The Sideshow talks about why
sometimes there are legitamite reasons to view child pornography:
First of all, there are many legitimate reasons to review child pornography, or to want to see for
yourself how much is out there, on the net or in circulation by any means. The police are constantly
claiming that there are extraordinary amounts of child porn available, and any honest reporter who
wishes to comment on the subject, from any side, would reasonably want to see the evidence for
themselves.I’m forced to rely on sources from other countries to tell me how much actual child porn is really
on the ‘net, because there is no legal way for me to do primary research. So I can never give
first-person accounts on a matter I’m a relative expert on; I can only report what others have said.
I’m certain that the police have made highly misleading statements on the subject; I just can’t prove
it. Many activists and journalists simply take the cops’ word for it and state it as fact. I can’t,
because a lot of it makes no sense. (A few years ago the cops were claiming that there were warehouses
full of child porn up and down the country, but that they had no powers to investigate. Leaving aside
the fact that there really wasn’t any reason to believe such warehouses existed in the first place,
there is no question that if the police had any evidence that they exist, they have had all the power
they need to investigate since 1976 when the original child porn laws were passed.)