I think Cosh has a pretty good column on the Telus dustup thing here.
There are loads of companies (cable/satellite providers, DVD media and equipment manufacturers, home electronics manufacturers, airlines, hotels, etc) that make money off the adult entertainment industry and Catholics aren't rushing to boycott them.
I've sat in first class beside guys on 8-hour flights who used the whole time to watch pr0n, heedless of the fact that there's another guy sitting a few inches away.
The way I see if, if one's need for pr0n is such that one is willing to pay exorbitant fees to watch it on a tiny phone screen, then one has bigger problems than mere moral palsy. It is in the same league as the homeless guys who drink Lysol mixed with water out of Mason jars, just to get the alcohol hit.
If that's the only joy they are getting out of life, I am not going to be the guy to deny it to them.
As far as getting joy out of your life - what one does in the privacy of one's own environment/home is not my concern.
Ah, but here's the rub -I'm a parent. I have children, and the thought of some guy palming his cell phone to watch Suzy do Jerri or Jerri doing Steve while he rubs up against my daughter on a packed subway car or bus at rush hour I find repulsive in a way that words completely fail me to express.
And the very smallness and mobility of the cellphone porn lends itself all to easily for those who have no apprecible standards of decency while in the public domain. It's encouraging the opportunities for reheprensible conduct in public.
And yes, I have no personal qualms about telling those "guys" to put back the porn back in their pocket and take it out when they get behind their own home door.
I don't dispute the repulsiveness of it, but on the other hand people do all kinds of repulsive things on public transit. Like clipping fingernails and toenails. Picking ears and noses. Farting. Spitting. Et cetera.
If a guy was watching pr0n on his cellphone while packed into tight quarters with your daughter, I would not be surprised if your daughter took appropriate action to define her personal space a little more clearly. Or moved to the other end of the bus/car so as to avoid the pr0n-watcher. It's not like these situations don't exist out there today.
Reading pr0n on public transit is rightly designated as socially unacceptable, but the whole wireless pr0n phenomena is not exactly going to go away, and perverts will be perverts whether or not they are facilitated by convenient new media.
A guy (or girl) watching pr0n in public might as well be wearing a "giant loser" sign as far as I'm concerned. If you're worried about them committing a sexual assault -- or that cellphone-pr0n will facilitate an upswing in assaults -- that's one thing. I'm not sure I share that reasoning, but it is not beyond the realm of possibility. From where I sit, watching cellphone pr0n on the bus is merely being pathetic in public. And lots of people do that every day.
Okay, nail clipping and nose picking while repulsive, are still not as half as repulsive as rubbing yourself against a female or a child in a packed subway train while you watch porn on your telus.
As far as my daughter protecting her personal space goes, often its not quite possible. You can start on a car that isn't packed and end up jammed in.
There have been more times than I want to remember when I have been inappropriately gropped on a packed subway car...being late to work to avoid a potential groping is not always a feasible option if I am to meet all my other responsibilities. And of course, there are all other kinds of disgusting things people do in the public domain but do we need as a society to enable or encourage more disgusting things to do?
And just what pray tell is wrong with having societal limits on standards of behaviour in the public domain? Note I am not suggesting legislative limits, but societal ones.
That's what happened in this case.
Telus decided to offer a service, the general public found it outrageous and made their feelings known. Some canceled their service as they didn't want to be paying into a telecommunications company's bottom line which also was a faciliator of cell phone porn.
Telus took note and changed their plan. What's so wrong with that? I fail to see how this isn't a win-win situation.
It was stupid of Telus to cave. Anybody that wants to watch mobile porn can do so on their video iPod, Windows Mobile device, Palm device, and so on. And they can ride public transit while doing so, rubbing up against whomever they please (and facing the consequences thereof, naturally).
The only thing that has been prevented is that carrier's wireless delivery of porn. Meanwhile, every Windows Mobile and Palm phone on the market today can play video and they all have storage media slots (SD card, micro SD, etc). People can still watch porn on public transit. They just have to have enough forethought to have loaded the porn video on the device before they leave the house.
Hell I watch episodes of 24 on the Treo on my way to work. Is that stuff wirelessly delivered to the device? No. Could I remove the headphones and subject everyone else on the subway to audio snippets of Jack Bauer's adventures? Sure. But I don't. The guy standing beside me might see some of the episode, though (the horror!).
This has closed one potential distribution channel for one particular wireless carrier. The customers can still load porn (or videos, in general) on their phones if they have the technical savvy. It is akin to outlawing the distribution of Coca-Cola via vending machine, but not via corner store retail, restaurants, bars, etc. Plenty of other distribution channels exist and are already in use right now. I don't see a lot of "win" about it.
5 comments:
I think Cosh has a pretty good column on the Telus dustup thing here.
There are loads of companies (cable/satellite providers, DVD media and equipment manufacturers, home electronics manufacturers, airlines, hotels, etc) that make money off the adult entertainment industry and Catholics aren't rushing to boycott them.
I've sat in first class beside guys on 8-hour flights who used the whole time to watch pr0n, heedless of the fact that there's another guy sitting a few inches away.
The way I see if, if one's need for pr0n is such that one is willing to pay exorbitant fees to watch it on a tiny phone screen, then one has bigger problems than mere moral palsy. It is in the same league as the homeless guys who drink Lysol mixed with water out of Mason jars, just to get the alcohol hit.
If that's the only joy they are getting out of life, I am not going to be the guy to deny it to them.
Personally, I thought I had a pretty good response to the Cosh's position here.
http://thelastamazon.blogspot.com/2007/02/i-dont-do-las-vegas-or-telus.html
As far as getting joy out of your life - what one does in the privacy of one's own environment/home is not my concern.
Ah, but here's the rub -I'm a parent. I have children, and the thought of some guy palming his cell phone to watch Suzy do Jerri or Jerri doing Steve while he rubs up against my daughter on a packed subway car or bus at rush hour I find repulsive in a way that words completely fail me to express.
And the very smallness and mobility of the cellphone porn lends itself all to easily for those who have no apprecible standards of decency while in the public domain. It's encouraging the opportunities for reheprensible conduct in public.
And yes, I have no personal qualms about telling those "guys" to put back the porn back in their pocket and take it out when they get behind their own home door.
I don't dispute the repulsiveness of it, but on the other hand people do all kinds of repulsive things on public transit. Like clipping fingernails and toenails. Picking ears and noses. Farting. Spitting. Et cetera.
If a guy was watching pr0n on his cellphone while packed into tight quarters with your daughter, I would not be surprised if your daughter took appropriate action to define her personal space a little more clearly. Or moved to the other end of the bus/car so as to avoid the pr0n-watcher. It's not like these situations don't exist out there today.
Reading pr0n on public transit is rightly designated as socially unacceptable, but the whole wireless pr0n phenomena is not exactly going to go away, and perverts will be perverts whether or not they are facilitated by convenient new media.
A guy (or girl) watching pr0n in public might as well be wearing a "giant loser" sign as far as I'm concerned. If you're worried about them committing a sexual assault -- or that cellphone-pr0n will facilitate an upswing in assaults -- that's one thing. I'm not sure I share that reasoning, but it is not beyond the realm of possibility. From where I sit, watching cellphone pr0n on the bus is merely being pathetic in public. And lots of people do that every day.
Okay, nail clipping and nose picking while repulsive, are still not as half as repulsive as rubbing yourself against a female or a child in a packed subway train while you watch porn on your telus.
As far as my daughter protecting her personal space goes, often its not quite possible. You can start on a car that isn't packed and end up jammed in.
There have been more times than I want to remember when I have been inappropriately gropped on a packed subway car...being late to work to avoid a potential groping is not always a feasible option if I am to meet all my other responsibilities. And of course, there are all other kinds of disgusting things people do in the public domain but do we need as a society to enable or encourage more disgusting things to do?
And just what pray tell is wrong with having societal limits on standards of behaviour in the public domain? Note I am not suggesting legislative limits, but societal ones.
That's what happened in this case.
Telus decided to offer a service, the general public found it outrageous and made their feelings known. Some canceled their service as they didn't want to be paying into a telecommunications company's bottom line which also was a faciliator of cell phone porn.
Telus took note and changed their plan. What's so wrong with that? I fail to see how this isn't a win-win situation.
It was stupid of Telus to cave. Anybody that wants to watch mobile porn can do so on their video iPod, Windows Mobile device, Palm device, and so on. And they can ride public transit while doing so, rubbing up against whomever they please (and facing the consequences thereof, naturally).
The only thing that has been prevented is that carrier's wireless delivery of porn. Meanwhile, every Windows Mobile and Palm phone on the market today can play video and they all have storage media slots (SD card, micro SD, etc). People can still watch porn on public transit. They just have to have enough forethought to have loaded the porn video on the device before they leave the house.
Hell I watch episodes of 24 on the Treo on my way to work. Is that stuff wirelessly delivered to the device? No. Could I remove the headphones and subject everyone else on the subway to audio snippets of Jack Bauer's adventures? Sure. But I don't. The guy standing beside me might see some of the episode, though (the horror!).
This has closed one potential distribution channel for one particular wireless carrier. The customers can still load porn (or videos, in general) on their phones if they have the technical savvy. It is akin to outlawing the distribution of Coca-Cola via vending machine, but not via corner store retail, restaurants, bars, etc. Plenty of other distribution channels exist and are already in use right now. I don't see a lot of "win" about it.
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