Because of the way politics works, any action that can be perceived as softening the war on sex will be seen by some Republicans as an opportunity to advocate toughening the war on sex. Naturally, this would take the form of new calls for adding more obscenity prosectors, more obscenity prosecutions, and increased penalties for porn. (Maybe even as GOP platform positions. Ugh! I mean, I have to hold my nose and vote for those guys, you know....)
It doesn't take much imagination to see the same thing happen if the Obama administration were to show any sign of loosening-up in the "Drug War." (Or, more chillingly, if the Democrats tried to do something about improper SWAT Team raids, would Republicans reflexively oppose that too?)
Problem is, a move by the left triggers a countermove by the right. Why, it's almost as if the law of physics (that an action triggers an opposite reaction) applies to politics, except the problem is, we're talking about government. Complex laws and powerful bureaucracies with the power to ruin lives and put people in prison.
I wish I could think of a way to suspend the application of laws of physics to politics, but I can't. At the risk of sounding pessimistic, all I can say is no wonder so many things suck.
Maybe I should look on the bright side. I should probably be glad things don't suck more.
At least things suck in a bipartisan manner.
posted by Eric on 08.01.09 at 01:00 PM
Comments
If you look on the bright side too often, you may be blinded :-)
Wait, the Democrats are the ones who proposed and sponsored pretty much every censorship law over the past 20 years, and it's Republicans you're worried about?
It's not the Republicans I'm more worried about, but the way reactive politics works. Democrats are in general more against free speech than Republicans, which is good.
A key censorship issue now before the Supreme Court involves the right to depict animal cruelty:
Then there's so-called "virtal kiddie porn" law -- passed by a Republican congress and signed by Clinton. (Its broad bipartisan support indicates it was a product of this reactive process. No one wants to be called "pro-kiddie porn.")
BTW, I agree with Penn Jillette that it punishes thought crimes:
What worries me about this is that the crime can be committed by one person expressing his own thoughts.
Of course, what is far more egregious is that many Democrats want to ban hate speech -- very clearly a thought crime -- and they would love to kill talk radio.
I know that's not a question, but I can answer it anyway.
Because people are involved.
What's the difference between men and dogs?
Let's ask Mr. Twain If you pick up a starving dog and make him prosperous, he will not bite you.
People are scum.
It's right there in all the owner's manuals, like the Bible for instance.
Veeshir · August 2, 2009 4:55 PM
Couple of issues here:
* This isn't about passing laws, this is about using those laws to put people in jail. People who make videos of adults engaging in activities of their own free will may be disgusting individuals and the stuff they are doing might be gross, painful and degrading, but as long as no one is forced to participate, watch the video etc. then no harm, no foul. When you start doing it to animals, children (there's a line there, but that's a different argument) or forcing people blah blah blah.
* Democrats are marginally more willing to pass these laws. Republicans are more likely to actually want to, you know, enforce the law. Democrats will have no problems enforcing the law against their political opponents because to them it's a political issue. Republicans will enforce most of the obscenity against anyone since to them it's a moral issue.
* I think it's very telling that the Obama Administration didn't get ahead of this story. They could have *easily* said that they were going to re-align the DoJs investigation and prosecution efforts to focus on problem areas rather than just playing "gotcha" by applying Small Town Mississippi standards to material produced and marketed in Big Town Florida/California.
* RE the virtual kiddie porn law: One side effect of this is that now a significant percentage of the creeps[1] that get caught with child porn immediately claim that the images are "virtual". This will often trigger a call to the FBI, who has a team of image analysts who get called to testify in court as to the "reality" of the image. Often times they "know" the participants in these pictures. The FBI image analysts occasionally have trouble sleeping because of the quantity and contents of some of these pictures.
* Throwing someone in jail for their thoughts is clearly wrong, all of us can go down dangerous thought-tracks from time to time. Expressing these thoughts in some ways, especially in safe "coping mechanisms" or as a part of therapy etc. should be protected to a degree.
* But having a culture, a society means we must have lines. These lines should be bright and obvious, but they should be there. I am totally comfortable with "You shall not create images depicting sex with pre-pubescents" and "You will NOT use models/actors under the age of majority in sexually explicit film/photo material". Yes, I'm sure this infringes on some peoples right to be titillated. And no, I don't think that drawing a line *somewhere* means that that line can be arbitrarily whipped around all over the place.
[1] There are significant problems with current "child porn" laws. Almost all hetro men are stimulated by pictures of post-polymorphic women in erotic poses. This can include "well developed" 13 year olds on up. Most of the people getting busted are NOT getting in trouble for "Traci Lords" type of child porn where the participants look a little young. That's not what the Feebs are after and that's not what most people think of when they think of child porn.
The Anti-Idiotarian Rottweiler
Don?t bang your head!
If you look on the bright side too often, you may be blinded :-)