(Note - I recognise that you’re building a construction, I am not raging at you. Just in case that’s hard to tell in text.)
Because consensual homosexuality harms no one. Animals kill each other too, but we recognise that HARM is a bad thing, natural or not.
True, but a) that still isn’t technically harm, that’s just a bad idea. b) even if you have gay sex most of the time, you could still have non-gay sex occasionally, c) science! We can already make babies without sex.
If every person on Earth exclusively mated wearing condoms, there’d be no children either.
It’s a matter of what rights are fundamental. And there is a hierarchy of value. While I, for instance, am in favor of gay marriage, it would be wrong for me to invade another country and force them to perform it (assuming I had robots and gunships and stuff and were capable of doing it.) Because marriage is less important than the damage that would be inflicted by my invasion.
However, if some country is rounding up its gays and to execute them, then it would be right for me to invade and rescue them. In my moral hierarchy at least.
It is wrong to stand by and allow a great wrong to take place if you have the power to prevent it.
The men are. But just because the slave owners are happy doesn’t mean the slaves should be disregarded.
… we all know? I suspect several non-American posters here may have quite different opinions on that. Of course, there’s a difference between ‘control’ and ‘ban’. I do think America would be much better off with much stronger gun controls. Attempting to ban all guns completely would be stupid though.
A better argument for the point you’re trying ot make would be cars. Cars have great potential to be dangerous. Car accidents kill huge numbers of people. But very few people are arguing to ban all cars.
That may have some truth. While its anecdotal, I know a friend who after playing several hours of GTA went outside and saw a car and thought basically “Yea, I could steal that, no problem.” He didn’t. He realized that it was still wrong and he also realized in the back of his mind that game =/= real life. The effect quickly wore off and later on he never had that thought.
It suggests that even if there is a case of temporary impairment, that one still is able to process the difference between real life and games and more importantly, moral decisions weren’t compromised, which the core argument.
This is exactly the same kind of judgementalism that leads the feminists to cause the huge blowup over RapeLay. Cherry pick someone’s low point, their darkest hour, and it’s easy to make almost any group look ridiculous. Look at what eroge fans have done with the death threats and mountain of protest letters to the feminist groups piling on RapeLay.
In this particular example, these people are idiots, doing an idiotic thing. This does not mean all of them are idiots all the time, or that everyone involved with the feminist movement is an idiot. All it means is that within the feminist movement, there are people to be found who are feminists and who are also idiots.
Push forward the statistical studies which argue that violent media reduces violent crimes, and porn reduces sex crimes. The Miller Test requires that a work be found to be “lacking serious political value” before it can be found to be obscene. Politics relates to the proper functioning of society, therefore something that has a demonstrably proven effect to reduce crime has political value.
In fact, with sufficiently strong proof, you might even be able to meet the summary judgement standard; if your proof is strong enough the judge agrees that no reasonable jury could find in favor of the other side, then you win without a jury even needing to be empanelled. (‘Reasonable’ meaning one who decided based on facts, and not emotion, which in obscenity cases is what the prosecution hammers on even though in theory they’re not supposed to)
But the science is nowhere near conclusive enough to demonstrate this. And to get it conclusive enough would require a lot of funding for basic research. Start fundraising.
EDIT:
And yes, I am in the US, and Olf is in France, and papillon in England. Winning a trial based on US law in the US won’t directly affect them. But it would shift the battleground – like Narg was alluding to in the other thread, courts respect decisions of other courts much more than they do random citizens griping. It would also shift public debate. If a court said that pornography is a social benefit because it reduces crime, then that isn’t just some guy saying it – it’s a court saying that as an official judgement.
Right now if we say “lolicon is good because it reduces child sex abuse incidence”, or “rape games are good because they reduce violent rape crimes”, or “violent games are good because they reduce violent behavior”, people view it as fringe, and one fringe nut is easily ignored. Because too few people are standing up and saying it, and the media doesn’t listen, and the other side is screaming at the top of their lungs.
Is it now? At what point did mutual consent to something become the defining factor if it’s right?
If an adult woman consensually surrenders her freedom to me (maybe because I give her family millions of dollars; but she’s selling her freedom to me, not them selling it to me) - doing so under written testimony and partial third party witnesses - why can’t I own a slave? I promise not to beat her or sell her to someone else… but she’s distinctly my property.
If adult twins consensually wish to marry me, why can’t I marry them both?
If I pay someone millions of dollars, and they consent to me breaking their arms and shooting them in the leg with a handgun in exchange for that money, why can’t I do it?
It’s all consensual, is it not?
Homosexuality is obviously deviant behavior: normal people DO NOT enjoy having sex with someone of the same sex. Shouldn’t matter if it’s consensually or not: we have to protect them from themselves, even if they don’t understand. It’s what good moral, upstanding citizens do.
The United States is one of a number of countries where the court system punishes people for drawing or owning grotesque fictional illustrations (sexual or not), despite both parties being consent to the dealing and promising to not show it outside of closed doors. America is a nation that systematically employs a death penalty system for criminals, which on several occasions has killed men and women INNOCENT of the crimes they were supposedly convicted of - had no death penalty been active, they would have been set free. The United States is the ONLY wealthy industrialized nation WITHOUT a baseline universal health care system, where the personal wealth of an individual does not dictate what level of treatment they receive: in multiple situations, a person who could be cured of an illness has died simply because their “insurance policy” did not cover it, or they couldn’t possibly afford the treatment no matter how many jobs they could reasonably get. America has committed gross violation of human rights, with active organized torture of captured criminals - shows no signs of prosecuting the guilty, despite admittance of guilt - and holds dozens upon dozens of individuals in confinement WITHOUT a criminal case for them to be held or chance to get a fair trail, because there’s a lack of evidence to prove them guilty of a crime they may or may not have done.
That’s just the TIP of the iceberg. Yea. I use Saudi Arabia: because America’s shit stinks just as badly. It’s not just the Saudi Arabian legal system that has a lot of room for change.
Your argument is a fallacy and falls flat because of it. To slightly rephrase a statement I used earlier:
Pedophiles rape children. Lolicon has child rape. People who like lolicon are child rapists.
Which is what your argument can insinuate. There is no clear “indication” of something being wrong with a person, simply because they enjoy something. I think the twin 16 year old daughters of my neighbor are incredibly hot. If I were years younger, I’d be hitting on them like white on rice, in a Styrofoam cup of milk, on a clean paper plate, resting on industry bleached bed sheets, in a white painted room with a thousand bright colorless lights. Does that now mean I should go report to a clinic for psychological evaluation? Should I now be thrown in jail for the good of society, because I’m a repressed pedophile who could lose sanity at any time? I’m sexually attracted to REAL underage twins! I find their youthful sexiness attractive. That’s infinitely worst than being attracted to FICTIONAL underage twins. Throw me in confinement without committing a crime?
Also… ANYTHING can be damaging psychologically. Serving in the military or on a police force is psychologically dangerous. Many a cop or soldier has gone off the deep end and killed his wife and children without warning or sign of distress. Should we start monitoring every cop and soldier with a domestic lifestyle? It’s not just serving on the battlefield or on a beat that’s a source of violence - the long hours and stressful environment have proven to be enough. Lookout! Cops and soldiers are dangers to society!
Uh oh… I’m a former serviceman who thinks his neighbor’s twins sexy (and own a gun collection). I’m a SUPER danger to society! :roll:
You’re out of character. And convincing another person is a fundamental cornerstone of debate, isn’t it?
I know you’re playing a Devil’s Advocate¬Ö that’s why I’m being so serious with you.
The point is: you don’t punish EVERYONE for the wrongs committed by SOME. The precedence it sets is frightening.
You would murder tens of thousands - with the rational that the nation you are invading would fight to defend their way of life - to save several hundred (as homosexuality is a population minority in nearly all cultures)? You’ve committed one great travesty to stop another. I see no morality being served, except on culture imposing it’s ideology upon another.
Morality is dictated by culture. What’s moral in one society, can be immoral in another.
I know it’s a rhetorical question: but who has the “moral right” to decide what civilization is more moral than another? The real answer is: whoever wins the war.
Hey, I said nothing about murdering tens of thousands. If I have my proper evil genius robots I should be able to stomp straight through to the prison and pick up the prisoners to save them! A few people would, no doubt, get in the way. Also, the prison would probably be wrecked. So damage is done.
As I said, the values have to be weighed. If you have the power, you have to judge how much good you can do vs how much harm will be done. These judgments can be pretty hard to make, and sometimes we’re wrong.
People do live in consensual master/slave relationships. And if it’s what they both want, fine then. However, see later note on duress.
No reason that I can see.
Now this one gets tricky. Because there is consent, but harm is clearly being done. Similarly, if you have a nutjob who agrees to let you kill him as part of some sick sex fantasy, it may be semi-consensual, but…
In these cases one factor in question is usually sanity. Were you in your right mind when you agreed to this? (And how do we define ‘right mind’? Some would say it’s so obviously insane that no one could agree to it and be in their right mind.)
Because society believes there is no possible way that anyone sane could agree to such a bargain, it’s generally thought that such a bargain is either made because of insanity or because of duress and in either case is not genuinely consensual. Which is why people aren’t allowed to sell their organs.
Duress, as I got into in the Male Rape Tangent From Hell, applies in cases of desperate poverty as well as gun-to-head. If you think you have to do something in order to live, that’s not free consent.
That’s why the animal argument often gets brought up in discussions of homosexuality. Since consensual gay sex clearly doesn’t hurt anyone, the people arguing against it are forced to argue either that it’s NOT NATURAL or that it’s AGAINST GOD. Well, it clearly is natural… gayness isn’t a new invention, there have always been gay people, and there are gay animals. Natural doesn’t make it right, but it negates the ‘unnatural’ argument. As for the AGAINST GOD, that’s hard to refute, because it might be, but many countries these days hold that legislation based purely on one religion is probably improper.
As for ‘normal’ people, figures vary. The percentage of pure-homosexuality is pretty small, but the range of bisexuality and people who’ll have same-sex sex out of desperation if they can’t get anything else is much wider.
Also, normal people do not have red hair, but it’s probably a bad idea to burn all the gingers as witches.
Call me strange if you want, but the combination of all that is said in the quote above brings to mind the ridiculous image of thousands of AlizÈe clones with shaved heads marching through the Arc de Triomphe wearing a dominatrix outfit and carrying FAMAS. Yes, I’m aware that she is Corsican like NapolÈon Bonaparte and not “true” French, but she is still who came to mind. In any case, you all may laugh when you see where the link I associated with her name leads. I think a brief break of humor is needed due to the seriousness of this topic.
Ah but you see all three of those “consensual scenarios” that I mentioned, are illegal in the US (indeed many Western democracies): consent or not. I merely wished to point out that the notion of consent, isn’t a valid legal argument in modern law. Just because two adult homosexuals consent to have sex, doesn’t automatically make it legal.
It still doesn’t counter the evidence that homosexuality is a deviance in biology. Cancer has a significant occurrence in biology (if I’m not mistaken, even with greater numbers than homosexuality): but under no circumstance is cancer considered “natural” in general biology. Nor is it considered “normal” behavior for the majority of biological creatures. Cancer is a considered a deviance in cell growth, because it’s not the population norm. Just as someone with an immunity to AIDS (which actually exist), is considered a deviance.
Homosexuality is deviance, because it counters the basic core of biology - from the lowest germ to sentient humans - successful reproduction. Not politically correct in calling it that… but it fits the definition of the word. Be that as it may: deviant behavior does not mean self destructive tendencies. The same goes for someone who may enjoy fictional rape or fictional lolicon. Just because a person has a deviance in their personal enjoyment, does not mean that person is self destructive to society or will commit a harmful act.
There is no scientific evidence that a mentally stable and law abiding citizen who enjoys fictional rape stories, will commit actual rape. Just as there’s no scientific evidence that a mentally stable and law abiding citizen who hates fictional rape stories, will not commit actual rape. Its mere speculation and opinionated assumption of what people think other people will do.
Furthermore, the sole unbiased scientific study on the abundance of fictional sex and its impact on criminal intent in a country by a world acclaimed expert in the field of sexual behavior (Milton Diamond), comes to the ultimate conclusion that it most likely has a positive effect on society and deserves significant further study. Thus so far, as far as I am aware, no other attempt at peer reviewed research by an university expert has taken place to disprove it. It isn’t out of line to think, one possible reason “anti-lolicon” people haven’t funded a non-biased study of their own, is the fear it could support what Milton Diamond got.
The difference between empirical data and psychological assumption is huge.
You’re late though. We just discovered that the original news report was wrong and false reporting. Rape games are not getting systematically banned in Japan. Not yet at least…
Supposedly there’s some new “rules” going to be released, but the general expectation from most people is that there will be enough loopholes to not change anything. We’ll know soon enough.
Thus so far neither Kunio Hatoyama or Seiko Noda - the two Japanese lawmakers in position of real power, who would most likely seize this opportunity to enforce new anti-hentai laws in Japan - have made an official motion for new legislation in doing such.
Basically it seems everyone is waiting what the new rules look like… which will be released next week.
@ the homosexuals, I’ve been hearing that homosexual marriage is “not considered illegal” in some countries. If that is so, there is an option to relocate the activity from the US to somewhere else, right?
From this perception I will prepare myself for non-Japan based (dark) eroge. Anyone care for China/Taiwan based eroge?
