lightrasp1664881197 Posted May 12, 2009 Share Posted May 12, 2009 <p>Thanks to Rep. Kathi-Anne Reinstein (D-Revere), it may soon be illegal to take nude photographs of people over 60 - even your spouse. HB 1668 ( Massachusetts )"...Commonwealth of Massachusetts is essentially declaring that individuals over 60 are no longer consenting adults with sexual proclivities. If you're a sexually active sixty-one year old man with a bit of life left in the ol ' joint, you are no longer free to take licentious images of yourself and email them around to your recently-widowed paramours. And the statute that prohibits this activity is the same one used to convict perusers of child pornography.</p><p>IF YOU'VE HAD ENOUGH OF GOVERNMENT INTERFERENCE write to:</p><p><br /> KATHI-ANNE REINSTEIN<br /> State Representative<br /> 16th Suffolk District<br /> Revere-Chelsea-Saugus <br /> State House-Room 171<br /> Boston, MA 02133<br /> <br /> PLEASE NOTE: If you have sent an email without attaching your name address and telephone number to it, it will not be replied to by this office. <br /> </p> Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
vrankin Posted May 12, 2009 Share Posted May 12, 2009 <p>Yuck!</p> Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
brucecahn Posted May 12, 2009 Share Posted May 12, 2009 <p>Govt. gets more and more ridiculous. What will they do next? Invade Lesotho?</p> Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jennifer_spencer Posted May 12, 2009 Share Posted May 12, 2009 <p>Okay, I am confused by the inconsistencies in MA. I mean, gay marriage is okay in MA. But you'd better not take nude pictures of anyone over sixty. This is one boring state, MA. Everyone's married and they are cracking down on porn! </p> <p>Seriously, I guess it just bothers me that they claim to be busy lifting restrictions on civil liberties but the same time they are making new ones. Seems hypocritical. I would think many people over age sixty would be ticked off about this. Some of them must have been part of the Free Love movement. Hasn't Rep Reinstein done the math on that? </p> Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lightrasp1664881197 Posted May 12, 2009 Author Share Posted May 12, 2009 <p>BTW she also wants the "Fluffernutter" Peanut Butter & Marshmallow Fluff to be the state sandwich...</p> Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
joshroot Posted May 12, 2009 Share Posted May 12, 2009 <p>Do keep in mind that your emails and letters will carry a lot more weight if you are a resident of MA. If you don't live there, you don't vote for her, she's not going to care. That's the world of politics. It's hard enough to get an elected official to pay attention to you if you are in their district. If you are in another state, good luck.</p> Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jenkins Posted May 12, 2009 Share Posted May 12, 2009 <p>I reckon her 61 year old husband just sent a bunch of nudey pictures of her to Silver Fox Naked.</p> Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
joshroot Posted May 12, 2009 Share Posted May 12, 2009 <p>Overall, after reviewing HB 1668 it just looks like a stupidly written bill. The concept of not allowing people who cannot give their own informed consent (children, those with mental problems, etc) to be exploited is a pretty common one. And as much as we dislike this particular bill, older people get taken advantage of. Particularly when their mental faculties start to go.</p> <p>However, this bill is written is such a lame bush league way that I'm surprised anyone would be stupid enough to try and gather support for it. It is obvious to anyone (or should be) that there is no blanket age that you can lay down and say "anyone older than this is a mental child who cannot decide for themselves".</p> Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
daverhaas Posted May 12, 2009 Share Posted May 12, 2009 <p>To paraphase a line by Cary Grant in Operation Petticoat:</p> <p>When a girl is under 21, she's protected by law. When she's over 65, she's protected by nature. Anywhere in between, she's fair game. <br> :-)</p> Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
john_h.1 Posted May 12, 2009 Share Posted May 12, 2009 <p>The rest of the bill, involving making nude photographs people deemed mentally incompetent by a court or children for lascivious intent (as opposed to other reasons) seems fine as these are classes that need protection. The sixty years age limit is arbitrary and troubling however.</p> Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tomwatt Posted May 12, 2009 Share Posted May 12, 2009 <p>Since I live in Mass., I'm better served by bringing this nonsense to the attention of my local Rep, who can stand up against this stupidity. Unbelievable. But then, there's no end to the follies going on here... always something stirring.</p> Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lightrasp1664881197 Posted May 12, 2009 Author Share Posted May 12, 2009 <p>Thomas,</p> <p>Thank you -</p> <p>John</p> Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mariodennis Posted May 12, 2009 Share Posted May 12, 2009 <p>Competency or the ability to give consent is a legal right that can only be restricted (in my state) by a circuit (superior) court after a hearing in which the respondent is represented by legal counsel. I don't believe that a legislative body can remove that right by passing a law. I suspect there would be constitutional issues to be considered.<br> IOW, I suspect that this law would be thrown out the first time that 60 year old Joe takes a nude photo of 60 year old Jane and in some way makes it public and someone complains. Unless Jane had been deemed incompetent and appointed a guardian, she may be free to pose nude whenever she and Joe want.</p> Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
James G. Dainis Posted May 12, 2009 Share Posted May 12, 2009 Although younger people like to think that they invented sex, please be advised that many people well over 60 years of age still have active sex lives. James G. Dainis Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bobatkins Posted May 12, 2009 Share Posted May 12, 2009 <p>It's about time someone clamped down on all the geriatric porn that's flooding the country....Oh, wait, there isn't any...</p> <p>If mental competance is the issue, there should be a ban on nude photography of MA state representatives.</p> <p>I can wait for the AARP to take a position on this issue.</p> Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lex_jenkins Posted May 12, 2009 Share Posted May 12, 2009 <p>I can just about guarantee that ol' Kathi-Anne just stirred up the wrong hornet's nest. There is no more politically sensitive demographic than voters over age 60. They're battle hardened, have disposable income and a helluva lotta time on their hands with which they can make a politician's life miserable.</p> Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jpo3136b Posted May 12, 2009 Share Posted May 12, 2009 <p>The way I had it explained to me one time was: if you speak an insult, it's slander; but, if you publish an insult, it's libel. I bet an attorney could use existing libel laws to protect a client, regardless of age; and, I bet there's a bunch of historical decisions already supporting the idea that people who can't consent because their reasoning ability is limited would somehow receive the benefit of the community's decision. There's probably an extremely limited "need" for such a law.</p> <p>My first suspicion is that it's some kind of shameless political pandering to appease someone for some kind of political gain. That, or it's a deliberate lowball move to promote failure or sap the strength out of something. Maybe some type of thing where someone would say, "Well, I tried to protect you; but so-and-so voted against it. Therefore, he's in favor of nude photos of old people." Some type of trap like that.</p> <p>My guess is that if such an idea were passed, there'd be someone somewhere who'd figure out a way to get the thing to backfire into saying that everyone over 18 and under 60 were automatically consenting if they were photographed nude.</p> <p>Another way it could backfire would be, if it were a law, and someone used it one time, then maybe it would lay down some kind of groundwork for asserting that it was true that people over the age of 60 weren't mentally sound by virtue of their age alone. Not being of sound mind makes a citizen ineligible for a whole slew of decisions, many of them legal and financial. This pitfall alone could make such a protection a tool for aggression, effectively victimizing the people it was intended to protect. </p> <p>Anytime you give standing orders in government, you have to think ahead about potential unintended consequences. Looks to me like this idea would need to be revised. It'd probably be more efficient and effective to lend support to the use of existing laws. Just saying. I'm not over 60, but I feel that overall this sounds like a bad idea. J.</p> Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jenkins Posted May 12, 2009 Share Posted May 12, 2009 <p>More info:<br> http://www.boingboing.net/2009/05/04/massachusetts-wants.html<br> http://www.mass.gov/legis/member/k_r1.htm</p> Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
freewolf Posted May 12, 2009 Share Posted May 12, 2009 <p>Coming soon... forced euthanasia for the inconvenient elderly...</p> Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lightrasp1664881197 Posted May 12, 2009 Author Share Posted May 12, 2009 <p>looks as if she has put on a few years & #'s since that was taken:</p> <p> <p>pretty soon that 'Whippersnapper' will be our age</p> Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lex_jenkins Posted May 12, 2009 Share Posted May 12, 2009 <p>Good points, John. Upon first reading this thread I immediately thought of Ira Levin's under-appreciated dystopian novel <em>This Perfect Day</em> in which despite advances in science that create nearly homogenous humans, somehow age 60 is considered the upper limit and few wonder why nearly everyone dies at that age. As the story unfolds it becomes clear that youth is prized in this highly controlled society because the young are easily duped, not only by conformity but by the illusion of rebellion that only masks another conformity.</p> Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jim_momary Posted May 12, 2009 Share Posted May 12, 2009 <p>Well, crossing Ma off the list of retirement places, just in case I needed to make some supplemental money in my retirement!<br> Drat!</p><div></div> Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lightrasp1664881197 Posted May 12, 2009 Author Share Posted May 12, 2009 <p>http://www.comstockfilms.com/blog/tony/2009/04/10/banned-in-boston-making-films-about-older-adult-sexuality/</p> Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
akajohndoe Posted May 13, 2009 Share Posted May 13, 2009 <p>I suppose a picture of a 40 year old taken 20 years ago falls into the chasm this bill defines.</p> Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bms Posted May 13, 2009 Share Posted May 13, 2009 <p>Well, sounds pretty unconstitutional to me...... ? Stupid.</p> Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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