Posted on 09/30/2002 1:16:31 PM PDT by 11th Earl of Mar
Edited on 04/29/2004 2:01:19 AM PDT by Jim Robinson. [history]
ANNAPOLIS JUNCTION, Maryland (AP) -- A lieutenant colonel at the Army War College pleaded guilty Monday to killing his wife, saying he beat and strangled her as they fought about his use of the Internet to find pornography.
Lt. Col. David Bartlett Jr., 46, reached a plea deal with prosecutors in the slaying of his 39-year-old wife, Suzanne.
(Excerpt) Read more at cnn.com ...
My sister is in the process of divorcing her husband who is a big porno fan. All of the grossest stuff you can find on the internet. It's affected her life, and that's affected my life. So you could say that my life has been harmed by pornography. Or not.
The concept isn't particularly difficult for Christians to apprehend since all of the baptized are part of the Body of Christ.
I also have a childhood friend who, unfortunately, spends a lot of his free time going to strip clubs and viewing porn. Like you, he doesn't see any problem with it. He's in his late thirties and still single. His criteria for a wife seems to have come from his viewing habits. It's doubtful that either he or his older sister will ever provide their parents with grandchildren. That saddens me. So pornography has certainly harmed his life and his parents' lives and, since he is my childhood friend, it has affected my life as well.
It's affected her life, and that's affected my life. So you could say that my life has been harmed by pornography. Or not.
It's not my concern. You could say it harmed you (whatever I think is irrelevant). If you think you've been harmed by another that person's act of viewing pornography take the person to court and do your best to prove before an impartial jury that you've been harmed.
That said, this forum is used by some people that want the power to initiate force, fraud and coercion against people (be the "higher authority") or seek to enlist government agents ("higher authority") to initiate force, fraud and threat of force against people on their behalf.
Pray for GW and the Elections
Please demonstrate to me that there is no causal relationship between pornography and violence. The question is, how much evidence of violence correlated with pornography do you need before you will admit a causal relationship? That's why I asked above what would constitute evidence of a causal relationship between pornography and violence.
I've described above my own firsthand experience with the harmful effects of pornography. From what I have personally observed, there is a very high correlation between pornography and loserdom. Does pornography cause loserdom or are losers attracted to pornography? From my own experience I have to conclude that it can be either or both.
You forgot to mention another equally valid scientific fact: A gun in the home is 43 times more likely to kill a family member than an intruder.
No representative of the state has any possible vested interest in marriage, unless you live in a jurisdiciton where jus primae noctis is the law of the land.
It should be a simple enough thing to create a controlled experiment. In one room, we have the subject, attached to various and sundry medical monitoring devices. In another, we have someone randomly watching either pornography or pictures of dogs playing poker. After a statistically significant number of runs, the medical monitoring ought to detect any harm done to one person by another person's viewing of pornography (or, for that matter, by another person's viewing of dogs playing poker).
Non sequitur. He evidently isn't troubled by the fact that he's still single, so there's no harm there. His parents have no claim of right on his life, so there's no harm there either.
Would that not be asking to prove a negative?
No, I mean that the vast majority of people who view porn don't kill people. Therefore porn does not cause people to kill anyone.
1. I have no idea what "if pornography is neutral" even means.
2. No, it is not good to show pornography to children. Why would it be?
No, pornography did not harm his life. He used pornography to harm his life. The distinction is important, since it reflects the main distinction between a man and an amoeba, which is the presence of volition.
FWIW, I am a Christian and do not beleive there is any non-harmful or good use of pornography at all, whether for a married or a single person. It has no redeeming value, ever.
But pornography is a tool used by human wills, and it is to the wills that harm or good must be tallied in a Christian universe.
And, unfortunately, taking the bad stuff away from him won't fix his "heart problem", either.
That being said, I see no reason to think viewing porn is any more or less damaging than watching gorey or violent action movies. I do think women are tremendously offended by porn, and not violent movies, only because they seem to have an innate contempt for anything they perceive as competition.
I think that's what happened in the topic story. I venture to say the wife, offended by the husband's consumption of porn, capitalized on his shame and embarrassment at being caught to inflict as much emotional injury as she could accomplish over several days. I think his choice of a computer cord, and an obvious phalic symbol as murder weapons say much about how he was being taunted when he snapped. (Note the crime is being treated as second degree murder...not premeditated.)
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