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Fiel a Verdad
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- Dec 20, 2001
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Canadian News:
This Problem Sounds Awfully Familiar
Mar. 9, 2004. 01:00 AM
Child porn bill `disaster'
Artists unite to rally against passing Bill C-12 Broad change
to law would stifle legitimate projects
CHRISTOPHER HUTSUL
ENTERTAINMENT REPORTER
In Susan Swan's 2002 novel The Last Of The Golden Girls, two bored teenage girls simulate sex to pass the time. "I kiss her as hard and tight as I can on her lips," Swan wrote. "`I'm a hard kisser,' Bobby says. She smells of Noxzema."
Art or child porn?
Under a proposed change to Canada's child pornography law, depictions like that of children in sexual situations could be criminalized, say artists and writers.
The proposed change removes "artistic merit" as a defence for any written or visual material charged under child porn laws. If Bill C-12 is adopted, any film, painting or book depicting sexual activity involving people under 18 can only escape prosecution if a judge rules it serves "the public good and does not extend beyond the public good."
The bill will likely have its third reading later this week and could be passed into law shortly after that.
At a news conference yesterday to illustrate artists' fears of Bill C-12, Swan read a scene from The Last Of The Golden Girls, a work Publishers Weekly called a "pretentious ... sex-drenched novel about as erotic as a wet paper towel, and only half as interesting." As she read, a man dressed as a Mountie took her by the arm.
"Under the terms of Bill C-12, this is illegal, and I'm asking you to stop," said the actor playing the officer.
A crowd of 200 artists, filmmakers and arts administrators attended the event put on jointly by the Canadian Conference of the Arts and the Writers Union of Canada.
Video artist and art educator bh Yael read a statement from celebrated Canadian filmmaker John Greyson, who is currently in New York City.
"I'm getting ready for a knock on my door," wrote Greyson, whose film Lilies depicts teenage boys frolicking in a bathtub.
Greyson said he'd always been prepared to defend his film on the basis of artistic merit, using the Genies and other awards the film had garnered as evidence. But under the amended law, that defence would be useless and he would instead have to prove his work somehow served the public good.
"If Bill C-12 is passed, I'm going to rush right down to 52 Division and turn myself in," he wrote. "My only worry is that there's going to be a long line-up. What if I'm stuck behind Atom Egoyan, or the cast and crew of Degrassi High. Or worse, Alice Munro. Think of all the hours it will take just processing her."
Frank Addario, a criminal lawyer and legal representative for the Canadian Council of the Arts, called the bill both "a disaster" and "unconstitutional." He says without the benefit of long-term analysis, it will be impossible to determine if a work of art serves the public good.
"(The notion of public good) has never been understood by the courts, and when it has been understood, judges have said things like, `Well, surely the public good didn't require that much sex,'" he said.
In the bill, public good is defined as "that which is necessary or advantageous to the administration of justice or the pursuit of science, medicine, education or art."
The legislation was introduced in Parliament partly as a reaction to the 2001 trial of child-porn collector Robin Sharpe, who was acquitted of some charges of child-porn possession when lawyers were able to make the case that some of his collection had artistic merit.
The bill also amends the law to prevent people from writing child porn for their own uses, another defence used successfully by Sharpe. Under Bill C-12, any depiction of sex with children written for a sexual purpose will be illegal, even if it is never made public. And the bill stiffens some of the sentences for child-porn offenders.
The bill would also create a new crime of voyeurism to combat electronic-age peeping Toms who have abandoned keyholes in favour of high-tech devices such as tiny video cameras. The vague wording of the bill has also upset nudists, whose daily activities may be criminalized as a result. [end excerpts, Toronto Star, 3-09-04]
This Problem Sounds Awfully Familiar
Mar. 9, 2004. 01:00 AM
Child porn bill `disaster'
Artists unite to rally against passing Bill C-12 Broad change
to law would stifle legitimate projects
CHRISTOPHER HUTSUL
ENTERTAINMENT REPORTER
In Susan Swan's 2002 novel The Last Of The Golden Girls, two bored teenage girls simulate sex to pass the time. "I kiss her as hard and tight as I can on her lips," Swan wrote. "`I'm a hard kisser,' Bobby says. She smells of Noxzema."
Art or child porn?
Under a proposed change to Canada's child pornography law, depictions like that of children in sexual situations could be criminalized, say artists and writers.
The proposed change removes "artistic merit" as a defence for any written or visual material charged under child porn laws. If Bill C-12 is adopted, any film, painting or book depicting sexual activity involving people under 18 can only escape prosecution if a judge rules it serves "the public good and does not extend beyond the public good."
The bill will likely have its third reading later this week and could be passed into law shortly after that.
At a news conference yesterday to illustrate artists' fears of Bill C-12, Swan read a scene from The Last Of The Golden Girls, a work Publishers Weekly called a "pretentious ... sex-drenched novel about as erotic as a wet paper towel, and only half as interesting." As she read, a man dressed as a Mountie took her by the arm.
"Under the terms of Bill C-12, this is illegal, and I'm asking you to stop," said the actor playing the officer.
A crowd of 200 artists, filmmakers and arts administrators attended the event put on jointly by the Canadian Conference of the Arts and the Writers Union of Canada.
Video artist and art educator bh Yael read a statement from celebrated Canadian filmmaker John Greyson, who is currently in New York City.
"I'm getting ready for a knock on my door," wrote Greyson, whose film Lilies depicts teenage boys frolicking in a bathtub.
Greyson said he'd always been prepared to defend his film on the basis of artistic merit, using the Genies and other awards the film had garnered as evidence. But under the amended law, that defence would be useless and he would instead have to prove his work somehow served the public good.
"If Bill C-12 is passed, I'm going to rush right down to 52 Division and turn myself in," he wrote. "My only worry is that there's going to be a long line-up. What if I'm stuck behind Atom Egoyan, or the cast and crew of Degrassi High. Or worse, Alice Munro. Think of all the hours it will take just processing her."
Frank Addario, a criminal lawyer and legal representative for the Canadian Council of the Arts, called the bill both "a disaster" and "unconstitutional." He says without the benefit of long-term analysis, it will be impossible to determine if a work of art serves the public good.
"(The notion of public good) has never been understood by the courts, and when it has been understood, judges have said things like, `Well, surely the public good didn't require that much sex,'" he said.
In the bill, public good is defined as "that which is necessary or advantageous to the administration of justice or the pursuit of science, medicine, education or art."
The legislation was introduced in Parliament partly as a reaction to the 2001 trial of child-porn collector Robin Sharpe, who was acquitted of some charges of child-porn possession when lawyers were able to make the case that some of his collection had artistic merit.
The bill also amends the law to prevent people from writing child porn for their own uses, another defence used successfully by Sharpe. Under Bill C-12, any depiction of sex with children written for a sexual purpose will be illegal, even if it is never made public. And the bill stiffens some of the sentences for child-porn offenders.
The bill would also create a new crime of voyeurism to combat electronic-age peeping Toms who have abandoned keyholes in favour of high-tech devices such as tiny video cameras. The vague wording of the bill has also upset nudists, whose daily activities may be criminalized as a result. [end excerpts, Toronto Star, 3-09-04]
