3 ms·

4.5 years is a really long time. Ridiculous US sentencing habits might be affecting your calibration for how seriously this offense is being taken.

igetspam 4y ago
4.5 years for child abuse feels like a very short period of time. Multiply that by the volume and it feels laughable. Child pornography is not a victimless crime. These children were abused and the people who possess this material are party to it. How is 4.5 years "serious," considering the extent of the crime?
- DangitBobby 4y ago
  Again, 4.5 years is a long time. Nothing else to it. I tried doing research on average sentence lengths in Canada to see how serious this sentence is relatively speaking and couldn't find much easily so I gave up. You could try yourself and see what you find.
  - nickthegreek 4y ago
    Do inmates in Canada regularly serve their full sentence? If 4.5 turns into 3, are we still going to say that is long time?
  - igetspam 4y ago
    I don't have to research sentencing to feel that 4.5 years is out of line with the amount of victimization being discussed. What would you think was justified for someone who abused children for profit? Someone who forced kids to do lewd things, so they could sell photos of it? Is possessing the material different? Or do think causing lifelong harm to children, in general, is only worth a handful of years to the abuser? Is 1/25 of a life really the just outcome for an entire life in therapy? A lifetime of trust issues? What if one of those kids committed suicide because they couldn't cope? So 4.5 years, huh? The US has plenty of examples of light sentencing. Rapists who get "time served" is common. Victim blaming is part of what we do. Serious crimes deserve serious punishment or the ROI on crime becomes worth it.
    - mablopoule 4y ago
      "Is possessing the material different?" I mean...yes? of course it is? It's like pretending to watch a football match on tv to be materially the same as being in the field. There is of course the question of whether he shared it or not, or if it was just for personal use, but still, as horrible that subject might be, I'm more than a bit mystified at the idea of the act vs. watching the video of the act considered as being even remotely in the same ballpark.
      - igetspam 4y ago
        That is a false equivalence, unless you're saying that professional athletes are there under duress and that they are not choosing any long term side effects. We're talking about paying for violence and abuse. By consuming the material, you are supporting the activity in a material way, thus creating an incentive for it to continue.
    - DangitBobby 4y ago
      I don't know, do you feel like a party to child exploitation when you buy an iPhone and clothes? What about people living and working in horrific conditions to support your lifestyle? Do you feel culpable for that? Without people like you, that human suffering wouldn't exist, or at least there would be less of it, right? What would be an appropriate prison sentence for your participation in those things, a couple of months? Clearly benefiting from horrific crimes is not the same as perpetrating them.
      - prepend 4y ago
        I don’t think the suffering in the creation of an iPhone is in any way comparable to the suffering of sexually abusing children and filming it. And doing that thousands of times.
        defrost 4y ago
        True enough. Now, in this specific case is there evidence that this person abused children first hand and|or filmed themselves doing so? Apparently the court saw no such evidence if they merely charged and found on filesharing.
- mablopoule 4y ago
  Honestly, it sounds like the same bogus logic that some copyright holder companies uses to charge people with an absurd fee / prison sentence, by just multiplying big numbers unrelated to the actual harm done. 4.5 years is not a light sentence in any way.
- riaa4lyfe 4y ago
  The crime associated with the 4.5 year sentence is not child abuse. The crime is sharing prohibited files. 4.5 years in a prison - a half decade - is an incredibly harsh penalty for filesharing. And then there is the post incarceration collateral conditions (fail all background checks, hard banned from working in a large number of industries with vulnerable peoples, housing restrictions with likely being on a sex offenders registry, social media vigilantes to name just a few). This individual is unlikely to lead anything approaching a normal life ever again. They will suffer a massive economic penalty due to 5 years lost wages and loss of 80%+ employment opportunities. They will suffer material psychological harm from being in a prison for 4.5 years, especially as an identified target for other inmates. They, by virtue of their actions and their sentence duration, will lose virtually all of their social connections. This sentence, especially when combined with the other they will be receiving, is effectively a punishment for life. The result is this individual is unlikely to ever be a productive member of society ever again and is much more likely to reoffend. Even if they don't they will almost assuredly be a ward of the state due to the impact of the above. Mandatory minimums, long prison terms in sentencing guidelines and post incarceration collateral conditions make the underlying problem a lot worse not better.
1letterunixname 4y ago
There are 10k's-100k's of aging black and brown men in US prison for de facto life for having a joint or being accused of some random crime without having a proper defense. The US has the highest incarceration rate on the planet per capita except for the Seychelles, and this includes all of the unofficial carceral populations of regimes like China, Russia, and DPRK. Some countries consider ~21 years to be "life" because a person may recalibrate, transform, and be rehabilitated in that time frame. America is a punitive, brutal, soulless regime. It has mass shootings because its socio-economic order, fulfillment, and values are third-world, at best.

igetspam 4y ago

4.5 years for child abuse feels like a very short period of time. Multiply that by the volume and it feels laughable. Child pornography is not a victimless crime. These children were abused and the people who possess this material are party to it. How is 4.5 years "serious," considering the extent of the crime?

DangitBobby 4y ago
Again, 4.5 years is a long time. Nothing else to it. I tried doing research on average sentence lengths in Canada to see how serious this sentence is relatively speaking and couldn't find much easily so I gave up. You could try yourself and see what you find.
- nickthegreek 4y ago
  Do inmates in Canada regularly serve their full sentence? If 4.5 turns into 3, are we still going to say that is long time?
- igetspam 4y ago
  I don't have to research sentencing to feel that 4.5 years is out of line with the amount of victimization being discussed. What would you think was justified for someone who abused children for profit? Someone who forced kids to do lewd things, so they could sell photos of it? Is possessing the material different? Or do think causing lifelong harm to children, in general, is only worth a handful of years to the abuser? Is 1/25 of a life really the just outcome for an entire life in therapy? A lifetime of trust issues? What if one of those kids committed suicide because they couldn't cope? So 4.5 years, huh? The US has plenty of examples of light sentencing. Rapists who get "time served" is common. Victim blaming is part of what we do. Serious crimes deserve serious punishment or the ROI on crime becomes worth it.
  - mablopoule 4y ago
    "Is possessing the material different?" I mean...yes? of course it is? It's like pretending to watch a football match on tv to be materially the same as being in the field. There is of course the question of whether he shared it or not, or if it was just for personal use, but still, as horrible that subject might be, I'm more than a bit mystified at the idea of the act vs. watching the video of the act considered as being even remotely in the same ballpark.
    - igetspam 4y ago
      That is a false equivalence, unless you're saying that professional athletes are there under duress and that they are not choosing any long term side effects. We're talking about paying for violence and abuse. By consuming the material, you are supporting the activity in a material way, thus creating an incentive for it to continue.
  - DangitBobby 4y ago
    I don't know, do you feel like a party to child exploitation when you buy an iPhone and clothes? What about people living and working in horrific conditions to support your lifestyle? Do you feel culpable for that? Without people like you, that human suffering wouldn't exist, or at least there would be less of it, right? What would be an appropriate prison sentence for your participation in those things, a couple of months? Clearly benefiting from horrific crimes is not the same as perpetrating them.
    - prepend 4y ago
      I don’t think the suffering in the creation of an iPhone is in any way comparable to the suffering of sexually abusing children and filming it. And doing that thousands of times.
      - defrost 4y ago
        True enough. Now, in this specific case is there evidence that this person abused children first hand and|or filmed themselves doing so? Apparently the court saw no such evidence if they merely charged and found on filesharing.
mablopoule 4y ago
Honestly, it sounds like the same bogus logic that some copyright holder companies uses to charge people with an absurd fee / prison sentence, by just multiplying big numbers unrelated to the actual harm done. 4.5 years is not a light sentence in any way.
riaa4lyfe 4y ago
The crime associated with the 4.5 year sentence is not child abuse. The crime is sharing prohibited files. 4.5 years in a prison - a half decade - is an incredibly harsh penalty for filesharing. And then there is the post incarceration collateral conditions (fail all background checks, hard banned from working in a large number of industries with vulnerable peoples, housing restrictions with likely being on a sex offenders registry, social media vigilantes to name just a few). This individual is unlikely to lead anything approaching a normal life ever again. They will suffer a massive economic penalty due to 5 years lost wages and loss of 80%+ employment opportunities. They will suffer material psychological harm from being in a prison for 4.5 years, especially as an identified target for other inmates. They, by virtue of their actions and their sentence duration, will lose virtually all of their social connections. This sentence, especially when combined with the other they will be receiving, is effectively a punishment for life. The result is this individual is unlikely to ever be a productive member of society ever again and is much more likely to reoffend. Even if they don't they will almost assuredly be a ward of the state due to the impact of the above. Mandatory minimums, long prison terms in sentencing guidelines and post incarceration collateral conditions make the underlying problem a lot worse not better.

1letterunixname 4y ago

There are 10k's-100k's of aging black and brown men in US prison for de facto life for having a joint or being accused of some random crime without having a proper defense. The US has the highest incarceration rate on the planet per capita except for the Seychelles, and this includes all of the unofficial carceral populations of regimes like China, Russia, and DPRK. Some countries consider ~21 years to be "life" because a person may recalibrate, transform, and be rehabilitated in that time frame. America is a punitive, brutal, soulless regime. It has mass shootings because its socio-economic order, fulfillment, and values are third-world, at best.