On Sat, 3 Mar 2007, Peleg Wasserman wrote:
The law was passed by 25 members of parliament, most of which come from religious factions. These people do not represent the majority of the people.
No, they represent a fraction of the ruling coalition, which has passed hairier laws in the past, using the well-known quid pro quo arrangements with other coalition members from other parties. In this country the words 'don't worry only a few MKs voted for it' is a set of 'famous last words' because often such laws pass anyway due to the 'arrangements' between the coalition parties. Give me a stricter shabbat law and I'll give you some money for the kibbutzim, or vice versa. You know how it works.
Second, while I do not agree with the way they decide speed limits (and I do enforce them every day), I see why a commission of experts can decide on speed limits based on empirical evidence, on the other hand I can see a lot of problems with a commission deciding on moral values, and porn after all is a moral value. The views of a Rabbi are totally
Speed limits are related to physics, road and vehicle conditions, and psychology and driver experience. Probably 80% of experienced drivers would not pass a reaction test at the end of the day when driving home tired. Yet speed limits do not change by the time of day. Also they vary widely from country to country.
But they do not change if it rains or snows, instead drivers are 'warned' to drive carefully. How come, since these are factors which influence the rate of accidents more than 'speed limits' ? Yet elsewhere people drive with almost 200 km/h for hours every day (on roads where this is permitted) and nothing interesting happens.
Do you really think that a speed limit above 50 km/h and respecting it will save your life if an idiot runs into you at that speed, or if you hit a tree at that speed ? Did you know that the chances of death from being hit by a car are above 70% if the car is faster than 30 km/h and you do not get medical help immediately ?
*whose* moral value is porn ? How do you define porn ? Pictures depicting nudity ? Pictures depicting more than one nude person ? Pictures depicting reproductive acts ? How do you know they are not simulating ? (in most cases porn artists are simulating).
What if they are not nude ? What if they are pictures of people completely covered in, say, rubber diving suits and gas masks ? Is that porn ? If it's the guys from the diving club then it's not porn, but if they wear them far away from water then it's porn ? I very rarely watch porn and I have read enough to know that exposing an ankle or too much hair under an all-covering garb counts as porn in some places.
Elsewhere little round disks pasted over the navel and nipples and having other details slightly blurred by 'clothes' thinner than paper is enough to consider a person 'decently covered' for public display purposes (as in advertising poster or magazine cover at any news stand).
Where is your limit ? And do you think that such a limit can be defined democratically ? Let alone by the knesset ? So far there is a status quo of what can be displayed and what not. The status quo allows the majority of the public to go to the beach without wearing 18th century style bathing suits. Those who do not wish to participate don't.
Newsstands who sell to modest customers do not have the magazines with the ladies on the front cover, and so on. While a kid could get easier access to porn from a home computer than from a newsstand, the method of the ISP filter (optional, not mandatory) is valid and working. Even my ISP has such a service:
http://www.actcom.net.il/services/?page=%F1%E9%F0%E5%EF+%E0%FA%F8%E9%ED Who needs the knesset to make such laws ?! Peter P. ================================================================= To unsubscribe, send mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with the word "unsubscribe" in the message body, e.g., run the command echo unsubscribe | mail [EMAIL PROTECTED]
