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Legalizing child pornography is linked to lower rates of child sex abuse
Published: Tuesday, November 30, 2010 - 12:35 in Psychology & Sociology

Could making child pornography legal lead to lower rates of child sex abuse? It could well do, according to a new study by Milton Diamond, from the University of Hawaii, and colleagues. Results from the Czech Republic showed, as seen everywhere else studied (Canada, Croatia, Denmark, Germany, Finland, Hong Kong, Shanghai, Sweden, USA), that rape and other sex crimes have not increased following the legalization and wide availability of pornography. And most significantly, the incidence of child sex abuse has fallen considerably since 1989, when child pornography became readily accessible – a phenomenon also seen in Denmark and Japan. Their findings are published online today in Springer's journal Archives of Sexual Behavior.

The findings support the theory that potential sexual offenders use child pornography as a substitute for sex crimes against children. While the authors do not approve of the use of real children in the production or distribution of child pornography, they say that artificially produced materials might serve a purpose.

Diamond and team looked at what actually happened to sex-related crimes in the Czech Republic as it transitioned from having a strict ban on sexually explicit materials to a situation where the material was decriminalized. Pornography was strictly prohibited between 1948 and 1989. The ban was lifted with the country's transition to democracy and, by 1990, the availability and ownership of sexually explicit materials rose dramatically. Even the possession of child pornography was not a criminal offense.

The researchers monitored the number of sex-related crimes from Ministry of Interior records – rape, attempted rape, sexual assault, and child sex abuse in particular – for 15 years during the ban and 18 years after it was lifted.

Most significantly, they found that the number of reported cases of child sex abuse dropped markedly immediately after the ban on sexually explicit materials was lifted in 1989. In both Denmark and Japan, the situation is similar: Child sex abuse was much lower than it was when availability of child pornography was restricted.

Other results showed that, overall, there was no increase in reported sex-related crimes generally since the legalization of pornography. Interestingly, whereas the number of sex-related crimes fell significantly after 1989, the number of other societal crimes – murder, assault, and robbery – rose significantly.

Viewing child porn not a risk factor for future sex offenses
Published: Tuesday, July 14, 2009 - 04:57 in Psychology & Sociology

For people without a prior conviction for a hands-on sex offense, the consumption of child pornography alone does not, in itself, seem to represent a risk factor for committing such an offense. Researchers writing in the open access journal BMC Psychiatry studied 231 men convicted of consuming child pornography in 2002 and found that only 1% had gone on to commit a hands-on sex offense in the following six years. Frank Urbaniok from the Canton of Zurich Department of Justice, Switzerland, worked with a team of researchers to investigate these consumers. He said: "When investigating the prevalence of internet child pornography consumption, an important practical question is whether consumers of child pornography pose a risk for hands-on sex offenses. Our results support the assumption that these consumers, in fact, form a distinct group of sex offenders. Probably, the motivation for consuming child pornography differs from the motivation to physically assault minors. Furthermore, the recidivism rates of 1% for hands-on and 4% for hands-off sex offenses were quite low."

As has been found in other studies, Urbaniok and colleagues were able to corroborate that the offenders were well educated and that most consumed other types of illegal pornography as well, such as pornography depicting sexual acts with animals, excrement, or involving brutality.

Commenting on the findings, Urbaniok said: "Due to the widespread use of the internet, child pornography consumers today may differ from our sample in some socio-economic aspects, such as in the level of education or level of income. Nevertheless, there are two relevant and practical findings that seem to be robust: For consumers of child pornography without a criminal history, the prognosis for hands-on sex offenses and for recidivism with child pornography is favourable."

Here is the problem, the greatest benefit for the individual balanced with the greatest benefit of society. An outpatient program would probably be better for the individual but would it be better for society? Locking him/her away in a dark cell would probably be best for society, but is it best for the individual? You have to find balance. I agree, with whom ever said it, that a combo inpatient program in the prison would probably be the best, but then you go outside this argument and into how to finance it, which is another can of worms all together.

Far as I can see, the biggest reason is purely political. People want child abusers to be punished. Spending money beyond what's necessary to send them to prison for as long as possible is "going soft on pedophiles", and will lose you the election. The same thing happens with more "acceptable" criminal behavior, despite the fact that rehabilitation and special programs are cheaper in the long run, it's going "soft on crime", radio jocks disembowel you, the opposition has a field day, and you lose votes.

lol, except of course for the children being abused in the videos right?

lol, except of course for the children being abused in the videos right?

While the authors do not approve of the use of real children in the production or distribution of child pornography, they say that artificially produced materials might serve a purpose.

Maybe to some extent. The other problem is that most of the other crimes are things that can be fixed, either by moving up the economic ladder or by psychiatric help. Problem with paedophilia is that it seems to be something people are born with, or are convinced is fine at an early age.

If you're just going to throw child molesters in prison and throw away the key, why not just execute them? Among prisoner hierarchies, child molesters are below snitches, incarcerated cops, and pretty much everyone else and are essentially guaranteed to either be brutally murdered by other inmates or put into solitary confinement indefinitely for their own protection. At that point, why not save them the suffering and us our tax dollars simply by executing them, if one wants to argue that point for society? Especially since there isn't going to be anyone who would reasonably hire them after they were released from prison (unless the state agrees to seal their court records from potential employers).

So, at some point, society needs to work on rehabilitating child molesters and try to make them into productive, benign citizens, which benefits everyone. Part of that is not locking them up and throwing away the key, and trying to find ways to reintegrate them into society (employment, primarily).

If people want to do something constructive about pedophiles, it's probably best to increase the likelihood that they seek treatment before they actually molest a child.

It's actually hard to come up with a good moral reason not to execute child molesters other than relying on blanket statements about the death penalty.

It's actually hard to come up with a good moral reason not to execute child molesters other than relying on blanket statements about the death penalty.

It's actually hard to come up with a good moral reason not to execute child molesters other than relying on blanket statements about the death penalty.

I think a good reason for not making child molestation into a capital crime is that it would give an incentive to the molesters to kill their victims in order to silence them. After all, they wouldn't have anything to lose from a legal perspective, since they would already be facing the death penalty. I think that is the same rational that keeps kidnapping from being a capital offense.

It is not possible to integrate them back into society without concealing what they've done, because people would not accept their presence if they were aware of their past. However, the act of concealing what they've done poses a risk to the general population.

If people want to do something constructive about pedophiles, it's probably best to increase the likelihood that they seek treatment before they actually molest a child.

If you answered yes to any of those questions, you are officially using your asshole as a mouth. That's disgusting, and you should stop.

Not quite understanding the problem my self I have to ask the obvious question. Are all pedophiles really the kind of ticking time bombs you describe, only holding their urges in until the moment that they inevitably explode and rape a child? I always figured that was an illusion created by the fact that those are the only ones we hear about. So like, can anyone point me toward any evidence to it?

In a roundabout way. Real (as opposed to media-based) child sex crimes in the USA have declined around 45% from 1993 to 2005 as far as the CPS (Child Protective Services) data I could dig up from the US Department of Health and Human Services shows C, from ~150k substantiated incidents in 1993 to 81k in 2005. Numbers I extrapolated from the 2010 report show in that year 3.0 million unique children prompted CPS responses, of which 20% were substantiated; of those 9.2% concerned sexual abuse for 55.2K total, for a 19-year decline of 64%. Those numbers are impressive enough to suspect methodological flaws, but outside analysis shows CPS is doing its job about as well as ever. The numbers are even more surprising when you remember that the USA isn't exactly less populous than it was in the early 90s.

Availability of child pornography, on the other hand, has exploded. Easy availability of live subject hardcore stuff peaked in the early 2000s with early file-sharing programs, and though it's trickled off as perpetrators are caught/sites are shut down it's still far more available than it was in 1993 ([whatever]-chan posts are now "tell me where to get CP" instead of "give me CP") and child models and lolicon are still abundant. The overall volume has run well ahead of personal internet speed.

That isn't definitive proof, but the contrary trends very strongly suggest that there are a whole lot of pedophiles who don't act on their urges offline.

The findings support the theory that potential sexual offenders use child pornography as a substitute for sex crimes against children. While the authors do not approve of the use of real children in the production or distribution of child pornography, they say that artificially produced materials might serve a purpose.