Is it legal to torture women in SF?

Are the women being physically coerced? Are they adults with the full mental capacity to make an informed choice as to whether or not they want to participate? Are there agreed upon limits and/or "safe words" in the scenes that are played out? Are the women in abusive relationships or being otherwise coerced? This is a consent issue. If the women are physically, financially, mentally, and otherwise free to consent to participating, then no, this is not an issue of torture.

The flip side of this, however, is that the people who hear or see the activities happening must ALSO be consenting. If neighbors are being subjected to these sounds WITHOUT THEIR CONSENT, there is a case to be made for sexual and/or psychological abuse taking place.

To CONSENT, would YOU "consent" to torture by porn guys who ADMIT YOUR SCREAMS are real? What kind of a person ARE you?!!! Its sort of impossible to "consent" if your'e tied up and restrained. What if no one came to your aid and disregarded YOUR SCREAMS?

Your and your distancing use of "reason" and "logic" make me sick. What if was a loved one you cared about being torturerd so a bunch of male sickos could jerk off to her agony?

Do you object to all forms of S&M or just when its not done in a private fashion or when ones is paid to engage in it? Do you have specific problems with S&M porn or do you also object to the basement of the Power Exchange, the Janus society etc...

I would guess that a majority of those who engage in S&M in SF are not straight and there are likely many all male S&M video production places in the city. Do you have the same problem with those places or is it different when its straight porn? Straight porn definitely has more money it it and more relations to organized crime so there are aspects of abuse for pay rather than masochism one is less likely to find with non-straight porn, but should this tarnish all straight or bi porn?

I have a problem with anyone being tortured, male or female. I also have a problem with porn since it treats human beings (mostly women) as a collection of body parts to be used for recreation, it treats humans like things, not people.

When women or men are seen as objects (like beer cans, drugs or any recreational substance) its easier to abuse them

There is a difference between free choice and coersion. If any "choice" has an element of coersion, its NOT a choice since choice and coersion are mutually exclusive.

Those of you making the torture accusations against kink.com, have you taken a look at their website's listing of model's rights and the obligations of the director? If these are indeed implemented as written, there is no illegal activity happening, no torture.

http://www.kink.com/modelrights.php

http://www.kink.com/shootingrules.php

(btw, there is no imagery on these pages, so don't worry about seeing something you don't want to)

You say you have a problem with anyone being tortured but that doesnt really clarify what you think about S&M, be in what is going on at Kink or what many people engage in at home (many by themselves I might add). Good Vibes sells lots of books on safe S&M (mush of it targetted at straight and nonstraight female buyers) and most of it revolves more around fetish rather than pain and could hardly be called torture, but some people enjoy slightly heavier stuff. Am I morally wrong and evil if I like to get spanked? What if I like to have someone lightly whip me in a way where it wakes me up more than it really hurts? What if I just like to eat really bitter chocolate or skinny dip in freezing lakes?

Broadly condemning S&M as torture blurs the problem with harder questions around activities people engage in for pay that they do not enjoy. Do I debase myself by destroying my body by working on an asembly line? What about gay for pay male porn stars who dont really enjoy it but dont really mind much either? What about prostitution? Is work only evil if it involves non-monetary coersion and sexuality?

Torture is defined as *involuntary abuse* inflicted by those with overwhelming power, such as in Abu Gahrab prison, upon a helpless victim. The victim can not stop the torture.

S&M is a game, a voluntary imitation of torture which can be stopped when the person(s) want to stop. This is a great difference.

Utopia: if, according to their website, the employees of kink.com are engaging in consensual BDSM play, and you agree that BDSM play is not torture, than what exactly is your problem with kink.com? Is it because the women who "witnessed" the screaming were unwillingly subjected to watching/listening to the scenes? What "crime" is being committed?

Do you actually believe kink.com's site? Where is the outrage? Are all of you who posted replies uncaring about the disgusting images of tortured women? Where is your humanity?

All these ethical semantic contortions are as non logical as they are ridiculous.
("Do I debase myself if working on an assembly line?" "Do the women have free choice" etc etc)

These "justifications" are just as idiotic as meat eaters who accused vegans of killing animals if they accidently kill bacteria.

This so-called "culture" is totally depraved. Not one poster spoke up in behalf of the women. You all have no guts.

Utopia, again, what crime is being committed here? What exactly is it that we should be outraged about? Yes, if you're not into BDSM, these images are disturbing. Yes, if you have not consented to hearing or watching BDSM play, you have every right to be upset and offended. But this is not the case, and yes, I do believe kink.com's website, because it has been confirmed by press interviews of employees and as someone with friends in the BDSM community I know of kink.com's higher-than-average ethical standards when it comes to treatment of models/performers.

As for outraged, i'm a bit outraged at the way you're infanitlizing the women who work for kink.com, assuming that they can't make informed choices and need us to decide for them that no, they haven't consented to modeling and despite every indication to the contrary, they they really are being tortured and it's up to us to "save" them because we know what's best.

Well, if they were tied up and did not consent, that could sue, and would, they could also file police reports, ect
So the idea that they are tied up and therefore can't consent is a red herring