When did I become sbject to German or Dutch Law?

Whose law would you propose be adhered to? The Servers are all US based at the present time.The US doesn't own the Internet, true but a US Company owns SL. As long as it is hosted here, than US law should apply, ayt a minimum. LL can add whatever conditions it wishes via TOS and CC. As far as something being "Legal" but "Not right", Legal has to be the benchmark, in the absence of LL imposed restrictions. Just anything someone does in SL could be considered wrong by someone.

it's my opninion that all who think this kind of role-play and child abuse is normal have a sick mind. No matter wich part of the world they live in.

here's my take on this:

Its one thing to have two consenting adults engage in mutuallty agreeable acts, RL or imaginary.

Its another thing to have an adult and a child engage in any type of act of that nature...which is completely wrong.

I'm sure everyone agrees with that?

Now the attempt at making the grey area black:

SL gives us the means to use imagery to enact our thoughts. We can visually see what we could only imagine before.
It adds to the realism.

When an adult takes the shape of a child to perform sex acts, even though they are not really a child, they are still providing an outlet for their.....or their partners thoughts.

Perhaps they do it becasue they know its wrong and they get a sexual "rush" out if it. Or perhaps theydo it for some other reason.

But, It brings an "illegal" RL action into an "illegal" RL image, because it allows the person behind the computer to now SEE what is considered illegal without actually comiting any true crime.
This type of behaviour can easily steamroll into more and more imagery to satisfy the minds hunger...and could promote actual illegal actions down the road.


I hope that makes sense.

There's a big difference between a 25 year old dressed as a schoolgirl saying to her partner "spank me daddy" and what was clearly an under age avatar as depicted in the video clip.

Just because US law hasn't yet caught up with most of the rest of the world, and given that the US playerbase is an increasingly small fraction of the worldwide playerbase, it's only a matter of time before US "freedoms" get overruled by the laws of another country. Remember, before someone says it, that the First Amendment does not apply to a private company which is what SL is; you sign away whatever rights you think you have when you agree to play as per the ToS, and whatever amendments LL choose to make subsequently.

Broccoli

I thought the Advertising of Ageplay was banned, not the activity itself. Am I wrong?

Child porn is not illegal because seeing it is evil, but because actual children are being harmed to produce it. Ageplay doesn't bring any illegal RL action into a RL picture, it at most brings a legal thought into a virtual picture.



Doesn't matter. The line is when and where there are actual children involved. Not before that. Just like committing murder in a videogame is not prohibited just because terrorists, depressed kids or disgruntled employees might be encouraged to go on a shooting spree. The line between real life and fantasy is exactly there: where fantasy becomes real life. Thoughts are, and should be, free.

Change "child" to "adult" and "sex" to "rape" and please tell me why it's not allowed for two adults to do A but not B, when both are clearly illegal acts.

It doesn't matter if both consent, the fantasy is about one person assaulting another against their will. That's what is being indulged in and nurtured.

Rapeplay is a personal petpeeve for me, but it's certainly applicable for a whole lot of things the "moral majority" doesn't find acceptable. If you justify that A can not exist, then accept that anyone else will make the same arguement for B. It's not "yes this, but not that" on moral grounds.

If it's on legal grounds, then all arguements are off, because that's simply the law and everyone should live their life accordingly, vote for change, or move .

No there isn't. Whether or not ageplay should be legal cannot be defined by how successful an adult individual is in dressing up and looking like a minor. An 'under-age' avatar is not an under-age person. It is (or at least should be) an adult wearing a different kind of costume.

But WHOSE laws should be followed?UK? Germany? France? China?

Actually... if you check the history of the Internet.... Yes, we do.

You are saying that the moral difference between Child Pornography and homosexuality is subjective?


WTF???!!!!!

in some places in the world... yes. By some people's perspectives, both are against gods law, and both merit the death penalty.. and consent or age never enters into it.

Morailty... in and of itself.. IS SUBJECTIVE.

Good point Markubis ... but ...

whilst consenting adults are portraying their fantasy it is keeping possibly one RL paedophile indoors and away from a real victim.

SL has huge potential. It's an utter minefield but a lot of good could come out of it.

In portraying whatever fantasy an individual craves, legal or illegal in any country that plugs into the US legislated servers, there is a possible path for quiet self-satisfaction and therapy.

Yes, many won't respond to any attempt to curb their paedophiliac fetish but by just shutting doors in their faces will merely drive them onwards to another door .. or worse, out into the parks.

Whatever the individual views on these people are, one thing must be clear, they need help. Alienation will do utterly nothing to combat the number .. merely divert them somewhere else .. possibly with a worse outcome.

Within private areas, suitable posted, in mature rated sims, within SL, has got to be better for the community as a whole than driving them outdoors, burying our heads in the sand .. or coming out with the usual tyrades of 'string em up by the b***s'

SL is about community for many of us. Some of us think nothing more than our own personal Disneyland. Some of us build our personal skills within SL for the betterment of RL. Some of us could combat RL problems within the safe confines of a virtual world.

This is true. When my 22 yr old fiancee dresses up in a schoolgirl outfit in RL and we have "Teh Sexxing", does this automatically make her "a minor"?? I think not!!

Really, if this were the case, there's an aweful lot of wrinkled "teens" on the Net these days.

Nope sorry, you don't... nobody "owns" the internet, it just happened to start as a US military project. Big, big difference.

Broccoli

I would disagree there. An adult women dressing in a uniform is still an adult body, the child avs are made to look just like child bodies.

I personally found the video clip disturbing, really gives me the creeps that there are groups set up for paedophiles to act out their fantasies. I find it even harder so many people are defending the rights of paedophiles in SL to carry out this form of cyber sex and have clubs for the purpose.

LL has a right to make any rules it wishes, no matter what country they are in, as long as it doen't allow something illigal. Some sites you can't use bad language, others you can't have adult material, very little is banned in SL.

Do the Americans wish for all of Europe (the biggest majority) to be blocked from the grid just so they can excerise their freedom when it's over something like this? If LL were to not take action, that is what would happen.

Yes they do. But they haven't. They refuse to do anything to regulate behavior. You can't keep policing after the fact. Give us a comprehensive TOS, decide what laws are applicable and there won't be much to argue about.

And you, sir, are a blinkered fool. Using Iran as an example of a country with restrictive laws has nothing to do with the politics of the person who mentions it: "their laws" are simply their laws for the purpose of this discussion. Winter's idea that 20th century history is a good guide to the way Germany reacts today (which is my unpacking of your reference to Godwin, and her paraphrase of Pastor Niemoller) is interesting but does not line up well with the reality of the modern Germany.

In Europe, there is definitely a red-hot topic of what International law is and how it works. We are told persistently every time we set up a Windows PC that this contract for use shall be governed by the laws of Maryland: actually, no it won't. We have been shown several times now that UK citizens merely accused (not found guilty) of crimes by a US court will be arrested and extradited without any obligation to show genuine culpability - so the US has been very happy to impose it's laws outside it's own jurisdiction thus far, and then persistently refuses to bring it's own citizens up for trial in other countries. Why is this? If we cross that behaviour with the proven trail of fabrication by US law enforcement as shown in the Operation Ore situation, then it's quite clear that this exact issue, of the applicability of foreign laws - is thorny right now, and there's a risk SL is the place where it gets played out.

Weirdly, in the US, both murder and prostitution are illegal - yet in SL, these are pretty much the most prevalent hobby roleplays. It's very bizarre to find US citizens defending their rights to one kind of imaginary behaviour, while ignoring others.

What you say is true BUT it is no justification for draconic age verification methods. You don't believe that the person selling or passing around the kiddie porn was a a child do you???

Age verificatin will have little or no effect on stopping this criminal activity in SL.

Also note that the two persons who were unjustly banned from SL for engaging in roleplay were both well over the age of 18.

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... then you'll get people whining about their liberties being infringed by their behaviour being restricted.

With total freedom comes total responsibility. It's that not being understood that's caused this issue and the many that are to come.

Broccoli

Thinking back, it was kinda hazy, but you may be right.

But, "deciding which laws are applicable" has no force in law!

You can shout loudly that you want to be tried for sex under the laws of Austria or Japan (AoC: 14 & 13 - see http://www.avert.org/aofconsent.htm - not exactly banana republics, either of them), but a court in NYC or London will still throw you in jail, where you had better be damn careful who's around you 24/7 for that offence...

http://archives.cnn.com/2002/LAW/04/16/scotus.virtual.child.porn/

http://www.freedomforum.org/templates/document.asp?documentID=16075

http://www.freedomforum.org/templates/document.asp?documentID=16082



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Actually Winter touched on an interesting point: namely the fact that something may be legal in one country and illegal in another. Now in the days before 't3h int4rw3bz' that wasn't so much of a problem as countries were effectively hermetically sealed entities. With the arrival of the internet the previous old paradigm has been rendered irrelevant much in the same way that globalisation has allowed multi-national corporations to run rings around nation states.

At the moment the internet (and SL) is in the 'lawless wild-west' phase as no-one can either agree upon legally binding laws for the internet or even enforce them. This leads to hotch-potch attempts like the German sting, Operation Ore in the UK and various other trawls for internet fraud and such like. Many of these attempts, however worthy, are limited by the existing legal frameworks in place today on our planet. The arrival of the internet is forcing a major re-think on how laws are enacted and enforced in this new global environment.

Clearly there is a need for world-wide harmonisation of laws (shades of EU-style harmonisation?). Something that will no doubt be met with howls of protest by all sorts of interest groups who feel their 'rights' are being infringed upon. However the net effect could well result in de facto liberalisation of laws in countries / regions where there are currently repressive and/or persecutory laws. As such it would be an experiment I would welcome as I see myself primarily as a citizen of this planet rather then of any particular nation. I believe that we are seeing the beginning of the end of nation-states as separate entities. It has often been said that the internet will be as revolutionary as the printing press was in its' time and the types of issues that were are touching upon here are part and parcel of that process of change.

Here's to the future! Don't be afraid of it, seize it gladly and play your part to shape it.

It seems to me what they were banned "for" is, doing it in front of a journalist. As has been said already, we don't know yet whether they were in cahoots with said journalist, or not. Besides which banning doesn't require the demonstration of "justice": it's the Lindens bat and ball. They want to take it away, that's up to them.

You are entirely right that the outcome of this will have very little to do with the situation that brought it about - age verification doesn't stop people playing as brats. That doesn't matter, and there are many many precedents to show that society isn't interested in actually stopping real child sexual abuse. Someone here has already talked about "real paedophiles going out into parks" because he shares the common, classic misundertanding of the lonely guy in a long raincoat, as the highest risk for child abuse. Fact is, the overwhelming majority of abuse takes place inside families - a fact which the loud and dangerous campaigners simply don't want to contemplate.

So be prepared for an irrelevant solution - this field is peppered with such things.