But I stand behind the essay. It's harsh and deals with a touchy subject and there are very touchy subjects inside it. But facts are facts, and I took it where I took it.
Jim Little
An attempt to discourage the sale of X-rated material in the city of Fairview Heights will have to wait for additional legal research before it can be considered by the City Council.
English 101
Mr. Lovin
10/01/2008
Do you have any idea exactly how pornography (porn) is defined? I didn't and to be honest the definition makes me want to petition for my soul due to the images viewed while google(ing) the words "hole in one". Didn't we all have a childhood friend who found his father's "dirty magazines" and we learned what nudity was (maybe it's a guy thing)? So, what happened when we flipped through those pages (rhetorical)? There is no trauma, nobody became sexually abused by those images. Just take a look at some definitions I found on the topic.
Pornography - obscene writings, drawings, photographs, or the like, esp. those having little or no artistic merit.[1]
Obscene - offensive to morality or decency; indecent; depraved; abominable; disgusting; repulsive.[2]
With those definitions, I oddly find myself wanting to defending pornography. My Question is who defines porn for me? Who decides what should and shouldn't be protected under the freedom of speech?
Shouldn't words like obscene, offensive to morality, disgusting, repulsive, dirty, and other such words, shouldn't those extremely harsh words be reserved for the 4% of all priest who served in the US from 1950 to 2000 who face some sort of sexual accusation[3] along with other sexual predators? That percent, "4%" came from the Catholic Church, the Catholic Church tends to hide such things and has an interest in keeping that percentage as low as possible. There's not much question the percentage is probably double. You see, in my mind pornography is and image, it harms no one. Some of the main critics such as religion have practiced activities that actually do harm people.
There is a song by Apocalyptica called "I'm Not Jesus". Following are links to the lyrics and video. http://www.lyricsmode.com/lyrics/a/apocalyptica/im_not_jesus.html> It's just a song, possible from the imagination of the writer, possible written by someone who had been violated by the worse of the worse sex offenders. Such as those offenders who hide behind the bible or hold political office easily gain the trust of children, and the parents of those children whom were abuse. In one single disgustingly horrible act the fictional priest takes trust, childhood, innocence, religion, God, hope, and love while replacing it with hatred, fear, and torment.
Long before there was a United States of America there was religion and religion is one of the biggest, probably original critic of pornography. Freedom of speech, religion, and pornography are all related.
One question we were given with this topic was. Is pornography harmful to women? Women and men in the pornography industry participate with their own free will and I assume get paid very well for there work. No, pornography does not harm women.
A stretch of that question might be. Would pornography in and of itself cause a person to perform a sex crime on another simply from the viewing of it? Japan has the lowest sex crime rate in the industrialized world and is noted for is large output of rape fantasy pornography.[4]
The argument of pornography as a cause for crime just doesn't mix. That isn't to say that some mentally unhealthy individual might not try to live out some deranged fantasy he may have viewed in porn. The same goes for violence in movies, music, or pictures.
Is pornography offensive? That is a very simple question to answer. Yes, absolutely. Some think beach volleyball is offensive. There isn't anything in this world someone won't find offensive. Luckily, there is a simple solution to this problem. Don't participate in it. Your opinion on what is acceptable is just that, "YOU'RE OPINION". Assumable Japanese rape fantasy porn is something that I would find offensive, so I wont view it, it's just that simple. However, if that type of porn is something you like to view it should be your choice. If nobody is hurt in the making or viewing and it's all consenting adults, where is the problem?
Should porn be viewable in public areas? No, that would be impractical and nobody wants that. What about children viewing porn? Of course not. There should be age limits just as in alcohol consumption and gambling. However if adults choose to purchase and view such materials in the confines of their homes, who has the right to say they can not?
Look at how the sale of porn is discouraged. The following is a section of a news story when and adult store was trying to open in Fairview Heights.
St. Clair Journal. By J.W. Campbell 2006. 1 Oct 2008
City May tax X-rated Material
Attorney will research the matter before it is considered by Fairview Heights council.
Kinda makes me wonder how many if any of those council members have "dirty" magazine hidden away in their homes.
Let's take a very small glance at the behavior of some of the judges of freedom of speech.
Seattle-Post-Intelligencer Reporters. By Chris McGann and Kathy Mulady 2005. 1 Oct 2008
Gay sex scandal rocks Spokane
Mayor denies he abused boys in 1970s or misused his office
West confirmed to The Spokesman-Review of Spokane that he offered gifts, favors and a City Hall internship during Internet chats with a man he believed was 18. The online pen pal was actually a forensic computer expert working for the newspaper. After the story hit the newsstands yesterday, West sent city staffers a remorseful e-mail.
"I want to sincerely apologize to you personally for the shame I have brought to the Mayor's office and the city," West wrote. "I stumbled and let you down."
The accusations of child molestation stem from The Spokesman-Reviews three-year investigation and interviews with two felons who said West fondled them and forced them to perform sexual acts on him when they were Boy Scouts
This guy wants to "sincerely apologize". Are you kidding me? This guy and all others brings to mind another controversial topic, the death sentience. If he molested those two men when they were Boy Scouts he desires major or capital punishment.
There are literally hundreds if not thousands of these stores from the toe tapping Senator Larry Craig’s bathroom antics, to Senator Mark Foley’s sexual predatory behavior with male pages, to the 69-page document with the seal of Pope John XXIII that was sent to every bishop in the world. It instructs a policy of 'strictest' secrecy in dealing with allegations of sexual abuse and threatens to excommunication those who speak out.[5] Pope John XXIII should have been excommunication for sending that document. In my mind severely punished.
These are the groups and people who tell us that porn is acceptable or not, what is and what isn't acceptable under the freedom of speech. Personally I think my judgment on what is acceptable to me should be my choice and not what hypocritical perverts think is acceptable. My moral judgments and theirs couldn't be further apart, thankfully.
Last note. There are many offshoots from the subjects in my essay. Do to limits, what was discussed is what I decided to focus on. Only a relatively small percentage of priest and politicians are hypocritical child molesters, and possible not all porn should be allowed. I chose to focus on hypocrites and their judgments.
References
1. http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/pornography
2. http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/obscene
3. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roman_Catholic_sex_abuse_cases
4. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pornography#Effect_on_sex_crimes5. http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2003/aug/17/religion.childprotection
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