From Alex.
This is a response to the article by Rick Falkvinge, founder of Sweden’s first “Pirate Party,” and “political evangelist” for information policy. Rick wrote Three Reasons Why Child Porn Must Be Legalized in the Coming Decade. He plugs relentlessly away at the idea that someone who would want to turn in a child molester/pornographer would be convicted of the crime of possessing the porn. He also uses the ever-popular argument of a slippery slope when it comes to freedom of speech. I want to first say that this system does find all sorts of ways to fuck with people, that is a fact, but calling for the legalization of child porn is a narrow, disgusting, delusional, and intrinsically flawed reaction to that. My response to his article is below.
Dear Rick,
I know your specialty is information policy, but it seems like you are attempting to shelve social science, psychology, and economics in the process. Let’s zoom out.
There is a multi-billion dollar industry in porn, and money talks. That industry has all the freedom of speech. Economically, you have greater freedom of speech than I do, because you can fund speaking tours and publish to a wide readership. We can both say what we want, but the well-funded will actually be heard, and in this case, the porn industry will continue to profit off of sickness, sex trafficking, and child rape, and will spread that sickness to make more profit.
People watch porn and it teaches them what they are turned on by. This is not an essential part of society. ”Every generation of Homo Sapiens” did not have their sexuality dictated to them. ”Every generation of Homo Sapiens” did not go on the internet, only to find themselves overstimulated, and then understimulated, and driven further to seek the next thrill, eventually watching things they never thought would arouse them, but now do. That is social conditioning, because the porn industry has all the freedom of speech, a disproportionate amount.
You are writing as if no one in the world gets off on child pornography. You are writing as though there are only the producers of child porn, and altrustic passersby who want only to help. That is crazy. Child porn affects huge numbers of people who were never “pedophiles” until they were turned on by child porn. There are people who click the wrong link and find themselves turned on by something they never thought they would be.
Your conclusion: LEGALIZE IT? That is really twisted. In your fantasy world, we legalize child porn and suddenly everybody’s a hero, turning in pedophiles. You want to unleash a full throttle, no holds barred effort, fully funded by the multi-billion dollar sex trafficking & pornography industry — the best interest of which would be to create a generation of pedophiles — to completely redefine for this generation what is attractive. Young kids are already being sexualized in the mainstream, and grown women infantilized… do you think that has no affect on the way people look at each other in their everyday lives? Fantasy then gets played out as reality.
In conclusion, reality exists, not just your clever little ideas and exaggerated scenarios, and worse yet, your blatant lying by omission. I think maybe you’ve watched too much porn? Come to think that it was your idea to begin with, and regulating it is an attack on your rights? The increasing acceptance and normalization of this shit is a huge part of what allows it to go on. Yes, it’s illegal, and people still jack off to it. When it comes to this issue, maybe step outside of your narrow lens on information legislation and start thinking about how to actually address the problems of child rape, and of porn’s undeniable influence on the viewer to normalize rape and desensitize people to child abuse. It won’t be through information legislation, freeing all those heroes to exact justice on the pedophiles… like they’ve been waiting their whole lives to do.
I call bullshit.
Sincerely, Alex.
