community impact

[fetishdj]

Suggestions? Launch a mission into space to find a planet we can colonise for ourselves...

Unfortunately, I think Sweden is one of the more enlightened countries in this regard. Though I have found it strange that parts of Scandanavia (not sure which parts) have laws which forbid the drinking of alcohol in the presence of minors (in case it corrupts them into thinking drinking is ok) but has very few problems with public nudity (it being the land of running naked into the plunge pool after a sauna). In this country the opposite is true - drinking is restricted but not too much whereas nudity or anything sexual is an abhorrance.

In truth, however, in terms of 'indecency' (however you may define it) the reality is that the law is effectively impotent. It is a sop to the conservative masses because in truth the enforcement of the law is next to impossible. Take the now largely obsolete in many countries sodomy laws. IN theory, under that law, it is illegal to have anal sex with your legal partner in the privacy of your own home. So, how do they investigate this? How do they prove it? Would they even bother to try to prove it unless they had another reason to want to arrest and detain the person involved? The police have neither the time nor the resources to look into these minor crimes that have no immediate and obvious social impact so they tend not to. Prosecution will only occur if you get caught (doing it in public, someone dobs you in, your wife complains to the police) or the police are investigating you for something else (your wife has been murdered, there is forensic evidence that you had anal intercourse with her, they suspect you murdered her but cannot prove it so they use the sodomy law as an excuse to arrest you).

Personally I do not beleive that the government or the law should have any say in personal, consensual activities but increasingly it seems to be the case.

[TomOfSweden]

Though I have found it strange that parts of Scandanavia (not sure which parts) have laws which forbid the drinking of alcohol in the presence of minors (in case it corrupts them into thinking drinking is ok)

If I remember correctly this isn't Scandinavian but a British obscure law which nobody takes seriously. No, Sweden has no law of the kind.

but has very few problems with public nudity (it being the land of running naked into the plunge pool after a sauna).

The idea that the human body is somehow shameful and should be covered has an interesting background and isn't a particularly old idea. The entire concept of "privacy" and personal space wasn't invented until the 19'th century. Hiding your body is an off-shoot of this. Why this never got a hold in Scandinavia has more to do with how poor and culturally backward we were in the 19'th century. ...when these ideas spread through Europe. Rather than us having a different value system or something like it. We got rich/educated in a very short time, and the idea of the shameful body were receding in the west before us Scandinavians joined civilisation.

Civilisation just allows us to learn loads of more things. There's nothing that says that civilised ideas are necessarily good ideas.