There are plenty of books that describe how to commit heinous crimes...from Agatha Christie murder mysteries, to Nabakov's Lolita, to the 9/11 Commission Report, to the Bible. Should they all be banned?
This is a pointless part of the argument - we're not debating whether his book should have been banned.
And to use the history of books that have been banned is futile in this case - Where's Waldo was banned in many schools and libraries because of some boobs on a cartoon figure. . . so that's no precedence to follow. . . and I've heard various stories of the Bible being banned - Madonna's book 'Sex' was banned from some stores - and so on. . .So according to those examples - yes - a book should be able to be banned based on content. . . but that is not the issue being debated.
That has quite a chilling effect on freedom of speech. No one should have to think twice about exercising their constitutional rights due to intimidation from the government or other citizens.
The question, here, is if encouraging pedophilia is actually a constitutional right - or if it's obscenity. You cannot determine that and neither can I right now - we don't know enough to make that call. All you know is that he wrote a book about how to do it - and that's all I know, too.
Take the issue of pornography *for adults - by adults* as an example. . . even the Justices couldn't determine *exactly* what was obscene and *exactly* what was not - they just gave a generalized view on it: if someone's deemed to be "obscene" then it is not protected under the 1st Amendment.
You cannot presume that EVERYTHING is protected - because everything is NOT protected.
And it is, therefor, up to a judgement of the jury in a trial to determine this on a case-by-case basis.
No, that's not how our legal system should work. If the facts of the case are not in dispute, but the accused person is not guilty as a matter of law, then the charges should never be filed in the first place.
If you disagree with our system then that's your issue. But that IS how our system DOES function right now.
And that's, then, the purpose of a trial - to determine the facts of the case and the resolve of the issue in question. You cannot determine guilt or innocents without an investigation and a trial - etc etc. It just doesn't work that way.
Some might be assuming guilt
Others might be assuming innocents.
The only way to determine which one it is - is to have a proper trial with official procedings and make a legal call.
You're accusing people of letting their *feelings* cloud their judgment - and it seems that, since you *feel* like our judicial system is wrong and you *feel* like he should be innocent - then you are also letting your *feelings* govern your view.
And there is no landmark case in this exact situation to refer to, either. This is a first in this exact area. Other cases are vaguely close - but not quite like this. Thus, it's just common sense to permit it to procede - it might not proceed very far, it might proceed quite a ways. Who knows. He might be found innocent of the charges or he might be found guilty.
But it's actually illogical to *not* follow through with the natural course of law when someone has been accused of a crime - and when there has been proper preliminary 'evidence' to necessity a charge being filed - and a judge has examined the preliminary evidence and felt it was compelling enough to proceed legally.
Except this isn't really an area of law that is in dispute; you are simply on the wrong side of it. There have ALREADY been landmark cases in favor of freedom of speech (see:
Brandenburg v. Ohio) and the Supreme Court is not likely to continue to revisit the issue on a case-by-case basis when they've already made their position pretty clear.
You wanted an appeal to logic - yet you're specifically not doing so.
You cannot automatically throw someone in jail without a trial.
And you cannot automatically assume someone's innocent purely because what they're accused of doesn't seem like a problem *to you personally*
So - you want an appeal to logic? Then prove it by supporting a trial in which the accused is given a fair chance at justice.