" . . . people like to point to the author's explanation of the pictures as proof of their innocent nature . . . "

Exactly. Not even "He said, she said," just "He said." Hence the need for further inquiry. Why is that apparently so hard to understand???

It's never actually stated in the article that any of the adults' penises were at any time visible to the children. I understand that your penis hysteria perhaps clouded your thinking process, but it's actually possible for a man to urinate without anyone seeing his genitalia! Simply by rotating the body 180 degrees, and then craning the neck to smile for the camera, it is indeed quite easy to simultaneously urinate on a campfire and mug for a photo, with the penis not visible to anyone located behind the urinater. In fact, I've done it myself!

And on a separate point, with all due respect, your notions of allowable nudity in families are culturally shallow and subjectively-driven. Do some homework on nudist colonies and naturalist philosphy, and then see if you can polish up some of your theories of human psychology. Of course, if your penis hysteria is deeper-seated and a product of your personality, well, all bets are off.

Honestly, that seems to be your take here. That some how, people just should have known that the pictures, which none of us have seen, just weren't possibly exploitive.

I really can not see how it is physically possible for a social worker to look at a picture of a naked kid and know why it was taken.

I definitely don't know how a lawyer, or a cop, who have not studied exploited children as part of their degree programs could either.

What I see is people upset that an innocent man was investigated, that he possibly had his good name dragged through the mud, although negative consequences are mentioned because of that name dragging.

He doesn't mention friends ceasing to speak to him, or the lose of income due to this investigation, which leads me to believe that however people were contacted, they were contacted with grace and decorum by DFCS with little or no information provided.

And finally, as to the issue of warrantless searches by child protective services, which again did not happen in this case, and may not exist as the author’s lawyer is the only one who mentions such a thing. The laws of the state were written to allow this, these laws, written by law makers, many of whom are lawyers, were determined not to violate the bill rights by the Supreme Court. So what's at issue?

I guess what is bothering me in this is the presumption that the social workers are not trained experienced individuals. That presumption is just baseless, and ignorant.

No one wants to be investigated, but it is necessary in our world. Sometimes innocent people get accused of crimes they didn't commit. It's horrible, but it is the cost of a fallible system, which is better than no system at all.

Grow up; you can't protect everyone from everything. All you can do is try and protect those who are too young, and too weak to hire a lawyer. Grown ups have the ability to defend themselves, and sometimes they have to. How the hell is a kid supposed to defend themselves if we stack the system against them?

"Finally, although people like to point to the author's explanation of the pictures as proof of their innocent nature,...."

The author wasn't the only adult there. His best pal was there as well.

"The laws of the state were written to allow this, these laws, written by law makers, many of whom are lawyers, were determined not to violate the bill rights by the Supreme Court."

Exactly, and rightly so. Which is why, as I have made abundantly clear, we are simply continuing the same process by re-addressing, clarifying, and amending these laws. Exactly as I and the author have proposed.

"I guess what is bothering me in this is the presumption that the social workers are not trained experienced individuals. That presumption is just baseless, and ignorant."

I said nothing of the sort. Public officials include trained social workers. For some reason unknown to me you are hung up on this. I have nothing against licensed social workers.

Finally, I'm going to put this as simply and anecdotally as I can, for the sake of clarity. If:

A) I have a photograph of my child in the bathtub, and

B) a drugstore worker subjectively interprets this as pornographic, and if

C) the law requires mandatory reporting by the worker, and

D) the law is set up so that mandatory reporting leads directly to mandatory full-blown investigation (which includes contacting my employer, child's teachers, etc.), then this system is faulty. Broken. Needs to be fixed. Not destroyed, not scrapped. But fixed. Specifically, at point 'D'. Maybe it takes your losing your job, or having your identity smeared, or having to change careers from a false investigation, in order for you to comprehend the need for fixing this problem. But it shouldn't have to: you're rational adults. It's actually possible to believe that child welfare protection is of utmost importance AND ALSO that poorly written legislation which results in illegitimate investigations of innocent citizens is undesirable.

Yes, we do know penises were visible to the 8 year old girl, the author himself said they took a picture of everyone pissing in the campfire.

I have no hysteria about penies, stop trying to fog the issue by attacking the commenter instead of addressing the actions in question.

The fact is MOST child experts BY FAR think it is inappropriate for a father to reveal his genetailia to his young daughter. It is wrong. It USUALLY is part of worse actions and even if it isn't, it leaves the girl with no sense of boundaries and often leads to a pubescense without boundaries.

Children do not have the brain neurons, experience, knowledge, or understanding to interpret nuances, or the strength to say no. They are not mature enough to say no, to understand a lot of differences between good and bad "touching" or "showing". That is why sex is best left to adults. As are innocent situations that have sexual references. Kids just don't have the tools to handle them the way we do.