Bernie Ward and the porn charge

[figmo]

Bernie Ward is a colleague. I've met him once in person, and I've worked with him on the air countless times.

I am also a reporter for one of the competing stations in the same market.

That said, since many folks are wondering about my view on the whole controversy, here it is.

I do occasionally come across porn in my radio work. Whenever I've done so, I've made sure my management knew exactly why I surfed onto a pornographic web site during work hours. Usually it's been in the form of "some local legislator or business let their domain registration lapse and a porn site grabbed it up." I obviously have to check the link to make sure it's real. Most of the times I've done this I've called over the station's owner so he could see for himself what was going on. Granted, I don't understand the appeal child porn. If I want to see a naked male, I want to see an adult, and I don't want to see him "doing it" with other women or children (eeeuw). Old issues of National Geographic work just fine, thank you!

I saw some of the transcripts in the Ward case. My first reaction was to think, "Bernie, you idiot, when an online dominatrix asks for pictures, she's not asking for pictures of other adults with children, she wants pictures that are allegedly of you so she can start cutting you down!" While folks may want to come down on her, while prostitution is illegal in every state except Nevada, there's nothing illegal about being a dominatrix. If Bernie was really doing research for a book on hypocrisy, he'd have had notes or would have told someone else involved with the book, such his publisher or editor. He'd also have covered the heck out of his butt whenever dealing with any kind of porn. He didn't.

That said, I don't agree that possessing or distributing child porn ought to be illegal, but doing the sexual acts to a child that create such porn ought to be (as opposed to using Photoshop to create it, which IMHO is art, albeit disgusting art).

Comments

[the-magician.livejournal.com]

I can sympathise with a lot of what you say ... until the end.

One of the problems with child porn is that people are willing to pay for it. As soon as money starts changing hands, then it becomes "worth it" for someone to abuse more children (or the same children more) and make money from it.

And if you were the victim of child abuse, and discovered that people were trading pictures of you being abused, I would imagine it wouldn't help you to come to terms with and try to lead a "normal" life as you grew older, to know that pictures of you in that state were still being circulated.

And for better or worse, there's a definite opinion out there that those that start by looking at child porn are more likely to move on to being abusers themselves (I do not know how true that is, or what percentages), ditto real or real-looking sadistic abuse of women. Which is why both are illegal in many countries.

In an analogy, there are websites showing people being beaten up, mugged etc. the people distributing the videos may not be the ones doing the bullying, assault or mugging, but it certainly has lead to copycat crimes and "happy slapping" in this country. However I do not believe that showing such videos are a crime aside from the invasion of privacy aspects.

In the UK our laws are different, if a picture depicts an under-age sexual act (whether it is a true photo of such thing, a photo of an "adult" who is playing someone under the legal age, or a drawing/photoshop image/3D graphical image) then it is a prosecutable offence. I believe in the US that it is illegal if either participant is under age, but that a drawing/3D image etc. of that same scene would be perfectly legal.

Just my opinion, and I have no personal experience in either abuse or viewing such images.

[tigertoy.livejournal.com]

I believe in the US that it is illegal if either participant is under age, but that a drawing/3D image etc. of that same scene would be perfectly legal.

In the US I grew up believing I lived in, you would be right, and I strongly believe that's how it should be. As things actually are, anyone caught possessing anything that appears to be a photo of a child involved in sex is in deep trouble.

[pbristow.livejournal.com]

[NODS] I remember the snippet of the Michael Jackson trial where the proescuting wossname made a big point about Michael owning copies of a magazine called "Barely Legal". And he repeated it with heavy, outraged emphasis: "*Barely*... Legal!" As if this were somehow proof that MJ was into minors, and had only bought this title 'cos it was the closest he coul legally get.

Of course, anyone who's ever walked into a newsagent in this country with their eyes switched on has seen "Barely Legal" right there on the top shelf, alongside Hustler and other members of the Larry Flint stable, and knows that if you're a guy who buys mainstream porn, then Barely Legal is one of the titles you might buy. The title is a pun; The models are of course all legal, albeit at the younger end of the spectrum... Some of them are actually in their twenties. The main selling point is really that they are new models on the scene rather than the same ones who've been turning up in Hustler for the last three years. And yes, many of the scenarios are "my first time"... Not the same thing at all as "I'm a child".

But I somehow got the impression that the folks in the court didn't want to know any of that. Even those that already knew it full well... =:o\