Sexual abuse image offences and the normalisation of children as pornographic objects
It is no exaggeration to suggest that handing down light, suspended sentences to child sex abuse image offenders such as Edwards or Melleney is part of a whole-scale remaking of society. Today, children in child sexual abuse image cases are not treated as real, sentient, vulnerable, or valued. When it comes to sentencing, such children are instrumentalised as the (unfortunate) means by which the perpetrators of these offences, who are treated as real, sentient, vulnerable and valued, get their sexual satisfaction.
Child sexual abuse image offences are being gradually redefined through lenient sentencing patterns as part and parcel of ordinary or regular habits of pornography consumption. This is having a transformative effect upon the wider society, reshaping who we think we are and the values we purport to hold dear.
A society which may be presumed (tacitly) to have consented to a widening definition of pornography to include the distribution and consumption of child sexual abuse images is a society which, by default, is presumed to want access to the market in child sexual abuse – just as the public might be presumed to want easy and affordable access to any other product (rental properties, broadband, alcohol). Such a society has placed a very low premium on child safeguarding and a very high premium indeed on adult sexual cliches such as ‘forbidden love’ or the ‘last taboo’. Long term, children sold or otherwise folded into the sexual exploitation and pornography industries are the price to be paid for adult sexual self- indulgence.
There is a need at the national level for a serious review of the legal distinction between ostensibly non-contact offences involving child sexual abuse images (and attracting lenient sentencing) and contact child sexual abuse offences under sections 5-8 of the Sexual Offences Act 2003. It is time to abolish this distinction.