Amazon Defends Pedophile Book

[kennyc]

Originally Posted by penartur

And someone would put such people as gays or lesbians in the same category as "unpopular or disfavored minorities"???? Kill them with fire!

In the very same moment we decide someone should close their eyes to what they believe is wrong, but is okay for us.

Can we please not talk about Killing People.

as mentioned above it is against forum guidelines.

Thank you.

[penartur]

Originally Posted by Piper_

I promise you, not only are Lolita, Mein Kampf, the Bible, Koran, Diary of Anne Frank, Harry Potter, and all the others perfectly safe, but even books like the Anarchist's cookbook.

And that's because the masses and amazon have demonstrated by their actions that they can see the line.

I don't see your point. So, you mean, that, if amazon haven't removed some book, then said book is perfectly safe? Not the other way around?

[penartur]

Originally Posted by SameOldStory

What a mess. When I first saw this, I thought of posting a comment or two. But decided not to.

But then, again, decided to post?

* Child protection -
- - I see very little of that in society. Oh there are laws, but they're for prosecuting after the fact. They don't do much protecting.

Thank goodness, we live in Roman Law countries. That means, you cannot judge someone just for their views - only for their deeds. As long as there is no "the fact", no deed is done and there is nothing to judge. And, if you want to jail pedophiles before they try to commit the offence, how would you decide who is to be jailed and who is not?
And there is a child protection in terms of securing childs instead of jailing potential pedophiles. You can e.g. do not let your children go outside. Or you can explain them why they should not talk with or even come close to the strangers.

Also, i'm sorry that there are so many pedophiles victims in this thread; i do not, in any way, depreciate or underestimate your pain; but i want to say that maybe your state has something to do with it.
Here in Russia we also have freedom of speech. Although there is a registry of banned books, it is about half of thousand items long, it contains mainly political items such as Mein Kampf, and really there is no control over spreading these forbidden materials over the internet (said Mein Kampf could easily be downloaded in lib.ru, which is sponsored by Federal Press and Mass Communications Agency - prooflink). However, i believe that pedophilia crimes are of much lower scale here. For example, i just cannot imagine that such a thread on some thematic russian forum (unless said forum is devoted to the victims) could gather so many victims. It is really incredibly.
PS: Oh, and, by the way, child pornography is prohibited in Russia. But, as far as i know, it is forbidden not because it could turn some pedophile on a way of active pedophilia (conversely, there is an opinion that child pornography will gave pedophiles what they want without having them to doing something bad with actual children), but just because children actors were sexual abused during the filming.

[penartur]

Originally Posted by kennyc

Can we please not talk about Killing People.

as mentioned above it is against forum guidelines.

Thank you.

Okay, sorry for writing that. *offtop* It isn't actual appeal to murder, it is just sarcasm.

[penartur]

Originally Posted by Pushka

In Australia, giving someone instructions about how to commit a criminal act, is a criminal act also. You merely have to instruct someone, you don't have to actually do it.

There is a line to be drawn, and lawyers have to draw it, not you.
First of all, as i understand, giving someone instructions about how to commit a criminal act is not considered to be criminal act until said person you gave instructions to will commit that criminal act? So, as long as (in our case) no children were harmed by someone who did that by instructions in that book, writer of the book did no criminal act?
Then, "giving someone instructions about how to commit a criminal act" is a very elastic notion by itself. Did your school physics and chemistry teachers gave you instructions about how to make a bomb?

[penartur]

Originally Posted by recluse

I am a great believer in human rights.
It's time to redefine "human".
If it preys on the young of humans,
it is not human.

Okay, and if it has a black skin, it is not human. **just being sarcasmic, no actual offence implied**

[penartur]

Originally Posted by Pushka

Well, the author has admiited as a teenager he had sex with children and even though not in pictures, if the descriptions and information provided is more detailed than what could be known from general knowledge, then it isnt a great leap to infer that children have already been abused in the process.

Someone there posted an image with excerpt from the book discussed. Well, although it contains disgusting details about having a sexual intercourse with children... there is nothing i could not conclude from my experience (i never had any experience with children, i swear it!) and general knowledge about children's physiology.

[penartur]

Originally Posted by SameOldStory

The Association for the Treatment of Sexual Abusers is an organization of professionals whose business is the treatment of, as they say, "Sexual Abusers". But rather than self abusers, it's clear that they are paid to take care of sexual predators.

Didn't read the entire post, however, they have at least some mistakes in their math.

[B][COLOR="Red"][I]"It is also important to recognize that official recidivism statistics are always lower than actual reoffense rates, because some sex offenders commit many sex crimes that go unreported and undetected.

Denote number of detected offenders as X and number of second-time detected offenders as Y. Then, Y/X is official recidivism statistics.
Then, denote the actual number of offenders as X', and actual number of multi-time offenders as Y'. Then, Y'/X' is actual recidivism statistics.
So, because some sex crimes go unreported and undetected, we can say that X' is larger than X, and Y' is larger than Y. From that, we cannot conclude anything about whether Y'/X' is larger or smaller than Y/X.

[penartur]

Originally Posted by kennyc

Yeah, it's a "classic"

So there are chances that the book in subject will reach academic curriculum in 22th century? Cool.

[billyad2000]

While I personally find the book in question objectionable, I do think that this is a storm in a teacup stirred up by an irresposible media.

While it is true that pedophiles are sick individuals who do serious harm to the children who become the objects of their attentions, I doubt very much a book could make such a person, imho there are far worse influences that hurt far greater numbers of individuals, adults and children alike.

To take this to the extreme, my own personal belief is that religion is a load of crap, and only serves to divide humanity, causing the death and abuse of countless millions of people each year. I may argue that books such as the Bible and Koran, or indeed any religious fantasy that is used in the brainwashing and abuse of its victims should be banned.

I suppose most would consider the above example to be extreme, yet there are countries that do ban opposing religeous and political works. In the developed world these bans are never applauded.

I suppose my point is that while there is a great many books that are of little moral value, they do have a place. Indeed, such a book written by a peadophile may be of great interest to people interested in researching this deviance in some people.

It may also be speculated that such outrage is extremely counter productive. It is ironic that in all their outrage, these people have become the best friends of the author, doing little more than promoting the book, raising sales considerably.
I would like to bet that even though Amazon has withdrawn it, he has likely sold far more copies in the days it was available than it would have sold in years, had it not hit the headlines.

[Sonist]

Originally Posted by penartur

...

Thank goodness, we live in Roman Law countries. That means, you cannot judge someone just for their views - only for their deeds....

Also, i'm sorry that there are so many pedophiles victims in this thread; i do not, in any way, depreciate or underestimate your pain; but i want to say that maybe your state has something to do with it.
Here in Russia we also have freedom of speech. ... However, i believe that pedophilia crimes are of much lower scale here....

While I agree with much of what you say, technically, most of us live in common law countries (even most states of Europe have evolved local code variations).

Also, as someone who grew up in Eastern Europe, I would guess that Russia has at least as much child abuse as the West, but it is much less discussed in the open, and often taken less seriously (Russia and parts of Asia seemed to be be in the news a few years ago as the major sources of child pornography).

The media in the West goes into feeding frenzy on some topics, and child abuse is one of them. In Russia, as in much of Eastern Europe, child abuse rarely made the news, just as homosexuality barely existed

There is also a significant divergence as to what is considered a child: in some states in the US a 19 year old can be convicted for sleeping with his 17 year old girlfriend, while in Spain the age of consent is 13, according to Wikipedia. I remember when Roman Polanski was in the news, someone mentioned that at the time when he raped the 12 year old girl, the age of consent in France was 12 - thus he could not be extradited back to the US (have not looked this up to verify).

Anyway, I do agree that a book should not be banned, period. Amazon was in the right for defending the right to sell the book, and is in the wrong for taking it down.

BTW, I doubt the book in question advocated anything as violent as this:

"If any man take a wife, and go in unto her, and hate her ... and say, I took this woman, and when I came to her, I found her not a maid: Then shall the father of the damsel, and her mother, take and bring forth the tokens of the damsel's virginity unto the elders of the city in the gate: And the damsel's father shall say ... these are the tokens of my daughter's virginity. And they shall spread the cloth before the elders of the city. ... But if this thing be true, and the tokens of virginity be not found for the damsel: Then they shall bring out the damsel to the door of her father's house, and the men of her city shall stone her with stones that she die." Deuteronomy 22:13-21

[penartur]

Originally Posted by Sonist

(Russia and parts of Asia seemed to be be in the news a few years ago as the major sources of child pornography).

Can you please provide me a proof link?

The media in the West goes into feeding frenzy on some topics, and child abuse is one of them. In Russia, as in much of Eastern Europe, child abuse rarely made the news, just as homosexuality barely existed

There were numerous news about gay parades on a Red Square and Luzhkov (ex-mayor of Moscow) trying to drive these away... but yes, homosexuality is hardly covered in the news. I guess that if the two are in love to each other, then there is no need of them talking about their passion in the news; they could live together etc, but why the news?
However, when it comes to child abuse, it seems that our laws are becoming as strong as ridiculous (IMHO) laws in USA. There recently was an initiative of passing another juvenile justice law, by which, in situation when e.g. child has a cold, asks the parents to buy him some icecream, and gots an refusal, then he can call a special "children protection number" (or rather, of course, threat his parents with such a call) and tell to "children protection service" about being restricted of icecream... and then a special minivan will arrive, the child will get his icecream, the parents will be deprived of their parental rights, and, ultimately, the child will go to an orphanhood (and our orphanhoods are really bad thing). All because of an icecream.

There is also a significant divergence as to what is considered a child: in some states in the US a 19 year old can be convicted for sleeping with his 17 year old girlfriend,

Yes, there also is such a problem in Russia. They have two terms for it, "age of consent" (16 and later) and "adult" (18 and later). Non-adult cannot be responsible for their deeds (so e.g. if 17 years old will sleep with 7 years old, everything is considered to be gross, but perfectly legal... as far as i know); but adult bears all the responsibility. Also, if someone haven't reach the "age of consent", then it is considered that they could not give their agreement (which itself is pretty reasonable - 4 year old wants to receive that candy from the hands of that stranger, so they give their agreement to sleep with the stranger, and of course it should not be considered an agreement). So, effectively, if someone who 18 or more years old sleeps with someone who haven't turned 16 yet, jail.

Anyway, I do agree that a book should not be banned, period. Amazon was in the right for defending the right to sell the book, and is in the wrong for taking it down.

Amazon is a privately-held company, they could do what they want. Of course, they could as well ban Harry Potter from sale in their stores - just because their CEO doesn't like the appearance of Rowling.

"If any man take a wife, and go in unto her, and hate her ... and say, I took this woman, and when I came to her, I found her not a maid: Then shall the father of the damsel, and her mother, take and bring forth the tokens of the damsel's virginity unto the elders of the city in the gate: And the damsel's father shall say ... these are the tokens of my daughter's virginity. And they shall spread the cloth before the elders of the city. ... But if this thing be true, and the tokens of virginity be not found for the damsel: Then they shall bring out the damsel to the door of her father's house, and the men of her city shall stone her with stones that she die." Deuteronomy 22:13-21

Unfortunately, it's an religion. If someone will touch the Bible or the Qur'an with a barge pole, the 3rd WW will happen. Mankind requires global anti-brainwashing to get rid of it (but still, then they will find another brainwashing just because they cannot live without any...)

[disney_mommy]

Originally Posted by Nate the great

...It's a shame that you are mixing up the book and the act. The 2 are not the same.

I think they should be allowed to sell this book.

I also think they should be allowed to sell Mein Kampf, but that doesn't mean I think the Holocaust was a good idea.

I also think they should be allowed to sell the political tracts of the Weathermen Underground, but that doesn't mean I think we should go blow up the government.

I also think everyone should be allowed to buy and sell guns, but that doesn't mean I think you should go kill someone.

There's a huge difference between the tool and the act. This book,by itself, does no harm. It's the act that does the harm, and it's already illegal.

This is the best argument in this case I have read so far. I was waffling before, between thinking that the author has a right to write whatever he wants, and imagining if I would feel the same if someone did something like that to my son. But in the end, Nate sums up exactly how I feel about the book. The book and the act itself are different. One does not cause the other.

[jhempel24]

Originally Posted by Nate the great

It's a shame that you are mixing up the book and the act. The 2 are not the same.

I think they should be allowed to sell this book.

I also think they should be allowed to sell Mein Kampf, but that doesn't mean I think the Holocaust was a good idea.

I also think they should be allowed to sell the political tracts of the Weathermen Underground, but that doesn't mean I think we should go blow up the government.

I also think everyone should be allowed to buy and sell guns, but that doesn't mean I think you should go kill someone.

There's a huge difference between the tool and the act. This book,by itself, does no harm. It's the act that does the harm, and it's already illegal.

Let us not forget though that no government agency forced them to remove the book, they as a business listened to the consumer, so no rights were violated, it would be just like sending it to a publisher and having it rejected, it was a business decision, and a right one in my opinion, they won't lose much if any money over it, even with the increased publicity. I actually believe that not selling it is more protecting the author than anything, because I bet there are people that would read it, be disgusted, and lynch him.

Yes it's the act that does the harm, but I also believe that if you have a pre-disposition to this type of behavior, this type of NON-FICTION work could send someone over the edge. Could fiction do it too? Yeah, I think so, but this book was marketed as a how-to guide, not a fictional setting, so I do think that there is a HUGE difference in deciding if the author has any blame in any instance in courts if someone says "the book told me".

And if some self published book gets pulled by the corporation that was selling it due to public out-cry, I won't shed a tear. I think this is an extreme case, and not really a slippery slope....comparing this (which targets kids specifically) and the anarchists cookbook (which tells you how to build a bomb, not where to place it for maximum damage), and harry potter are all apples and oranges and bananas.

Just because you have the ability to write it, doesn't mean that anyone HAS to carry it.

[eric11210]

I just want to dispel a myth I've seen mentioned a number of times in the course of this thread, though it's not directly related to the book in question. People keep talking about a stranger offering a child some candy and how kids have to be taught not to talk to strangers. The reality is that the vast, vast majority (over 80%) of child sexual abuse is done by someone who knows the child very well, a relative (the most common form of child sexual abuse), a teacher, a coach, a close friend of the family. This business of discussing the stranger giving a child candy just perpetuates a myth.