I’m encouraged that Ashcroft’s renewal of the porn wars has re-entered the notice of the mainstream — this time via blogs — but I’m also frustrated. Why? Because I’ve been saying since the inception of this blog that pornography’s legitimacy has always been tenuous. And that we were only one Republican Administration step away from seeing a renewal of the ultra-right engaging in a moral crusade against pornography, free speech, and privacy. I’m encouraged that Reason magazine points to some of the seminal sources I mentioned yesterday* — Comstock law, Adam & Eve — yet frustrated to see Reason point out via Extreme Associate Robert Zacari:
“For example, why is pornography held to a higher standard of decorum than other genres of pop culture? Are the two amateurishly simulated murders in Forced Entry somehow more offensive than the dozens of expertly simulated murders in Jason vs. Freddy or Gangs of New York? Is the difference between eating semen-spattered dog food in a porn movie and eating raw pig rectums on Fear Factor really so pronounced that the former deserves a jail sentence while the latter becomes a prime-time major network staple?”
Well, just where do you think the FCC crackdown is headed? First, it’ll be Howard Stern (with Clear Channel’s Republican big-shot owner kowtowing to the pressure), then it’ll be things like Fear Factor and Freddy.
Likewise, I’m frustrated to see how closely today’s Porn War parallels that which surrounded the Meese Commission. I went into Time magazine’s archive yesterday and sought its Sex Busters: A Meese commission and the Supreme Court echo a new moral militancy. (July 21, 1986.)** Oh, the names are different then than now — Meese/Ashcroft; Falwell, Robertson/La Rue, Burgess — but the sentiments are the same. Moralists rarely change their arguments, just their tactics. Their ultimate strategy this time appears to be severing porn’s infrastructure within the (so-called) free market system via the FCC and the Justice Department. Hell, if the FCC witchhunt can bring about substantive changes, what’s to think a parallel effort by the Justic Department won’t as well?
And you shouldn’t be too surprised by this. After all, Bush not only verbally pledged to “make it a point to enforce obscenity laws,” he signed a letter of committment with the American Family Association (via Reason). If you voted for Bush, you enabled this to happen. And don’t give me that “Republicanism isn’t about this” crap. The Republican party has been about this crap ever since the religious right co-opted their way into the party more than twenty years ago. They’ve been a staple influence for decades now; just wait and see what happens with the party platform, come convention time.
Worse case scenario, should the government destroy the American adult, it’s not the porn companies that’ll suffer. It’s us, the average American consumer. The porn industry will simply go off-shore and resume business — but our access to it will be interrupted and hampered. Mail order will become difficult because legal rulings and offshoring will disrupte the entire distribution system as it exists now. Hotel porn channels might become a thing of the past and adult bookstores might disappear because they won’t be able to stock best-selling merchandise. We’ll likely have the Internet, but who knows what kind of blocking mechanisms might be able to keep us from global porn in the future? Yes, I’m being overly dramatic about the possibilities, but think about the logical consequences of a successful crack-down.
I’ve long thought the ultra-right, social conservative movement would love nothing more than to undermine every modern law and ruling that’s favored private choice and freedom. I see no reason why, if Ashcroft can convict a few pornographers, it won’t ultimately lead us back to the days of Comstock. I think they’re like nothing better than destroy Miller vs. California and every other ruling which shook Comstock out of America’s common law hair.
Eigtheen years ago, the Meese Commission report included within its pages a set of guidelines for citizen’s actions. Hmm, let me get out my two volumes of the report to quote specifically:
“While citizens should and must rely heavily on official government action to ensure that obscenity and pornography-related laws are enforced, there are a number of alternative remedies available to them in their effort to control the proliferation of pornography in their community. The private actions initiated by groups or individuals are often as effective as a government-initiated action. For example, citizens can organize pickets and economic boycotts against producers, distributors and retailers of ponographic materials. They can also engage in lettering writing campaigns and media events designed to inform the public about the impact of pornographic materials on the community.” (Final Report, July 1986, pg. 1313.)
Remember when Playboy and Penthouse got yanked from 7-Eleven magazine racks? For every high profile example like that one, a half-dozen less visible examples also occurred back then, including the outlawing of sex toys in Kansas.
But what I’d like to suggest is we apply those citizen actions in countervoice. Attend every adult entertainment convention you can. Up the number of purchases you make your local adult toy store, whether its a brick-and-mortar or virtual store. Buy from as many outlets you can afford to, whether it’s Adam & Eve, Adam & Steve, or Amazon. Drive up the consumer numbers and CREATE SUCH A PORN BOOM that the media will have no choice but see as a consumer backlash to Ashcroft and the social conservatives. Write letters to the administration and tell them to keep their hands off your porn. And for Pete’s sake, consider withdrawing your vote for them next time around because second terms are often embraced as “mandates from the public” by winning incumbents.
Do something. Just don’t sit there and whine in your blog.
If you don’t care about porn, but see Ashcroft’s efforts as an assault on personal freedom or as a terrible misuse of resources in light of today’s fight against terrorism, then fucking complain to the administration. Do something about it. Just don’t site back and complain.
And hey, don’t say I didn’t warn you. As long as a Republican administration hold power, you can expect this kind of crap.
* Consider getting a copy of Helen Lefkowitz Horowitz’s book, “Rereading Sex: Battles over Sexual Knowledge and Suppression in Nineteenth-Century America” to see how obscenity law formed in this country. The Reason article only just taps into the topic.
** The Time magazine article is only availabe to subscribers. I suggest that if you have a subscription to it or any other long-running weekly, you comb its archives and bone up on what happened back in the Meese days of office. Know what came before and how little the moralists’ arguments have changed over the last century.
