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.
I would NOT allow myself to be videotaped at all. Also, if my husband asks I'd wonder where his mind is at. That's leaving open a big gateway. Plus tapes can be LOST and get in the hands of other people. Vulgarity so YES I think it's just another compromise and is part of the whole lure of pornography.
It will not be OK for ANY of my children at all. Take your libertinism eleswhere.
Bingo - a difference transparent to many on this thread.
What an absurd statement. Whoever defined liberty as the right to do whatever you please?
Well for starters, post #1 asks the question:
So if life imitates art, and a piece of suppossed art models a destructive form of behavior that we would never want to see indulged, should that piece of art be banned?
Since the article opened with the example of David Westerfield and his collection of kiddie porn, I would say the writer of the rhetorical question above.
When you do the same with your tyranny.
Have your porn. Just remember what holds this civilization together and it sure as hell isn't your precious losertarian ideals.
Not if it were up to you.
Just remember what holds this civilization together and it sure as hell isn't your precious losertarian ideals.
And it sure as hell isn't tyranny.
Happiness, or just a happy penis?
In the strictest sense, then yes, I suppose it ought to be upheld since it may constitute the pursuit of happiness - although who's kidding anybody - porn is not going to bring anyone true happines...
Then you should have made a different argument.
Kudos to you being a proud parent too!
I agree with you.
I also can say that my son can never come back and say he hates me for controlling his life.
His life is his own and I see my being his care provider as a job which I enjoy immensly.
My plan was to go into the medical field when I was a young person so in a twist I have been able to fufill my passion of practicing medicine in a full spectrum of areas with one patient who is in himself a case medical history.
One of his most fave Biblical passages is:
Love is faithful, Love is Kind and ends (I am having a mental geezer lapse) in Love is like a resounding Gong.
But yes I agree with you. Also when they are mature enough to be honest with you that they have muddied up you can support them but not coddle them back on their way and then leave that in the past never to bring up as a way to badger them. Of coarse with humor intended there are events that are always good for a laugh looking back.
Don't patronize me.
- would video of a married couples sexual activity be pornographic in your mind, if only they watched it? Or does it only become "porn" when it's distributed for public use? Is it the medium, the act, the participants, or the viewer that makes it porn? Would it be a sin to use such tapes in sex therapy to improve a marital sexual relationship? If a married couple should watch each other in the mirror and enjoy it, is that un-Christian?
Lust is "the inordinate craving for, or indulgence of, the carnal pleasure which is experienced in the human organs of generation," and can occur even within marriage, when a spouse is considered simply as a means of gratifying one's sexual impulses. This contradicts the purpose of the marital act, which is two-fold: the unity of the couple and procreation.
This information is sufficient to answer your sophistries.
The pro-porn, prostitution, and drug crowd.
Yikes. THAT's an interesting viewpoint.
I know the verse, and in my opinion, I think you are misreading--I don't think the Jesuits did me a bad turn; that would be very difficult indeed.
I never said that Jesus says that porn is healthy and its not a sin, but he says do not judge--that is clear. The verse that you mention, on the Sermon on the Mount (I can't imagine the Jesuits not teaching the Sermon on the Mount in your 8 years....) is again, like I said before, the guidelines for a Christian to live by. Yes, a married person who lusts after another woman has committed adultery, but here Jesus just defines the rules of adultery--he doesn't say we should condemn the person; indeed, his teachings both on the Sermon on the Mount and in John 8:1-11; Jesus specifically does not condemn the adulterer.
Remember what I was saying: in the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus gives a guide to Christians for their behavior. He says some things are bad--lusting in your heart after women, certainly--but he also recognizes that we are all humans, and we err and we sin. Because of that, a good Christian should not condemn or judge others for their failings, because we all have failings of our own.
Which brings us to pornography. Assuming for a moment that it is a sin, God gave us all free will, and whether or not to view pornography--and sin--is a moral choice for all of us to make; as such, Jesus tells us that we should not judge others for the moral choices that they make. If nothing else, the Gospels make that clear. Assuming, however, that viewing pornography is not a sin--because it just simply isn't sinful or Christianity is wrong--well then, no harm, no foul, and society has no legitimate interesting in banning a practice, which, in and of itself, is not socially harmful.
As for St. Paul, he is not Jesus.
Pretty much. There were many instances where the actions of American government did not live up to the Constitution.
If only everybody would be just like you, eh? Your way is the true path to true happiness...got it. Variation is the source of all misery. I have an idea, let's legislate that everyone behave just like you then see how many concur that they are truly happy.
No, freedom is the ability to do whatever you want so long as you do not harm the person or property of another without their consent.
The basis of liberty is not that permission to do legitimate things is granted to the people by the government. Rather, the government is empowered by the people to do a limited number of legitimate things. All else the people are free to do. We do not need to justify our choices.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.