8 ms·

Sure, except anything that passes the Miller Test is, by definition, not obscene.

by jarin 15y ago

chimeracoder 15y ago
Furthermore, if it were, then you'd just be replacing one offense (copyright infringement) with another (distribution of obscene materials). Not sure whether that's a net benefit - it may depend on the specific circumstances, but it's not exactly what I'd call Plan A as a lawyer.
- mikeryan 15y ago
  replacing one offense (copyright infringement) with another (distribution of obscene materials). Except one is a civil matter the other is criminal and currently I don't think there's a ton of DA's interested attempting to prosecute everyone sharing porn on the internet.
  - electromagnetic 15y ago
    The police are fully within their rights to determine if a law is worth enforcing. Here in Ontario it's still on the books that if you purchase alcohol it has to be taken directly to the property it's going to be stored at. IIRC the law dates back to bootlegging days to prosecute the mafia shipping the alcohol down into the US. This isn't even mentioning the laws still on the books that got inherited from the British system.
    - recoil 15y ago
      > British system Nitpick, but there's no such thing. You mean the English legal system. Scotland's legal system is completely different (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scots_law http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scots_law), as is that of Northern Ireland.
      - electromagnetic 15y ago
        Actually in Canada the law is inherited from England, Scotland and Ireland and IIRC is up to a judges discretion as to whether the common law applies. This is due to the fact that many of the people originally immigrating to Canada came from Scotland and Ireland.
tantalor 15y ago
(from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Miller_test http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Miller_test) The Miller test was developed in the 1973 case Miller v. California. It has three parts: * Whether "the average person, applying contemporary community standards", would find that the work, taken as a whole, appeals to the prurient interest, * Whether the work depicts/describes, in a patently offensive way, sexual conduct specifically defined by applicable state law, * Whether the work, taken as a whole, lacks serious literary, artistic, political or scientific value.
- anigbrowl 15y ago
  She's going to have a hard time arguing that the porn breaches contemporary community standards after choosing San Francisco as the venue for her action. I don't know what 'Amateur allure Jen' depicts but it sounds tame rather than wild and kinky.
zbuc 15y ago
But the point of the Miller Test is to define what obscenity is. If porn isn't obscene, then what is? I'd say porn pretty clearly fails the Miller Test, with the possibility for argument of works containing elements relating to the prurient interest being granted clemency under the third criterion, that is: someone may argue that a work containing a subsection that may generally be considered "obscene" should not be considered "obscene" on the whole because of its other literary, artistic, political, or scientific qualities. So this case means that they have to prove that their specific pornography does not meet the 3rd criterion of the Miller Test to classify it as non-obscene.
- anigbrowl 15y ago
  Child porn, cruelty and (possibly) some kinds of criminal assault, ie material that cannot be produced without unlawfully injuring the subject.
  - ThaddeusQuay2 15y ago
    Your comment merely serves to affirm falsehoods which we, as a society, have come to accept without question. There is a good amount of "child porn" which does not injure the subject. http://news.cnet.com/2100-1030_3-6139524.html http://news.cnet.com/2100-1030_3-6139524.html (Federal case may redefine child porn)(2006-NOV-30) http://blog.al.com/spotnews/2011/02/tuscaloosa_county_photographer.html http://blog.al.com/spotnews/2011/02/tuscaloosa_county_photog... (Tuscaloosa County photographer sentenced to federal prison in child modeling porn case)(2011-FEB-09) Both articles are about Jeff Pierson, and his case is just one of several examples that I can give regarding the misuse of child porn laws. What about bestiality? Is it cruel and/or illegal because animals can't give consent? We eat animals much more often than we fuck them, yet we don't care that they can't consent to being killed. What about those "bum fights" videos, where homeless guys are paid to fight each other for our entertainment? Is that "cruel", or "criminal assault", or "unlawful injury"? I agree that children should be protected, and that animals shouldn't be hurt unnecessarily, but the crux of the matter is that there is a big difference between the act, and the recording of the act. The former is illegal, whereas the latter is just information, which in itself cannot harm, and which should thus not be illegal. The bottom line is that we've been made to believe that there is no difference. There used to be the Iron Curtain, whose purpose was to control people through political ideology. Then we got the Moral Curtain, behind which we still live, and which consists of child porn, bestiality, and all things "obscene". Now we are busy constructing the Copyright Curtain.

Sure, except anything that passes the Miller Test is, by definition, not obscene.

by jarin 15y ago

Sure, except anything that passes the Miller Test is, by definition, not obscene.

Furthermore, if it were, then you'd just be replacing one offense (copyright infringement) with another (distribution of obscene materials). Not sure whether that's a net benefit - it may depend on the specific circumstances, but it's not exactly what I'd call Plan A as a lawyer.

mikeryan 15y ago
replacing one offense (copyright infringement) with another (distribution of obscene materials). Except one is a civil matter the other is criminal and currently I don't think there's a ton of DA's interested attempting to prosecute everyone sharing porn on the internet.
- electromagnetic 15y ago
  The police are fully within their rights to determine if a law is worth enforcing. Here in Ontario it's still on the books that if you purchase alcohol it has to be taken directly to the property it's going to be stored at. IIRC the law dates back to bootlegging days to prosecute the mafia shipping the alcohol down into the US. This isn't even mentioning the laws still on the books that got inherited from the British system.
  - recoil 15y ago
    > British system Nitpick, but there's no such thing. You mean the English legal system. Scotland's legal system is completely different (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scots_law http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scots_law), as is that of Northern Ireland.
    - electromagnetic 15y ago
      Actually in Canada the law is inherited from England, Scotland and Ireland and IIRC is up to a judges discretion as to whether the common law applies. This is due to the fact that many of the people originally immigrating to Canada came from Scotland and Ireland.

tantalor 15y ago

(from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Miller_test http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Miller_test) The Miller test was developed in the 1973 case Miller v. California. It has three parts: * Whether "the average person, applying contemporary community standards", would find that the work, taken as a whole, appeals to the prurient interest, * Whether the work depicts/describes, in a patently offensive way, sexual conduct specifically defined by applicable state law, * Whether the work, taken as a whole, lacks serious literary, artistic, political or scientific value.

anigbrowl 15y ago
She's going to have a hard time arguing that the porn breaches contemporary community standards after choosing San Francisco as the venue for her action. I don't know what 'Amateur allure Jen' depicts but it sounds tame rather than wild and kinky.

zbuc 15y ago

But the point of the Miller Test is to define what obscenity is. If porn isn't obscene, then what is? I'd say porn pretty clearly fails the Miller Test, with the possibility for argument of works containing elements relating to the prurient interest being granted clemency under the third criterion, that is: someone may argue that a work containing a subsection that may generally be considered "obscene" should not be considered "obscene" on the whole because of its other literary, artistic, political, or scientific qualities. So this case means that they have to prove that their specific pornography does not meet the 3rd criterion of the Miller Test to classify it as non-obscene.

anigbrowl 15y ago
Child porn, cruelty and (possibly) some kinds of criminal assault, ie material that cannot be produced without unlawfully injuring the subject.
- ThaddeusQuay2 15y ago
  Your comment merely serves to affirm falsehoods which we, as a society, have come to accept without question. There is a good amount of "child porn" which does not injure the subject. http://news.cnet.com/2100-1030_3-6139524.html http://news.cnet.com/2100-1030_3-6139524.html (Federal case may redefine child porn)(2006-NOV-30) http://blog.al.com/spotnews/2011/02/tuscaloosa_county_photographer.html http://blog.al.com/spotnews/2011/02/tuscaloosa_county_photog... (Tuscaloosa County photographer sentenced to federal prison in child modeling porn case)(2011-FEB-09) Both articles are about Jeff Pierson, and his case is just one of several examples that I can give regarding the misuse of child porn laws. What about bestiality? Is it cruel and/or illegal because animals can't give consent? We eat animals much more often than we fuck them, yet we don't care that they can't consent to being killed. What about those "bum fights" videos, where homeless guys are paid to fight each other for our entertainment? Is that "cruel", or "criminal assault", or "unlawful injury"? I agree that children should be protected, and that animals shouldn't be hurt unnecessarily, but the crux of the matter is that there is a big difference between the act, and the recording of the act. The former is illegal, whereas the latter is just information, which in itself cannot harm, and which should thus not be illegal. The bottom line is that we've been made to believe that there is no difference. There used to be the Iron Curtain, whose purpose was to control people through political ideology. Then we got the Moral Curtain, behind which we still live, and which consists of child porn, bestiality, and all things "obscene". Now we are busy constructing the Copyright Curtain.