Severity of Child Pornography Offenses

The laws on child pornography contain a number of inconsistencies. In my thinking, the punishment for the crime should be proportional to the actual amount of harm done a child. The important factor to the law is possession. That makes no sense to me. If someone views pornography online or offline is immaterial. What is important is did the pedophile pay the pornographer to photograph the child? If he did, he has committed a much more serious crime. He is the motive for the abuse. He should be treated as a conspirator who directly committed the crimes against the child. Without that money, the pornographer could not make a living harming kids. Ironically, those that view free pornography or that set up robots to flood the pornographers with requests, incur costs for the pornographers, thus making their businesses less profitable. Ironically, the presence of such people discourages the pornography industry. The other inconsistency is equating fantasy art with actual photos. If fantasy art is created without live models, there is no child to be harmed. It one ridiculous case, a pedophile’s fantasy journal, a written record of his thoughts, was equated in law with pornographic photos. I think the problem is legal minds are so uncomfortable thinking about the child pornography that they fail to double check that their gut reactions are rational.

~ Roedy (born:1948-02-04 age:68)