Definitely worried

[elfs]

This story [Ads may be NSFW] tells of a sex story website operator whose home was invaded by the FBI and all of her files seized and taken away. The affadativit that led to the warrant assured the issuing judge that the website contained "obscene" materials.

Red-Rose-Stories.com was, by all accounts, a pretty nasty place, featuring child rape stories among other things. However, there can be no doubt that if it's merely the stories that the FBI was worried about than the prosecution is completely without merit. There hasn't been a successful obscenity prosecution in this country in nearly 50 years, but then that's never stopped the feds from scratching the itch to harass someone and make them burn all their assets defending their right to create fiction.

I'm just waiting for the Feds to go after Anne Rice. Beauty was, after all, fifteen when the series starts.

I'm not taking down anything in my stories, but damn, this is definitely a damnably worrying trend.

Comments

[solarbird]

You may have missed that Alberto Gonzalez has set up a special obscenity-prosecution squad, to help keep the fundamentalists happy. They've been applauding it vociferously. And with a large number of Bush-appointed judges, it wouldn't surprise me too much if some of these cases started going the other, by which I mean bad, way.

[elfs.livejournal.com]

Which would be tragic for the U.S. Whatever happened to "the pursuit of happiness?" I don't want to be straitjacketed into Alberto Gonzalez's notion of "happiness." The idea is just icky.

[sierra-nevada.livejournal.com]

The "pursuit of happiness" is, alas, in the Declaration of Independence (and has no force of law), not the Constitution of the United States of America.

But you knew that.

Something related

[redhipple.livejournal.com]

Hi Elf, this popped up in the ERWA's writer's group earlier this week. Sufficiently outraged as I was I started a thread at a BB that I frequent. I've included a link below if you or anyone else is interested.

http://www.hondosbar.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=4683&hl=

Re: Something related

[elfs.livejournal.com]

You have some scary friends on there. Since when is it "the government's responsibility" to do many of the things those writers believe? Isn't it a parent's responsibility?

Re: Something related

[redhipple.livejournal.com]

I firmly believe that repsonsibility begins at home with the parents first and foremost. I take into account that most of the folks on the BB are twenty somethings with no children of their own. But, they're hearts are in the right place. Most of the time...

[kengr]

There hasn't been a successful obscenity prosecution in this country in nearly 50 years,

This is the second time I've seen this statement in posts about that site.

It's not true. In the mid-80s (a mere 20 years ago or less) the operators of the Califonia based Amateur Action BBS were tried and convicted on obscenity charges in a Tennessee court.

Now, it might be true that there hasn't been such a conviction for a *written* work as oppopsed to photos and videos since 1955. But I'd be rather surprised if even that is true.

[elfs.livejournal.com]

The last successful prosecution of written porn was Roth v. United States, 1957.

What's really scary about this is that I found the DOJ's latest internal newsletter crowing about their success using a "well-coordinated and well-executed strategy" to frighten people into "changing behavior." PDF copy (http://www.usdoj.gov/criminal/obs032604.pdf). It's a very frightening document because it's written from a point of view interested in appeasing the hard right.

[bldrnrpdx.livejournal.com]

The thing is, it doesn't matter if the prosecution is successful. It's still going to ruin someone's life. Even if they "win". I think I'm just as glad the KATS site is down right now. I know I don't have the wherewithal to fight for it, and I doubt I could find enough personal, political, or financial support to help me win something like that. Never mind what the fight would cost me otherwise.

[antonia-tiger.livejournal.com]

There's some pretty unpleasant stuff out there, some of it bad enough that I wouldn't want to try to defend it. And photographs can document real crimes, even though modern desktop CGI is getting near enough reality to need careful checking before one can be sure what is real.

The hard problem is making a definition that you can trust other people with, and running a system where the accusation doesn't become the punishment.

And this FBI central unit might have been an XXX-Files, a bureaucratic defence against politicians, but that doesn't look likely now.

[ivolucien.livejournal.com]

Um, I just followed your PDF link, and from there went to the US code and found these laws: [18 USC 1462] & [18 USC 1465]

Does anyone know the history of these statutes? They seem to imply that any Internet or interstate commerce of pornography of any form is illegal. Scary indeed. I presume there's been significant diluting of these via court precedent? <scared too>