Porn vs. Art

[Brian-M]

I'll try to get back to those challenges, I'm going to be busy for the next few days, so you'll just have to quell the intense need to read my replies.

I'm trying to gather some studies on the issue, but obviously google is not the end-all, be-all of research and I don't particularly want to put in more effort. But here are some things you guys may find interesting:

That's okay, we understand if you can't reply as often as you'd like to.

But why all these reports on the victims of child pornography? That has nothing to do with nude modeling. And the child pornography these reports refer to are not the kind of images taken for artistic purposes and then later declared as pornographic. Those reports are about the kind of pictures intended to be pornographic.

Can't you accept that children who willingly pose nude for pictures intended to be artistic are in an entirely different position from children who are forced to participate in making pornography?

 

[tesscaline]

It's based on a few things:
1) Child porn does incredible damage to children throughout the world.
2) It does so for reasons that are not solely limited to physical abuse.

These two points are not in dispute.

3) We cannot distinguish pornography from art, or harmful from unharmful situations to a degree reliable enough to justify the risk (if anyone can do so, I instantly join their side)

This, however, you have provided no actual evidence for. And every time anyone asks you to clarify your train of logic on the matter, you backtrack and try to say that you're not actually saying what you are. Part of the problem with your statements is that of qualification. You are including none. Thus, your statement is applicable to all possible incarnations. You are basically saying that no person can possibly distinguish between any situation that could be harmful to a child and any situation that is not harmful to a child. You are also not defining the degree of harm to which you are referring. Is anything that makes a child cry "harm"? And then you require some undefined level of reliability, justification, and risk.

I'm sorry, but the logical fallacies you display here are simply too numerous to catalogue.

4) The harm to society from the prohibition against using live naked kids in art, no art with naked kids, is minor compared to the damage caused to children if we get the balancing act wrong.

Is it? You have evidence of this? Sounds more like a blatant emotional appeal to me.

6) There's no reason to think that even a really well defined, tightly drawn line (say 95% accuracy), will justify the harm incurred by those we fail.

There's no reason to think that about cars, planes, trains, alcohol, paint fumes, or peanut butter either. Please explain why you are advocating only the banning of naked children in art, but not those other things.

I'm legitimately curious what people would accept as a success rate.

I'm not. What I'm curious about is how you even got this far in your line of reasoning (if there is even any actual reasoning at all, that is).

Then explain how to separate the two.

Nope, sorry. Me explaining how I can tell the difference between art and child pornography isn't going to address the issue of your continuing to conflate known terms, and refusing to define those conflations when you do so.

I will ask, since you claim that it is impossible to tell the difference between art and child porn: Why is it that you think William-Adolphe Bouguereau's "The Birth of Venus" is child porn? (No, I will not provide a link. FSM forbid I wind up accused of linking to child porn just because some ignorant uneducated moron thinks that anything involving the depiction of naked babies is pornographic -- you know, since people can't tell the difference and all.. )

I'm sorry, but I tend to think that when someone sees a naked child and automatically thinks "sex" instead of whatever other innocent activity (bath time memorialized, for example) is going on it says more about that person than it does about anyone or anything else.

Sure, fair enough. Having spent some more time trying to research this (now my google search window is filled with a massive number of permutations of "child pornography" "abuse victim" and assorted other unpleasant sounding things--don't send the authorities my way until I delete all that) I am willing to concede that I cannot currently establish a factual case to prove that even well-meaning photographers of nude children can cause them damage.

So, are you willing to withdraw that claim then?

It is important to reiterate, however, that the reason the data hasn't isolated those cases is because such a huge number of those cases also involve abuse.

Oh, you're not willing to withdraw that claim... Now you're just compounding your past lame excuses with more lame excuses. Seriously? The only reason we don't know about any damage caused to children from innocent and non-sexual nude artwork depicting them is because... They've been harmed by other abuse? What? You do know that correlation does not imply causation, right? That you're working with an incomplete sample size, right? That you're making logical fallacies all over the place here, right??

 

[JFrankA]

I'll try to get back to those challenges, I'm going to be busy for the next few days, so you'll just have to quell the intense need to read my replies.

I'm trying to gather some studies on the issue, but obviously google is not the end-all, be-all of research and I don't particularly want to put in more effort. But here are some things you guys may find interesting:

1) This is a survey of crime statistics involving pornography/sexual offenses. It deals with a claim I made earlier about the impossibility of isolating JUST the posing naked (victim pornography has the child as the subject, as opposed to situations where pornography is used to seduce or molest children):

"...all juvenile victim pornography incidents included other offenses in addition to illegal pornography; the great majority of them were sexual or violent offenses..."

As to the parents being the people who should decide: "Juvenile victim pornography incidents occurred in various locations but overwhelmingly in private residences and homes, which is also where sexual abuse tends to occur..."

"For juvenile victims whose offender could be identified, 25 percent were members of the offender’s family, 64 percent were acquaintances, and 11 percent were strangers."

http://www.ncjrs.gov/pdffiles1/ojjdp/204911.pdf

2) Another big study that reiterates the point that the pure effect of porn cannot be isolated, but discusses other related issues:

"Exposure to pornography is often used as a technique to normalize the practice of prostitution during a pimp's "seasoning" process. Pimps may take photographs of children who are nude in the context of a caring relationship but then threaten to send the images to the child's family or school."

The family and school are just the leverage for blackmail, it could easily say "post on the internet." Is a child who is "nude in the context of a caring relationship" art?

"In one study of adult female prostitutes, 38 percent of the women reported that they had sexually explicit photographs taken of them, while they were children..."

http://www.popcenter.org/problems/child_pornography/PDFs/Klain_etal_2001.pdf

Lot's of sources to dig around in on that one, if anyone cares.

3) Regarding the child's ability to "consent":

"The vast majority of children who appear in child pornography have not been abducted or physically forced to participate. In most cases they know the producer—it may even be their father—and are manipulated into taking part by more subtle means."

http://www.popcenter.org/problems/child_pornography/2

4) "Little research exists on how exposure to and participation in pornography affect children, although it is apparent that such experiences often produce feelings of betrayal, guilt, worthlessness, and rage."

Pierce, R. L. Child pornography: A hidden dimension of child abuse. Child Abuse & Neglect, 1984, 8: 483-493.

I couldn't get that whole thing for free.

Okay, I have to echo what Brian-M said:

You do know we that there is a major difference between legitimate nude child photography, such as a parent takes of a child, an artist takes with the parent's consent, etc, and child porn?

Please do not equate naked child photo with child porn. (Hint: This is what I mean by "guilty until proven innocent").

 

[Kevin_Lowe]

I think Tranewreck is making two major errors here, both of which have already been pointed out but both of which bear further highlighting.

The first is that it's irrational to take data about the outcomes of child sexual abuse plus the recording of said abuse, and assume that it is valid data about the outcomes of nude child modelling. You can't generalise from apples to oranges.

Tranewreck is arguing that in practise you cannot adequately distinguish child sexual abuse plus the recording of said abuse from nude child modelling. I find that argument very strange indeed, since the differences appear to be quite obvious.

The second, perhaps deeper issue is that Tranewreck thinks it is okay to restrict people's freedom to act as they see fit unless the people being restricted can prove that they need a given freedom. I take great exception to that. I think that it should be up to people who want to censor or restrict others to prove that they need to pass such laws in order to prevent provable, significant harm. No proof of harm from the activity in question, no law censoring or restricting it.

There's absolutely no proof of harm from posing for artists such as Henson, to pick one example, but we have first-hand testimony from at least one of his models that while the photography did no harm at all, subsequent harassment by malignantly self-righteous "moral" crusaders caused her significant emotional suffering. Based on the available evidence I'm more in favour of censoring anti-child-pornography crusaders than of censoring artists like Henson.

 

[quadraginta]

<snip>

Based on the available evidence I'm more in favour of censoring anti-child-pornography crusaders than of censoring artists like Henson.

I like.

Sensible, evidence based restriction.

 

[Southwind17]

Although, intent nonwithstanding, a person watching the movie could be aroused, nonetheless.

So what?!

 

[Southwind17]

If you think that is stretching credibility then you are demonstrating a weak, if not non-existent grasp of both photography and art.

In that case we're all budding photographers and artists. I knew it wasn't difficult!

 

[Southwind17]

It is my intent to show this story, to show their love for each other. Not my intent to be erotic or sexual.

At least you can now consider yourself educated on the meaning of the word "erotic". I suppose that's a start!

 

[Southwind17]

No, he eventually showed he understood my point.

That's good - got him over the line in the end! Well done.

 

[Southwind17]

But then again, Andrew Blake's work was never in a museum. So does your definition: "If it was never in a museum, it isn't art" apply to Blake?

Doh! And there was I, foolishly, thinking you'd "got it". Seems you only recognized the mis-quote, and nothing more. Silly me. :

From the last time we had this discussion, it seems to me that SW's definition of art is anything that made it into a museum.

Not quite. I questioned why "main-stream" porn wasn't found in museums if it's art. More-than-subtle difference.

Okay. I misquoted you. That's fair.

 

[Southwind17]

I made a video with no intention of any erotic or arousal. My intention is only to tell this story and convey the emotional bonding that these two people have rekindled. I don't know if it will sexually arouse anyone, it doesn't matter. It is not my intent.
I say to you, by your definition, it is not porn. It is art.

In that case (now that you've been clear), to my mind (by the definiton I go by) I agree it's not porn. I'm not sure what your point is now, though, but I am sure that you've provided insufficient information for me to agree that it's necessarily art!

 

[Southwind17]

Maplethorpe had nude children in his exhibition. They were hung in a museum. Some people called it porn, some people called it art.

And this incidental observation has what, exactly, to do with my comment to which it purports to respond?!

 

[Southwind17]

Have you actually seen those pictures? I have. I don't think of it as filth and/or crap.

The point is, how is this decided as porn or not?

According to SW, it isn't because Maplethorpe didn't intend it to be sexually arousing.

 

[Southwind17]

That makes no sense.

So, we have no way of knowing if anyone is going to become an alcoholic in order to protect all people from the possibility of becoming alcoholics, we should ban all alcohol.

Er ... we have already. Oh, hang on ... no, only in relation to minors, who are judged (rightly) not to be of sufficient age to judge for themselves. Yes ... that's the difference. I do wish you'd pay attention. It would save some of us a whole lot of effort trying to keep you on program, but we've been there before, haven't we!

 

[Southwind17]

Wow. So amateur people who take pictures and are bad at it aren't doing art ? Or does "no skill" qualify ?

What part of the meaning of "skill" don't you understand?

 

[Southwind17]

Again, how do you gather evidence of intent, especially when the person is dead ?

If the person is dead where's the public interest in even thinking about gathering evidence?

Who cares ? You said it was the intent that mattered.

Why do you think we differentiate between murder and manslaughter?! I suppose it shouldn't "matter", should it?

 

[Southwind17]

That makes no sense. When do you ban something on the mere possibility that it can do harm ?

When the perpetrator (loose definition) is an adult and the potential "victim" is a minor, and when there's no actual or duly-informed judgement of perceived benefit to the minor of the "perpetrator's" actions (or inactions)under the circumstances, essentially.

Again, do you ban chainsaws because someone may hurt themselves by shaving with it ?

See ... it works!

At some point you're going to have to give other people the benefit of the doubt.

Yes ... "at some point", but not the point where you stick the pin.

 

[Southwind17]

Once again, my argument is that no one can distinguish between those situations and thusly should not be making unnecessary decisions for children that place them in potentially damaging situations. [emphasis added]

I'm desperately hoping that's a typo!!!

 

[Southwind17]

What happened to "intent"? I thought you had decided that was the gold standard.

Are your goal posts on the move?

You miss my point. "Intent" is indeed the current "gold standard" so far as defining pornography goes (at least so far as I'm concerned). I was merely seeking to introduce and highlight another aspect into the debate, i.e. differentiating between "intentional" and "unintentional" in the context of criminality, a good analogy being murder and manslaughter. Both are crimes, but with different severity and generally having different punishments. I'm merely suggesting that having no intent to sexually arouse, thereby discounting material as porn (by the definition I prefer), might not be sufficient defense to an allegation, even if shown to be true. Whatever the porn equivalent of murder is maybe we also need a manslaughter equivalent; maybe even a simple homicide equivalent. Maybe we already do!

 

[Southwind17]

.
An adult gives a chainsaw to another adult, knowing the other adult is a booze hound.
It almost worked.
The guy was only seriously maimed.

But guilty of negligence, nonetheless. Same principle, essentially.