As much as I hate pedofiles...

[Sasaki Kojiro]

What difference does it make which order we place them?


But it comes down to circumstances no matter which path you take. If you decide on a case by case basis you either begin with the facts of the situation and you work from those to reach some sort of "big statement" that essentially is your justification for how these facts should play out. Or you do it the other way around an you start with the big statement and then dictate how these facts fit into it.

When you frame it as a balancing act, you are implying that the two things which need balancing are:

A. Able to be quantified and given an exchange ratio. How many security points is this in exchange for a few less freedom points due to restricting such drawings?
B. That the two things that are being balanced are inherently opposed in each other. Namely freedom vs security. When it is not always so.

To me it seems as if your view is the more black and white one, and thus is less suitable to adequately make judgments of reality off of.

I don't even know what we're talking about anymore...

If you are making an argument based on the circumstances then using a broad principle is just contradicting yourself. Like: "In this case the increased ability to catch criminals is not worth the privacy risks. In conclusion: it's always wrong for the government to impinge on our privacy". In my aside in that original post I was objecting to people saying the second part when they believe the first part. That aside has little to do with this thread though...

Logical, but very dangerous. This is a very-very slippery slope.

Restrictions on porn are not remotely dangerous. You guys must have a different conception of dangerous than I do...

I don't see any slippery slope either, unless you mean we are starting at the bottom and trying to go up.

Whether or not porn can affect behavior shouldn't matter. Alcohol consumption affects behavior, that doesn't mean that booze should be banned.

Alcohol affects behavior by making you drunk, which is often ok. How do child porn drawings affect behavior? Do they increase the rate at which pedophiles fantasize? Can they have specific fantasies which someone might obsess over?