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Comment by ericb | Hacker News Reader

Let's not put up straw men. I'm surprised you have so many upvotes for such an absurd argument--not that there aren't valid ways to disagree, but I don't follow your logic.

The issue is whether there is speech that is objectionable, and whether free speech has some sort of nearly universal limit if properly considered (yeling fire in a crowded theater, for example) and whether creating a law-free zone might have unintended consequences.

I don't see how a straw man implying that all laws require draconian enforcement really benefits the conversation. So we let child molesters do as they please because somehow any law enforcement would mean total and constant invasion of privacy? Not sure I follow the leap.

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I'm saying, kids are being abused, even if there aren't pictures of it on the intarwebs. The internet is not the problem.

The parent post talked about the distribution of child porn not stopping all child abuse which is why I think you're beating on a straw man.

He's not beating on a straw man. The problem is you're conflating child abuse with certain patterns of bits floating around on the Internet.

I've also heard pedophiles claim that looking at child porn sates their desire to act out those fantasies, so perhaps fewer children are being harmed? That sounds plausible to me since 'normal porn' works, to some degree, as substitute for sex for many non-pedophiles.

> The problem is you're conflating child abuse with certain patterns of bits floating around on the Internet.

Please reread my posts. I am talking about the bits. The only place where I talked about actual child molesters (child abuse) was to point out a specific false-choice that jrockway put up--that we had to put cameras everywhere to enforce child abuse laws, which really was defeating an argument that no one made--ie, jrockway was the person who brought up actual child abuse, not the bits. He has articulated his position better in other posts now.

Child porn isn't speech, it's evidence -- evidence of a crime that has already taken place. This crime, like other crimes, can and should be prosecuted without any sort of totemic obsession with inanimate copies of the evidence.

In general, censorship of kiddie-porn-as-speech is the greatest favor we can do these criminals. We've already taught them to hide in the real world, and hide well. Now we're teaching them to cover their tracks online.

> obsession with inanimate copies of the evidence.

If a search reveals a video of your child being abused at day camp on the internet, would you want censorship of that video?

No. I don't believe in censoring the Internet.

jrockway's post below is basically my position as well.

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