Horror No. 4: Kiddy Porn.

Here it is, Man Arrested for Looking at Child Porn at UNO Library. And I just started this blog yesterday with the intention of documenting all the horrible things that can happen in your library.

The goal here is just to document news stories as I find them. I was fully expecting to have Regular Porn (Horror No. 18) or Murder (Horror No. 6) appear first before we got to Child Pornography.

Librarians understand that Child Pornography will always be a problem at libraries. As long as we allow Internet access, we allow the Child Porn to flow freely into our lives. I'm not sure if librarians thought about this back in the early 1990s when the first graphical browsers were created. All I remember thinking was how damn long it took for an image to load through my work computer that I loathed visiting any site with more than one 22 kb picture on it.

For every librarian who tries to block Child Porn from the library, you will find twenty others who will fight for Free Speech. The only way libraries will get rid of the child porn is when the Internet Providers decide to block it. And since most of those are public companies, why don't their shareholders demand that it's blocked?

And it doesn't matter how abhorrent the crime, there will always be defenders who will find some comparison with something rational that will make your feelings appear irrational:

"You know who else feels that way? George Bush."
Which one, the father or the son?
"Does it really matter?"

There is always another argument down the road you need to win.

"If you're going to execute Child Molesters (Library Horror No. 1), then how soon until you descend that slippery-slope toward executing Cat Owners (Library Horror No. 45, and not to be confused with Library Cats, Horror No. 21)?"

And that's what's absurd. We have no plans to execute cat owners. Not today, anyway. I have 44 other horrors to deal with first.

That's why there are crimes where you just need to act. Society needs to move to a point where when you call 911 on some guy who molested a child, the operator just says, "Okay, I'll dispatch a car in about 20 minutes. Whatever happens to the perp between now and then will not be investigated by the officers. Don't make me spell it out. Just be creative."

And don't ask why Kiddy Porn is only Horror No. 4. Since I anticipate more stories this year about child molestation in libraries, I decided to leave a few gaps at the top.

And why is Murder only No. 6? Dunno. Sure, Murder is horrible, but we've become so desensitized toward violence that the "coolness" factor of seeing a real live murder victim outweighs the "ick" factor. And I'm assuming that the victim deserved it, like in a gang turf war, or something. The murder of an innocent person is not cool at all.

So you should understand that the numbering system is entirely subjective and should not dissuade you from converting the Horrors into a family fun board game like BINGO.