OFF: Cyber Sleaze

[Chris Bates]

Andy wrote:

> Um.  I'm in two minds here, because I think this is really off-topic, but I'm
> quite interested in it as well...

I have the same feeling :-)

> Now, many people (including me) feel that porn, especially of the
> hard-core kind, can do actual social harm, both to the users of porn,
> the families of users of porn, and also to the people (usually women)
> that are photographed for porn.

I would tend to agree with this, although the argument is, like most aspects
of human behaviour, impossible to prove one way or the other. We all KNOW
that advertising works, who has not gone out and bought something that they
don't need merely because an advert has created a desire. I feel that porn,
and violence, in films/pictures works in a similar way. They are harmful
to the majority but a minority use them to legitimise their world view and
as an encouragement to act. Youngsters whose ideas are unformed and whose
desires are driven by a mass of seething hormones must be particularly
susceptible here.

> (If you think that coercion
> isn't a normal part of procuring women (or children) for the sex industry,
> and it's just a freely undertaken transaction, then that's just naive.)

As an aside, wouldn't radical Marxists argue that we're all coerced by
the capitalist system?

> Of course, the pornographers and their sympathisers are more than happy to
> defend their degrading practices by shouting "freedom of speech".

Constitutional guarantees of reedom of speech are restricted to a few
countries. In the American context they guarantee religious and political
tolerance, although interestingly it seems not for Marxists (c.f.
McCarthy).

> political or religious issues without fearing the knock on the door at 3 am.

Within certain politically acceptable boundaries ...

> An interesting text is Michael Moorcock's essay "The Case against
> Pornography", in the _Casablanca_ collection (a-ha, some HW/BOC relevance!).

To be read with the reminder that MM is very influenced by Andrea Dworkin.
AD has said many interesting and useful things but she is not a liberal
on this one and I would tend to take anything she says or influences with
a pinch of salt.

FoFP wrote:

> It really is an all or nothing thing:
> once you give a politician the right to censor anything, you've condeded
> the principle that they can censor everything.

Oh come on Mike! Calm down and get real!! In the UK there is a ban on
the advertising of tobacco products on TV and a code which prevents the
tobacco barons advertising there products near schools. Is this really
the first step on the road to a totalitarian dictatorship? Though not.

> So it;s tough being a parent? It's not compulsory. If folks figure the
> job is too difficult then they don't need to apply for the post.

Didn't know you had to apply! For many people it just happens, they don't
plan to have children and have less training and preparation than they
do to cross the road! Expecting the majority of people to provide
quality parenting and perfect control AND expecting them to keep abreast
of technological changes such as the internet is expecting too much.

Someone else (sorry I deleted it) wrote about obscene materials and the
postal service. Here in the UK it is illegal to send unsolicited
*adult* material through the post. Change the word *internet* to
*postal service* in FoFP's following comment:

> Anyone for an internet comprising the political tolerance of the
> chinese, the religious tolerance of the iranians, the sexual tolerance
> of the british, and the artistic tolerance of the french?

Censorship of the internet will not lead to the end of the world.

Right I'm going to self-censor myself out of this debate but will
be happy to continue off-line.


Chris
p.s. Mike: has your politics list started yet?