So, someone reads your work online.
They find some titillation in your artistic, possibly romantic, description of the seduction, of even a fictional child or adolescent. They are so moved that they are encouraged, justified even (“hey you know I read this stuff on the internet, its cool to interfere with children, other people do it and write about it, its ok”) to act on their “victimless” urges and interfere with some parent’s child and boom! you have a victim.
And you are a perpetrator to a crime. That would not be covered under the First.
I don’t care what you write, but, if you are truly a humane person, you should consider the impact that your writing may have on other people in the world.
Keep it all, well and truly to yourself.
I love children too. I love them as fellow human beings. And I do what I can to ensure that they all, have the freedom and space to grow into physically and psychologically healthy adults.
Is it really? I had a friend who worked in customs enforcement in New Zealand. He told me that only pictorial porn could result in prosecution, and literary porn is exempt. Which is ironic, because until the 70s New Zealand Customs had a policy of confiscating any book with a title containing a female name (e.g. “Fanny Hill”). That policy ended after someone’s copy of “Jane Eyre” was confiscated at Christchurch Airport.
Hopefully they’ll start confiscating the Bible, which the only dirty book I’ve ever read that is actually harmful.
My understanding is that it is illegal in America as well; however, there is a gray area. It is only illegal as pornography. Written for the explicit purpose of jerking off, I guess. Though how you would prove that in court, I have no idea. So, as long as you couch your porn in a reasonable story line, you get away with it.
Jack and Jill went up the hill, Jack fucked the hell out of her. Jill’s knees got weak and she came tumbling down the hill. Jack went tumbling after her.
I often don’t even use human characters in my stories, so you can not really say people will use it for child grooming. I take no responsibility for misuse of my stories as I will only take responsibility for my own actions.
And how about the people who draw underage human stuff? Should they be arrested for their drawings?
I am very aware of that part of the internet. Many years ago, in my quest for knowledge, I wanted to explore little visited locations, and found the seedy side of the internet.
That is where the sickos and perverts cluster. And each year the forces of law and order are nabbing them.
Here in America there’s constitutional rights which prevents the laws from prosecution against art only collections. Unless there’s evidence of some true and direct contact with a minor conviction of art only is difficult to achieve. It falls into freedom of expression. When you have no victims to testify a conviction is too difficult to achieve. Mostly they leave these cases go. Unfortunately there’s too many cases with real victims which they have problems convicting in the end, and they go free without any punishment at all. When there’s real living victims these people should be convicted and sentenced.
This reminded me of a Ray Stevens song, Mr Businessman.
You’ve got air conditioned sinuses And dark disturbing doubts about religion And you keep those cards and letters going out While your secretary’s tempting you Your morals are exempting you from guilt and shame Heaven knows you’re not to blame
Just keep telling yourself you are not part of the problem.
I think David’s question inferred your moral obligation to avoid harming a child goes beyond your own direct interactions with children. In a wider moral context do you feel no obligation to ensure your actions don’t risk encouraging someone else into harming any child?
As far as I’m concerned, you remain guilty of sordid behaviour which may in fact be illegal under US Federal law…
I just did a very quick search. Found this:
“Federal law strictly prohibits the distribution of obscene matter to minors. … In addition, visual representations, such as drawings, cartoons, or paintings that appear to depict minors engaged in sexual activity and are obscene are also illegal under federal law.28 May 2020”
There’s heaps more in PDF form. You may in fact be skating on thin ice. I truly hope someone reports you.
All the while there’s quite a few actual abusers out and about. Some even repeat offenders. Federal law also says Marijuana is a schedule 1 drug listed with heroin and a few other real dangerous drugs.
The law enacted 18 U.S.C.§ 1466A, which criminalizes material that has “a visual depiction of any kind, including a drawing, cartoon, sculpture or painting” that “depicts a minor engaging in sexually explicit conduct and is obscene” or “depicts an image that is, or appears to be, of a minor engaging in … sexual intercourse … and lacks serious literary, artistic, political, or scientific value”. By its own terms, the law does not make all simulated child pornography illegal, only that found to be obscene or lacking in serious value.[citation needed]
In November 2005 in Richmond, Virginia, Dwight Whorley was convicted under 18 U.S.C. sec. 1466A for using a Virginia Employment Commission computer to receive “obscene Japanese anime cartoons that graphically depicted prepubescent female children being forced to engage in genital-genital and oral-genital intercourse with adult males”.[12][13][14] He was also convicted of possessing child pornography involving real children. He was sentenced to 20 years in prison.[15]
On December 18, 2008, the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals affirmed the conviction.[16] The court stated that “it is not a required element of any offense under this section that the minor depicted actually exists [sic]”. Attorneys for Mr. Whorley have said that they will appeal to the Supreme Court.[17][18]
The request for en banc rehearing of United States v. Whorley from the Court of Appeals was denied on June 15, 2009. A petition for writ of certiorari was filed with the Supreme Court on September 14, 2009, and denied on January 11, 2010, without comment.[19]
And it does not matter that much when it does come to federal law there’s many people don’t even know exists.
Bottom line is it is hard to enforce some of these federal laws and no matter if you like it or not the laws should be focusing on the many real abuse problems as there’s too many cases and some get let go. Unless you would rather the law system wasting time and resources. They usually do not do that, at least not for fiction.
Of all people you should know this. Pot is illegal where you live, yet you advocate for it? Yet when it comes to your “art”, you reverse your position and follow the dictates of the law.