The War on Child Pornography—Who are the Victims?
By Robert T. DeMarco
Peter Banks, National Center for Missing and Exploited Children
The dissemination of child pornography on the Internet is growing very fast. At the same time, internet crime against children is the fastest growing crime in America. The problem is so big that the FBI operation to combat these kinds of crimes is now second only to the fight against terrorism. FBI officials say, on their website, that the use of computers has become the most widely used technique by pedophiles to share illegal photographic images of minors and to lure children into illicit sexual relationships.
When the vast majority of Americans think about child pornography they generally think of teenagers in porn films. But the real problem focuses around images of children as young as six months old having sex with adults (Deputy's Alleged Porn Possession Includes Infants). Since it is impossible to show these kinds of images to the public, the public remains generally unaware of the dimensions and seriousness of the problem. And, the public remains unaware that sophisticated pedophiles use these images to desensitize vulnerable children into thinking and believing these kinds of behaviors are acceptable. The dissemination and use of child pornography to victimize our children is exploding.
Thomas Spina Jr., US Attorney
It is not surprising given the lack of education that the typical adult will often dismiss this problem out of hand. About one-third of the people I speak with take the stance that there is no real problem and that the problem is being blown out of proportion. At the same time, they willing admit that they have read little about the problem and their opinion is based more on what they think then what they know.
The discussion of child pornography often focuses on the images. The real issue should be on the victims in these images—the children. This is the real issue, the children as victims. The number of victims is growing fast and these victims are unable to defend themselves.
Article comments
1 - Michael Croft
Sexual exploitation of children is despicable and those proven guilty of it should be punished and good laws exist to do so.
My concern here is that we should do so without infringing the rights of adult citizens who are not violating the law.
One of the reasons the problem (which is real) is not universally accepted is that the flag gets carried by politicians who aren't universally trusted. If a politician fulminates against abortion, women in the army, tax exemption for Unitarians, gay marriage, gays in general, welfare, gun control, the income tax, the Clenis, nekkid statues in the halls of justice, and the internet, they'll get support from some and ignored by others. The baby gets thrown out with the bathwater.
Because of this, I'm generally leery of any claim by politicians that my rights must be infringed 'for the sake of the children!'. It usually means someone wants to infringe my rights because they hate my freedom and want to cloak their authoritarianism is your fear. I just don't believe that the only way to protect the children is preemptive destruction of everyone's liberty. The response I have to 'think of the children!' is 'no, you think of a way to protect them without all the baggage of your anti-freedom agenda, and then we'll be able to move forward.'
The solutions that I see proposed (like the assorted unconstitutional laws like Children Online Protection Act) seem like they'll have no effect on the problem (due to the nature of the internet) and will instead curb our freedoms for a false sense of security and the vague comfort of 'having done something' about the problem. I want the opposite of what we're being offered: a solution that will actually curb the problem without curbing freedoms. Freedoms are hard to recover once they're surrendered to the fearmongers.
I think this is good information, but because it's incomplete it's potentially misleading. It discusses arrests, search warrants, and reports, but those aren't convictions. Arrests and search warrants go up when the government increases scrutiny, but that doesn't necessarily mean there is a real problem, just government scrutiny. File sharing warrants are at an all-time high, but that doesn't indicate a crime wave. Salem was not an isolated incident involving a few bad apples.
There is a very human tendency that urges actions against freedom and justice in order to provide security. It's easy to get a gut level reaction in agreement with such appeals, but that's not how I want public policy decided. Some solid data presented without emotional appeal is more likely to convince me that this isn't just a screen for an attack on personal liberty.
So, the stated point of the post was to raise awareness of the problem. I'm aware of the problem. Now what? Is there a way to prevent it without ordering the tide not to come in or without assaulting liberty? I hope so. Not that I know what that way is.
2 - JeremyT
Personally, I Think child molesters and those making money off running these types of websites should be sent to a muslim country where they can be dealt with.
Im not muslim but dang atleast they got one thing right!