He allegedly used Stable Diffusion, a text-to-image generative AI model, to create “thousands of realistic images of prepubescent minors,” prosecutors said.
The line only exists because puritan busybodies banned pornography entirely. Their arguments were a mix of dogma and making shit up. So, two kinds of making shit up.
It’s been trimmed back by judges admitting we’re not supposed to do that, but making excuses to keep doing it anyway. The Roth standard was literally “I know it when I see it.” The Miller standard just pinned down a pretense for that sentiment.
Even the Ferber decision, specifically concerning actual CSAM, was about obscenity instead of focusing on the abuse. It took until Osborne for the court to really go ‘oh, right, the kids.’
This whole area of American law is deeply gross because we’re coming at it ass-backwards. Free speech does not need a purpose! Free speech does not need value! It is innately irrepressible, until it causes direct harm. Offense is not harm. I can talk shit in the most G-rated way and make people understandably think about strangling me. Or I can list every swear word and slur that I know before inventing some of my own. Both are protected - or goddamn well ought to be. I can get booted off a website or told to leave the drive-through, but the government’s not gonna come arrest me for mere frothing bigotry, however objectively value-less that ranting and raving might be.
The Ashcroft standard still cares equally about obscenity and the existence of actual victims. Despite obscenity being complete horseshit. And even then, the upheld decision pointed out, speech is protected unless it causes direct harm. As Wikipedia neatly puts it: the government could not prohibit speech merely because of its tendency to persuade its viewers to engage in illegal activity.
Now the current standard is… you’re not allowed to draw too good or render too fancy… because it might make the government’s job harder? We’re gonna look back on that as bluntly as puritanical nonsense about how vulgar stories turn men into insatiable beasts. The battle is half-over thanks to clarifying CSAM versus CP. No C? No SA. The other half is reminding people that fictional violence doesn’t become “interest in real violence” and normal pornography has yet to ruin society.
… is it, though?
The line only exists because puritan busybodies banned pornography entirely. Their arguments were a mix of dogma and making shit up. So, two kinds of making shit up.
It’s been trimmed back by judges admitting we’re not supposed to do that, but making excuses to keep doing it anyway. The Roth standard was literally “I know it when I see it.” The Miller standard just pinned down a pretense for that sentiment.
Even the Ferber decision, specifically concerning actual CSAM, was about obscenity instead of focusing on the abuse. It took until Osborne for the court to really go ‘oh, right, the kids.’
This whole area of American law is deeply gross because we’re coming at it ass-backwards. Free speech does not need a purpose! Free speech does not need value! It is innately irrepressible, until it causes direct harm. Offense is not harm. I can talk shit in the most G-rated way and make people understandably think about strangling me. Or I can list every swear word and slur that I know before inventing some of my own. Both are protected - or goddamn well ought to be. I can get booted off a website or told to leave the drive-through, but the government’s not gonna come arrest me for mere frothing bigotry, however objectively value-less that ranting and raving might be.
The Ashcroft standard still cares equally about obscenity and the existence of actual victims. Despite obscenity being complete horseshit. And even then, the upheld decision pointed out, speech is protected unless it causes direct harm. As Wikipedia neatly puts it: the government could not prohibit speech merely because of its tendency to persuade its viewers to engage in illegal activity.
Now the current standard is… you’re not allowed to draw too good or render too fancy… because it might make the government’s job harder? We’re gonna look back on that as bluntly as puritanical nonsense about how vulgar stories turn men into insatiable beasts. The battle is half-over thanks to clarifying CSAM versus CP. No C? No SA. The other half is reminding people that fictional violence doesn’t become “interest in real violence” and normal pornography has yet to ruin society.