People act in them, they get paid, they choose the part they play – they make their living by doing it.

And consumers will either choose to pay for it, or obtain it for free on the Internet via backdoor means.

I agree with the previous comments that not all pornography is exploitative, particularly professional/amateur “home-made” porn – these people are willing to be in the position that they are, pardon the pun but that’s the reality.

Yes, the sex industry has plenty of problems, but they’re not problems exclusive to the sex industry. Exploitation and dehumanisation happens everywhere. We need to work on eliminating exploitation as a whole – not singling out one industry as a scapegoat.

Same thing with this filter. This doesn’t actually do anything about child porn – which is inherently exploitative as there’s no consent anywhere and the kids can’t hardly understand what they’ve been sucked into. It’s reactive rather than proactive. You want to stop child porn? GO AFTER THE DAMN PRODUCERS. And then educate families, communities, schools, peers, EVERYONE about Internet safety, dealing with people, about respecting yourselves and knowing that you have the right to say “No”. A lot of issues come up due to people’s reluctance to talk about sexuality and all the mixed messages it brings. What happened to respecting your body and knowing that you have the power to decide what people do or don’t do to you? What happened to actually taking reports of abuse seriously, instead of going “oh well you asked for it”?

Freedom of speech is an open licence, indeed. When we don’t like it we can tune it out. And when it defames or abuses people we can charge them under the law.

I’m not about to defend everything on the internet, nobody is. Some of it is vile, some of it is dehumanising and debasing and illegal. But you know what, better it IS on the internet because it will be much easier to uncover pedophilia and other illegal activity while it is in the public domain and not underground. And if parents are worried their children are accessing material they shouldn’t then they should be parents and monitor internet use. This is not an excuse for bad parenting.

Is promoting dehumanisation and debasement the price we have to pay for freedom of speech? Yes. Simple as that. Because we CANNOT draw the line based on individual moral preference. State censorship is the most immoral thing imaginable.

As Helen Razor quoted: “I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it.” So love the feedback! Thanks heaps.

Is freedom of speech an open licence to promote dehumanisation and debasement? Do you really think that pornography plays no part in the abuse and damage done to the innocent?

It’s all fun and games till somebody loses an eye.