No one yet has said one thing that makes me think any action will result from this other than MAYBE Amazon dropping the book.
It seems some people are reacting to its easy availability rather than it being legal to produce; is it better if it's swept under the carpet?
And those that object to it's being legal to produce such a book have neatly sidestepped the issue of how you would frame such a law - understandably, as the Supreme Court has enough trouble with the issue of what restrictions you can reasonably put on the exercise of freedom of speech.
I'm really surprised no one reacted to my comment about how the imagary associated with young women in the media indicates many men in the West are attracted to adolescents.
I basically think that Western culture is awfully hypocritical over this issue.
On one page of a newspaper you will find an article about how two 14 year-olds are under criminal charges for being found in bed together.
On the next you will have a furor over a book seller selling a book that is quite legal to produce.
And then, in the centre spread, in colour, you will have the latest pout-lipped pubescent pop-starlet thrusting her 32B's cameraward... unless she's on her second album, in which case she'll of had a visit from the silicon fairy.
We have rightful outrage over child pornography, but the magazines that specialise in portraying 18 year-old models as 'Barely Legal' High School nymphets have massive circulation.
Is it only me that thinks this is inconsistant and dangerous?
Obviously the issue is clouded by the term 'paedophile' being applied by many people to anyone finding people under 18 sexually attractive. Technically speaking it applies to an attraction to prepubescents.
I think, given the fact that many men (and some women) who will rant and rave about how terrible a sexual assault on a preteen is, and who will then spend some time seeing if they can see the 16 year-olds nipples in a photospread, it's important to make a distinction between the two.
Obviously ALL minors need protection from sexual predators.
But the teenage minors are getting a very mixed message from our society.
On one hand they are rightly made aware of the risks of sexual predators. On the other hand, the very attributes that these predators are attracted to are the ones that are used to market produce that those so rightly opposed to sexual predators - and their children - gobble up.
This is something affecting Western Society as a whole. It's easy to concentrate on the really dangerous people, the sex offenders, but howabout our society giving itself a good look in the mirror?
Then we have more local problems; teenagers in America being told that abstinance is the best way to handle sex until they are older - and being prevented from really learning anything about sex by people on largely religiously motivated grounds - either that or misconceptions that teaching kids about sex will encourage them to have it. .
The fact that this not only DOESN'T WORK (research below), but it INCREASES THEIR VULNERABILITY TO SEXUAL PREDATORS is conveniently forgotten in either religious or prudish self-satisfaction that 'children are being protected'.
American society idolises youthful sexuality whilst denying youths sexuality, it is obsessed about protecting youthful sexuality whilst determined to deny youths knowledge that might protect them.
We must protect minors from sexual predators.
But what about protecting kids from the damage our societies screwed-up attitudes towards sex inflicts on hundreds of thousands of young lives? If the USA, for example, had teen pregnancy rates equal to the Netherlands, then there would be 441,000 fewer teen mothers each year, and 215,000 fewer abortions, for a saving to the public pocket of some $921 million. I'm no anti-chiocer, but I certainly think less abortions is better than more abortions!
Both the USA and Europe both need to look at the portrayal of youth's sexuality in the media; the portrayal conflicts heavily with the attitude many people express.
The USA needs to realise a lot can be done to protect young people by EDUCATION, as it is this that makes for the shocking differences shown by the linked report that I drew the above figures from;
http://www.advocatesforyouth.org/publications/factsheet/fsest.htm
I support a death sentence or life for pedophiles. It is a proven fact 75% or more can't be rehabilitated.
Come on! For a start, your statement equates sex offender (which is what you mean) with pedophile, making the false assumption that paedophiles are automatically sex offenders. God only knows how many people successfully repress such desires - which means that far more than 25% of people with this sickness can be helped. You are also quite sanguine about killing or imprisoning the 25% (according to your statistics) who can be treated, and would punish an 18 year-old boy who had sex with a 15 year old girl in the same way as a 57 year-old man with a 5 year-old.
I understand this is an emotive issue. I escaped being groomed by a paedophile when younger, had one try and pick me up when I was 17 (I looked 14), and have a friend who studies it at University (if you have a friend who does this do not read her textbooks unless you want nightmares). I've discussed the issue with her extensively as at one time I was going out with a girl who was sexually abused when younger.
Just because it is an emotive issue doesn't mean we can fool ourselves that knee-jerk soap-box style declarations that really don't stand up to serious examination are going to solve the problem.
We have to look at the problem clinically, and at contributing factors, like societal attitudes and ways of protecting children through knowledge, rather than going for 'easy' solutions that are just modern rationalisations of lynchmob logic. And we have to stand together, rather than immediately doubting the PC credentials of anyone who doesn't wave a pitchfork in the air when the mob is getting going.
That way MORE children will be safer, which is what everyone wants.