Your right about that. The villification and subsequent removal of rights for pediphiles is certainly up there in terms of creating a sub-class.

Yes, I'm liberal and proud of it but it does make for interesting conversations when you mention that to people and they roll their eyes. I do try to understand where the right comes from but it is just a bunch of hoohaa based on non-facts and predjudice assumptions (like that teming mass of welfare mothers who are bankrupting the country and getting pregnant so they can go buy a mercedes...)

Although I don't like sex offenders, especially paedophiles or child abusers of any sort (I am also vehemently anti-corporal punishment), I do welcome your honesty and your guts to say what needs to be said.

I'm gonna make a post which will perhaps be even more unpopular. That is, I think the law regarding child porn has parallels with the law on hard drugs (another area I don't like!), in that the total clamp-down is making the situation worse by driving it underground.

Granted, the law is there because child pornography is created by the abuse of children - which must be stamped out harshly. However, I disagree with the Establishment's (somewhat hypocritical) assertion that "every child porn image represents an abused child" - if the same image is distributed many times, the maths don't add up there! Even one abused child is one too many, true, but misleading comments by the Establishment don't help us weed out the real villains, ie those who make and sell the images.

In my view, harsh action must be taken against those who commit or profit from child abuse. However, those who download child port which is not paid for - in cash, in supplying images in return, or by any other means - should be decriminalised. They cannot really be accused of "contributing to the abuse of children" as such. I find child porn utterly obscene, and believe those who look at it are sick perverts, but also believe there's a difference between people who are sick and people who are actually a danger to children.

This would also mean people who view or download child porn by accident, or as a result of a virus/trojan/hacker attack (which has happened at least once in the USA) would not be prosecuted. And people who stumble across such sites, whether by accident or through a spam email, would be less hesitant to contact the authorities and get the real nonses shut down.

A "grey area" is pseudo-images of naked children, created by doctoring adult porn pictures (don't ask how, I really don't know!) Should the supply of those be decriminalised, if it stops nonses from taking indecent images of real children? Maybe readers could submit their views - they can't possibly be as controversial as this posting!