This is a very disturbing repression of freedom
Angus Scrimm, 02 Mar 2006 01:21:30
I have known about all this proposed banning of 'erotic horror' and other 'extreme material' for some time - but have never known how serious it is.
What disturbs me is a couple of comments I read on this site.
1/ Prosecutions will be brought against those viewing such material on the internet.
OK.... just VIEWING?
What if you do indeed occasionly visit such websites and either never/rarely actually download material. What little you do download exists on your computer for only a short ammount of time before being deleted. And most importantly you have not signed-up with any 'accounts' on any such website at all.
Could you still get arrested.... and how would the authorities be able to prove you have visited such websites without any 'credit card records' etc to work from?
2/ The police have probably already begun to web logging and looking into credit card details in anticipation of the new law being passed.
Is this illegal for the police to do this?
If this material is still not yet against the law - why is incriminating evidence being gathered already?
Are they going to attempt to 'backdate' once this law is passed?
Ie, if extreme porn becomes illegal on say 1st June 2006, could someone who had viewed such material on say 1st March 2006, STILL be prosecuted? Even though on 1st March 2006 it WAS STILL LEGAL?
If that is so, why did this not happen to fox hunters when hunting was banned?
This country is getting worse even than North Korea!
Graham Marsden, 02 Mar 2006 14:16:16
Hi there,
saynotodarwinism@yahoo.com wrote:
Interesting name you have there, been on any other groups recently?
> What disturbs me is a couple of comments I read on this site.
>
> 1/ Prosecutions will be brought against those viewing such
> material on the internet.
>
> OK.... just VIEWING?
The proposals, from what I understand, want to criminalise "possession"
of these images, I'm not a lawyer, but, as I understand it, the way the
law is being interpreted, especially in child porn cases, is that simply
downloading a file counts as "creating" an image (or a copy of an
image), this includes "viewing" it, since that creates a copy on your
computer and thus you are "in possession" of it.
> What if you do indeed occasionly visit such websites and
> either never/rarely actually download material. What little
> you do download exists on your computer for only a short
> ammount of time before being deleted.
There is, I believe, a possible "get out" if the picture *only* appears
in your browser's cache, but if it's been saved eg to a folder called
"pictures" then they assume there was deliberate intent to obtain the
image (and the argument "I was saving it to report to the Police" tends
not to wash) and you are in possession of the image.
Even if you subsequently delete the image unless you use a proper
"deletion tool" that actually overwrites the file space and record
(instead of just marking the space as "available for use") traces may
well still be detectable and thus you can still be ruled to be "in
possession" of the image.
> And most importantly you have not signed-up with any 'accounts' on any
> such website at all.
>
> Could you still get arrested.... and how would the authorities
> be able to prove you have visited such websites without any
> 'credit card records' etc to work from?
The new EU "Data retention directive" which has just been approved by
the "Justice and Home Affairs Council" says:
"[...] obliges communications providers to retain all telephone and
internet traffic data for a year (phone calls) and six months (internet
data)"
So if the authorities want to, they can theoretically get records of
anyone who has visited a "suspect" website. See:
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2006/02/24/data_retention_directive_ratified/
> 2/ The police have probably already begun to web logging and looking
> into credit card details in anticipation of the new law being passed.
>
> Is this illegal for the police to do this?
> If this material is still not yet against the law - why is
> incriminating evidence being gathered already?
Do you have any proof or information to back these claims up?
> Are they going to attempt to 'backdate' once this law is passed?
> Ie, if extreme porn becomes illegal on say 1st June 2006, could
> someone who had viewed such material on say 1st March 2006, STILL
> be prosecuted? Even though on 1st March 2006 it WAS STILL LEGAL?
Under the European Convention on Human Rights, laws cannot be
"backdated" in this way, however the Home Office proposals intend to
criminalise "possession" which is an "ongoing" offence, ie it doesn't
matter *when* you downloaded it, if you have it after the date the law
is implmented, you are committing an offence.
Cheers,
Graham.
Angus Scrimm, 03 Mar 2006 01:12:12
> > 2/ The police have probably already begun to web logging and looking
> > into credit card details in anticipation of the new law being passed.
> >
> > Is this illegal for the police to do this?
> > If this material is still not yet against the law - why is
> > incriminating evidence being gathered already?
> Do you have any proof or information to back these claims up?
Actually I'd read this somewhere amongst the pages of this website, I've no proof myself this is going on - and really wanted to know if this was really true!
And if this law gets passed, what will be next. 'Ordinary' pornography? Horror films of ANY kind? (Remember the kerfuffle over the 'Child's Play' films several years ago). Will even films such as 'Magnum Force' get banned? - that has scenes (such as the pool scene) which could be interpreted as 'violent' and 'pornographic'.
Violent computer games such as the Grand Theft Auto series and Manhunt? Indeed a computer game called 'Postal' did get banned around 1999/2000, on the grounds of excessive violence, as far as I can remember! All those games have scenes that could, by some overly-sensitive people, also be classed as violent and pornographic. Even female boxing matches could be tarred with the same brush! Will female boxing be banned?
Before long almost everyone in this country will be a potential criminal!
What is your advice to anyone in the UK who does frequent site containing such 'erotic horror','fighting amazons','consentual snuff', 'bondage' material (or whatever label you wish to use)?
I would recommend stopping visiting them, totally, at least until we have a clear indication that this new law will get thrown out!
But, as our internet activity is recorded and retained for anywhere from 6 to 24 months, is it already too late to just simply stop visiting such sites?
Teddy, 06 Mar 2006 00:46:53
All part of New Labour's vision of this perfect "Nanny state"; I would agree with Alan's previous observation-
"What the hell is going on in this country?"
> This country is getting worse even than North Korea!