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RE: Child Porn as Thoughtcrime
by Chuck Thompson 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

At 04:09 PM 9/10/96 -0700, you wrote: >>From: tcmay(a)got.net >> >>My point is this: For anyone who claims that "thoughtcrime" is something >>the Evil Empire specialized in, i.e., totalitarian communist regimes, look >>to the enforcement of laws about what can be viewed or accessed from the >>United States. Thougtcrime. >>......................................................................... >> >> >>Those laws obviously (to me) don't have all that much to do with legality nor >>all that much with thought, either; but more with a government aiming to >>"looking good" in front of an audience of voters, presenting an image of >>being more moral, or "better-than-thou" - in front of other nations, etc.; >>that is, to gain favor, and therefore political support, from the Citizen >>Units by sounding like Mother Superior/fatherly figures who are going to look >>after All The Little Children (tm), plus all the similarly weak & >>dispossessed. Let's see if I understand you correctly. The anti-child porn advocates are only interested in votes and positioning themselves as more moral or "better-than-thou"... >>This posturing gives all the un-selfconfident people someone to look up to, >>even if they don't really get anything (their memories being too short to >>notice the failed promises, lack of follow-through, and blatant >>inconsistencies, not to mention the 'legal' crimes committed along the way). in order to provide an icon for the "citizen units" to worship... >>Many people seek after sympathy towards their feelings (present and/or future >>pain) more than to be respected for the ability to think. because they are too stupid to think for themselves, and therefore are reduced to going on their intuition... >>I imagine this >>develops into a reduced sympathy towards certain kinds of thought or towards >>thinking per se, eventually, promoting a general atmosphere of tolerance for >>offenses like "thoughtcrimes". causing them to be unsympathetic to thinking? What in the devil are you trying to say? Maybe I'm one of those stupid citizen units. I just don't get it - I'd like to, but I don't. How about rephrasing your comments so that us average citizen units can understand your wisdom. >> >>And of course anyone who is free to think about anything & everything (who >>could therefore potentially think about what everybody else has forgotten) >>will seem dangerous to those who wish to appear to be in total, beneficent >>control. If there is logic to the wind-up, it escapes me. It seems to me that the appearance of being in total control (dictatorship) is the last thing any politician in this country would want to be seen (seen being the operative word) as attempting. Is this message spoofed from that juno kid? Regards, Chuck Thompson

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Child Porn as Thoughtcrime
by tcmay＠got.net 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Q: Is a drawing of a child engaging in a sexual act an illegal item? Q: Is an image of Raquel Welch morphed to make her look like a 15-year-old illegal? Q: Is writing a story about a child having sex illegal? Q: Is a collage of images of little girls (or boys, one presumes) in swimsuits, with apparent salacious intent, illegal? Q: Is accessing a Web site having nude or sexually-related images of children who are of legal sexual age in the site's country--but not in the accessor's country--illegal? Q: Is it legal to have photographs of one's own children in a nude state? (E.g., playing in a backyard pool, at the beach, etc.) Does it become illegal to let others see these photographs? How about putting them on a Web site? Q: Is a crime committed if a teenaged girls takes a photograph of _herself_ and shows it to others? To adults? Or if she writes a salacious story about herself or her friends? Or if she just invents it all? Whom is exploiting whom? Which acts are crimes? I submit that the various child porn laws we have in the United States are about the clearest examples of "thoughtcrime" one can find, where the _thought_ is what is being criminalized. First, a caveat, which ought to be clear, but which is necessary to state anyway (never know what search engines will find my words and take them out of context). I have no unusual interest in little children. Surely some teen girls can be sexually attractive, even if technically underage. Nothing surprising in this, surely? But, no, I am not an advocate of "child porn," merely wondering about the many constitutional and moral issues involved in the panoply of laws and precedents involved. Anyway, we have on this list various comments about "child porn" and why it should be illegal: -- consumption of child porn "creates a market" -- it harms the children -- it's disgusting -- etc. Clearly the first argument applies to many other things. Why not outlaw pro-drug speech? Pro-drug speech "creates a market" for an illegal product. Shut down "High Times," seize copies of books by Aldous Huxley and William Burroughs, ban mocking comments about the War on Some Drugs. The second argument, that children are actually harmed, is vitiated by the fact that much so-called child porn comes from countries where the actors are of legal age. How can a 14-year-old Thai girl be "harmed" when what she is being paid to do is perfectly legal in Thailand? (It's parallel to the situation with, say, Arab countries. Porn videos in Saudi Arabia are of course illegal, with roughly the status of child porn videos in the U.S. (maybe worse, as I'm sure the punishment could be death). Are the American and European actresses in such videos being harmed?) And the case of morphings, drawings, stories, etc., clearly involve no actual children, so the argument that children are harmed is empty. (Catherine MacKinnon and Andrea Dworkin, amongst others, have argued that "women as a class" are injured by pornography. I won't get into the issues of this here. Suffice it to say that if speech or nonviolent acts begin to be suppressed on the basis of "class action" cases, we're in a heap of trouble.) As to me argument that the images, stories, etc., are disgusting, amoral, inappropriate, etc., well, perhaps. But what is the legal and constitutional basis for restricting such things? Many opinions and actions are vile and disgusting, but are not illegal. Under what interpretation of the Constitution is the creation of a drawing depicting, say, a 7-year-old girl having sex with someone or something a criminal act? The obscenity laws? (And as to the obscenity laws, which part of "Congress shall make no law" did the readers of the First Amendment miss? I realize this is a longstanding topic of discussion, with various famous cases (Miller, Hustler, etc.), but it remains a mystery to me.) My point is this: For anyone who claims that "thoughtcrime" is something the Evil Empire specialized in, i.e., totalitarian communist regimes, look to the enforcement of laws about what can be viewed or accessed from the United States. Thougtcrime. --Tim May -- [This Bible excerpt awaiting review under the U.S. Communications Decency Act of 1996] And then Lot said, "I have some mighty fine young virgin daughters. Why don't you boys just come on in and fuck them right here in my house - I'll just watch!"....Later, up in the mountains, the younger daughter said: "Dad's getting old. I say we should fuck him before he's too old to fuck." So the two daughters got him drunk and screwed him all that night. Sure enough, Dad got them pregnant, and had an incestuous bastard son....Onan really hated the idea of doing his brother's wife and getting her pregnant while his brother got all the credit, so he pulled out before he came....Remember, it's not a good idea to have sex with your sister, your brother, your parents, your pet dog, or the farm animals, unless of course God tells you to. [excerpts from the Old Testament, Modern Vernacular Translation, TCM, 1996]

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ALERT: Call the Commerce committee! The White House is fighting us! (9/10/96)
by Voters Telecommunications Watch 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

======================================================================== SENATE COMMERCE COMMITTEE VOTE TOMORROW IN QUESTION WHITE HOUSE STALLING; THE NET CAN SAVE THE VOTE OFFICES ARE RECEIVING 'LOTS OF CALLS' MAKE A CALL TO THE COMMERCE COMMITTEE September 11, 1996 Please widely redistribute this document with this banner intact until September 30, 1996 ________________________________________________________________________ CONTENTS The Latest News What You Can Do Now Background / What To Expect This Week Description of S.1726, Pro-CODE Bill Chronology of Pro-Crypto Legislation For More Information / Supporting Organizations ________________________________________________________________________ THE LATEST NEWS Sometimes things work out better than imagined. This was the feeling tonight as I waded through my email from people all over the country that called the commerce committee. This was the feeling as I heard from visitors to one Senator's office who, while waiting for a few minutes in the lobby, listened to the receptionist take two quick calls from netizens calling about the bill. Receptionist, cutting the caller off: "S.1726? Yes, I'll pass that along to the Senator, thanks. We've been getting a lot of calls." Another netizen emailed us saying that he also called his Representative. It turns out this Rep. has some friends who have co-sponsored HR 3011, the House version of Pro-CODE. The calls and elevated publicity from this phone campaign have convinced him to consider co-sponsoring HR 3011. This is great, but our success has mobilized the anti-crypto forces into action as well. The Clinton Administration, who has long opposed the right of citizens to use non-Clipper encryption, has begun working behind the scenes to make sure that the vote on Pro-CODE (S.1726) never happens. To have the Senate Commerce committee go on record that encryption exports should be loosened, against the will of the Administration, would be an embarrassment to the White House. They have begun pushing hard to pressure Democratic Commerce Committee members to put the brakes on the bill, and do everything they can to prevent the vote this Thursday. To see the business community, the industry, and the public line up the Administration would be extremely hard to take and still seem credible. It's crucial that we continue to make noise and ring those phones. By pulling enough favors with members of the Senate Commerce Committee, it's possible that the White House could prevent this vote from happening. WE MUST NOT LET THAT HAPPEN. Appropriately forward this to everyone you know until the expiration listed above. Go to work, bug your neighbor in the cubicle or office next to you. Have they called yet? Bug them until they do. Call the rest of the members you haven't gotten around to yet. And don't forget to sign the petition at http://www.crypto.com/petition/ ! [Rest of alert is the same from last time] ________________________________________________________________________ WHAT YOU CAN DO NOW It's crucial that you call the Commerce committee members below and urge them to pass S.1726 out of committee without amendments. (This is also known as a "clean" bill.) Any opportunity for amendments (even if they are good) opens us up to the possibility of hostile amendments that could restrict the use of encryption even further than today's abysmal state. It could even prohibit the use of encryption without Clipper Chip-like key 'escrow' technology, which includes built-in surveillance and monitoring functionality. 1. Call/Fax the members of the Senate Commerce committee and urge them to pass S.1726 out of committee "cleanly". Do not use email, as it is not likely to be looked at in time to make a difference for the markup on September 12th. Use the sample communique and directory listing below to make it a simple TWO MINUTE task. 2. Sign the petition to support strong encryption at http://www.crypto.com/petition/ ! Join other cyber-heroes as Phil Zimmermann, Matt Blaze, Bruce Schneier, Vince Cate, Phil Karn, and others who have also signed. 3. Between now and Wed. September 12, it is crucial that you call all these members of Congress. P ST Name and Address Phone Fax = == ======================== ============== ============== D SC Hollings, Ernest F. 1-202-224-6121 1-202-224-4293 D MA Kerry, John F. 1-202-224-2742 1-202-224-8525 D HI Inouye, Daniel K. 1-202-224-3934 1-202-224-6747 D KY Ford, Wendell H. 1-202-224-4343 1-202-224-0046 D WV Rockefeller, John D. 1-202-224-6472 1-202-224-7665 D LA Breaux, John B. 1-202-224-4623 1-202-228-2577 D NV Bryan, Richard H. 1-202-224-6244 1-202-224-1867 D ND Dorgan, Byron L. 1-202-224-2551 1-202-224-1193 D NE Exon, J. J. 1-202-224-4224 1-202-224-5213 D OR Wyden, Ron* 1-202-224-5244 1-202-228-2717 R SD Pressler, Larry* 1-202-224-5842 1-202-224-1259 R MT Burns, Conrad R.(*sponsor) 1-202-224-2644 1-202-224-8594 R AK Stevens, Ted 1-202-224-3004 1-202-224-2354 R AZ McCain, John 1-202-224-2235 1-202-228-2862 R WA Gorton, Slade 1-202-224-3441 1-202-224-9393 R MS Lott, Trent* 1-202-224-6253 1-202-224-2262 R TX Hutchison, Kay Bailey 1-202-224-5922 1-202-224-0776 R ME Snowe, Olympia 1-202-224-5344 1-202-224-1946 R MO Ashcroft, John* 1-202-224-6154 1-202-228-0998 R TN Frist, Bill 1-202-224-3344 1-202-228-1264 R MI Abraham, Spencer 1-202-224-4822 1-202-224-8834 * supporter or cosponsor. The bill also enjoys broad bi-partisan support from members not on the committee including Senators Leahy (D-VT) and Murray (D-WA). 4. Here is a sample conversation: SAMPLE PHONE CALL You:<ring ring> Sen:Hello, Senator Mojo's office! You: SAY I'm calling to urge the Senator to pass S.1726, the THIS-> Burns/Leahy/Pressler bill, S.1726 when the committee votes on it on Thursday. It's critical to the future of privacy, security, and electronic commerce on the internet. Sen:Ok, thanks!<click> IF THEY SAY "The Senator has concerns about the bill", please answer, "Please try to work these issues out as it moves to the Senate floor, but passage out of committee will send an important signal to the Administration." 5. To help us measure the effectiveness of the campaign, WE NEED TO HEAR FROM YOU. Please tell us who you called, and how they sounded. We'll be passing this information to folks in D.C. who can help apply pressure where needed. $ Mail vtw(a)vtw.org Subject: I called so-and-so Hey, I called Sen. Mojo. He sounded iffy, call in the reinforcements. ^D 6. Forward this to your friends and colleagues in appropriate forums until the date of expiration at the top. Forward a copy of this to your Internet Service Provider as well, and ask them to put the following text in their message of the day (motd), or on their WWW page: ALERT ALERT ALERT ALERT ALERT ALERT ALERT ALERT ALERT ALERT ALERT The U.S. Senate will be voting on a proposal to encourage better security on the Internet on Thu Sep. 12th. Your help is needed to call Congress. See http://www.crypto.com/ for more details. ALERT ALERT ALERT ALERT ALERT ALERT ALERT ALERT ALERT ALERT ALERT ________________________________________________________________________ BACKGROUND / WHAT TO EXPECT THIS WEEK For the past 3 years, Cyber-Rights Activists, citizens, and industry leaders have been working hard to reform US encryption policy. Support has been building behind several legislative proposals this year because they send a clear signal to the Administration about the need for security and privacy in the Information Age. The digital revolution is currently being held hostage by the White House's Cold War restrictions on privacy-enhancing encryption technology. Now, with Congress less than a month away from adjournment, everyone who supports encryption and privacy is working to see this bill leave committee in order to send a clear message to the White House that they are on the wrong side of the encryption issue. Although this bill may not become law this year, its passage out of committee will be a landmark event that will clearly tell the White House that the Congress, the public, and the computer industry care about security and privacy, and need strong, reliable encryption technology in order to make the Internet a viable platform for commerce, education, and democracy. Success for our side is not certain, and the next week is not without risks. On September 12th, the Senate Commerce committee will hold a "markup", where the bill is examined, voted on, and if there are enough votes, passed out of committee. Two things could happen: -the committee could pass the bill as written, -the committee could pass the bill with amendments. Any amendments are not likely to be friendly, and in particular, quiet sources have told privacy activists that the Clinton Administration has been readying a legislative assault on your right to use encryption for several weeks now. A Clipper-like amendment could be attached to the bill if our side does not have enough votes to block all amendments. It is crucial that all netizens who consider privacy and security important take a moment to call members of the Commerce Committee right now and urge them to vote S.1726 out of committee without amendments. ________________________________________________________________________ DESCRIPTION OF S.1726, PRO-CODE BILL Privacy-enhancing encryption technology is currently under heavy restrictions kept in place by the White House. Encryption that is currently allowed to be exported is not sufficient to protect confidential information. This policy acquires an "Alice-in-Wonderland" quality when one realizes that strong encryption products are available abroad both for sale and for free download off the Internet. The Pro-CODE Act resolves to: 1. Allow for the *unrestricted* export of "mass-market" or "public-domain" encryption programs, including such products as Pretty Good Privacy and popular World Wide Web browsers. 2. Requires the Secretary of Commerce to allow the less restricted export of other encryption technologies if products of similar strength are generally available outside the United States, roughly up to DES strength. 3. Prohibits the federal government from imposing mandatory key-escrow encryption policies on the domestic market and limiting the authority of the Secretary of Commerce to set standards for encryption products. ________________________________________________________________________ CHRONOLOGY OF PRO-CRYPTO LEGISLATION 9/12/96 (scheduled) Senate Commerce committee will hold markup of S.1726 and hopefully pass it out of committee with no amendments. 7/25/96: Full Senate Commerce committee holds positive hearings on S.1726. FBI Director Louis Freeh testifies along with many cyber-luminaries. Hearings are cybercast Internet Cyber-Rights activists with HotWired and WWW.Crypto.Com. You can see the photos, read the testimony, and listen to the audio transcript at http://www.crypto.com/events/072596/ 6/26/96: Senate subcommittee holds positive hearings on S.1726. Hearings are cybercast Internet Cyber-Rights activists with HotWired and WWW.Crypto.Com. You can see the photos, read the testimony, and listen to the audio transcript at http://www.crypto.com/events/062696/ 5/2/96: Bi-partisan group of Senators introduce Pro-CODE Act, which would free public-domain encryption software (such as PGP) for export, free much commercial encryption for export, and reduce the government's ability to push Clipper proposals down the throats of an unwilling public. Original sponsors include: Senators Burns (R-MT), Dole (R-KS), Faircloth (R-NC), Leahy (D-VT), Murray (D-WA), Pressler (R-SD), and Wyden (D-OR). 3/5/96: Sen. Leahy (D-VT) and Rep. Goodlatte (R-VA) announce encryption bills (S.1587/H.R.3011) that significantly relax export restrictions on products with encryption functionality in them, as well as free public domain software such as PGP (Pretty Good Privacy). ________________________________________________________________________ FOR MORE INFORMATION / SUPPORTING ORGANIZATIONS There are many excellent resources online to get up to speed on crypto including the following WWW sites: http://www.crypto.com http://www.privacy.org http://www.eff.org http://www.cdt.org http://www.epic.org http://www.vtw.org Please visit them often. The following organizations have signed onto this alert: Center for Democracy and Technology Electronic Frontier Foundation Electronic Privacy Information Center Voters Telecommunications Watch ________________________________________________________________________ End alert ========================================================================

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(no subject)
by Skonk 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

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Re: Movies
by Adamsc＠io-online.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

On Tue, 10 Sep 1996 13:35:52 +0200 (METDST), Asgaard wrote: >> is viewed as being essentially Mexican. (Some great humor, too. And a good >> murder mystery. And a love story. Conspiracy, humor, murder, love...all the >> ingredients of a great story. All three major American races collide, and > >I think the love ingredients, all too common in movies without adding >anything to the real story, are a pain in the behind. I usually channel- >surf during the coitus scene (one in every movie for the last year). "We've just barely managed to escape the transdimensional alien demon spawn. We're bruised and exhausted. Let's make love in this ditch and hope the alien's Nazi henchmen don't find us!" And people say Hollywood retains even a touch of reality. . . # Chris Adams <adamsc(a)io-online.com> | http://www.io-online.com/adamsc/adamsc.htp # cadams(a)acucobol.com | V.M. (619)515-4894 "I have never been able to figure out why anyone would want to play games on a computer in any case when the whole system is a game. Word processing, spreadsheets, telecoms -- it's all a game. And they pay you to play it." -- Duncan Frissell

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Re: Child Porn as Thoughtcrime
by tcmay＠got.net 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Declan answers in the affirmative that, yes, nearly all of the examples I cited are indeed crimes. As I well knew, which is why I presented them. (The Jock Sturges case was in SF, the "little girls in leotards" case was only a few years ago, etc.) My point really was not to ask if the examples are illegal but to point out the "thoughtcrime" nature of making it a felony to draw pictures of naked children, when clearly no actual child was ever involved, when no actual person could have been the victim of an actual crime. --Tim May We got computers, we're tapping phone lines, I know that that ain't allowed. ---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:---- Timothy C. May | Crypto Anarchy: encryption, digital money, tcmay(a)got.net 408-728-0152 | anonymous networks, digital pseudonyms, zero W.A.S.T.E.: Corralitos, CA | knowledge, reputations, information markets, Higher Power: 2^1,257,787-1 | black markets, collapse of governments. "National borders aren't even speed bumps on the information superhighway."

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FW: Child Porn as Thoughtcrime
by blanc 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

From: Blanc, responding to herself (a la Detweiler - NOT) >Many people seek after sympathy towards their feelings (present and/or future >pain) more than to be respected for the ability to think. I imagine this >develops into a reduced sympathy towards certain kinds of thought or towards >thinking per se, eventually, promoting a general atmosphere of tolerance for >offenses like "thoughtcrimes". ................................................................ This statement is entirely wrong and totally false. What I really meant to say, rather than "tolerance for offenses like...", was that there is created an atmosphere which is tolerant towards classifying certain kinds of thinking as "thought crimes". And once it is allowed that some types of thoughts, or some types of thinking, are classifiable as criminally offensive, I expect most anyone on this list can extrapolate the consequences of such a development upon the collective conscience. .. Blanc

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Re: Crypto Anachy MUD
by jim bell 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

At 12:01 AM 9/10/96 -0700, Timothy C. May wrote: >At 5:10 AM 9/10/96, Jon Leonard wrote: >>Duncan Frissell wrote: >>> Did anyone make the point (I gave up on the thread) that we already have a >>> great Crypto Anarchy MUD with lots of the coding already done. We call it >>> the Internet. Digital cash, strong crypto, remailers, everything. >> >>Tim May expressed doubt that it was worth the effort: Not much easier >>than the real thing, and not as good. That's the closest to your point, >>I think. >.... >>Finally, a MUD has the potential to spread crypto-anarchic ideas to people >>who would not otherwise have considered them. >> >>It may be that I'm wasting my time, but I could come up with some useful >>new crypto protocol too. > >Don't tar me with the "Tim said it was a waste of time" label. Rather, I >said I thought it would be pretty tough to get a reasonable ontology, one >with rich enough behaviors and reasonable incentives and disincentives. >Simulations are an art...they were useful in nuclear war planning, where >the degrees of freedom were constrained, and so on. Jon Leonard made it clear to me that he was planning a human-assisted game/MUD, rather than a computer simulation. His explanation is that it is difficult to implement an unbiased simulation, because it is difficult to "simulate" a human. But putting people controlling characters into the equation restores the "human element" which arguably will make the results more realistic. Makes sense to me. The one item I suggested was that instead of people controlling individual characters in this MUD, they control a "weighted character" whose weight depends on the number of people of that type in the society. After all, in the path towards a crypto anarchy-type situation, people will naturally have to migrade away from government-oriented solutions, and towards other jobs. Some will be killed, some will retire, some will switch jobs, etc. Turning such a group into a weighted character would allow their number to reflect societal changes a more quantitatively than individual characters. Jim Bell jimbell(a)pacifier.com

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Re: Conjuring up the latest utopia for a minoritarian sect of illuminati
by tcmay＠got.net 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

At 1:46 AM 9/11/96, Dr.Dimitri Vulis KOTM wrote: >tcmay(a)got.net (Timothy C. May) writes: >> I didn't call for your "expulsion." No one has been expelled in four years >> of the list's existence. > >However Tim has been complaining about my postings to various people I know >and respect. (I stopped respecting Tim years ago.) And who might these people be? I suggest you name them, as I have not even mentioned your name to anyone. You don't rate a complaint from me. --TCM We got computers, we're tapping phone lines, I know that that ain't allowed. ---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:---- Timothy C. May | Crypto Anarchy: encryption, digital money, tcmay(a)got.net 408-728-0152 | anonymous networks, digital pseudonyms, zero W.A.S.T.E.: Corralitos, CA | knowledge, reputations, information markets, Higher Power: 2^1,257,787-1 | black markets, collapse of governments. "National borders aren't even speed bumps on the information superhighway."

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(Fnord) Edupage, 10 September 1996
by Deranged Mutant 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Chances are this already made it to the list... ------- Forwarded Message Follows ------- ************************************************************ Edupage, 10 September 1996. Edupage, a summary of news about information technology, is provided three times a week as a service by Educom, a Washington, D.C.-based consortium of leading colleges and universities seeking to transform education through the use of information technology. ************************************************************ TOP STORIES Wired World Will "Diminish National Sovereignty" [..] WIRED WORLD WILL "DIMINISH NATIONAL SOVEREIGNTY" A leading Clinton Administration official on information security and cryptography matters says that traditional notions of sovereignty, national security and warfare will be undermined by the year 2020, when the whole world is "wired" and e-cash is the norm. The result will be less powerful governments in relation to criminal organizations such as the Mafia and international drug cartels, says Michael Nelson, who adds that organized crime members are already some of the most sophisticated users of computer systems and strong encryption technology. In addition, computer crackers will pose a more significant threat. In response, Nelson advocates resolving the issue of whether unauthorized access of a computer is an "act of trespass" or an "act of war," and prosecuting the intrusions accordingly. (BNA Daily Report for Executives 6 Sep 96 A14) [..]

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