100% illegal in Britain too - as it SHOULD be.

BUT, here it is illegal to create artificial Children engaged in sex, (or merely just nude), - via Computer Animation. Even though no real Children - or Adults - are involved in the images, in any way.

If the Cops find 'Computer Generated' Cartoons or 3D images of FAKE Children on your computer, you are taken to Court and face a few months in prison - or a big Fine. Plus press coverage calling you a 'Pervert'.

Even Hard Core ADULT Porn was ONLY made legal in the UK in about 2000, when the UK Censor decided that it was silly to refuse to allow UK Adults to see people having sex, in Films, when the USA, and the rest of Europe had been allowing it for Decades - and when Britons could now see it on the Internet.

In the UK, if the Cops found out you had been buying Hard Porn. - especially by Post - they would RAID your Home, and take away all your Porn., your Mail, your Computer, your Video Recorder, and your DVD Player. Later you were interviewed as they demanded to know where you got it from, had you been swapping it with friends and so on. It was illegal here for more than 1 person to watch a Hard Porn Film in the same room! (I am NOT joking!) It was also illegal for friends or workmates to swap Porn with each other. Our Laws said, such behaviour was encouraging others to become 'Depraved and Corrupt').

Imagine being 'Raided' at 6AM or 7AM, just because you ordered ADULT Porn in the Post, and the Cops found out? Well THAT is how it WAS and STILL IS in Britain!

However, it was recently decided in UK Courts that Adult Hard Porn STILL cannot be ordered by POST here in the UK. If you order it by Post - and are found out - both you and the Company who sent it to you face Court.

Likewise, if we Britons order it from International Porn Sites on the Internet. If our Customs open the package, (when it arrives in the UK), they confiscate the Porn AND are likely to pass your address onto the Cops.

Instead you can only buy Hard Porn in UK Sex Shops, and even then only if your Town or City allows them to open in your Town - many do not allow them. (Many Councils. What you call the people at City Hall in the USA).

So, you are allowed Adult Porn - Hard - as long as you only buy it in a Sex Shop, and only then if there is one in your area. (Most UK places - where they are allowed - only have 1 or 2 such Shops). Otherwise you have to travel miles to go to Shops in other areas. (For example, Glasgow in Scotland refuses to allow Sex Shops to open. If people there want Porn. they have to travel over 50 plus miles to buy it in Edinburgh, where there are Sex Shops).

CREATED, (Computer Generated), images of naked Children - be they having sex or not - are 100% illegal, and that gets you taken to Court too - even though no real Children are involved.

I HATE Child Porn, but think our Laws are too strict when some Parents have ended up arrested just because they took naked photos of their toddlers playing in the garden, house, bath, or at the beach! 'Indecent Photos Of Children' they are called!

So, you Americans who are glad that your Courts struck down your would be Laws on the matter, just be thankful that you do not live in Britain. Our Authorities are far, far more draconian and ruthless on such matters.....

Just to clarify the above:

In the UK it is a serious offence under the Protection of Children Act, 1978 (PoCA) for a person to do any of the following:

to take, or permit to be taken, any indecent photograph of a child

to distribute or show such indecent photographs

to have in his possession such indecent photographs, with a view to their being distributed or shown by himself or others

to publish or cause to be published any advertisement likely to be understood as conveying that the advertiser distributes or shows such indecent photographs, or intends to do so.

Additionally, there the Sexual Offences Bill [HL] relevant here.


And, fortunately the United Kingdom passed legislation to reflect changes in the new technologies - morphed images of child pornography are illegal and treated by the law exactly as if they were real.


And welcome to A2K, hermes666 - nomen est omen?

If you go to one of the major cam-chat sites like ifriends or livejasmin or especially imlive, there are a lot of youngish looking girls on there. They'll be dressed in school uniforms and sometimes have stuffed animals. This girl I know is about 21 but looks 14-ish and makes good money doing this online here in Moscow. These pedos will come into her chat room and role-play - she'll be his daughter or kid sister or something, and daddy will punish her by having sex with her. They get really turned on when she says things like 'no, daddy, no!' Some girls that are better looking make considerably less than her on these sites because they don't appeal to this pedo audience. Of course, it completely freaks her out and she thinks all older American men are pedos.

Here's a pic of another such girl from Yekaterinburg, Russia:
Edit (Moderator): Link removed
Notice that she has pillows with pictures of animated characters on them. A lot of Japanimation rape-porn involves girls that are 14-17.

Has anyone here heard of Prof Dworkin of NYU? a great advocate of rights, especially personal rights and he for one justified the existence and non-banning of pornography based on one's right of free speech (of course this got the feminists flaming furious). Based on legal theory and his theory of rights as "trumps" over any thing else, I guess he would justify the court's judgement based on one's free speech rights at least.

Hmmm it seems that 'Americans' are the only ones in their 'right' mind but mind you that is only becuause we were completely rebellious of the British and their ways (i will not be surprised if they view diffrently on this issue just becuase of old rivalries lol)....

I think that the existence of virtual kiddy porn is a danger to actual children beause:

a. People immersing themselves in kiddy porn is often the beginning of an escalation to actual child abuse - and I see no reason to think that virtual kiddy porn is different in this respect.

b. I understand that it is difficult to tell the difference between real and virtual - so I would see the existence of a virtual industry as a threat to the ability (already damned low) to police the real industry.

I think the decision is a very bad one.

My views exactly it may then also lead to pedophiles gettin more of what they want and getting even more sick in the head and then carrying things with real children to far