These artists are not considered pornographers because they label the work as art, that is the only reason. Art should have some censorship and operate within the law.
C'mon now, we all know that there actually IS censorship in art and that art operates within the law. It might be that the laws and limits concerning art are not as strict and narrow as you'd like them to be, but to imply that freedom in art has no boundaries gives a distorted picture of the situation. You also imply that the authorities did nothing in Henson’s case which is also not true. They did act, but a commission decided that there is nothing in these pictures which would allow to make a case out of it.
Some of the greatest paintings and photographs I have seen include the naked body- but adult bodies, children should be off limits as nude subjects.
That's where I don't agree. I think they should be taboo as sexual objects. You yourself made a difference between nudity and sexuality. The problem is who decides what's still nudity and what's already sexuality? And even in terms of sexuality we must be very careful not to be too limiting. Take for example art that deals with the motif of... let's say a girl loving a man. I mean, that's a pretty prominent theme in literature and also in movies. I'm sure you'll find a few conservative moralists who'd like to prohibit these, because they think the theme is inappropriate and might give people the impression that something like that is morally acceptable.
For me it comes down to children often don't have a voice, often aren't believed, the majority of physical, sexual and mental abuse is by parents, family member or trusted family contact (teacher, head of a church, scouts leader etc) and if calling it art means nothing happens then the law is powerless to prevent grooming of victims and children having emotional and mental damage that may manifest later in life, or may be with them for all their life.
I mean, on the one hand you're saying child abuse is much more likely to happen in a private sphere, but there you want to allow taking naked pictures. But in a public sphere where it's less likely to occur you want to prohibit it. That doesn't make much sense.
Yes, in my opinion a very firm line needs to be taken with exploitation of children and if the law and public perception have little tolerance of children being exploited for any reason, it will be easier to identify and act on abuse without arguments.
You're talking a lot about child abuse, child exploitation, and child pornography... where you fail is to show how what Henson did was actually all that. You have this very fixed, and if I may say so stereotypical image of children in mind, which you see threatened, I guess. No offense, but probably there is also a bit of prudery mixed in. Let's be a bit more rational about it. The act of taking pictures of naked children does in itself not harm them in any way unless it is done against their own free will. And please, children are just small people, they're not idiots. The children in Henson's pictures were over ten, so they certainly had the cognitive ability to understand what this was all about. And even if not, you can get children to do things they don’t like so they’ll enjoy it – that’s what adults do all the time. Because very often children do not want to do what their parents want them to do. Know what’s child abuse? All the parents out there that bully their children into becoming the next Britney Spears… but there no one cares because they’re not naked. The kids on the Henson pictures might be later on embarrassed that such pictures of them exist, but in my opinion that's a problem of society that still sees nudity as something to be ashamed of. Or, and that would be the better outcome they'll be educated in a liberal way and later on be proud that they actually made the photos. So this is neither exploitation nor abuse. The chances that these children will later on have mental problems just because of these pictures is probably zero.
The child pornography argument is also nonsense. Look at the Henson pictures. Seriously that's not pornography. If you want to know how pornography looks like - well, you obviously got internet access... Although you constantly say you're not equating pornography with nudity, you do exactly that. A certain facial expression or pose or a certain make up that might be inappropriate for a child - all these things do not automatically mean pornography. I'm sure that an artist could go way further in insinuating sexuality if the children were dressed. The problem is that the children on these pictures are naked, nothing else.
Who was it that said ‘All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing’. When I looked at some of these photos I had warning bells going off in my head, and I hope there is some form of censorship on photos like this- not you need to be over 18 to view the photos, but the work cannot be displayed, the original is estroyed and legal ramifications for the artist to show a zero tolerance of child exploitation.
It is almost allegorical that you’re using a quote that is in itself very problematic and prone to “abuse”. It has often been attributed to Edmund Burke, but it is not clear if he ever used it. At least it cannot be found in any of his writings. Critics think that it might a distortion of Burke’s, “When bad men combine, the good must associate; else they may fall one by one,” which does not only sound differently, but also cannot be misused to such an extent as the evil-triumph-quote. This quote (evil-triumph) has been used to justify war and invasion, so one should be careful to use it. I’ll have a quote for you which you should also think about:
"Eine Kunst, die nicht auf freudigste und innigste Zustimmung der gesunden breiten Masse des Volkes rechnen kann, sondern sich auf kleine, teils interessierte, teils blasierte Klicken stützt, ist unerträglich (...) der Künstler schafft nicht für den Künstler, sondern er schafft für das Volk! Und wir werden dafür Sorge tragen, daß gerade das Volk von jetzt ab wieder zum Richter über seine Kunst aufgerufen wird."
Adolf Hitler, 1937
