Man loses appeal over cartoon porn based on The Simpsons
Now granted, this took place in Australia... so it's not like this particular incident of judicial lunacy is one of the many that continue to take place in the US, but it still made me think a lot. Are you the type to save archives of many, many old emails? I know i've got messages going well back to circa 1997 or 1998 saved in my MAIL directory. Thank god for crypto, because i don't even want to think about having to manually search through all that each time some government finds a new item objectionable and obscene.
While i highly doubt that i am in possession of any of these parody images, i know that for sure many of you have seen some of them before. Hell, if you perform the right Google Image Search they spill out all over the damn page. (Don't click that link if you're in Australia, i suppose, or you could be next on Justice Michael Adams' chopping block.)
Of particular interest to me is the undeniable fact that these are clearly parody/satire/etc. I can almost understand the notion of treating "fictional" child porn as something to be taken seriously if it's very realistic drawings and such of youths engaged in sex acts, even if the drawings are "fictional" it might still merit some investigation or counseling for the accused party. But here we have sketches well-known television characters who do not represent anyone in "real life" being treated like polaroids taken in the back of a perverted day-care center before it was shut down.
The biggest problem with this style of government creep (and something they didn't touch on in the article at all, despite my belief that it was a factor) is that, sure, while they're not likely to ever go after 99% of the public for this nonsense... once you establish a lot of "little" serious crimes on the books, you all but guarantee that all people are guilty of at least one or two of them. Where does that lead, you ask?
OK, rant over. Didn't mean to have that run so long. Guess I just had a lot to say. Fuck, what is wrong with the whole goddamn world, anymore?
CARTOON characters are people too, a judge has ruled in the case of a man convicted over cartoons based on The Simpsons, in which "children" are shown having sex.
...
Alan John McEwan was appealing his February conviction for possessing child pornography and using his computer to access "child" pornography.
(sad, ironic emphases mine)
...
Alan John McEwan was appealing his February conviction for possessing child pornography and using his computer to access "child" pornography.
(sad, ironic emphases mine)
While i highly doubt that i am in possession of any of these parody images, i know that for sure many of you have seen some of them before. Hell, if you perform the right Google Image Search they spill out all over the damn page. (Don't click that link if you're in Australia, i suppose, or you could be next on Justice Michael Adams' chopping block.)
Of particular interest to me is the undeniable fact that these are clearly parody/satire/etc. I can almost understand the notion of treating "fictional" child porn as something to be taken seriously if it's very realistic drawings and such of youths engaged in sex acts, even if the drawings are "fictional" it might still merit some investigation or counseling for the accused party. But here we have sketches well-known television characters who do not represent anyone in "real life" being treated like polaroids taken in the back of a perverted day-care center before it was shut down.
The biggest problem with this style of government creep (and something they didn't touch on in the article at all, despite my belief that it was a factor) is that, sure, while they're not likely to ever go after 99% of the public for this nonsense... once you establish a lot of "little" serious crimes on the books, you all but guarantee that all people are guilty of at least one or two of them. Where does that lead, you ask?
Let's say you are being charged with dealing drugs...
Cops, acting on a tip from a junkie looking to get out of a possession bust, storm through your front door because they believed whatever piece of nonsense information the crackhead pulled out of his ass. Not wanting to look stupid or admit that they destroyed an innocent party's home by acting on bad information that they didn't bother to verify, they tear your house apart with dogs... ultimately finding maybe a one-finger bag of schwag and a dirty bong in the back of a closet.
You didn't have major weight in drugs (or, indeed, any cocaine based products at all... but the warrant was sufficiently vague to let that slip past) but the small bag, when taken along with the new, unopened box of Ziplock bags you had in the kitchen and your bathroom scale, is enough for them to put together a phony case against you. You spend your days in jail and time being put through the system. You get your public defender who gets you through your arraignment and bail hearings and possibly you then get your real lawyer. The case is laughable... but in a meeting with the prosecutor's office it is revealed that a 5¼" floppy disk they found in a box in your basement next to some old Comodore 64 parts and a broken Atari had this fuzzy GIF image of Maude, Rod, and Todd Flanders from The Simpsons in their altogether.
Your attorney turns white. The A.D.A. says that unless you plead out on the drug charge, you'll additionally be slammed with a kiddie porn angle. Depending on what state you live in, that means appearance on an offender registry even after being arraigned, let alone sent to trial. This would, of course, also mean a large increase in your bail. Being that this will likely put you beyond your financial means, that will almost certainly result in you being sent back to county until your trial date. Forget missing work and being unable to make the rent... your mind can't get around being sent back into the tombs with a kiddie porn charge on your jacket.
Your lawyer pulls you aside and starts frantically whispering in your ear. In all likelihood, you take the deal. It's bullshit like this "Simpsons cartoon porn" matter that, once they creep into the system, turn situations where the state should be a laughing stock and forced to apologize and pay for disrupting people's lives into situations where one more citizen is stripped of everything and has their life thrown away, just so the government can save face.
Cops, acting on a tip from a junkie looking to get out of a possession bust, storm through your front door because they believed whatever piece of nonsense information the crackhead pulled out of his ass. Not wanting to look stupid or admit that they destroyed an innocent party's home by acting on bad information that they didn't bother to verify, they tear your house apart with dogs... ultimately finding maybe a one-finger bag of schwag and a dirty bong in the back of a closet.
You didn't have major weight in drugs (or, indeed, any cocaine based products at all... but the warrant was sufficiently vague to let that slip past) but the small bag, when taken along with the new, unopened box of Ziplock bags you had in the kitchen and your bathroom scale, is enough for them to put together a phony case against you. You spend your days in jail and time being put through the system. You get your public defender who gets you through your arraignment and bail hearings and possibly you then get your real lawyer. The case is laughable... but in a meeting with the prosecutor's office it is revealed that a 5¼" floppy disk they found in a box in your basement next to some old Comodore 64 parts and a broken Atari had this fuzzy GIF image of Maude, Rod, and Todd Flanders from The Simpsons in their altogether.
Your attorney turns white. The A.D.A. says that unless you plead out on the drug charge, you'll additionally be slammed with a kiddie porn angle. Depending on what state you live in, that means appearance on an offender registry even after being arraigned, let alone sent to trial. This would, of course, also mean a large increase in your bail. Being that this will likely put you beyond your financial means, that will almost certainly result in you being sent back to county until your trial date. Forget missing work and being unable to make the rent... your mind can't get around being sent back into the tombs with a kiddie porn charge on your jacket.
Your lawyer pulls you aside and starts frantically whispering in your ear. In all likelihood, you take the deal. It's bullshit like this "Simpsons cartoon porn" matter that, once they creep into the system, turn situations where the state should be a laughing stock and forced to apologize and pay for disrupting people's lives into situations where one more citizen is stripped of everything and has their life thrown away, just so the government can save face.
OK, rant over. Didn't mean to have that run so long. Guess I just had a lot to say. Fuck, what is wrong with the whole goddamn world, anymore?
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