Forum: Author Hangout

As far as using her name, I suspect, given what you've said about her, that there are likely several who would attempt to 'defend' her honor, thus you might face lawsuits if you use her real name. A simple solution is to simply change her last or first name. You "Dove"/"Dive" challenge is an easy fix, just perform a global search and replace before you're ready to post and you're set.

Not at all a problem. Her name was nothing like "Dove". I happened to pick "Dove" because it has a secondary meaning of a color, which was a secondary meaning of her real given name. If anyone figures out the relationship from that, Sherlock Holmes lives again.

If you change her name, I'd also suggest changing the town she worked in, though if the town she worked as a stripper in was a notorious biker town, I'd leave it as is, as no one is likely to object as it's a commonly accepted historical fact (and her defenders are unlikely to link your 'fake name' to that town), at least not without calling attention to her personal history.

I don't even remember the original town, although I knew her in Kamloops -- but never visited there, only Victoria and Vancouver in BC. I doubt I'll have much need to refer to any further detail, although I do think it's pertinent to say that she was a qualified therapist. Since she's alive in the story, there's no linkage with some horrible events preceding her death, and her death itself.

Of course, I could move her completely out of Canada, but that would remove some of our interesting interactions in cultural differences.

As I understand it, you could have your character saying, "I started working as a stripper at ... then as a prostitute at ... ". However, descriptions of that "work" might not be acceptable. Note the law also prohibits descriptions of "salacious actions" by those under 14. You cannot describe anyone under 14 watching others have sex.

I used "prepubescent" rather than a numerical age, and referred to dance.

I used "prepubescent" rather than a numerical age

I would be surprised prepubescent was not considered under 14 by Canadian law - but I'm not the one you need to convince.
The point of my post was it's not elementary, and you should ask Lazeez if in any doubt.

"Prepubescent" means, before sexual maturity, which virtually guarantees the character is younger (usually much) than 14. Instead, the key is to NOT specify how young they were

I am very disturbed by about any advice here about how to "get around" the Canadian law.
We should only discuss what may be needed to ensure that law is complied with.
It's not our arses on the line, it's Lazeez's. He is the one the Canadian authorities may come after if we step over the line.
I stress, you must ask Lazeez if in any doubt about whether the content a story is allowed by the Canadian law.
I very much doubt the law would have been framed in a way that allows what you suggest, i.e. writing "thirteen years old" would be illegal, but using either "fourteen years old" or "prepubescent" instead would be legal.

I am very disturbed by about any advice here about how to "get around" the Canadian law.

My most recent rewrite makes it clear that any actual sexual contact of the character in the story is after her 14th birthday.

I am trying to home in on how best to present it to Lazeez. From a literary standpoint, is it the intent or the practice of the Canadian law to exclude the discussion of child sex abuse as a formative factor for an older person, or is it only when discussing sexual activity of the older?

Alternatively, is the legal purpose not to glorify any sort of sexual exploitation of children, a goal with which I completely agree?

As an aside, I'm of the silent majority that, as I think Oscar Wilde called something else, "the sin that dares not speak its name." In current culture, that unmentionable sin is pedophobia. Being around children makes me ill. Had I been cast in 1984, that which would have been my room with the ultimate fear would not have been hungry rats, but children.

I am very disturbed by about any advice here about how to "get around" the Canadian law.

My most recent rewrite makes it clear that any actual sexual contact of the character in the story is after her 14th birthday. As a writer working on plot, but also honoring the memory of a strong and brave woman, I wish I could explain how much she overcame, which, not to put a better name on it, included child rape with parents that didn't care.

I am trying to home in on how best to present it to Lazeez. From a literary standpoint, is it the intent or the practice of the Canadian law to exclude the discussion of child sex abuse as a formative factor for an older person, or is it only when discussing sexual activity of the older?

Alternatively, is the legal purpose not to glorify any sort of sexual exploitation of children, a goal with which I completely agree?

As an aside, I'm of the silent majority that, as I think Oscar Wilde called something else, "the sin that dares not speak its name." In current culture, that unmentionable sin is pedophobia. Being around children makes me ill. Had I been cast in 1984, that which would have been my room with the ultimate fear would not have been hungry rats, but children.

As an aside, I'm of the silent majority that, as I think Oscar Wilde called something else, "the sin that dares not speak its name." In current culture, that unmentionable sin is pedophobia. Being around children makes me ill.

I agree with that sentiment and add any forced sexual action regardless of the force used. Force can include physical, mental, emotional or any combination of the three.

At the same time I can and will try and apply the standards of the culture and/or time period. Those can be different from the standards of current era. I don't have to like those differences but I need to keep an open mind as to their reality.

I trust you understand my comments were not an accusation, but merely to express concerns about what some posted comments seemed to suggest.
My point was you must ask Lazeez if in any doubt.
Lazeez did use the word "crap", so I think I was correct in stating I felt "disturbed".
I cannot be specific about details, but I understand the law prohibits descriptions of sexual (or even merely salacious) behaviour by those under 14. It does not prohibit a character with history of underage abuse from stating what happened to them. However, it does restrict the level of detail that can be included. Your more precise description of what you're planning sounds okay - but I do not know.
You will find Lazeez is very helpful. He is on your side. He wants authors to employ the maximum possible artistic freedom to create stories which interest readers. He just doesn't want the Canadian police knocking on his door.
I am inclined to agree with you about the "current culture". I see some elements of a mass hysteria leading to excessive legal responses, but I will comply with the laws as they are written. I envy your level of freedom. As an Australian, I must obey a law which sets the minimum age at 16, and my Member of Parliament has not responded to an email in which I asked for just the title of the Bill that introduced laws I am required to obey!

If your story depends on such descriptions, then you're clearly in violation of the law.

A story that depends on a character being 21 is not in violation of the law.

Lots of things other than character descriptions would put a character in a particular age range.

Does the story take place in a high school involving students?

Does the story take place at a college?

I had a nice exchange with Lazeez, and my language seems to be OK. Still to be finalized, but "clinical" language of underage sex, as background and not erotica, seems to be OK.

In my story, the character, based on a real person, was abused, but used it to build character.

As an example both of character and working through trauma, while I was 16 or so, I took back my power from a male family friend who had repeatedly abused me. He was bigger, but I was trained and surprised him.

Having swept him off his feet into the first part of a shoulder throw, I explained, as coldly as possible, that he still had choices, choices that I might not have had. He could choose whether or not to be dropped on his head, and he could choose whether or not to have his elbow broken.

Having an abuser crying on the floor, not actually damaged, is good for the soul.

You can't do that for every story, but if you not, even ASSTR isn't much interested in high school stories anymore

ASSTR has plenty of Naked in School stories and gets new ones, there was one recently, and they are usually set in High School.

having a character who's in high school, but which doesn't mention the grade, could range anywhere from 13 to 19 years of age (more if they were exceptionally bright, a bit slow, or got held back several times).

For someone not from America, what is the "usual" age of students when they start and finish high school, assuming they started at the normal age and were never held back or jumped a grade?

For someone not from America, what is the "usual" age of students when they start and finish high school,

this wiki page says it all

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Education_in_the_United_States.svg

I believe he was asking about countries other than the US.

Yes, EB. I'm an Australian and have a story set in America. I have not posted it yet, mainly because of age issues.
It was written before I moved over from asstr to SoL. To be legal on SoL, I could simply state all characters were in high school, but I dare not because Australia has a new law with an age limit of 16.
Can anyone tell me the title of the Australian law?
I've sent out about 10 emails just trying to find out the title of the law. It's scary not knowing if my actions are breaking a law and being unable to find out what it says.

18 under Commonwealth Laws for transmission - links below

Thanks. That was as clear as mud. :)

I'm only concerned about the Commonwealth law. Can you confirm :
1. It is safe to store written words om your computer;
2. It may be unsafe if anyone else can ever access them?

At this point I am scared about what type of stories I may agree to edit - because returning them via telecommunications equipment may be illegal unless all characters are 18+, without any doubt.

Thanks.
I will not rely on that law being interpreted rationally.
I will tell those I edit for that anything containing a number less than 18 (and various other no-no's) is unlikely to be returned. :(

The way the law is written the government is saying the description of 17 y/o having sex damages the communications network.

....That almost puts a certain infamous Senator from Alaska ("the internet is a series of tubes") on the intelligent side of things.

How does that stand up in court? Are data packets that contain "underage material" somehow clogging their data services and forcing them to send in a plumber? ;)

Note: I actually do think the description of the internet as "a series of tubes" was a rather apt metaphor, but taking it literally is another matter. Even before that incident became a meme, I know of people who referred to their internet connection (speed) as "a pipe" which would play well on the whole "series of tubes" thing.

There are numerous metaphors associated with networking. I worked for a company that was developing a Virtual Private Network application. I still have trouble understanding things like the concept of 'tunneling' in regard to the internet.

It's basically point to point encrypted communication. It leaves Network A by way of "the tunnel" at which point it is encrypted before entering the tunnel, the information is then sent over the internet until it reaches Point B where it is decrypted upon exiting "the tunnel."

Basically other Network administrators could potentially see the traffic moving across their networks between point A and point B, but beyond knowing that it's there, they don't know much of anything else about it beyond it's being encrypted.

The fact that the connections exists at fixed points, and therefor is technically "always there" makes it a virtual fixed object. Which leads to it being called a tunnel: One entrance, one exit, and "nothing to see" in between.

Of course, then you can also "tunnel" from a laptop computer which may not exist at a fixed point. But anyhow, the imagery still generally holds, it just isn't as fixed or permanent. :)

Edit to add: Getting into more complicated applications that I know other people have used. This is also often used by people to skirt around GEO-IP and other such things by placing a proxy server on "Point B" which they've often setup at a (virtual) server in the country they want to show as being from. So they'll "tunnel" from Point A to Point B over what should be a (mostly) secure connection, at which point they "come out" to the Internet at large via the proxy at Point B, and begin going about their activities.

I know of a few people who've done this to get around Geo-IP blocks to access internet content from the United States. Although some of them will skip the tunnel and just use a proxy as that's more than sufficient in most cases.

Thanks. While I understood how tunneling was accomplished, I had trouble with the concept of 'digging' a tunnel (i.e., something parallel to the network) for the network traffic to pass through.

The other way to view it is kind of like quantum tunneling. although the "nothing to see" aspect is still the key part of why it's called "tunneling."

The "tunneled" network sees network A and network B. It doesn't see the networks C, F, J, Z, T, and K which their traffic passed through to reach each other. They still transited those networks, but they essentially "tunneled under them"(or bridged over them; which is why networking is rife with terms like "tunneling" and "bridging") as you don't see them on your network. They're there, they exist, they're just not relevant to that network application.

I think you are missing my point. The tunneling analogy I was given implied the tunnel connected Point A and B, and the VPN's traffic went through the tunnel without going over the network. Which of course is not true.

Yeah, they were thinking along the lines of quantum tunneling, where it (in theory) literally skips the distance in between. No such luck with present day networking.

It still travels to the points in between. The points in between just aren't visible to the customer, and the content itself isn't readily decipherable for anyone else watching from those points in between. (Which isn't to say they can't decipher it, they're just going to have to do some work to make it happen)

Getting into more complicated applications that I know other people have used.

Probably far too much of a digression, but I'm aware of a number of ISPs that treat the entire public Internet as one more VPN (i.e., BGP/MPLS RFC2547), mapped on top of their internal address structure.

As far as Virtual Private/Public Networks go. The internet is a giant network of networks. Some of those networks are virtual as well as physical, so that model works. ;)

Particularly if you need to tunnel through a firewalled physical network to get to the internet. :)

the message is transmitted through a tunnel between two network nodes without passing over the network connection between the two network nodes.

Entirely plausible. Assume that A and B are connected to one another over a 1 gigabit connection, but both are connected C via 10 gigabit links. Assuming no other factors, especially if A, B, and C are in the same network, they'd take the fastest path defined by a modern routing protocol like OSPF. An old protocol like RIP would minimize the hop count regardless of link speed.

Things get more complex when internet policy routing (e.g., BGP) is involved. There might be a physical link, but it might be reserved for certain traffic types, or traffic originating or terminating in a node beyond the directly connected one.

The premise presented to me was the message goes through a tunnel which is separate from the network links, which is not possible.

To clarify for Lugh: The message transits from A to B by means of "a tunnel" which somehow doesn't use any network infrastructure in between. Which is physically impossible using current technology. Now if someone gets a working Ansible transceiver...

The premise presented to me was the message goes through a tunnel which is separate from the network links, which is not possible.

I'd have to see a diagram. It's entirely possible to have a tunnel between A and B that does not traverse the direct network connection between A and B. A simple graphic here really doesn't lend itself to showing how multiple virtual address paces superimpose on a physical address space.

/--------------C------------
A/=============================B

It would be entirely plausible and appropriate to have a tunnel that traverses a physical path ACB between A and B, but does not use the physical link AB.

Let me give you a nodal map to illustrate the concept I was given.

X/ ---------- A/ ----------- B/ --------- Y/

There is no physical connection from another node to nodes A and B. The message travels from X to A to B to Y, but it is not travel over the physical network segment A-B.

Can't happen. You can give A and B virtual addresses but the traffic must still pass over physical connection between A and B.

Correct, and when they're "tunneling" they just encrypt the traffic leaving X and route it to Y, where they decrypt it upon arrival. It still traveled through A and B, but those nodes couldn't "read" anything beyond the routing headers.

It also is likely that nodes A and B are "invisible" to the tunnel itself, as the VPN firewall strips that information before passing it along. (They only get the information that was encrypted; However, the VPN agents that actually did the tunneling probably retain some kind of log, so the guy who maintains it could find out where it went)

And that "invisibility" is where it can get confusing for people. You know it started at X, and finished at Y, but you don't know exactly how it got there.

The Commonwealth Criminal Code Division 10 is the law covering Infrastructure to protect physical infrastructure against damage or abuse. It is nothing to do with the protection or welfare of people. Section 474 is about the Telecommunications Hardware and Cables and their abuse or misuse as part of protecting the communications network to keep it operational. That's why most of it is about hardware and devices.

Not entirely true that it is all about protecting the infrastructure and not people.

474.10 - 474.12 deals with identity theft.

474.14 Involves the use of telecommunications network to further other crimes

474.15 using a carriage service to make threats against another person

474.16 Hoax threats

That was just from a few minutes scanning through.

I'm only concerned about the Commonwealth law. Can you confirm :
1. It is safe to store written words om your computer;
2. It may be unsafe if anyone else can ever access them?

as far as the law goes. I can only suggest that better safe than sorry is the way to go. Anyone you edit for should be able to understand the risk just is not worth it.
This type situation causes me to remember the advice I got from an old "Moonshiner" who brewed in large batches. Advice was: "You will get the same prison time for a 100 as you will for a 100k. Make sure whatever you do is worth the time."

For someone not from America, what is the "usual" age of students when they start and finish high school, assuming they started at the normal age and were never held back or jumped a grade?

Even with no hold backs and no skipped grades, there is still a little variance in the age of high school seniors (the graduating class, 12th grade). They will be either 17 or 18. The variance has to do with when your birthday falls relative to the school year.

If the reader understands that the character engaging in sexual activities (or is in an explicitly described sexual situation, then it's a no-no.

There looks like a typo in the webmaster's post. I am confident what he meant to say was:

If the reader understands that the character engaging in sexual activities (...) is under 14, then it's a no-no.

I wouldn't submit an unedited manuscript to him.

Agreed the main point is he is highly helpful when given the chance. Much easier to ask his opinion ahead of time when in honest doubt as to what would be legal. Same as it was done here, polite discussion of the topic and he responded in a very honest manner without a major fuss.

Perhaps that's the key for this situation, more than the age itself?

To Daydreamz: I'm NOT trying to single you out with this comment.
***
The key for this situation is to ALWAYS ASK LAZEEZ if in any doubt. It's as simple as that!
He knows how the law affects the site.
He wants authors to be able to submit their stories.
He will only veto something if it's needed to protect the site (and his liberty).

if you see what I mean.

I re-read your post, and I now see what you meant. :-)

There is a role for serious consideration of issues in literature, but it's a narrow perch, and it's easy to topple off of.

I like the way some writers who do have kids in their stories: keep it private yet don't really try and hide the fact the adults are having sex from them. Instead they seem to use it to teach them about safety and in some cases why everyone participating has to be a minimum age. One even went so far as to pull up the state's law regarding legal ages among other factors on the internet. Then having the kids read it with them.