Replies

That's not a very good analogy. What you describe is prohibited by a deliberately broad reaching statue. But a more "generic" image of a presidential assassination would not be prohibited. Thus an image depicting the death of "President Jones" is legal. The difference, as noted in the case's synopsis, is proximate harm. Your billboard is viewed as a threat to the President, and thus is a proximate cause of harm. "President Jones", however, cannot be harmed as he does not exist. You can threaten him all day long. Similarly, real child porn harms a child in its production. Simulated child porn, on the other hand, harms no child. It may be true that a pedophile will use that virtual image in his crimes, but there is no evidence that the crime would have gone uncommitted had it not been for the existence of the image. There is no proximate harm in the case of virtual porn.

Banning virtual child porn based upon what a pedophile might do with it is like banning guns because of what a bank robber might do with a gun.

"That's not a very good analogy. What you describe is prohibited by a deliberately broad reaching statue. But a more "generic" image of a presidential assassination would not be prohibited. Thus an image depicting the death of "President Jones" is legal. The difference, as noted in the case's synopsis, is proximate harm. Your billboard is viewed as a threat to the President, and thus is a proximate cause of harm."

A careful reading of the USSC decision (that Timesink was kind enough to post for us) makes it clear that as long as the image is not "actual," ie. photographic, it is legal to publicly display it. The billboard image I hypothesized, while closely approximating a photographic image of the real President, would likewise not be an "actual" image. By the SC's own interpretation, the sponsor of this display could not be prosecuted for the crime of threatening the President. (As a sidebar, consider what happened to Craig Kilborne when he displayed on national TV an actual photographic image of Bush in the cross-hairs subtitled "Snipers Wanted" -- no action was taken against Kilborne.)

But since your objection has been framed in terms of individual likeness, ie. that the image in question must be "generic" to be legal for display, what would be the legal status of a virtual "generic" image of a black man being hanged by figures in white hoods? That image would not constitute a threat toward any "actual" black man, nor would its creation require an actual lynching. Therefore, it would not be subject to criminal prosecution, right? Can it be said that it would be any different from a "generic" image that depicted a similarly illegal act against a "virtual" child? Both of these images depict crimes and both of them are bound to offend a broad segment of society, but according to this SC ruling just handed down, aren't both of them legal to display, even if they are presented in an approving context?