I did a thing Thursday. Probably minor in the overall scheme of things, but I did it anyway.
You know how words or phrases hit you just the wrong way? Like they’ll get on your nerves? You know there’s something wrong with the word because of the way people are using it and you just want to scream?
“Child pornography” is one of those terms for me.
I freely admit this may be caused by my neurologically atypical nature. I get laser-focused on making sure things are used or said the right way. “I’m sorry” is another one of those things that just grates on me in a similar way, but that’s another post.
I read a story that day about someone getting arrested for possessing “child porn,” and “child pornography,” and it set me off on another one of my windmill-tilting adventures.
Before you get all wound up about how the internet is responsible for pornography and how porn is going to be the downfall of civilization, let’s remember that it’s been around for thousands of years. The Kama Sutra was written in the 3rd century CE. Fanny Hill came out in 1748. And there are cave paintings dating back 40,000 years.
It’s nothing new.
By definition, it’s erotic or sexually suggestive material intended to cause sexual arousal.
In my mind, calling imagery pornography suggests a sort of legitimacy in the production of the images. I get that that basic concept—the legitimacy of pornography—is more than a little controversial. I’m not here to address that right now.
But what of children?
There can be no such thing as “legitimate” child pornography.
The adults involved in producing “legitimate” explicit images and videos generally consent to being involved in the industry. How that consent is achieved is a matter I’m also not addressing here.
But kids can’t consent to sex. Yes, the age of consent varies across the country. But the explicit stuff that involves kids isn’t about a couple of 16- or 17-year-old kids getting frisky in the back of the car.
It’s about children being assaulted. Abused.
Raped.
12-year-olds don’t consent to sex.
6-year-olds don’t have a concept of sex.
So how can we have “child pornography?”
We can’t.
It’s literally evidence of a crime. The children being recorded in this kind of imagery are the victims of a crime.
And, in my own pedantic windmill-tilting way of thinking, I don’t think we should use the phrase at all, especially not in reporting about the offense.
States are changing the wording of their statutes, substituting “child sexual abuse material,” or CSAM. Advocacy organizations have been pushing the idea since 2016.
So after reading the most recent report, I headed over to the AP Stylebook to see what they had to say. The Stylebook is supposed to be something of a bible for serious journalists (as opposed to the people chasing SEO advantages by forgetting about the inverted pyramid). Turns out, based on my search, the Stylebook is silent on child pornography vs child sexual abuse material.
It also turns out that you can make a suggestion to the Stylebook editors.
I strongly encourage you all to do the same. Encourage your friends to do so, too.
Words matter.
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