On Mon, May 28, 2001 at 05:47:40PM +0900, Sam Joseph wrote:
> There is no analogy whatsoever. We're not talking about somebody getting
> a dog that happens to remind you of your experience. We're talking
> about you being horribly mauled by dogs and somebody videoing that, and
> then distributing that video over the internet. The two actions, your
> neighbour buying a dog, and your neighbour distributing images of you
> being savagely mauled by dogs are completely different activities, and I
> think many people would agree with me that they warranted completely
> different responses.
Ok, so how would a video of you being distributed over the internet hurt
you?
> Fair enough. But I'm not talking about banning anything that reminds
> you of the suffering. I'm talking about you having the right to get in
> touch with people who are distributing the images of you actually
> suffering, which seems completely different to me.
The problem is that you need to think, not in terms of what people have
a right to do, but in terms of what is required to *ensure* that they
have that right. So, I have the right to life, but does that mean that
the government should ban anything that might take away that right
(guns, knives, etc). Now, you might decide not to support Freenet on
the basis that it prevents people from identifying the source of
information, and to you the negative implications of that (child
pornography) outweigh the positive implication (freedom of speech), so
you shouldn't run a Freenet node in that case.
> > > > In that case, it is obtaining the images that is wrong, not their
> > > distribution.
> > > Really. You're telling me that if I distribute images of a married
> > > person having an affair in an attempt to destroy his marriage,
> family,
> > > status in the community, then the people who support their
> distribution
> > > have no blame or responsibility in the matter?
> > This is perfectly legal, and happens all the time.
> Not if the images are fakes, right.
In the scenario you outlined, there was no indication that the images
might be fake.
> > Ah, so you think that taking pictures of a child being sexually abused
> > is ok provided they are not distributed? Wow.
> That's a pretty lowly and pathetic piece of reasoning.
It was a joke, a parody of a frequent argument against Freenet.
> Hey, look, I think that Freenet incorporates some interesting and
> excellent technology, I just can't quite figure out why the anonymity
> part is actually necessary.
Almost all censorship is retrospective, the only sure way to prevent
such censorship is anonymity. Anonymous speech is essential for free
speech, this isn't a new idea.
Ian.
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