Strong Verbs Are Just Better

Man charged for uploading video of swinging baby.

The accused uploaded a video to his website of a man swinging a baby around. It was filmed outside of Australia, by a non-Australian, and originally hosted on a non-Australian site. The baby is shown laughing and apparently well at the end of it, but, as the nurse who reported the case to police says, it could be suffering from an unseen injury.

This is apparently child exploitation material, and faces roughly the same charges in QLD as child pornography.

Queensland Police said it was a crime "to participate in the exploitation and abuse of children by seeking to view, possess, make or distribute child-abuse or child exploitation material".

It provided a definition of "child-abuse material", which was any material that shows a person under the age of 18 who "is, or appears to be, a victim of torture, cruelty or physical abuse".

I HOPE the legislation has escape clauses in it for news media and activist organisations. I would HOPE that bloggers residing in QLD would be able to circulate photos (under cuts and warnings, folks) of persons under eighteen who have been the victims of abuse, torture or similar, either inside or outside of Australia (war zone stories, anyone?), if they wished to publicise the issue.

Furthermore, could we buy and sell the book A Child Called It in Queensland? That's material showing a person under the age of 18 as the vitim of cruelty, neglect and abuse. What about Burned Alive? She was a teenager when her family tried to kill her.

And what about fictional characters? They have human rights in South Australia - why do I get the feeling they're now protected from cruelty, torture and physical abuse in Queensland?

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On the bright side, K tells me Minister Conroy dropped his IT surveillance plans. Be thankful for small mercies.