On Thu, 27 Mar 2008 12:53:34 GMT, Palindrome wrote:
>>> Ah Godwin. About time. I am not aware of any impending legislation that
>>> would put kp downloaders in cattle trucks and ship them off to gas
>>> chambers. Rest assured, should there be so, I would write to my MP.
>> The effect on many people has been very similar.
>>> All the law asks is for people to refrain from keeping indecent images
>>> that appear to be of children - without good reason. It doesn't seem
>>> much to ask, in the scheme of things.
>> And if the law asked for every Jewish person to wear a distinctive arm
>> band, that would also surely not be too much to ask, in the scheme of
>> things, would it?
>One is the slight restriction on one form of "entertainment" featuring
>acts of abuse against children.
And the other imposes no restrictions whatsoever.
> Have you any idea how ridiculous your
>comparisons are getting?
I'm not sure - do you believe that mandatory arm-bands in all public
places are reasonable or not?
I do not believe it is reasonable *at all*. Nor do I believe that it
is reasonable to make it a serious criminal offence to be found in
possession of *any* form of reading material. I don't care whether
the reading material depicts criminal acts, political views, social
views, .ual acts, instructions for making bombs or the mathematical
formula of a secure encryption algorithm. I don't care whether a
person is reading it for entertainment, .ual stimulation, gaining
knowlege or idle curiosity.
The only circumstance that I would condone such prohibition is if the
material contains information that is not already in the public
domain, is not in the public interest, and would be significantly
likely to result in harm should it become generally known.
As an aside, I caught a Sky News report this morning about conditions
in Zimbabwe. The UK reporter had taken a significant risk in taking
news footage for broadcast, because it is a serious criminal offence
in Zimbabwe for anyone to indulge in any form of journalism without
prior government approval. No foreign journalist is likely to get
such approval, and indeed the report stated specifically that the Sky
reporter had been acting illegally and had pretended to be a tourist.
So do you feel that the reporter had been extremely stupid, and you
would have had no sympathy for her had she been caught and
"disappeared"? After all, in the scheme of things the law is not
particularly restrictive. It only affects journalists, and they have
a whole World of other countries to play in. People in Zimbabwe know
what the conditions are like, and nobody outside the country who
couldn't easily get that information legitimately either needs to know
or is likely to be very interested, so the prohibition of journalism
is no big loss. And as you have said, the law is bound to change in
20 years or so - all the journalists need to do is stay law-abiding
and wait for things to change. Maybe instead of risking her life by
breaking the law, she should have done as you have suggested and made
some legal but ineffective protests to the nice Mr. Mugabe and
explained why she thinks his law should be repealled. And marked her
diary for a trip to Zim around the year 2030.
--
Cynic
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