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Predators & Pornography. A disturbing link.
NRO ^ | May 19, 2005, 8:15 a.m. | By Penny Nance

Posted on 05/19/2005 11:05:47 AM PDT by .cnI redruM

On February 2, 2003, when seven-year-old Danielle van Dam disappeared from her family home in the middle of the night, every mother’s nightmare was played out on national television for almost a month while authorities searched for the girl. When Danielle’s body was found at the end of that month, the police and prosecutors discovered a frightening story about a neighbor of Danielle’s who had computer files filled with child pornography and even a sickening cartoon video of the rape of a young girl.

According to a report by Robert Peters, president of Morality in Media, on the link between pornography and violent sex crimes, the prosecutor in the Danielle van Dam case said “The video represented [the defendant’s] sexual fantasies and inspired the abduction, rape, and murder of Danielle.” According to Raymond Pierce, a retired NYPD detective who worked on the sex-crimes squad for many years and is now a criminal-profiling consultant, about 80 percent of rapists and serial killers are heavy pornography users. I was a victim of an attempted rape by a disturbed man who turned out to be involved in pornography.

May is Victims of Pornography Month. Today Senator Sam Brownback (R., Kan.), Rep. Katherine Harris (R., Fla.), Rep. Joe Pitts (R., Pa.), and leaders from the values community will participate in a summit to explore the troubling connection between pornography and violence against women and children.

Florida attorney general Charlie Crist advises parents that “we must never lose sight of the fact that sexual predators make the online world a dangerous place for innocent children. Parents must be ever-vigilant to make sure their children are not exposed to images and messages that would have been unthinkable just a generation ago.” Crist warns that we cannot allow the Internet to be a “pipeline for pornography aimed at children.” But while parents can use available means to protect their children when they are in their own homes, there is a cultural climate surrounding our children that threatens them the way Danielle van Dam was threatened. Because of the availability of pornography online, there is no way of knowing what lurks in the hearts of our neighborhoods.

More needs to be done to evaluate the connection between violent predatory behavior and pornography, and to crack down on these violent predators. Police and law-enforcement officers across the country report brutal instances in which those addicted to pornography utilized its sadistic images on their female and child victims.

Just this past February, the New York Times reported a story about a teenage babysitter who had raped three young children he was watching in their homes. According to the Times, his pattern was to watch pornographic videos with the oldest of the children, a 12-year-old boy, and intimidate them all by torturing them with a knife and threats to their family members. Perhaps one of the most notorious serial killers, Ted Bundy, participated in an interview with Dr. James Dobson shortly before he was executed. In the interview, Bundy explained, “I’ve lived in prison for a long time now. And I’ve met a lot of men who were motivated to commit violence like me. And without exception, every one of them was deeply involved in pornography — without exception, without exception — deeply influenced and consumed by an addiction to pornography.”

Since 1956, the Supreme Court has made clear that the First Amendment does not protect obscene materials. If we know from the perpetrators themselves how obscenity contributes to violence against women and children, what can we do?

We need to fund more studies of the addiction to pornography and its effects on violent behavior. Parents can install filters on any computer used by children and keep the family computer in a central location, not in a child's bedroom or someplace where parents might not regularly see it. We need to demand tougher law enforcement on the state and federal level. The Bush administration is stepping up federal enforcement of obscenity laws. This is a good first step. Contact the U.S. attorney for your district and ask what they are doing to enforce the laws. We need tougher state penalties against both possession and distribution of child porn and passing any kind of pornographic material to kids. Experts indicate that pornography is often used by pedophiles to break down the resistance of child victims. Parents should check out their state’s penalties for child rape and make sure offenders are going to jail and staying there for these offenses. Florida, for example, just passed a tough new law after the tragedy involving Jessica Lunsford, whose killer was a recently released violent offender. We should pass legislation to address the threat to children on the Internet. This includes chat sites, websites, spam, and peer-to-peer networks. Peer-to-Peer networks are of particular concern because they are widely visited by kids and offer porn for free without any age verification.

As Rep. Katherine Harris has pointed out, "Pornography displays human beings as objects, obliterating the wall between an individual's sick fantasies and the compulsion to act upon them. Often, the monsters who hurt women and children start with this malignant desensitizer." We need to all work together to find better ways to protect women and children against this violence.


TOPICS: Crime/Corruption; Culture/Society; Front Page News; Philosophy
KEYWORDS: amencorner; artorsmut; daniellevandam; mim; needlebutts; porn; violence
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To: frogjerk

Actually, that is no longer true.
Porn stars are now on the NYT bestseller list.
They have their own entertainment businesses.
If it were socially unacceptable, they wouldn't dare use their real names.
Hell, one even ran for Governor of California.


441 posted on 05/19/2005 4:39:56 PM PDT by mabelkitty
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To: XR7
Yawn. You need to change your online name from stuck_in_new_orleans to head_stuck_in_the_sand.

yawn. You need a better comeback

442 posted on 05/19/2005 4:41:39 PM PDT by stuck_in_new_orleans
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To: cyborg

I am also mystified by why men don't seem to mind at ALL that the breast they are oogling are "fake." Even my French husband says, "zat look good to me" when seeing like Pam Anderson on TV or something. I swear I have never met a man who is repulsed by this, and I agree with you, I don't get it, they are fake!!!! LOL


443 posted on 05/19/2005 4:47:05 PM PDT by ExPatInFrance (Terri's Starfish- 1 Mrs. Ora Mae Magouirk, 2 Clara Martinez)
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To: ExPatInFrance

Another thing that bothers me with this porn thing is that it's all fake and a fantasy. Women's breasts will never look like that in real life. What about after a few babies? What then? I don't wanna know what mine will look like in a few years *LOL*


444 posted on 05/19/2005 4:49:25 PM PDT by cyborg (Serving fresh, hot Anti-opus since 18 April 2005)
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To: Melas

Again, Alcohol is not immoral by it nature, pornography is. Alcohol can be drunk in moderation, can the same be said of pornography?


445 posted on 05/19/2005 4:49:54 PM PDT by frogjerk
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To: Melas
Whaaaat ever *LOL*
Could be that you are just looking at the young ones and when you get older the fake boobs and the real boobs all droop a bit. Which is exactly the moment the supporting lingerie can spice things back ^
446 posted on 05/19/2005 4:51:29 PM PDT by ExPatInFrance (Terri's Starfish- 1 Mrs. Ora Mae Magouirk, 2 Clara Martinez)
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To: cyborg

Actually having babies makes them BIGGER, which the guys like. Don't worry about it. In a good loving relationship if you both can stay on < side of obease, when you are older it won't matter that you don't look the same as you did 30 years ago. Just remember HE doesn't look the same either. Just get him a viagra now and then for the hell of it, just to spice it up once in a while, and beleive me you are going to look like a sex kitten to him, Major *LOL*


447 posted on 05/19/2005 4:58:08 PM PDT by ExPatInFrance (Terri's Starfish- 1 Mrs. Ora Mae Magouirk, 2 Clara Martinez)
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To: Dead Corpse
I like porn.

Gee, there's a surprise.

If you'd like to educate yourself instead of embarrass yourself you might peruse the Meese report on this subject. It's only been out there for about 20 years.

448 posted on 05/19/2005 4:58:25 PM PDT by hinckley buzzard
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To: frogjerk

Absolutely. I've looked at pornography with any interest less than a dozen times in the last 15 years. How much more moderation can there be than that?


449 posted on 05/19/2005 4:59:35 PM PDT by Melas
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To: frogjerk

You wrote: Again, Alcohol is not immoral by it nature, pornography is. Alcohol can be drunk in moderation, can the same be said of pornography?

My Reply: Porn in moderation? Hmmmmm well waht about reading a Penthouse or a Playboy, kind of soft porn, wouldn't that be porn in moderation?


450 posted on 05/19/2005 4:59:50 PM PDT by ExPatInFrance (Terri's Starfish- 1 Mrs. Ora Mae Magouirk, 2 Clara Martinez)
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To: ExPatInFrance

Yeah but what about the stretchmarks? I worked in a shopping mall for years before excaping that hell. It was a real lesson in social psychology. I'd see a lot of men walking with their wives who are either pregnany or just had a baby, and they're LOOKING at other women.


451 posted on 05/19/2005 5:00:10 PM PDT by cyborg (Serving fresh, hot Anti-opus since 18 April 2005)
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To: cyborg

Ah, but that's the real rub, some women really do look like that. Strip clubs are filled with women who really do look like that.


452 posted on 05/19/2005 5:00:31 PM PDT by Melas
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To: hinckley buzzard

Oh come one, even most honest anti-porn crudsaders admit that the Meese Piece was pure propaganda. It was very much driven by the then emerging Jerry Falwel and the Moral Majority, and very little real research.


453 posted on 05/19/2005 5:02:54 PM PDT by Melas
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To: Melas

After ten years, what do they look like? They're not going to look like that forever. Men who like that sort of thing don't realize that. They try to say it's fantasy and other rationalizations but it's all BS.


454 posted on 05/19/2005 5:02:56 PM PDT by cyborg (Serving fresh, hot Anti-opus since 18 April 2005)
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To: cyborg

Oh without a doubt. 30 is over the hill for a stripper. A regular grandma.


455 posted on 05/19/2005 5:04:23 PM PDT by Melas
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To: cyborg

My husband always looks at pretty girls. It has never bothered me. Even I look at them, I admire beauty. What he has not done is look at them, well in a "lusting" kind of way. I nevr had stretch marks so I am not able to comment on them.


456 posted on 05/19/2005 5:07:03 PM PDT by ExPatInFrance (Terri's Starfish- 1 Mrs. Ora Mae Magouirk, 2 Clara Martinez)
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To: XR7

XR7 wrote:

"Are you are using a straw-man argument because you don't want to face the demon inside?
When a grown man's wife is longing for intimacy but he can't get it up for anyone but his five-fingered-mary, he's a perv - admit it. And that's where addiction to porn takes you, ultimately"


And you know this how? Since you're so righteous, I can assume you have no experience with where addiction to porn leads.

If you've performed an exhaustive study entailing years of "hands on" experience, then perhaps I'd believe your words.


457 posted on 05/19/2005 5:07:08 PM PDT by Bird Jenkins
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To: Melas

I had a friend who did escorting. She's young and gorgeous. Most all of her clients are men who are married with children. Why is that? Why are a lot of these guys into strippers married with kids?


458 posted on 05/19/2005 5:07:50 PM PDT by cyborg (Serving fresh, hot Anti-opus since 18 April 2005)
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To: ExPatInFrance

Well...I do think when a man with his lady he should keep his eyes off other women (especially when she's pushing a baby carriage!).


459 posted on 05/19/2005 5:10:50 PM PDT by cyborg (Serving fresh, hot Anti-opus since 18 April 2005)
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To: cyborg

You wrote: After ten years, what do they look like? They're not going to look like that forever. Men who like that sort of thing don't realize that. They try to say it's fantasy and other rationalizations but it's all BS.

My Reply: I don't think men care about 10 years from now. They like what they like in the "present" time. Sex is a head (no pun intended) game it is NOT really that much about your body shape. I mean some of it is, as long as you are at least average pretty and body. Don't underestimate men's desire of fantasy!!!!!!!!! The key is to keep the fantasy alive in YOUR relationship, A little fantasy is a GOOD thing, beleive me along about year 7 & 8 ti will sound better and better tyo YOU, not jsut to him.

Men like fantasy, and I don't really think there is anything wrong with that.


460 posted on 05/19/2005 5:14:43 PM PDT by ExPatInFrance (Terri's Starfish- 1 Mrs. Ora Mae Magouirk, 2 Clara Martinez)
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