Posted on 05/19/2005 11:05:47 AM PDT by .cnI redruM
On February 2, 2003, when seven-year-old Danielle van Dam disappeared from her family home in the middle of the night, every mother’s nightmare was played out on national television for almost a month while authorities searched for the girl. When Danielle’s body was found at the end of that month, the police and prosecutors discovered a frightening story about a neighbor of Danielle’s who had computer files filled with child pornography and even a sickening cartoon video of the rape of a young girl.
According to a report by Robert Peters, president of Morality in Media, on the link between pornography and violent sex crimes, the prosecutor in the Danielle van Dam case said “The video represented [the defendant’s] sexual fantasies and inspired the abduction, rape, and murder of Danielle.” According to Raymond Pierce, a retired NYPD detective who worked on the sex-crimes squad for many years and is now a criminal-profiling consultant, about 80 percent of rapists and serial killers are heavy pornography users. I was a victim of an attempted rape by a disturbed man who turned out to be involved in pornography.
May is Victims of Pornography Month. Today Senator Sam Brownback (R., Kan.), Rep. Katherine Harris (R., Fla.), Rep. Joe Pitts (R., Pa.), and leaders from the values community will participate in a summit to explore the troubling connection between pornography and violence against women and children.
Florida attorney general Charlie Crist advises parents that “we must never lose sight of the fact that sexual predators make the online world a dangerous place for innocent children. Parents must be ever-vigilant to make sure their children are not exposed to images and messages that would have been unthinkable just a generation ago.” Crist warns that we cannot allow the Internet to be a “pipeline for pornography aimed at children.” But while parents can use available means to protect their children when they are in their own homes, there is a cultural climate surrounding our children that threatens them the way Danielle van Dam was threatened. Because of the availability of pornography online, there is no way of knowing what lurks in the hearts of our neighborhoods.
More needs to be done to evaluate the connection between violent predatory behavior and pornography, and to crack down on these violent predators. Police and law-enforcement officers across the country report brutal instances in which those addicted to pornography utilized its sadistic images on their female and child victims.
Just this past February, the New York Times reported a story about a teenage babysitter who had raped three young children he was watching in their homes. According to the Times, his pattern was to watch pornographic videos with the oldest of the children, a 12-year-old boy, and intimidate them all by torturing them with a knife and threats to their family members. Perhaps one of the most notorious serial killers, Ted Bundy, participated in an interview with Dr. James Dobson shortly before he was executed. In the interview, Bundy explained, “I’ve lived in prison for a long time now. And I’ve met a lot of men who were motivated to commit violence like me. And without exception, every one of them was deeply involved in pornography — without exception, without exception — deeply influenced and consumed by an addiction to pornography.”
Since 1956, the Supreme Court has made clear that the First Amendment does not protect obscene materials. If we know from the perpetrators themselves how obscenity contributes to violence against women and children, what can we do?
We need to fund more studies of the addiction to pornography and its effects on violent behavior. Parents can install filters on any computer used by children and keep the family computer in a central location, not in a child's bedroom or someplace where parents might not regularly see it. We need to demand tougher law enforcement on the state and federal level. The Bush administration is stepping up federal enforcement of obscenity laws. This is a good first step. Contact the U.S. attorney for your district and ask what they are doing to enforce the laws. We need tougher state penalties against both possession and distribution of child porn and passing any kind of pornographic material to kids. Experts indicate that pornography is often used by pedophiles to break down the resistance of child victims. Parents should check out their state’s penalties for child rape and make sure offenders are going to jail and staying there for these offenses. Florida, for example, just passed a tough new law after the tragedy involving Jessica Lunsford, whose killer was a recently released violent offender. We should pass legislation to address the threat to children on the Internet. This includes chat sites, websites, spam, and peer-to-peer networks. Peer-to-Peer networks are of particular concern because they are widely visited by kids and offer porn for free without any age verification.
As Rep. Katherine Harris has pointed out, "Pornography displays human beings as objects, obliterating the wall between an individual's sick fantasies and the compulsion to act upon them. Often, the monsters who hurt women and children start with this malignant desensitizer." We need to all work together to find better ways to protect women and children against this violence.
Most men who start out whackin' to porn once a week, do.
ROFLMAO. Please provide evidence for this claim.
See, that's the problem with these discussions, we have no baseline about what porn we're talking about, or what porn is.
On the one hand, we have people in this thread who're obviously talking about porn as beautiful adults doing it on camera. An interest in that kind of thing isn't necessarily indiciative of an underlying pathology. Most people have a healthy sexual interest in beautiful people. It's normal.
On the other hand, you have people like yourself who're talking about things like kiddie porn when we talk about porn. Obviously, there is a difference here. There is an underlying pathology in the kiddie porn viewer. Most normal people have healthy sexual interests in adults, not children. The latter is a sign of aberant development.
In simple words, Playboy wasn't a hit from the word go because it was perverse. Playboy broke out like gangbusters because men have always liked naked women. It's just the way we are. To equate that with kiddy porn is the ultimate Carvillesque spin.
Another strawman. Nobody here is arguing that porn can be shown in public, whether or not it is art.
Something can be art but still limited to being shown to consenting adults only.
Actually it is true. Many people like Coke more for its mystic than its taste. The new Coke fiasco is a prime example. New Coke was never given a chance because so many people felt an injustice had been done by changing the taste of Coke. But in test after test, Pepsi wins the Pepsi challenge.
If you like Coke fine, but never under estimate the power of advertising to make a product more than a mere cola. Instead, Coke has come to symbolize something more like a piece of Americana itself. Every thing from labeling to the size of the font on the can is carefully examined and used to create an image for Coke and unfortunately for Pepsi, taste is not enough to unseat the king of Cola's.
Advertising works and works well.
If I thought for a moment that children like Danielle would be safe if we had stronger government controls on nudity and porn, I would agree with you. However, I think you're so far off the mark it's not funny. Rather, I think you'd be scratching your head in your post porn world wondering why rape and molestation weren't wiped out like smallpox when you banned porn.
I'm trying to use this as a strawman it's not. But, really, let's look at the Muslim world. Porn is nonexistant, yet sexual abuse is rampant.
Violent crime in this country, sexual assaults included, has been gradually going down over the last couple of decades. IIRC, we're down to a mid 1960's level of crime these days.
If anything, one could make the argument that the legalization of porn has helped to reduce the crime rate.
For false advertising, sure. I'm not aware of any cases where an advertiser or a manufacturer has been held liable for criminal use of a legal product.
People would much rather hear anecdotal musings from a guy on the street than real statistics. Its the same reason why the 55 mph speed limit has stuck around so long.
Two major reasons:
1) The number of licenses the FCC grants are manageble from an enforcement perspective. There are (I'm guessing) probably less than 10,000 broadcast licenes. Let's be generous and say I'm really, really, really bad at math and say I'm off by a factor of 50, and there are really 500,000 licensed broadcasters, or 10,000 in every state (there aren't). That pales beside the massive, massive number of web pages which easily goes into the billions.
2)As if that weren't enough, the interenet is global, not American. I'm a click away froma German, Swedish, or Kenyan server than isn't bound by U.S. law.
I took maybe a dozen "Pepsi Challenges" when I was a teen. They were all run by Pepsi. There was a giant Pepsi logo at the taste site and you were asked to taste two and pick which one you like. Sometimes if you picked the Pepsi you got a free T-shirt. Other times you were asked to sign your name on a public tally sheet under whichever you chose. In both cases there was pressure to pick Pepsi. As long as you could tell the difference you were rewarded (however subtly). I preferred Coke but consciously picked Pepsi every time.
In my mind, there's no such thing as a "blind taste test" among American coke (lower-case c) drinkers in America. We've grown up drinking the stuff and can tell the difference, so picking the "best" one during a taste-test depends more on the social situation than the actual taste.
On a side note... It's really weird. I moved up to the north a couple years ago. Back in Texas the only places that served Pepsi were those owned by PepsiCo (Taco Bell, KFC, Pizza Hut) and a few stragglers that always got complaints. Up here it's much rarer to find a place that just serves Coke. I don't get it. But I always preferred Pepsi's diet flavors over Coke's anyhow. Now that I'm completely off the sugared variety it's all good.
With all due respect, I love Taco Bell, but I don't want my kids working there. As a matter of fact, my worst nightmares involve me pulling up at a drive-through and my (in my dreams) 30 something kids handing me a bag of food.
Who says that he is not?
BTW, Bundy totally manipulated Dobson in that interview - he told him what he wanted to hear.
Touche`
You do not drink alchohol, do drugs or watch porn? Hey are you married a lot of wimmin would like to meet a guy with those behaviors, (I mayself am married, I'm thinking of the other gals... )course being a lawyer might lower your point value but them other 3 issues are big +'s
Probably. The world would be better off without many things. Alcohol. Tobacco. Rap music. That doesn't mean the government should ban those things.
On tv this one actress described a sex act involving multiple male partners that was really painful
She's a grownup. Unless someone is holding a gun to her head, she is free to quit porn at any time.
I can't see one single good thing about porn, not one and I would not mind seeing it banned.
You are basically asking government to use its power to enforce your view of what is positive and what isn't.
I see no redeeming value in black licorice. Should government ban that, too?
Consider yourself lucky. I've had nightmares where I was married to Hillary Clinton.
Another lover of porn drawing moral equivalencies. Have your filth but don't expect me to find it acceptable.
FWIW, nobody on this thread wants to force you to view porn or find it acceptable.
Why do you ask questions if you don't want to hear the answers? What is the point that you are trying to make when you ask if a person would mind a family member working in the industry?
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