We need a clear definition of 'pornography'
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Nine departments recently launched a new round of harsh crackdown on the spread of pornography through the Internet and mobile sites in China.
We need a clear definition of "pornography" to justify the crackdown. Only vague references can be found in laws and rules. Authorities are implementing the crackdown according to their own understandings of pornography. Why not set a standard for what "pornography" is?
Seeking inappropriate gains from pornography – forced prostitution, non-consensual documentation, abetting minors, sexually abusing minors – is prohibited by law. Those who do these things should be punished. What we should rectify is not the pornography itself, but behaviors of seeking inappropriate gaining through "pornography."
But I don't think pornography itself is criminal. Thus, we should not be against all pornography. It may be asked, is the Guangzhou Sex Culture Exhibition pornography? Is erotic art pornography? Is a sex bed pornography?
A content developer for Web sites complained to me once that pictures of naked women would be classified as "human body art" on large Web sites, but they would be pornography on smaller ones. This was not his sophistry but a helpless explanation he gave to network users, highlighting the multiple standards of pornography. Some can be tolerated here but will become intolerable there.
If everyone agrees with this presentation, fewer sites that have pictures of nudity but don't receive compensation for them will be affected by these crackdowns.
Crackdown on Internet pornography should be in accordance with law. But everyone wants to know what pornography is. If the law cannot make it clear, how can we say "administration according to law?"
The author is a magazine editor based in Beijing.
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