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catman
Joined: 18 Jul 2004
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Posted: Mon Feb 25, 2013 8:54 pm Post subject: Iceland may ban porn |
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It looks as if Iceland is about to get a little colder.
Iceland's government is considering a sweeping ban on Internet pornography that would prevent its people from viewing or downloading x-rated material.
The legislation, being drafted by Interior Minister Ogmundur Jonasson, aims to block the effects of pornography on young people by filtering access to pornographic images and videos via smartphones, computers and game consoles, according to the Telegraph.
Sidestepping cries of censorship, Ogmundur, who is affiliated with the country's Left-Green Movement, a left-wing political party, pointed at the larger social problems he claims porn causes, stating that "violent pornography... has a very harmful effect on young people and can have a clear link to incidences of violent crime."
A law forbidding the printing and distribution of pornography is already on the books in Iceland, but Ogmundur's proposal would extend the ban to the Internet, according to the Telegraph. Methods for the ban being considered include enacting laws making it illegal to use Icelandic credit cards to purchase porn, and filtering out pornographic IP addresses.
"If we can send a man to the moon, we must be able to tackle porn on the Internet," Halla Gunnarsd�ttir, political advisor to Ogmundur, told The Daily Mail. Despite what the denizens of Internet's seedier quadrants might think, Halla claimed that the proposed legislation isn't anti-sex.
"It is anti-violence because young children are seeing porn and acting it out. That is where we draw the line. This material is blurring the boundaries for young people about what is right and wrong," Halla said.
Iceland has already outlawed strip clubs, a move which led The Guardian to proclaim Iceland a global leader in feminism in 2010.
While Icelandic politicians clearly have their reasons for seeking a ban on online pornography, Gizmodo used the Nordic country's prospective distinction as the first Western democracy to ban Internet porn as pretext to include it in a less-than-laudable league of nations: "By banning access to internet porn, Iceland will join countries like Iran, Saudi Arabia, Yemen and other temples of democracy widely known to protect women and children rights."
However, Mashable provided some counterbalance to censorship arguments, tapping Gail Dines, a professor of sociology and women�s studies at Wheelock College in Boston, Mass., who chimed in support for the ban.
"It is looking at pornography from a new position � from the perspective of the harm it does to the women who appear in it and as a violation of their civil rights," Dines told Mashable. "It also approaches porn from the point of view of children who are having their sexuality hijacked at a young age by brutal sexual imagery."
This isn't the first time Ogmundur has taken a stance on a controversial issue. In fact, since returning to Iceland's cabinet in 2011, after having resigned as health minister in 2009, Ogmundur has championed the banning of online gambling and has accused Israel of genocide against Palestinians, according to English-language Icelandic new site Grapevine.
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Those crazy Scandanavian feminists! |
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Fox
Joined: 04 Mar 2009
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Posted: Mon Feb 25, 2013 9:20 pm Post subject: |
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I seriously doubt that moderate viewing of pornography actually increases violence (in fact, it may even decrease it), but if Iceland really wants to ban internet pornography, I doubt there will be any serious negative consequences.
Banning internet gambling would probably be an outright blessing for the demographics most likely to partake in it. |
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comm
Joined: 22 Jun 2010
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Posted: Mon Feb 25, 2013 11:29 pm Post subject: Re: Iceland may ban porn |
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"If we can send a man to the moon, we must be able to tackle porn on the Internet," Halla Gunnarsd�ttir, political advisor to Ogmundur, told The Daily Mail. |
That's funny, I don't remember Iceland sending a man to the Moon.
So ironic. Women fought for decades to have the right to control their own bodies. They fought to be able to define their own sexuality for themselves and express it how they saw fit WITHOUT men telling them what they could and couldn't do.
Soon Iceland will require full-cover burkas. Women who are uncovered are seen as sex objects by men, which degrades them and violates their civil rights. It doesn't matter if they're doing it voluntarily, women are too stupid to know what's good for them. |
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Fox
Joined: 04 Mar 2009
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Posted: Tue Feb 26, 2013 12:29 am Post subject: Re: Iceland may ban porn |
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comm wrote: |
So ironic. Women fought for decades to have the right to control their own bodies. They fought to be able to define their own sexuality for themselves and express it how they saw fit WITHOUT men telling them what they could and couldn't do.
Soon Iceland will require full-cover burkas. Women who are uncovered are seen as sex objects by men, which degrades them and violates their civil rights. It doesn't matter if they're doing it voluntarily, women are too stupid to know what's good for them. |
It's interesting how radical feminism trends back towards the authoritarianism it decries in "patriarchal" society, isn't it? But I doubt it would ever end up with burkas; the feminist variant of the burka is the demonization of the male gaze. |
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comm
Joined: 22 Jun 2010
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Posted: Tue Feb 26, 2013 5:12 am Post subject: Re: Iceland may ban porn |
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Fox wrote: |
It's interesting how radical feminism trends back towards the authoritarianism it decries in "patriarchal" society, isn't it? But I doubt it would ever end up with burkas; the feminist variant of the burka is the demonization of the male gaze. |
That is an excellent point.
Ugh... seeing the phrase "male gaze" outside of university gives me the heebie-jeebies. |
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Kuros
Joined: 27 Apr 2004
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Posted: Tue Feb 26, 2013 5:23 am Post subject: |
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There's little evidence for the assertion that porn causes crime. Also, I don't understand how alleging 'violent pornography' may have harmful effects justifies a broad ban on pornography in general.
We may say that pornography isn't worth protecting, and it certainly isn't according to the U.S.'s First Amendment. But privacy should be our concern. To what lengths will the government go to enforce its porn ban? |
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rollo
Joined: 10 May 2006 Location: China
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Posted: Tue Feb 26, 2013 5:23 am Post subject: |
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It's a shame that Orwell couldnt be alive to see his writings become fact. Censorship is censorship, social engineering is just a fancy word for fascism.
I cringed when i read"male gaze". Looking at someone is now a thought crime. HaH!!! |
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Fox
Joined: 04 Mar 2009
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Posted: Tue Feb 26, 2013 2:58 pm Post subject: |
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Kuros wrote: |
We may say that pornography isn't worth protecting, and it certainly isn't according to the U.S.'s First Amendment. But privacy should be our concern. To what lengths will the government go to enforce its porn ban? |
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Methods for the ban being considered include enacting laws making it illegal to use Icelandic credit cards to purchase porn, and filtering out pornographic IP addresses. |
Neither sounds especially invasive if it's really just the obstruction of distribution. It already obstructs the distribution of physical pornography, and I have not seen any hard-core authoritarian horror stories about personal privacy invasion regarding that. |
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Kuros
Joined: 27 Apr 2004
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Posted: Tue Feb 26, 2013 4:19 pm Post subject: |
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Here's what I might support in porn legislation that purported to protect women's civil rights and the sensitive viewership of children:
- An expiration on distribution for profit of each specific depiction of women engaged in illicit sex acts after seven years. This would allow women who chose porn to escape it later.
- Some system that would establish and enforce effective but non-invasive measures to prevent those under the age of 18 from viewing porn depicting illicit sex acts.
- Funding for independent studies on porn viewership that might establish a scientific basis for further porn restriction if it produced substantial evidence that porn consumption harmed either viewers in general or a protected class (women, children) |
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Mix1
Joined: 08 May 2007
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Posted: Thu Feb 28, 2013 4:40 pm Post subject: Re: Iceland may ban porn |
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comm wrote: |
Soon Iceland will require full-cover burkas. |
Good idea, it's cold there!
No, but I'm guessing you've never been there. Those women would never go for that. Educated, strong, forward, and very liberated and sexual... and attractive! A very socially liberal society overall.
This legislation is likely viewed as a joke by them.
And the guy who drafted it almost certainly needs to chill out and get laid. He probably watched porn, liked it, then felt guilty about it and this is his way of addressing his own dissonance. |
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Fox
Joined: 04 Mar 2009
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Posted: Thu Feb 28, 2013 6:52 pm Post subject: Re: Iceland may ban porn |
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Mix1 wrote: |
And the guy who drafted it almost certainly needs to chill out and get laid. He probably watched porn, liked it, then felt guilty about it and this is his way of addressing his own dissonance. |
Probably not. |
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Titus
Joined: 19 May 2012
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Posted: Fri Mar 01, 2013 6:48 am Post subject: |
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A solid idea.
Iceland is going after banksters and pornography.
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Educated, strong, forward, and very liberated and sexual... |
Stop reading Jezebel. You sound like a spinster. |
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Mix1
Joined: 08 May 2007
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Posted: Mon Mar 04, 2013 9:14 pm Post subject: |
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Titus wrote: |
A solid idea.
Iceland is going after banksters and pornography.
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Educated, strong, forward, and very liberated and sexual... |
Stop reading Jezebel. You sound like a spinster. |
Whatever dude. You guys are funny.
Let me rephrase it then: they are hot and get down and dirty, and the club scene is fairly wild there.
No burkas anytime soon. Nobody is worried about porn there except the knee-jerk wanna-be do-gooder liberal guy who wrote the bill proposal.
Next issue. |
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Titus
Joined: 19 May 2012
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Posted: Fri Mar 08, 2013 6:45 am Post subject: |
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Mix1 wrote: |
Titus wrote: |
A solid idea.
Iceland is going after banksters and pornography.
Quote: |
Educated, strong, forward, and very liberated and sexual... |
Stop reading Jezebel. You sound like a spinster. |
Whatever dude. You guys are funny.
Let me rephrase it then: they are hot and get down and dirty, and the club scene is fairly wild there.
No burkas anytime soon. Nobody is worried about porn there except the knee-jerk wanna-be do-gooder liberal guy who wrote the bill proposal.
Next issue. |
I don't know or care why Iceland is working to diminish porn.
I support a very aggressive attempt at diminishing porn. Not because of women. Poor women, and their oppression, etc. Don't care. I support it because of the impact porn has on men. I don't think our society has much of a future when the young men are jerking off to porn in-between marathon sessions of "first person shooters" instead of being out and about as men.
I'm coming at this problem not as a "knee-jerk wanna-be do-gooder liberal guy" but as a wildly right wing aggressive beat people in the streets nationalist. |
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catman
Joined: 18 Jul 2004
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Posted: Fri Mar 08, 2013 3:56 pm Post subject: |
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Left wing authoritarianism meet right wing authoritarianism. |
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