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Friend Lee Ghost
Joined: 06 Jun 2011
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 Posted: Fri Jun 24, 2011 7:10 am Post subject: |
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| Squire wrote: |
| I'd be interested to see drugs like weed, ecstasy and possibly psychedelics like acid and ketamine legalised, but not so much cocaine and speed. The first four I mentioned are chemically pretty harmless and don't encourage users to go out and cause trouble. The latter, not so much |
I was with you up to the ketamine part. It is not a psychedelic but rather a dissociative anaesthetic, i.e. it is used for major surgery. It is not really something people should be fooling around with recreationally. It is on a par with propofol, and we all know what happened with that. (It killed Michael Jackson who was foolishly using it at home even with a doctor there administering it.) |
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Koreadays
Joined: 20 May 2008
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| Posted: Sat Jun 25, 2011 12:50 am Post subject: |
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| screw the governments! they don't care about us.. |
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Friend Lee Ghost
Joined: 06 Jun 2011
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| Posted: Fri Jul 15, 2011 8:46 am Post subject: |
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Ten Years After Decriminalization, Drug Abuse Down by Half in Portugal
July 7, 2011 by Trevor Lyman
Drug warriors often contend that drug use would skyrocket if we were to legalize or decriminalize drugs in the United States. Fortunately, we have a real-world example of the actual effects of ending the violent, expensive War on Drugs and replacing it with a system of treatment for problem users and addicts.
Ten years ago, Portugal decriminalized all drugs. One decade after this unprecedented experiment, drug abuse is down by half:
Health experts in Portugal said Friday that Portugal�s decision 10 years ago to decriminalise drug use and treat addicts rather than punishing them is an experiment that has worked.
�There is no doubt that the phenomenon of addiction is in decline in Portugal,� said Joao Goulao, President of the Institute of Drugs and Drugs Addiction, a press conference to mark the 10th anniversary of the law.
The number of addicts considered �problematic� � those who repeatedly use �hard� drugs and intravenous users � had fallen by half since the early 1990s, when the figure was estimated at around 100,000 people, Goulao said.
Other factors had also played their part however, Goulao, a medical doctor added.
�This development can not only be attributed to decriminalisation but to a confluence of treatment and risk reduction policies.�
Many of these innovative treatment procedures would not have emerged if addicts had continued to be arrested and locked up rather than treated by medical experts and psychologists. Currently 40,000 people in Portugal are being treated for drug abuse. This is a far cheaper, far more humane way to tackle the problem. Rather than locking up 100,000 criminals, the Portuguese are working to cure 40,000 patients and fine-tuning a whole new canon of drug treatment knowledge at the same time.
None of this is possible when waging a war. |
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sirius black
Joined: 04 Jun 2010
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| Posted: Sat Jul 16, 2011 5:12 pm Post subject: |
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Some people see something illegal as inherentlyh bad. what is illegal or even legal its subjective and changes within a society and reflects a current society.
ALL drugs were legal 150 years ago but it was legal to own another human being (in many states). Alcohol was illegal 90 years ago but in some states you weren't interracial marriages were not recgnized.
If those that advcoted keeping drugs illegal actually knew the reasons why it was made illegal in the first place may change their position IF they are open minded and honest.
Add prostitution along with drugs to the list of things that are illogically illegal as well. |
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Friend Lee Ghost
Joined: 06 Jun 2011
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| Posted: Sat Jul 16, 2011 7:43 pm Post subject: |
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| sirius black wrote: |
Some people see something illegal as inherentlyh bad. what is illegal or even legal its subjective and changes within a society and reflects a current society.
...
If those that advcoted keeping drugs illegal actually knew the reasons why it was made illegal in the first place may change their position IF they are open minded and honest.
Add prostitution along with drugs to the list of things that are illogically illegal as well. |
Since you are making a list, add possession of kiddy porn for personal use to it. Its availability has been associated with a decrease in child sex assaults in every country in which it has been studied.
| An ABC-TV website wrote: |
"Everywhere that pornography has been introduced sex crimes have gone down," said Diamond.
Especially sex crimes committed against children.
"In those three countries where child porn is legal the sex abuse against children is very low and it has gone down compared to when it was illegal," added Diamond.
That startling fact, along with his study will be published Wednesday in the Archives of Sexual Behavior. |
NYU Law Professor Amy Adler explains how kiddy porn laws actually make the problem worse in The Perverse Law of Child Pornography.
http://cyber.law.harvard.edu/ilaw/Speech/Adler.html
Possession of kiddy porn for personal use in British Columbia has been legal for several years now and the world has not come to an end there, either. |
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everything-is-everything
Joined: 06 Jun 2011
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| Posted: Wed Jul 20, 2011 6:27 pm Post subject: |
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| Friend Lee Ghost wrote: |
| sirius black wrote: |
Some people see something illegal as inherentlyh bad. what is illegal or even legal its subjective and changes within a society and reflects a current society.
...
If those that advcoted keeping drugs illegal actually knew the reasons why it was made illegal in the first place may change their position IF they are open minded and honest.
Add prostitution along with drugs to the list of things that are illogically illegal as well. |
Since you are making a list, add possession of kiddy porn for personal use to it. Its availability has been associated with a decrease in child sex assaults in every country in which it has been studied.
| An ABC-TV website wrote: |
"Everywhere that pornography has been introduced sex crimes have gone down," said Diamond.
Especially sex crimes committed against children.
"In those three countries where child porn is legal the sex abuse against children is very low and it has gone down compared to when it was illegal," added Diamond.
That startling fact, along with his study will be published Wednesday in the Archives of Sexual Behavior. |
NYU Law Professor Amy Adler explains how kiddy porn laws actually make the problem worse in The Perverse Law of Child Pornography.
http://cyber.law.harvard.edu/ilaw/Speech/Adler.html
Possession of kiddy porn for personal use in British Columbia has been legal for several years now and the world has not come to an end there, either. |
I'm not sure how you compare legalizing drugs or prostitution for adults to kiddy porn?
What kind of kiddy porn? Real life photos or videos? Or just drawings?
If it's the former that's just plain wrong on so many levels. |
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Fox
Joined: 04 Mar 2009
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| Posted: Wed Jul 20, 2011 6:37 pm Post subject: |
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| everything-is-everything wrote: |
I'm not sure how you compare legalizing drugs or prostitution for adults to kiddy porn?
What kind of kiddy porn? Real life photos or videos? Or just drawings?
If it's the former that's just plain wrong on so many levels. |
There's a big difference between criminalizing possession and criminalizing production. Criminalizing production results in legal action being taken against individuals or groups who demonstrably abuse children. Criminalizing possession results in legal action being taken against individuals who may well have never harmed anyone and may well never harm anyone.
No one should ever go to jail merely for downloading a picture. Not ever. |
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wishfullthinkng
Joined: 05 Mar 2010
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| Posted: Wed Jul 20, 2011 7:00 pm Post subject: |
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| Friend Lee Ghost wrote: |
Since you are making a list, add possession of kiddy porn for personal use to it. Its availability has been associated with a decrease in child sex assaults in every country in which it has been studied.
| An ABC-TV website wrote: |
"Everywhere that pornography has been introduced sex crimes have gone down," said Diamond.
Especially sex crimes committed against children.
"In those three countries where child porn is legal the sex abuse against children is very low and it has gone down compared to when it was illegal," added Diamond.
That startling fact, along with his study will be published Wednesday in the Archives of Sexual Behavior. |
NYU Law Professor Amy Adler explains how kiddy porn laws actually make the problem worse in The Perverse Law of Child Pornography.
http://cyber.law.harvard.edu/ilaw/Speech/Adler.html
Possession of kiddy porn for personal use in British Columbia has been legal for several years now and the world has not come to an end there, either. |
your logic has a startling flaw. with prostitution and drugs the person giving and receiving both have a conscious choice.
for child pornography however, a child cannot grasp the realities of their naked forms being photographed for explicit use, nor would they probably condone if their synapses were formed to understand such mentality.
yes, reported crime against children might go down because these people can get their fix via images, but that doesn't negate the fact that the unseen crimes of the photographs being taken aren't taking place to compensate.
you sir need to re-think your statement a bit. |
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everything-is-everything
Joined: 06 Jun 2011
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| Posted: Fri Jul 22, 2011 10:11 am Post subject: |
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| Fox wrote: |
| everything-is-everything wrote: |
I'm not sure how you compare legalizing drugs or prostitution for adults to kiddy porn?
What kind of kiddy porn? Real life photos or videos? Or just drawings?
If it's the former that's just plain wrong on so many levels. |
There's a big difference between criminalizing possession and criminalizing production. Criminalizing production results in legal action being taken against individuals or groups who demonstrably abuse children. Criminalizing possession results in legal action being taken against individuals who may well have never harmed anyone and may well never harm anyone.
No one should ever go to jail merely for downloading a picture. Not ever. |
That's ridiculous. The fact that a picture's been taken is an illegal and immoral and a sick act.
You can try all the legal mumbojumbo you want, posession result from production and both are criminal.
If the stuff is written or drawn then I don't think it should be criminal. You can't criminalize art. But any real photos are a result of abuse. Simple as that. |
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Fox
Joined: 04 Mar 2009
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| Posted: Fri Jul 22, 2011 4:39 pm Post subject: |
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| everything-is-everything wrote: |
That's ridiculous. The fact that a picture's been taken is an illegal and immoral and a sick act. |
Yes, the actual taking of the picture is both illegal and immoral. Going and throwing someone in prison who both didn't take the picture and was not involved in the production of the picture, however, is also wrong.
No one should be thrown in prison for merely viewing a picture. Not ever. Anyone who angrily insists otherwise is not only simply wrong, but actively harmful to society themselves due to their screaming for needless vengeance against their fellow man, in much the same fashion as witch hunts and angry mobs. Popular government becomes dysfunctional when such people become too common.
| everything-is-everything wrote: |
| You can try all the legal mumbojumbo you want, posession result from production and both are criminal. |
By this logic, if you watch a video of someone being beaten up on youtube, you too are guilty of assault. But that's obviously a vapid position. I wish you could see why your own position is equally lacking in substance, but because it's purely emotionally driven instead of carefully considered, you will not. |
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wishfullthinkng
Joined: 05 Mar 2010
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| Posted: Sun Jul 24, 2011 8:43 pm Post subject: |
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| Fox wrote: |
Yes, the actual taking of the picture is both illegal and immoral. Going and throwing someone in prison who both didn't take the picture and was not involved in the production of the picture, however, is also wrong.
No one should be thrown in prison for merely viewing a picture. Not ever. Anyone who angrily insists otherwise is not only simply wrong, but actively harmful to society themselves due to their screaming for needless vengeance against their fellow man, in much the same fashion as witch hunts and angry mobs. Popular government becomes dysfunctional when such people become too common. |
so if someone tied you up and took pictures of you naked and spread them around to your friends and colleagues with the explicit note "these are naked pictures of fox, open at your own discretion" you would see no problem with them viewing said pictures?
| Fox wrote: |
| By this logic, if you watch a video of someone being beaten up on youtube, you too are guilty of assault. But that's obviously a vapid position. I wish you could see why your own position is equally lacking in substance, but because it's purely emotionally driven instead of carefully considered, you will not. |
a video of someone getting beaten up on youtube would probably fall into two categories:
1. the video where people get up in arms about something asinine and go at it like monkeys.
2. the video where an innocent person gets beaten up through some unfortunate path of events.
now in number 1, the viewer is not taking advantage of anyone. these people were obviously fighting in a place where they could be videoed and probably didn't care that they were indeed being filmed. in my opinion they gave up all rights and ethical qualms of said film being viewed once they threw intelligence out the door and started to pound each other.
in number 2, perhaps the viewer wouldn't want others to see him or her get beaten up. however, this video can be helpful to their cause in putting the assailant where they belong, whether it be jail or juvenile camp. again, there is no assault taking place beyond what is in the film.
so really, your video argument isn't really related to the topic and holds no ground for your argument. watching a video of an assault does not mean you assaulted anyone, as there is absolutely no link. however, watching or looking at child pornography is accessory to the person who took the video/pictures whether you know that person or not because you are knowingly taking advantage of the child's privacy and ethical boundaries, just as the photographer was. that's the whole legal concept of someone being in accessory to a crime.
fox, i have to say you sound like an intelligent individual, but some of the things you type boggle my mind sometimes.
edit: spelling error |
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Fox
Joined: 04 Mar 2009
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| Posted: Sun Jul 24, 2011 10:36 pm Post subject: |
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| wishfullthinkng wrote: |
| Fox wrote: |
Yes, the actual taking of the picture is both illegal and immoral. Going and throwing someone in prison who both didn't take the picture and was not involved in the production of the picture, however, is also wrong.
No one should be thrown in prison for merely viewing a picture. Not ever. Anyone who angrily insists otherwise is not only simply wrong, but actively harmful to society themselves due to their screaming for needless vengeance against their fellow man, in much the same fashion as witch hunts and angry mobs. Popular government becomes dysfunctional when such people become too common. |
so if someone tied you up and took pictures of you naked and spread them around to your friends and colleagues with the explicit note "these are naked pictures of fox, open at your own discretion" you would see no problem with them viewing said pictures? |
Of course I wouldn't want them to view said pictures. However, there are a huge number of other things I also wouldn't want people to see me doing in videos. That doesn't mean viewing a video of those things should result in the viewer's incarceration. Regardless of the contents of the video, if all they did was download it and watch it, they committed no crime against me or against society. The criminal is the person who tied me up and videotaped me against my will, not the people who happened to watch the video. Which is why I say, again, there is a difference between production and possession, and a meaningful difference at that.
| wishfullthinkng wrote: |
in number 2, perhaps the viewer wouldn't want others to see him or her get beaten up. however, this video can be helpful to their cause in putting the assailant where they belong, whether it be jail or juvenile camp. again, there is no assault taking place beyond what is in the film. |
A child pornography video could also be helpful in putting their assailant where they belong, since it serves as tangible evidence of abuse. The distinction you're trying to draw here simply doesn't exist in any objective sense. An innocent person being assaulted on video and watched by strangers and an innocent person being sexually assaulted on video and watched by strangers is little different.
I've seen videos of children being beaten. Hell, some have even been posted on this forum as demonstration of the behavior of certain Korean teachers! If you want to continue to insist that watching that is no crime, but as soon as someone takes off their clothes watching it becomes an offense worthy of incarceration, well, I can't stop you. But don't think for a moment that there's any sort of reasonable basis behind your position. It's only our society's extreme irrationality regarding violence and sex that leads to the viewpoints you're pushing here, not any careful consideration.
This kind of nonsense is just another reason why America isn't worth the effort. Ingest the wrong substances? Incarceration! Have the wrong kind of sex with another consenting adult? Incarceration! Look at the wrong pictures? Incarceration! Don't the constant witch hunts ever get tiresome? |
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wishfullthinkng
Joined: 05 Mar 2010
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| Posted: Sun Jul 24, 2011 11:13 pm Post subject: |
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| Fox wrote: |
| A child pornography video could also be helpful in putting their assailant where they belong, since it serves as tangible evidence of abuse. The distinction you're trying to draw here simply doesn't exist in any objective sense. An innocent person being assaulted on video and watched by strangers and an innocent person being sexually assaulted on video and watched by strangers is little different. |
tangible evidence of abuse? i suppose in the weakest definition of "evidence" that could possibly be used.
anywho, the main and fundamental difference between an innocent person being assaulted and a child (not adult) being sexually assaulted is that an adult or even a teenager can defend themselves against unwanted advances or incidences whereas a child cannot. yes, it's a fine line when you get down to the meat and potatoes, but it exists.
| Fox wrote: |
It's only our society's extreme irrationality regarding violence and sex that leads to the viewpoints you're pushing here, not any careful consideration.
This kind of nonsense is just another reason why America isn't worth the effort. Ingest the wrong substances? Incarceration! Have the wrong kind of sex with another consenting adult? Incarceration! Look at the wrong pictures? Incarceration! Don't the constant witch hunts ever get tiresome? |
maybe you haven't seen a lot of my posts, but i'm about as "liberal" as they come. i agree with you that many societies including the one i grew up in has extreme irrationality regarding violence and sex. i take the same stance as you when it comes to substances, sexual preferences, looking at pictures/movies, however when it comes to media that exploits children like i stated above, it is crossing a line. |
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Fox
Joined: 04 Mar 2009
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| Posted: Mon Jul 25, 2011 12:02 am Post subject: |
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| wishfullthinkng wrote: |
tangible evidence of abuse? i suppose in the weakest definition of "evidence" that could possibly be used. |
What? You just insisted that a video of someone being assaulted could serve in such a capacity: "however, this video can be helpful to their cause in putting the assailant where they belong." Unlike a physical assault, sexual abuse can be done without leaving physical evidence of said abuse behind, meaning if anything a video of it is more useful in working towards such ends when compared to other types of assault.
| wishfullthinkng wrote: |
| anywho, the main and fundamental difference between an innocent person being assaulted and a child (not adult) being sexually assaulted is that an adult or even a teenager can defend themselves against unwanted advances or incidences whereas a child cannot. |
Videos of children being physically (rather than sexually) assaulted exist. Unless you're saying that people who watch those videos should also be incarcerated, your distinction fails. And if you are saying people who happen to see a video or picture of a child being, say, punched in the face should go to jail, then I'm forced to disagree with you even more.
Incarcerating sick people who view child pornography but who are able to resist the urge to sexually abuse children does not help anyone. It takes a mentally unwell but otherwise useful and productive member of society and destroys both their quality of life and their usefulness to the rest of society, all at great taxpayer expense. The actual abusers are the ones who harm society, and it's the actual abusers the law should address. If someone kidnapped my children, abused them, and photographed the abuse, I would want the full weight of justice thrown at them to ensure they never did such a thing again. If I later discovered that some sick fellow found said pictures on the internet and perused them, I'd be lying if I said I wouldn't feel a certain amount of disgust and upset, but so long as he had never harmed a living, breathing child, I would not want his life ruined over it. Who would it benefit? Not my children. Not our society. It would be harm for harm's sake, and that's not what we should be championing.
| wishfullthinkng wrote: |
| maybe you haven't seen a lot of my posts, but i'm about as "liberal" as they come. i agree with you that many societies including the one i grew up in has extreme irrationality regarding violence and sex. i take the same stance as you when it comes to substances, sexual preferences, looking at pictures/movies, however when it comes to media that exploits children like i stated above, it is crossing a line. |
One witch hunt is the same as another to me. It sounds like there's plenty of other things we agree upon, but I wish you could see that this particular witch hunt shares the exact same essence as all the other ones I listed off. |
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sirius black
Joined: 04 Jun 2010
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| Posted: Mon Jul 25, 2011 3:54 pm Post subject: |
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I would disagree with the kiddy porn analogy as well. Viewing it encourages the abuser to keep doing it and make it available for others.
Drugs are a choice you make that only affects you. When it affects someone else (drunk or drug driving that results in others getting hurt) then it should be punished.
I see the point but disagree with the similarities to drug use. I would not apply that to fictional pictures, cartoons, etc. only to actual photos or videos of child abuse.
Here's another example. If you know there will be a murder or you know of a murder and have not reported it, its accessory before or after the fact. Should that be legal? You personally did not help plan or perform it but knew of it. Should it be legal to be privy to such information and not report it? |
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