Whether you are making it or viewing it, there’s not much that is more morally depraved than child pornography. Sen. Lamar Alexander (R-TN) is now linked to child pornography through his chief of staff. I’m sure Sen. Alexander is surprised and disgusted to discover that his chief aide is a debased degenerate scoundrel, but it comes as no big surprise to me. The entire conservative movement is rife with tax-cheats, sexual deviants, grifters, and sociopaths who put personal gain before any societal or even social benefit. If you put 12 conservatives in a room, you’ll find one person who dumps chemicals in the watershed, another that scolds people about the sanctity of marriage while dressing up in diapers as a prostitute spanks him, another who hires undocumented workers to mow his lawn and babysit his children, another that takes money from Big Oil to deny climate change, another that commits legalized usury, another that commits tax fraud, another that writes pseudonymously for a white supremacist website, and so on.
This is the norm in the conservative movement because it doesn’t attract well-adjusted people. It is an ideology about self, not about collective action. It exists to allow the individual to live outside of the rules and to evade any responsibility to other human beings. They call this liberty, but it is just a cover to let them go on stealing, profiteering, polluting, gouging, and cheating.
You can probably go into any Republican senator’s office and find someone on their staff who has secrets that will shock you. They wouldn’t be working for a Republican officeholder if they weren’t half a sociopath to begin with.
I didn’t used to have such a dismal opinion of conservatives, but long experience and close attention have disabused me of the idea that they are just people who have different opinions about stuff. That might be true for most of the voters, but the people who are running the Modern Conservative Movement are just not good people. They cannot be trusted on any level, from running the government to watching your children to leaving you alone in an airport bathroom.
Sorry, Lamar, but these are the circles you run in.
Well said, about modern Conservatism and the people in it, in general, BooMan.
But, let’s at least wait until this guy’s tried, before we judge – remember, it’s innocent, until proven guilty.
But, let’s at least wait until this guy’s tried, before we judge – remember, it’s innocent, until proven guilty.
I don’t give the GOP the benefit on that any more. They want to drug-test all welfare recipents after all, even after one of their own outed himself as a cokehead.
But if we judge and the guy is innocent, it undermines the narrative of the rightwing being violent sociopaths who deserve to be institutionalized.
guilt by association would be a lot less salient if the guilty didn’t associate with the GOP so very frequently.
pervs of a feather, and all that
Well… being a politician has always been about hard drinking, intern fucking, hard partying, fun type of work. Every last one of them is a sleazeball, it’s a requirement to get anywhere in DC, or any city.
The GOP though in DC is called the Gay Old Party. Banging your intern or drinking too much, that’s just being a politician. But whenever it’s a really off the wall sex scandal, always a Republican. Which is funny, considering their entire “party of the family”.
I was once puzzled by gay Republicans. Why would they back a party that hates gays? But then I figured it out: They’re all in the closet because they sincerely believe that homosexuality is wrong. They agree with the GOP on gays. On themselves. Poor bastards.
There’s a lot of self-loathing in that crowd.
It’s about income really.
If you are a gay conservative in DC things are great. The city is amazingly gay friendly, nobody is going to gay bash you either. It’s also hugely expensive and gay males with a ton of income find that the lower tax rates they pay make their lives better.
In other words, take your lower taxes and spend it all on sex, drugs, rock and roll and party it the fuck up. The gay hating doesn’t affect you really because you live in Washington DC where everyone knows it’s bullshit and nobody gives a fuck that you’re being a hypocrite on it as long as taxes are kept down.
If you have enough money the bleating of social conservatives doesn’t matter. It’s not like they can affect your quality of life once you’re rich enough.
I wonder if because they secretly know they can’t be trusted they also don’t trust the government to do anything.
It is hard for them to believe anyone can selflessly serve a collective.
Frederick Clarkson this morning on DKos.
Child Sex Abuse Crisis of the Religious Right Grows
The money quote:
Preach it. This is the simple truth, and it’s time a lot more people came out and said it openly. That’s the first step toward freeing our country from the grip of these sickos.
Say it over and over and over again.
Lowdown, rotten, no-good muthafuckas.
The ENTIRE lot of them.
Folks,
Aren’t we being a wee bit OTT with our generalisations?
Every Republican or conservative is a paedophile?
Not sustainable!
It’s a bit like saying every catholic priest is a deviant or paedophile! simply not true!!
Let’s be clear here paedophiles may be drawn to this black or white cover but all or most? (“me thinks he (she) protesteth too much”) principal.
I’ve known (as in meeting and dealing with/ counselling) quite a few “paedophiles” many types and degrees. When it comes to basic instincts (sex), emanate from the most primitive part of our brains. That mean at this stage of our evolution we have no control over the initiation of those instincts thoughts, urges. This portion of the brain isn’t determined by rational thought or even cultural morality. Those are up to o genetics, conditioning and the development of our Pre-frontal cortex. It is almost impossible for the armchair moralist to determine with anything approaching accuracy those inclined to these activities. In short it isn’t quite as simple as right or wrong.
Research I’ve seen would support this.
Like it or not “culturally (western) unacceptable fantasies” etc are normal to both sexes. “Normal” in the sense of fitting in the two standard deviations (statistical term) . Who hasn’t had fantasies of having their sexual way with some sexually arousing younger person. Are you a pervert because of it? Hardly
Fact: a the most common sexual fantasies involve having sex with a more innocent younger person the Psychological implications of this can be many and varied.
Anthropologically speaking sex with near pubescent females is common in “primitive” cultures (cultures where life expectancy is low. This is understandable from a survival perspective.
NB sexual activity with well below pubescent aged children is a long way out of the usual accepted statistical SD and is indicative of a ‘problem’ either psychological or genetic. It is clearly unacceptable even sociopathic in nature. I have no issue with isolating the culprits from the genetic pool or society for the good of society and the good of their victims … But and here is my point, Contrary to the verbal bile they are still human beings and in other ways they can contribute to society in other ways. Getting all hysterically frothy mouth about it and spraying large groups of people is at best an over reaction and secondly counter productive. e.g. if I were a normal or undereducated conservative Such sprays would make me regardless of my sexual proclivities more hostile/ defensive and less inclined to listen to reason…. ‘for every action there is an equal and opposite reaction’.
The key factor is being able to distinguish between a fantasy and not acting on it.
Child pornography is also an uncomfortable term e.g. a man recently was convicted, fined and put on the sex offenders registry Because he had just cartoon pictures of (the cartoon invented) Bart Simpson having sex with his sister! This man’s whole life is now ruined for what was well bad taste, adolescent humour! On that basis most males over 10 should be on the sex offenders list….! Who knows what pictures the accused had?
Let’s be clear: I do not sanction condone those who trade or are involved in harming children.
As we know from drugs, booze, and draconian punishments for sundry to murder even mass murder sanctions simply don’t work least of all with those who have “genetic maladaptions”.
As for Beating up the Senator without evidence … Really?
I didn’t say that all Republicans are pedophiles or even that all pedophiles are Republicans.
I said it didn’t surprise me that a top staffer in the GOP Senate is a debased degenerate scoundrel because the conservative movement is rife with scoundrels.
All kinds of scoundrels. Slum lords, disreputable car dealers, people who prey on the poor with payday lending, check cashing joints, and advance tax rebates (all sold at usurious rates), tax cheats, regulatory and tax cheaters, users of illegal labor in violation of labor laws, unconscionable polluters, makers of unsafe products, swindlers, scammers, rip-off artists, closet-case moralists, evangelical johns, neo-confederates, white supremacists, misogynists, pederasts, rapists, stalkers, dead-beat dads, greedheads, talentless balls of seething resentment, sadists, and straight-up sociopaths.
What holds them together is a laser-focus on their own perceived needs at the expense of everyone and everything else, and a roiling hatred of anyone who has anything that might be undeserved.
Don’t forget Darryl Issa, car thief.
Bingo!
So good at stealing cars that he figured out a way to stop himself and make a fortune.
Classic case.
He probably still gets the itch to steal cars, but he’ll steal your pension instead.
Booman,
I take your point but the reality is the Dems have their bunch of well…far end of the statistical spectrum too.
I guess I was really cautioning against some of the extreme culturally induced attitudes in the comments too.
In the final analysis it was a cry for keeping things in proportion.
There are research papers that have found that sociopathic tendencies (dictatorial,messianic, abusive [verbal, physical and sexual] narcissistic, egocentric, selfish, lacking empathy) are more highly represented in political and business leaders on both sides of the faux political (imaginary?) “fence” than the public at large.
“Power tends to corrupt and absolute power tends to corrupt absolutely” Lord Acton.
I have a marked distaste for either party being a fair or appropriate representative of the people or their needs. The hard truth is representative’s first interest is themselves, the party and their ideology people are after that. The fist objective of any on going organization is its own longevity and growth. (see business and the catholic church.) their people tend to serve the inanimate entity rather than the other way around.
I’ve said before but to be qualified for real success in business or politics one one must have traits that render you equally the least appropriate for society.
We in the west tend to revere “winners” the problem is how they got there. America (west) is number one but it is so on the bodies and on going misery of billions of others (losers).
I guess I balk at the notion of binary absolutes Good or Bad. Clearly that includes “paedophiles”. Like alcoholics, those with genetic mental health issues or being Gay they have no real choice as to their proclivities. It’s not a case of someone simply deciding to be say a sociopathic business leader,a Democrat representative/senator or gay…That doesn’t imply NO CHOICE it’s simply not that simple.
No, the democratic party does not have the same number, or % of “scoundrels” as republican in 2013. And why are you discussing pedophilia in the same sentence with being gay and why including alcoholism in that discussion? very very wrong conflation of categories
It’s said that “power corrupts,” but actually it’s more true that power attracts the corruptible. The sane are usually attracted by other things than power. When they do act, they think of it as service, which has limits. The tyrant, though, seeks mastery, for which he is insatiable, implacable.
— David Brin, The Postman
(Emphasis mine.)
don’t forget that cokehead guy and his trips to Thailand
So very much wrong with your comment. But will only tackle one of them.
Menarche — traditionally the physiological dividing point between childhood and adulthood for women — was not so near what today is considered pubescent females. It was at or near what today are considered women — eighteen years old. There would have been no survival advantage to having sexual desires for girls before their bodies were fully developed.
Marie 2
Not true back in the 15th century England girls were being married off as early as 13. In PNG girls were being married at 12ish. Note too life expectation was 30-ish.
In the case of the African pygmies girls went into puberty at 6 married by 9 and parents at 10 then again life expectancy was mid 20’s really old was 30+.
What you were referring to was ethnology i.e. cultures.
Cultures are the developing social rules for a society.
If one is to be objective one needs to be careful not to see the world though a cultural filter.
Killing babies is morally wrong to us in the west but let’s look at the Moriori (Stuck on a very small island for 5-600 years)with no way to escape. Unlike their fellow polyanesians from NZ and those on Easter Island . In the latter two they (raped) their environments and had collapsed into internecine wars and cannibalism. yet the Moiori were so peaceful and lived within their island’s limits with a stable population…. they practised infanticide as birth control and developed rituals to suit.
When Brits told the Maoris where they were the Maoris came and enslaved and or ate the Moriori as per their warrior culture. Whose objectively right?
Then let’s not forget cannibalism to survive like many cultures in the PNG highlands( where there was little or no substantial sources of protein). Context is everything.
BTW several of these cannibalistic tribes had spiritual taboos that scientist have discovered have environmentally sustaining basis.
Right or wrong is subjective
PS Marie 2,
Puberty as indicated is different for different races. All examples I gave reflect both relative ages of puberty. What your source seems to underplay is the political joining of two clans/families and it’s part in the overall survival strategy. The Australian aborigines married at very young ages too.
BTW Juliet of Romeo and was 14ish. A common age for marriage. I seem to remember the supposed original Mona Lisa was 18 with 2 /3 children.
Romeo and Juliet are fictional. (btw Shakespeare recorded age when he married was 18 and his wife Anne was 26.)
The 15th Century is historically recent for human beings. Many millennia beyond the time of our early ancestors.
Marriage was a contract for the preservation of wealth and inheritance. Of course like most cultural practices, it began with the elite and only much later extended to the common folks. By the middle ages in western cultures, the royals did sign marriage contracts for their children. And sometimes the children actually wed. However, they didn’t live together and they were much older before the the marriage was consummated.
While we can’t be totally accurate as to the cultural mating practices in early human civilizations, we do know a bit about biology. Body mass and body fat hasten or postpone menarche. Ovulation is generally delayed a year or more after menarche. Wikipedia
That is consistent with my comment that sexual maturity in early communities was around age eighteen. What you’re citing from earlier centuries are the records of those of wealth and privilege. The people that would coincidentally also have a diet richer in calories and fats, and hence a possible earlier age for menarche in the girls. However, consider Eleanor of Acquitaine. Married at fifteen to the future king of France (he was seventeen). Their first child wasn’t born until seven years later.
Early humans weren’t dumb. They were probably much better at observing their bodies and communities than we are today and appreciating what was in the best interest of the community. Wouldn’t take more than a generation to note that maternal and infant mortality are higher when the mother is younger. Only later when communities became stratified by wealth and male privilege and codified as tradition cultural practices would non-adaptive perversities come into being as special privileges for the privileged.
I don’t want anyone to get the idea that I’m discounting the damage of child molestation, and the business of this kind of pornography is particularly immoral. But if viewing child pornography is in and of itself like actually abusing a child, then wouldn’t wearing shirts that had been made in that building in India that collapsed be like murder? Would looking at a car accident be the same as reckless driving? Would watching murder mysteries be the same as killing someone? I have trouble with the concept of thought crimes, no matter how heinous the thought.
The chief of staff of a Senator should have the obligation to obey the law that said Senator has voted on. Aside from the thought-crime objection, the main issue with the GOP is their rampant hypocrisy when they parade their moral virtue with ill-conceived legislation. And their shielding adults who are abusing children under the excuse that restraining the abuse is a violation of their freedom.
What needs to be reported on this case is whether the FBI got a warrant and whether the FBI or other law enforcement agencies used NSA data in this case. The fact that the possibility of politically motivating framing of a politician or the politician’s staff is an issue is because of the very broad powers that they gave to law enforcement and the intelligence community in the name of security and law and order.
The critical point about child porn is that by definition the act is non-consensual. And the viewer of the imagery is a witness to a crime regardless of their own motivations or responses.
Bob you make a good point in defining the immorality by harm that it does to others.
It is also true that the idea of consent is also at stake. But how come it’s okay for an under age boy to have sex with an under age girl. yet that same girl decides to have sex with say 19 yo or a 26 yo she is suddenly unable to give consent?
Let’s get real I’ve run across some women who are in their 40’s and shouldn’t be allowed in public with a fire arm aid a mature adult or much less become a state governor! Talk about arrested maturity! then again I’ve seen very mature 15 yo young women not as many mature young men though.
I remember one case from England where a 30yO teacher met a young woman he thought was 20’s+ and eventually they moved in together. He was shocked when he found out she was 15.She had run away from state ‘care’ and had been living on the steet …got a job as a waitress where she met him.
He was charged went to jail for 4 years she went into ‘care’ and was raped and became pregnant. As a convicted sex offender his career as a teacher was over.
They later married but tragically the father of the child tracked her down and beat the husband into a coma and quadriplegic and raped her again … While she thought he was dying she committed suicide …. the child was put into “care”.
What make 18 so special particularly given that in general the pre-frontal cortex ( rational judgement filter ) isn’t mature until around 26 (see the difference in the number and causes of road accidents under that age… hence the actuarial calculations resulting in their higher car insurance premiums…the same is true around the world.)
I agree with your comments about child porn/ sex (very young children (pre puberty). I suggest that the age barrier be contextual. Violence, deception, drugging and blatant abuses of power be included.
I once had a boss 40ish who had a series of sexataries all under 20 who were led to believe they were the next MRs boss. I actually had 5 of them crying on my shoulder over a period….He was a sexual predator and a sociopathic liar but he was “successful at business”. The board sanction his behaviour after the father of a barely 18 yo issued writs against the company.
The vulnerable of any age should be protected and the evil of any rank should be accountable not just under 18.
and? we’re onto a “my cousin knows somehow who …” discussion? what you write is essentially nonsense to blur any distinctions of moral evaluation. and your cultural relativism discussion is also not pertinent
presumably there is a high degree of correlation between the viewing and the action; if we want to go all anecdotal evidence on this I’ll say 100%. And please, everyone, lay off the comparison between child pornography and closeted hypocritical gay Republicans
Actually, there isn’t a correlation between viewing and doing, at least from the last study I saw. I don’t disregard the hypocrisy. And I don’t disregard the nonconsensuality of pedophilia. But the logic is that the viewer is being punished for witnessing a crime that was already committed because he is helping to create a market for this kind of porn. Would it be okay to view child pornography if you didn’t pay for it?
It just seems to be the prosecution of thought crimes. And if thought crimes are to be punished then I see an ugly future for thinking.
I’d be interested in the data on correlation/ non correlation between pedophilia viewing and actions. Viewing is not the same as thinking. I’m not talking thought crimes here. Pedophilia viewing is viewing images of children for sexual purposes. photographing children for sexual purposes is illegal as is distribution of those photographs/ videos. Also note that photographing a crime is not illegal. The photographing and viewing are part of the abuse
I guess I’d say in most instances the viewing is inseparable from the doing, it’s part of it.
good questions, but viewing pornography is not like viewing an auto accident. wearing the shirt, some complicity in worker exploitation, hence the demos and boycotts here.
anyway, here’s a tpm update. not a thought crime at all
http://talkingpointsmemo.com/muckraker/gop-strategist-s-child-porn-charges-stemmed-from-canadian-cas
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Wow, you’ve become even more cynical regarding Republicans than me.
And I’m more cynical than he is, because I don’t exempt “most of the voters”. I talk to people in that category all the time. They are full of hate for anyone different from and/or less fortunate than themselves. That’s why they;re Republicans.
I don’t think it’s cynicism. Cynicism is just an attitude. If you read what he says, he actually explains WHY the modern Republican Party is a magnet for sociopaths and fails to attract normal people who actually want to govern.
I’m speaking of those who run for office, not so much for voters, who may be all too normal but hoodwinked, because feeding the illusions and weaknesses of rubes is what Republican politicians do best.
To quote David Simon: “So how does it get better? In 1932, it got better because they dealt the cards again and there was a communal logic that said nobody’s going to get left behind. We’re going to figure this out. We’re going to get the banks open. From the depths of that depression a social compact was made between worker, between labour and capital that actually allowed people to have some hope.
We’re either going to do that in some practical way when things get bad enough or we’re going to keep going the way we’re going, at which point there’s going to be enough people standing on the outside of this mess that somebody’s going to pick up a brick, because you know when people get to the end there’s always the brick. I hope we go for the first option but I’m losing faith”
Brick or a Baseball Bat…after all it is America’s pastime.
Obama got elected on a hope that the devisiveness of red and blue states would end. He talked about a “united” states and most Americans agreed. Sadly, his election seems to have made it worse. Even as his governence has tried mightily to not poke a stick in anyone’s eye.
Yesteday’s comments about the “budget deal” are another example. But the Right thinks it is OK to talk about the 47%ers and pick dufuses like Palin as a VP or tell women to stop having the breast talk to men.
It might be time for a brick.
It seems that half the nation has forgotten that the Civil War ended at a terrible price for those who started it and they want to fight it all over again.
Well said, Booman.
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Aw, this was a really great post. In theory I’d like to write like this also – taking time and real effort to make a good article… but what can I say… I procrastinate alot and never seem to get something done.
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