What content should be censored from the politics forum?

[El Barto]

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So in other words, you would have no problem with some NAMBLA pervert starting a thread on how great it is to have sex with children under the age of puberty and how it should be legal. That right?

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People start threads on how great using drugs are all the time. I think we can judge when someone is trolling (just trying to get a rise out of people by being outrageous) and when they are being honest.

The locked thread was not trolling, it was raising a legitimate issue in a non-provocative way.

[BluffTHIS!]

You didn't answer my question. And having sex with minors isn't a legit topic for discussion.

[El Barto]

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You didn't answer my question.

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I did. It depends on whether it was trolling, as stated your example would be trolling (and no politics is being discussed)

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And having sex with minors isn't a legit topic for discussion.

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Discussing the politics of the issue is a legitimate topic for discussion. What should be legal? What should the penalties be?

Can you distinguish between discussing the politics of pedophilia and someone posting a pedophilia bragging post?

It is what should be censored from discussion in this forum that is of interest to me. Obvious trolling on any topic has little value to any of us.

[BluffTHIS!]

There is no "politics" of pedophilia. The abuse of children is not "politics". Either admit the truth of that or that you have no moral qualms about adults having sex with children.

[evil_twin]

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There is no "politics" of pedophilia. The abuse of children is not "politics". Either admit the truth of that or that you have no moral qualms about adults having sex with children.

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Of course there are politics surrounding pedophilia, you're just having a blind knee-jerk response. Our media is very good at programming this response, as we saw when the Brass-eye pedophile special (satirical comedy) aired in the UK in 2001. Chris Morris is a comedy genius who understood that the media simply cannot handle rationally discussing anything to do with children and went to great lengths to point it out in a humourous way.

The program itself was utterly hilarous if you could see past the subject matter, which of course many people could not. No children were harmed, and in fact no discussion of violating children occured IN ANY WAY on the program, but people still lost it, there were 3000 complaints, many from people who never saw the program.

The home office government minister at the time, Beverly Huges lost it the day after in the media. She attacked the content of the program without having ever seen it. There were 3000 complaints. However after the matter was investigated nothing was done, the program was fine and didn't even come close to discussing anything "over the line".

To get back to the original point, what if a 17 year old has sex with a 15.7 year old and gets sent to prison as a pedophile? Is this no different from a 40 year old having sex with a 12 year old? Of course it's utterly utterly different. The former is expected, the latter is a horrendus violation.

It is a touchy subject and one that needs to be handled with care, but if you can't see that there are some issues worth discussing then you're being blinkered IMO. I doubt I'll partake further in this discussion, and I might add just to be clear for you knee-jerk responders out there that pedophilia is disgusting and I in no way condone it at all. Although I conceed that the 17 year old with 15.7 year old is a much greyer area that the other obviously more insane and criminal acts.

[AngryCola]

*EDITED again because I'm half asleep and wasn't thinking clearly. *

While my original reason for locking that thread was not about the general subject matter, this thread and some thinking have led me to the conclusion that it's not a subject 2+2 would want on their site. If I'm wrong about that, I'll be more than willing to say that my conclusion was false. But after reading the T&C again, and remembering previous decisions made by Mat, I can't imagine this subject being something they want to allow.

The actual reason I locked that thread was simply because it is an x-post. Now that I've thought about it, it was a good lock for other reasons, too.

[BluffTHIS!]

The mere discussion of any abuse of children in a way that infers that it is a political matter is the same as advocacy of such actions.

And in case I haven't made myself clear on this issue, I hope all NAMBLA perverts die before they can abuse another innocent child prior to taking their deserved places in hell.

[TomCollins]

BluffThis, why is 18 the magic age? Why not 17 or 19?

[El Barto]

Asking what the definition of pedophilia is, informs the political debate. Just as asking when life begins, informs the abortion debate.

It was a political question IMO.

The text of the OP in locked thread was:
<font color="green"> Does wanting to have sex with a 15 year old who has gone through puberty make you a pedophile? Yes, it is illegal in at least nearly every state in the union, when you are over 18. However, the question is whether it makes you a pedophile.

I do not think it does. Pedophilia is the act or fantasy (wanting) of having sexual relations with a child. A person is no longer a child if he or she has gone through puberty.

Am I right?</font>

[AngryCola]

I edited my post again. My apologies for only being half-awake while writing it the first two times. [img]/images/graemlins/frown.gif[/img]

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Stop editing your posts so much. No one expects perfection and it screws up the context of the replies.

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EDIT-

Yeah, I know. I don't usually make that drastic of a change, but it was important for me to get this one right.