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Topic History of: The photo police are at it again!!
Max. showing the last 5 posts - (Last post first)
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Francis D |
Similar background and similar feelings, Beat Master.
The police force is unrecognisable now, and it has lost touch with it's original purpose. |
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Francis D |
What needs to happen, and what is happening but too slowly, is for the general population to realise how unstable and unsafe many of these laws are. We still have a jury system (for now) and while the law still forces people to face prosecution, the jury have the power to find them not guilty, and to not have to explain their decision. Even if a judge advises them that they must return a guilty verdict, they can still do the opposite because, in practice, the judge is a mere referee and it is the jury who do the actual judging. If more juries understood the power they have, and used it, then fewer wrongful convictions may take place, but first the people who make up the juries must be educated. This takes time and experience.
Logically, the more people who are arrested and convicted on these stupid laws, the more people understand the reality of them, because each person's life touches so many others. The ripples of injustice reach far and wide. It's not just one person being made to suffer in each case; there are familes, friends, colleagues, etc. many of whom know the real truth and are having their eyes opened on a daily basis. |
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veritas |
it's a touchy subject innocent accused but I do believe these laws are being abused by authorities for nefarious purposes and they do little to help genuinely abused children
It's impossible to make sweeping statements such as looking at photos is continuing the abuse. That means-unlike any other crime on the statutes that judges,lawyers, police , juries and even defendents in cases are literally abusing the person during a court case.
We know policeman, barristers, judges and even a top crown prosecutor have all been arrested on child porn charges.
After the Abu Graihb torture photos outraged the world you may recall there were horrific videos of Westerners (including Britons) being beheaded, circulating. Some of these clips were shown up to certain points on mainstream TV around the world.
It was clearly propaganda and it produced the desired effect..absolute horror throughout the West. I say anyone who participated in even viewing those videos fully or partly could be accused of encouraging the atrocities.
The law must always be consistent if it is to be fair-it's gotten out of balance and that is because the media and hysteria drives much of today's lawmaking. That is a bad thing.
One side will say porn encourages abuse yet the psychiatric world says porn probably decreases abuse. I certainly don't know the answer.
I also believe the current hysteria creates victims who weren't necessarily there in the first place .
Tell people enough times they should be full of guilt and shame for something that happened to them and they'll believe it eventually.
Also I've said it a hundred times-Interpol who have been in the business longer than most have declared that around 85% of what is classed as child porn that is recycled on the net is up to 50 years old.
It could be questioned also that the FBI which claims that it keeps 800,000 images on file in an attempt to identify "victims" is in itself continuing the abuse by their own reckoning and if Interpol is correct then it's likely the majority of people in the pics are well past middle-aged by now.
I'd also question whether a majority of people really would be upset if their snaps popped up on the net. It would depend on whether real abuse happened at the time.
We can always use the Page 3 Girls as an example. I'm still waiting for one to sue one day. Not only would they win in spectacular fashion but the media and legal sensation would be earth shattering.
Wake-up former Page 3 girls-there's a fortune to be had !
As for photography in public places..I have a young gay friend of 24 who poses for raunchy snaps and runs his own blog publishing these snaps and those of his friends. He told me how he was acosted on Bondi by lifesavers a few months ago when he was photographing a surfing friend.
This guy is an amateur and was quite disturbed...I informed him that the professional snappers I know all carry a copy of the rules about public photography (which basically say there is no right to privacy) on them as even the cops don't know the rules.
Local councils have tried to enforce laws which have been deemed unlawful...people have been arrested snapping topless girls on Bondi with the cases thrown out of court and costs awarded against the police...yet Bondi itself participates in a TV show shown around the world that breaks their own unenforceable laws by showing thousands of beachgoers in the background without their permission.
Even worse-the Lifesavers know the 6 or so papparazi who patrol Bondi snapping topless celebrities covertly and never hinder them
4 months ago when returning from Thailand I was stopped at Customs (I always expect it ) searched and asked if I'd particpate in a local "reality" TV show about Customs. I said "yes as long as the producer comes over and negotiates a fee "..I was then questioned basically as to "what did I have to hide"...I replied I didn't realize taxpayer funded Customs officers were now spruiking for a commercial TV show and asked for their business cards at which point I was politely ushered out.
The laws about photography...about what is really porn or child porn are an absolute shambles...everywhere. |
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Blackit |
some wierd replies there.
People are weird..they really think a camera is stealing their soul!
Excellent point Veritas.
The logical extension would be to force children, both boys and girls, to wear burqas.
A rather depressing point I need to make is that it is no longer in the power of the British government to define child pornography. A few years ago the United Nations defined child porn as an image of a person who is under 18 or LOOKS under 18, and that merely implies sexuality. This legally binding definition formed part of the rights of the child treaty which every country in the UN signed up to.
In other words, in every single country in the world these laws now apply (or should do).
I remember reading last year that Germay were being pressurised into bringing their child porn laws into line. Previously Germany had enshrined in law the sensible distinction between a child (under 14) and a young person (14 -18). 'Youth porn', was not illegal. There was a lot of opposition from the Greens and social democrats, one of the politicians calling it a form of American 'sexual colonisation' and cited concerns that 14 year olds could go to jail for uploading nude pics onto MySpace (as happens regularly in America). In the end the protest was so great that the government of Angela Merkel agreed to put the new leglislation on hold until a thorough review took place.
Now obviously most governments (especially ours) are happy to implement these laws because it gives them and their police forces terrifying powers over a huge percentage of their populations. |
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DR2 |
If only the modern police were as you used to be then, Beat Master. What I can't understand is while the public know what's going on and don't like it, they don't do anything about it. What are they being dosed with clandestinely to make them so compliant?
It surprises me that there hasn't been an uprising in this country before now, especially when parents are forbidden to take innocent photos of their own children at play. We once had a Civil War in this country for less than is going on now. There's something really odd going on, that's for sure.
It reminds me of part of the opening notice at the start of the 1960 film "The Alamo." "They faced the decision that all men in all times have faced. The eternal choice of men. To endure oppression or to resist." How much more must the British people be pushed towards the edge of the precipice before they begin to turn around and fight back? |
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