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	camilla 2007-12-03 07:20 am UTC (link)
	Haven't seen the picture, but if girls without boobs and without shirts is child porn...o.0 It's amazing how much child porn you can enjoy when you look at old pictures of me vacationing with my parents in Spain. I was a star! (Reply to this)(Thread)

worstangel
2007-12-03 07:28 am UTC (link)

I'm not sure if the girls were underage and, thus, 6A thinks she's a pedo or if they just flagged it for adult content and 6A decided she should be deleted. But, yeah! We all were, man. There's a home video of me running around the sprinklers then getting on my tricycle (in my underpants) before the camera jerks to the side and my dad's voice says, "Honey, put your underpants back on and ride the bike..."

/random anecdote

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	chibikaijuu 2007-12-04 02:16 am UTC (link)
	There are a surprising number of photographs involving my brother's penis (I tended to keep my underwear on for impromptu childhood swimming. He, uh, didn't.) (Reply to this)(Parent)

	wankaholic 2007-12-03 08:08 am UTC (link)
	They were post-pubescent but were still clearly underage, is how I understand it . . . (Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

	sisterelwood 2007-12-03 08:13 am UTC (link)
	Ahhh, yes, those will get you. A gray area, yes, but unless you know they're over 18 it's a no-no. I know some states have their own laws governing the exposure of post-pubescent girls' breasts specifically. had to write a legal memo on breast-feeding in public for a final in class last week (Reply to this)(Parent)

	ryuutchi 2007-12-03 07:36 am UTC (link)
	The fact that they locked down the post with details seems weird to me. You'd think they'd leave it open to put pressure on the Abuse team. It also gives people who want to help/are interested in the problem no details about what happened. (Reply to this)(Thread)

	sisterelwood 2007-12-03 07:38 am UTC (link)
	Yeah, that kind of smells funky to me. Me thinks someone got into something they shouldn't have. (Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

	ryuutchi 2007-12-03 07:43 am UTC (link)
	Yeah-- the mods did say that it was a mistake anyone could have made. But also said that the picture WAS pornographic. So... who knows. I'd like to have seen the text of whatever email the mod got from the Abuse Team, personally. (Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

sisterelwood
2007-12-03 08:10 am UTC (link)

Random though- maybe it was a secret saying someone liked kiddie porn? I'm pretty sure child porn could include teenagers as well as if someone took a picture of little kids who were all innocent and shit and slapped some text on to effect of, "HAY- I like the kiddies!" If it was either of those options that got posted someone was REALLY STUPID because I think those would fall under most people's definition of offensive or at least make someone think twice before posting it.

Again, I'm not saying that's what happened but since no one is telling us what else can we do but guess?

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	ryuutchi 2007-12-03 08:14 am UTC (link)
	Wankaholic just said above that apparently she's heard that the girls were post-pubescent but clearly underage. Which would have been nice information for the mods to note in their post, but probably would have undermined their point a little. (Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

	sisterelwood 2007-12-03 08:19 am UTC (link)
	Yup, I saw that. She beat me to the punch. xD You kidding? LJ IS THE ULTIMATE EVIL! So what if they were doing was illegal? LJ IS STILL EVIL AND THEREFORE WE CAN DO NO WRONG. That hurt just to write. (Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

	ryuutchi 2007-12-03 08:27 am UTC (link)
	Oy vey. I think it's questionable what LJ did-- stupid but understandable for an Abuse standpoint, questionable from a customer relations standpoint. I also think Wolfsilveroak is a dipshit-- this has less to do with flagging in general than the fact that flagging streamlined the Report Abuse process by making a Abuse button clearly marked and visible. (Reply to this)(Parent)

	smashingstars 2007-12-03 08:59 am UTC (link)
	Just found the cached version of the picture (via ljseek) and the girls do look about 16-19 years old. Hard to tell if they're underage. The secret was "I used to think I was born too late. Now I think I was born too soon." That seems to mean "I wish I was younger", but who knows if it means "I wish I was younger so I could schtupp hot teen girls" or not. (Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

	ryuutchi 2007-12-03 03:21 pm UTC (link)
	Looking at the secret it could very easily mean "I wish I wasn't too old to have sex with these girls"... (Reply to this)(Parent)

	chibikaijuu 2007-12-04 02:18 am UTC (link)
	Yeah, they only look a very little younger than me (and there's a VS model who looks about as young as they do). They could very well be underage, though, because I'm still regularly mistaken for sixteen, and I've had men uncomfortably ask my age before continuing to talk to me. But it's not a guarantee. (Reply to this)(Parent)

gmth
2007-12-03 02:28 pm UTC (link)

I copied part of it:

LiveJournal has zero tolerance for such content (i.e., child pornography), and as such, your accounts have been permanently suspended. You are no longer welcome to maintain an account on the domain of LiveJournal. Any accounts found to belong to you will be suspended without warning or notification.

There was more, but I didn't get all of it, unfortunately.

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	shaggydogstail 2007-12-03 10:15 am UTC (link)
	I saw the PostSecret mod post before it was shut down and the comments weren't wholly sympathetic. There was some outrage at LJ Abuse, but also quite a lot of comments from people either saying the mod completely deserved to be banned because it was gross child porn, or something along the lines of 'yeah, it's harsh, but that's the law.' (Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

	ryuutchi 2007-12-03 03:20 pm UTC (link)
	Huh. Well, they could have disabled comments, or copy-pasted the actual information into a new post, so people just hearing about the situation wouldn't have to guess what was going on. (Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

	shaggydogstail 2007-12-03 03:29 pm UTC (link)
	They could, but this is the same mod team who thought 'but someone else sent the picture in!' is a good defence when LJ Abuse busts you for (allegedly) posting child porn, so I don't think common sense runs too high with them. (Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

	ryuutchi 2007-12-03 05:04 pm UTC (link)
	Stupidity runs high on all sides here, methinks. (Also, posting it this way provides them with more sympathy, I guess.) (Reply to this)(Parent)

atalantapendrag
2007-12-03 08:18 am UTC (link)

I remember the secret in question, because I thought the pic was a bit questionable. Three girls, looking to be anywhere from 15 to 20 in my estimation, with their shirts off and their hands over their boobs.

I don't think the mod should have been kicked off LJ over it, but I do think it was a dumb move to post the pic. According to one of the other LJ mods, the one who actually posted the secret wasn't the one who'd coded the post, which is sort of WTFy to me.

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	atalantapendrag 2007-12-03 08:47 am UTC (link)
	ljsecret mods. headdesk (Reply to this)(Parent)

	rekall 2007-12-03 08:52 am UTC (link)
	According to someone on stupid_free, this was the secret. (Reply to this)(Thread)

	smashingstars 2007-12-03 09:00 am UTC (link)
	That seems to be confirmed by the ljseek cache here. (Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

	sisterelwood 2007-12-03 05:02 pm UTC (link)
	Anyone who thought it was a great idea to post that on a public community deserves getting banned if for no other reason than sheer stupidity. You may not agree that it's wrong to post it but, jeez, in the interest of protecting your own ass, then, use some discretion. (Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

	tunxeh 2007-12-03 07:03 pm UTC (link)
	Speaking of which, isn't it a bad idea to repost those links (which I haven't clicked and have no intention of clicking) here? (Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

	ryuutchi 2007-12-03 07:06 pm UTC (link)
	Whyso? (Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

	tunxeh 2007-12-03 07:09 pm UTC (link)
	How is posting the links to sexual photos of underage girls here any different than posting them on ljsecret in terms of bannability and criminal liability? (Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

	ryuutchi 2007-12-03 07:13 pm UTC (link)
	Depends on the admins, I suppose. After all, the image isn't being reproduced here, so... I don't know. It's questionable, but JF tends to be a little bit more lenient. (Reply to this)(Parent)

sashenka
2007-12-03 10:54 pm UTC (link)

I agree totally. I don't know that a ban was in order, but at the very least, they should have been asked to take it down and not show similar images in the future. One of the few policies deviantArt has that I really like is their policy that nude models must sign a release on every image that states that they are 18 or older and that they give permission for the image to be used on the site. I would not object to LJ having a similar policy. Those girls could easily be under 18 and may not even know that the image of them is being used in that context.

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	hallidae 2007-12-03 11:06 pm UTC (link)
	Agreed. As someone else said in the s_f comments, that falls into the Opalcat levels of modly stupidity. (Reply to this)(Parent)

wolfsamurai
2007-12-03 10:07 am UTC (link)

I think that LJ kind of went overkill on this (kind of like using nukes to clear anthills), but damn that wasn't exactly bright of that to post in the first place when it's not very clear how old they are. From what I saw, I'd guess in the neighborhood of 16, but they could just as easily be 15 or even 14. Or they could be 18-19 and fully legal (though I doubt it). They should have erred on the side of caution about posting risque images of girls that may be well underage. LJ also should have been a bit less... zealous about a permanent suspension too, perhaps just a temp suspension until the image could be taken down.

/Thoughts on Yaoi. Lack of sleep makes me chatty.

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	sparkysrevenge 2007-12-03 10:32 am UTC (link)
	I highly, highly doubt they're 18-19. I know some girls who looked youngish at that age, but those girls look, at most 16. One of them even looks 14. I'm pretty good at female age guesstimate, and those girls? Not 18. (Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

	wolfsamurai 2007-12-03 06:42 pm UTC (link)
	Yeah, I tend to agree. If they're 18-19, then I'm Santa Claus. Which makes it even more stupid that the mod would have posted it. Even allowing for the fact that they ~could~ be older, the fact that most people are going to see them as underage should have been a warning sign. (Reply to this)(Parent)

	mistressrenet 2007-12-03 08:04 pm UTC (link)
	There's also little to no way to determine where the picture came from, which is very, very problematic legally if (which seems very likely) those girls are underage. (Reply to this)(Parent)

photosinensis
2007-12-03 02:05 pm UTC (link)

I have some words for ElJay's abuse team here:

"The path of the righteous man is beset on all sides by the iniquities of the selfish and the tyranny of evil men. Blessed is he, who in the name of charity and good will shepherds the weak through the valley of darkness, for he is truly his brother's keeper and the finder of lost children. And I will strike down upon thee with great vengeance and furious anger those who attempt to poison and destroy my brothers. And you will know my name is the LORD when I lay my vengeance upon thee."

The expected reply is, "NOOOOOOOO!", to which I shall retort with gunshots.

I'd have done something similar for Halloween, but alas, I'm not quite black enough.

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	pyratejenni 2007-12-03 03:51 pm UTC (link)
	Stupidity is its own punishment. (Reply to this)

queencallipygos
2007-12-04 06:36 pm UTC (link)

On the one hand: technically, according to the strictest legal definition of pornography as I understand it to be, no, that picture (which I've now finally seen) is not pornography. The LJ team is playing it a little over-wrought right now in its reaction; it looks hinky, but a) it's not clear what ages the girls are and b) no nipple or pudenda is exposed.

On the other hand: even though people have their rights, there are some things that common sense tells you that you just don't do. It's like: okay, yes, technically I have the right to cartwheel naked through the South Bronx with a money belt around my waist hollering "I have hundred-dollar bills whee!!!!!" and technically, if someone were to rob or assault me while I was doing thus, they would be the ones guilty of the crime. But even though it's legal for me to do that, and even though any assailant I had would definitely be criminally responsible, there is no way in hell I'd go naked cartwheeling regardless.

In short: legal. But REALLY dumb.

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