Dont' bring manga into Canada

[Valmy]

Cartoon child porn is illegal in Sweden aswell. I fail to be upset about this. On the one hand, sure it is a limitation of someones freedom of expression, but on the other hand I just dont see any reason why watching cartoon child porn should be in any way a legitimate protected interest in the eyes of the law.

Surely there is an area between protecting and endorsing something and making it a crime.

[Valmy]

In this case, its either one or the other, yes.

So unless it is a public good it is a crime?  Are you allowed to masturbate because the state benefits in some way?

[viper37]

In what way did I ever say this stuff was simple?  You'll even note that what you quoted was me posing a question, not making a statement.  And later all I said was that these questions are not a "no brainer" aka this shit is hard to make policy about.

Sometimes we know each other so well here that we assume we know what someone's response is, and answer that, rather than what a person is actually saying.

You guys all said laws against child porn are to 'protect the victim'.  Well if you want to get technical about it, there is no victim involved in mere possession of child porn.  Nor is there any victim involved in copying and distributing child porn.  The only victimization is in the initial making of child porn.

Laws against child porn aren't only about protectign children from being victimized during it's creation (although that is a significant part of it).  It is also about prohibiting that market for its creation in the first place, plus is about preventing an attitude and culture that is accepting, or even promotes, viewing children sexually.

The law in Canada is complex, and not entirely satisfactory - but as I said there are no easy answers to this stuff.  Our laws prohibit any representation, be it film, drawn, written, audio recorded, depicting underage sex.  Now the standards are somewhat different - for a photographic, film, video or other visual representation, it is anything that merely depicts someone under 18 engaged in explicit sexual activity.  Written material is prohibited where it counsels sexual activity with those under 18, or whose 'dominant characteristic is the description, for a sexual purpose, of sexual activity with a person under the age of 18'.

And even there there are defences of artistic merit, educational purpose, scientific purpose, medical purpose, and public good.

So it's trying to set a balance between allowing legitimate educational and scientific purposes, and keeping paedos from having wanking material.

And yes - something like explicit cartoons ARE some of those hard cases.  Is what is depicted "explicit"?  Is the "dominant characteristic" displaying underage sexual activity?  Does it have sufficient "artistic merit" for that defence to qualify?

I dunno.

How cannot this argument be used to ban "Scarface", "Sin City", "True Blood", "Game of Thrones" etc.etc.

" Is the "dominant characteristic" displaying underage sexual activity?".
this.

It goes to "artistic merits" (and I won't debate that), but, True Blood is not a XXX tv series.  The plot of True Blood doesn't revolve around a situation wich will lead to sexual intercourse between men, women and... other creatures.  There's a story to be told and sex is part of the story to advance the plot.
In a XXX movie, the whole story is based around the sex scene.

So that's the difference between True Blood and Twilight a XXX Parody.

A nude picture in Playboy is pornography, a nude painting is art.

There's your distinction.  And I'm debating on the merits of this, just stating the facts as they are.

[Bluebook]

Surely there is an area between protecting and endorsing something and making it a crime.

Perhaps I am not expressing myself good enough in english. Freedom of speech and freedom of expression are protected by the law. These are vital protected interests because a liberal democracy requires it to function. They are not without bonds however. Freedom of speech is not without limits. Over here, freedom of speech ends when it collides with a legitimate protected interest. That makes threats, racist remarks or whatever against the law, despite that they could be argued to be protected as free speech.

So, over to cartoon child porn. Clearly it is a form of expression and as such it starts out as a protected right. Then we weigh that against the public interest of having as few people as possible getting sexually aroused by children. The balance of the scales tip over in favour of a ban. If there had been some form of legitimate protected reason to allow it anyway, it might have tipped the scales back towards allowing it anyway. But since I fail to see any legitimate reason whatsoever for someone to read child porn cartoons, I think it is fine that it is prohibited. The final step is to check if the limit to freedom of expression is proportional to the public interest, and I think it is. 

[Slargos]

I guess the question is one of cost/benefit.

Is cartoon child pornography a cost or a benefit to society? Criminalizing it for the "ick" factor is frankly good enough (since that's what we do most of the time anyway), but I suppose a case could also be made for the proliferation of this type of porn being a gateway to crimes with actual victims. You would have to prove that watching cartoon porn incites paedophiles who haven't yet crossed into active molestation, however.

On the other hand, I expect a case could also be made for the fact that the availability of cartoon child porn may in fact reduce the risk of acting on the inclinations since it could perhaps be a way for the paedophile to fulfill his needs without resorting to kiddie diddling.

[The Brain]

But since I fail to see any legitimate reason whatsoever for someone to read child porn cartoons,

Really?

[Josquius]

Cartoon child porn is illegal in Sweden aswell. I fail to be upset about this. On the one hand, sure it is a limitation of someones freedom of expression, but on the other hand I just dont see any reason why watching cartoon child porn should be in any way a legitimate protected interest in the eyes of the law.

Methadone for paedos.

[Bluebook]

But since I fail to see any legitimate reason whatsoever for someone to read child porn cartoons,

Really?

Irony?

[viper37]

I would never think sitting alone and writing stories for your own private use to be a crime.

it ain't a crime either.  Distributing such material is a crime, however.

I mean laws like that could be used to destroy completely innocent people if you interpret them broadly enough.  I guess you just have to trust on good people to make sure bad laws do not turn into tyranny.

Laws in general are pretty broad, so as to avoid people skipping through the nets.  Technically, murder is illegal.  However, there is the case of legitimate defense that can be used, under certain circumstances.  A prosecutor could still charge you for murder though.  A prosecutor's guideline is to charge someone when they believe they can make a case.  There are goofy cases sometimes.  Generally, though, common sense prevails.

Our societies are filled with bad laws and we have to trust on good people to make sure these bad laws do not turn into tyranny, that's why we have democracies, I suppose.

A man killing his child's murdered would be applauded as a hero by many, yet, he would be prosecuted for violating the law.

Drinking and driving is bad, we all know that.  But someone at 0,09 at 11:00pm is not the same as someone 0,09 at 11:00am.  Yet, they share the same punishment.

Justice is imperfect in itself, so that's why we invented trials with judge & jury to try to see if there aggravating or attenuating circumstances.  Even then, it may not work.  In both directions.  A drunk driver killing someone will get jail time, a pot user will get community work.  Some judges are morons, some are good, some are corrupt.

Back to the case at hand: we don't know what material there is.  I don't think it was a Sailor Moon comics, and I don't think we should tolerate just about everything because it's simply a drawing. 

[Bluebook]

Cartoon child porn is illegal in Sweden aswell. I fail to be upset about this. On the one hand, sure it is a limitation of someones freedom of expression, but on the other hand I just dont see any reason why watching cartoon child porn should be in any way a legitimate protected interest in the eyes of the law.

Methadone for paedos.

I think its the other way around, viagra for paedos...

[The Brain]

But since I fail to see any legitimate reason whatsoever for someone to read child porn cartoons,

Really?

Irony?

You really don't see any legitimate reason? That's just bizarre.

[Bluebook]

But since I fail to see any legitimate reason whatsoever for someone to read child porn cartoons,

Really?

Irony?

You really don't see any legitimate reason? That's just bizarre.

Ok, vilket skulle det skyddsvärda intresset vara för att tillåta tecknad barnporr? Konkret, utan att hänvisa till yttrandefrihet alltså.

[Slargos]

Cartoon child porn is illegal in Sweden aswell. I fail to be upset about this. On the one hand, sure it is a limitation of someones freedom of expression, but on the other hand I just dont see any reason why watching cartoon child porn should be in any way a legitimate protected interest in the eyes of the law.

Methadone for paedos.

Exactly. Very well put.

[Slargos]

But since I fail to see any legitimate reason whatsoever for someone to read child porn cartoons,

Really?

Irony?

You really don't see any legitimate reason? That's just bizarre.

Ok, vilket skulle det skyddsvärda intresset vara för att tillåta tecknad barnporr? Konkret, utan att hänvisa till yttrandefrihet alltså.

Varför måste det ha ett skyddsvärt intresse, din kommunistdjävel.

[viper37]

The pothead charge should have been sufficient. Surely they go straight to execution?

It should have been, unfortunately it's not really a crime in Canada