In the last couple of issues I’ve been looking at how the pace of technological change has been increasing and how, in addition to the whole information revolution, we may be on the cusp of a change in what it means to be human.
Many issues are raised. The degree to which we are just corks bobbing about on the rapids is one. Things have a habit of just coming into being without anyone ever having actually decided that they should on the basis of a clear rational discussion.
Who’s making decisions? Here we are, about to dump pretty much everything we’ve ever taken for granted and nobody’s ringing Liveline? Joe, there must be something wrong…
We know more than any other generation in human history, and we are well aware of it. Also, more is known about us, each and every individual, than was the case with any generation before us. And we know that too. We are watched and monitored to an incredible degree. In the years ahead, this will only increase.
But our embrace of the virtual raises many other issues. One of these relates to porn.
We all remember the distaste felt when Gary Glitter was exposed as having downloaded child porn. It was discovered when he had dropped off his computer to be fixed. He was not alone. Hundreds of others were nailed in various police operations, often by what internet surveillance could reveal.
And when these various cases were tried and individuals found guilty, there was remarkable, indeed unanimous, agreement that those who downloaded child porn were as guilty as those who trafficked in children, if not more so.
Headlines howled. Again and again it was asserted that there would be no child porn without those who downloaded it and that their willingness to buy was the driver of a despicable and corrupt global criminal industry.
Hmmm. As regards child porn – is the exploitation of vulnerable children the real crime? Or is it the sexual obsession with children? To listen to many, one would think the crime is the exploitation, not the obsession.
Well, in the digital age that raises a whole lot of questions. Where, for example, does that leave Manga cartoons? If the persons depicted in (child) porn aren’t human, does that make it okay? I mean, you can’t say anyone is being exploited if those involved are entirely digital, can you?
And face it, when you look at how extraordinarily realistic are creatures like Gollum in Lord of the Rings, or Lara Croft, not to mention hundreds of characters in game consoles, it’s not hard to imagine that any day now movies will be made that are entirely digital and virtual and in which no child is even involved, much less harmed.
Moreover, taking Sim City and Second Life as models, increasingly individuals will be able to construct their own, probably interactive, movies using malleable and customisable stock digital characters. These private movies will effectively be personal fantasies.
The same goes for adult porn. The whole impetus of creation in this area will pass from vendor to purchaser. Think of where music recording is at right now and transfer…
Now, I am not saying that in other movies there won’t also be the portrayal and exploitation of real children. But will our criminal system differentiate? And insofar as there will be private digital movies that are personal (fictional) fantasies that do not (ab)use any real actors, where will be the crime and how will we describe it? What will follow? Prosecution for dreams?
Ditto adult porn.
It’s a difficult area. Face it, many people argue for the legalisation of prostitution. This would, they say, regulate and control the industry. It would also, they add, provide a safer environment (for all) in which those who ‘need’ (however that’s defined) to buy sex could do so.
So, quite suddenly the argument will diverge. Some will argue that if no child is exploited or abused in a digitally generated child porn movie, then the harm is out of it. Those who disagree will say that it is the interest in sex with children that is harmful, that this is the wrongdoing.
Sooner or later this will come to a court. Someone will be charged with having sexual ‘images’ of children. They will argue that the images are graphic images, cartoons or whatever and are erotic rather than obscene. Or that they are computerised images generated and that the ‘movie’ is effectively a piece of fiction like, say, Lolita. Or whatever…
Imagine a hot-shot defence barrister cutting loose on it. The certainty that has underpinned prevailing attitudes to porn, and especially child porn, will no longer be tenable and the technological rush that threatens to overwhelm our human identity will have advanced another notch…
Interesting times ahead…