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Revenge porn often has devastating impact on the emotional health of its victims[1], with half reportedly considering suicide. But it is not strictly an "emoti

Revenge porn often has devastating impact on the emotional health of its victims[1], with half reportedly considering suicide. But it is not strictly an "emotional crime", since publication loops in many people beyond the victim and the perpetrator — there are frequently reputational, professional, and economic consequences for the victim as others become aware of the published materials. There is a huge variety of potential problems which require the attention of legislators, law enforcement, and the courts, and priorities change all the time. It's not as though the only recourse we have is to increase the system capacity. [1] http://jaapl.org/content/44/3/359 http://jaapl.org/content/44/3/359

giantg2 5y ago
"there are frequently reputational, professional, and economic consequences" Which can and should be handled under civil cases. You can extend many these problems, health effects, and the thoughts of suicide to many other issues too - victims of rape, assault, harassment, burglary, etc. So we end up with violent and property crimes which also contain these emotional damages, vs just an emotional crime. You would need to prove that this emotional-only crime is somehow more important and these other crimes that contain those damages plus violent or property damages. It's not that there isn't harm done by revenge porn, but that the damage done by others is objectively worse because it contains additional elements. "It's not as though the only recourse we have is to increase the system capacity." Then please, do explain. Because the only logic I see is that you ignore other crimes to pursue these, or you increase capacity. And frankly, ignoring any crimes undermines the entire system due to unequal enforcement and ostricizing some victims but not others by not giving them the recourse due under law.
- rectang 5y ago
  > Then please, do explain. Because the only logic I see is that you ignore other crimes to pursue these, or you increase capacity. For example: There's a difference whether the Attorney General is Bill Barr or Merrick Garland — and it does indeed involve choice as to which cases to pursue. The same holds true for many other offices in law enforcement and the courts. Who the district attorneys are, who the judges are, who sets budgets for police and who decides how those budgets are allocated and law enforcement resources are deployed... all of that matters.
  - giantg2 5y ago
    Which isn't contrary to what you quoted - they are ignoring some laws in order to pursue others. Unequal enforcement is wrong and should be ended. This should be fixed through increasing capacity.
_jal 5y ago
Given that property rights usually end up trumping human rights in US law, DMCA'ing revenge porn might work better. I wish I were joking.
- WalterBright 5y ago
  Property rights are human rights. Suppose I dropped by, tossed you out of your house into the street, and took possession of everything you had. You'd certainly feel your human rights were violated.
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
tharne 5y ago
> Revenge porn often has devastating impact on the emotional health of its victims[1], with half reportedly considering suicide. This obviously is a very important issue to you. While massive enforcement that punishes offenders and gives justice to victims would be the ideal, from a technical and legal perspective, that's very hard to do. Why not take the less morally righteous, but infinitely more practical, path of convincing folks to stop making porn movies of themselves? If our main goal here is to alleviate suffering, the discussion should center on how best to prevent this from happening, regardless of what the morally correct solution would be in an ideal world. While there is nothing morally wrong about making a sex video, it's a classic high-risk, low-reward activity. If everything goes perfectly, you have a video that you will likely never watch again. On the other hand, that video may find it's way online and ruin your life.
- rectang 5y ago
  > Why not take the less morally righteous, but infinitely more practical, path of convincing folks to stop making porn movies of themselves? A ton of reasons[1], including that such preaching is ineffective and so the only impact of doing it is to justify excoriating the victim later and excusing failing institutions. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Victim_blaming https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Victim_blaming

giantg2 5y ago

"there are frequently reputational, professional, and economic consequences" Which can and should be handled under civil cases. You can extend many these problems, health effects, and the thoughts of suicide to many other issues too - victims of rape, assault, harassment, burglary, etc. So we end up with violent and property crimes which also contain these emotional damages, vs just an emotional crime. You would need to prove that this emotional-only crime is somehow more important and these other crimes that contain those damages plus violent or property damages. It's not that there isn't harm done by revenge porn, but that the damage done by others is objectively worse because it contains additional elements. "It's not as though the only recourse we have is to increase the system capacity." Then please, do explain. Because the only logic I see is that you ignore other crimes to pursue these, or you increase capacity. And frankly, ignoring any crimes undermines the entire system due to unequal enforcement and ostricizing some victims but not others by not giving them the recourse due under law.

rectang 5y ago
> Then please, do explain. Because the only logic I see is that you ignore other crimes to pursue these, or you increase capacity. For example: There's a difference whether the Attorney General is Bill Barr or Merrick Garland — and it does indeed involve choice as to which cases to pursue. The same holds true for many other offices in law enforcement and the courts. Who the district attorneys are, who the judges are, who sets budgets for police and who decides how those budgets are allocated and law enforcement resources are deployed... all of that matters.
- giantg2 5y ago
  Which isn't contrary to what you quoted - they are ignoring some laws in order to pursue others. Unequal enforcement is wrong and should be ended. This should be fixed through increasing capacity.

_jal 5y ago

Given that property rights usually end up trumping human rights in US law, DMCA'ing revenge porn might work better. I wish I were joking.

WalterBright 5y ago
Property rights are human rights. Suppose I dropped by, tossed you out of your house into the street, and took possession of everything you had. You'd certainly feel your human rights were violated.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]

tharne 5y ago

> Revenge porn often has devastating impact on the emotional health of its victims[1], with half reportedly considering suicide. This obviously is a very important issue to you. While massive enforcement that punishes offenders and gives justice to victims would be the ideal, from a technical and legal perspective, that's very hard to do. Why not take the less morally righteous, but infinitely more practical, path of convincing folks to stop making porn movies of themselves? If our main goal here is to alleviate suffering, the discussion should center on how best to prevent this from happening, regardless of what the morally correct solution would be in an ideal world. While there is nothing morally wrong about making a sex video, it's a classic high-risk, low-reward activity. If everything goes perfectly, you have a video that you will likely never watch again. On the other hand, that video may find it's way online and ruin your life.

rectang 5y ago
> Why not take the less morally righteous, but infinitely more practical, path of convincing folks to stop making porn movies of themselves? A ton of reasons[1], including that such preaching is ineffective and so the only impact of doing it is to justify excoriating the victim later and excusing failing institutions. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Victim_blaming https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Victim_blaming