There's a lot of food for thought here, and important points. But in one area, the author completely glosses over a crucial distinction:
> why is it only documentation of sex crimes against minors that are being banned in this way? The lawmen are perfectly fine with a video documenting how a teenager is being stabbed with a screwdriver in both eyes, then murdered. ... why is the ban just related to anything sexual, and not to the bodily harm itself...?
There's a very important reason only documentation of sex crimes against minors is banned -- there isn't a big market for watching videos of murders. Virtually no one is going to go out and film themselves murdering people in order to satisfy a market for those videos.
But the reasoning goes that if child porn is legal, then this will actively encourage more child rape, etc., so that it can be filmed and distributed. Plus, even if we're really good against preventing the actual acts in the US, we're still creating markets for it in other countries, especially third-world ones. So children suffer.
But then there's another argument, that having child porn around is actually better than the alternative -- because potential molesters/rapists are able to satisfy their desire with existing videos. If they don't have the videos, then they go out and commit horrible acts. So, better to stick to the videos.
There are no easy answers.
> why is it only documentation of sex crimes against minors that are being banned in this way? The lawmen are perfectly fine with a video documenting how a teenager is being stabbed with a screwdriver in both eyes, then murdered. ... why is the ban just related to anything sexual, and not to the bodily harm itself...?
There's a very important reason only documentation of sex crimes against minors is banned -- there isn't a big market for watching videos of murders. Virtually no one is going to go out and film themselves murdering people in order to satisfy a market for those videos.
But the reasoning goes that if child porn is legal, then this will actively encourage more child rape, etc., so that it can be filmed and distributed. Plus, even if we're really good against preventing the actual acts in the US, we're still creating markets for it in other countries, especially third-world ones. So children suffer.
But then there's another argument, that having child porn around is actually better than the alternative -- because potential molesters/rapists are able to satisfy their desire with existing videos. If they don't have the videos, then they go out and commit horrible acts. So, better to stick to the videos.
There are no easy answers.