Pro-Porn Rulings Put Children in Danger

By Charlene Israel
CBN News Producer

CBN.com – (CBN News) - Freedom of speech is a protected right of every citizen of the United States of America, but are commercial pornographers hiding behind free speech to infringe on the rights of the young and innocent?

Eighteen-year-old Janell is just like any other Internet-savvy teenager, but when she posted a normal picture of herself on a seemingly innocent Web site, she saw more than what she wanted.

Janell commented, “It would be like, oh my gosh, I don't need to see that…girls who don't have much on and guys without shirts."

The site that Janell logged onto requires that you post a picture of yourself so that others who visit the site can view it and rate your looks.

But Janell says that good ratings for her appearance soon turned into requests for pornographic photos.

"Sometimes they'd ask for more pictures, and they'd make it short and to the point – ‘do you have more pictures -- are they naked?’" Janell said.

As a Christian, Janell's mother Mindy was not too happy about her daughter submitting her photo online, but she was outraged at how pornographers took advantage of what appeared to be an innocent request for a picture.

"There are sites that hook young people into an attitude of viewing themselves, communicating in a seductive way that only feeds into the deeper, darker stuff," Mindy said.

Pornography, including child pornography, has become one of the most dominant features of the Internet. But pornography was a growing national problem decades before the Internet came along. So what opened the floodgates for it in America?

The battle over pornography has often been fought for decades in courtrooms across this country, with some cases going all the way to the Supreme Court.

A 1964 case produced one of the most famous rulings - when Justice Potter Stewart tried to explain hard-core pornography by saying he couldn't necessarily define it, but... “I know it when I see it..."

Jay Sekulow of the American Center for Law and Justice (ACLJ) said that case was only one of many important rulings that have contributed to the growth of porn in America.

"It's hard to pin it on any one case,” Sekulow remarked, “because there's been so many that have impacted the development of the law of pornography and obscenity."

More recently, in cases involving Internet porn, the high court has ruled in favor of commercial pornographers - pointing to the Constitution's guarantee of free speech.

Sekulow explained, "The court has taken this view of pornography that somehow it’s entitled to minimal - at least that's what they call it - constitutional protection. It used to be thought that if something was obscene or pornographic, it could be regulated out of existence, but that's not the way the court views it anymore."

In one important case last year, the Supreme Court struck down a law aimed at shielding kids from Internet porn. The Child Online Protection Act, or "COPA," would have imposed jail time for those who made pornography too accessible to kids over the Internet.

But the court ruled that the law cramped the free speech rights of adults to see and buy what they want.

Liberal groups such as the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) praised the ruling. "The ruling today makes it safe for artists and sex educators and online magazines to discuss sexuality without the risk of jail time," commented ACLU spokesperson Ann Beeson.

Congressman Michael Oxley (R-OH), who co-sponsored COPA, says the real losers in this case were the parents and children of this country.

Oxley said, "I think the ruling was wrong. Ultimately, our goal as legislators was to protect children..."

And Sekulow questioned the reasoning behind the ruling. "If a minor were to go to a store and ask for the adult-oriented magazine behind the counter, they're going to verify to make sure that child is someone of adult age 18 or over. You would think the same thing applied to the Internet, but the court gave it a pass -- and basically said it was unconstitutional. This was shocking to many,” Sekulow stated.

The court also said that Internet filtering software was an effective alternative to banning online porn.

Young Internet users like Janell say some porn sites slip pass the filters. “They say that they have safeguards where it says, you know, ‘Are you 18?’ You click that even if you're not. How are they going to know? -- they're not looking at your birth certificate to see if you're really 18," Janell said.

In another case in 2002, the Supreme Court refused to outlaw virtual porn - where computer-generated children, indistinguishable from real kids, can be put into virtually any and all kinds of x-rated situations. The court said the ban would violate the First Amendment's protection of free speech.

Martha Coolidge, president of the Directors Guild, applauded the ruling, calling it a triumph for creative freedom. "We can all thank the Supreme Court for once again defending the First Amendment freedoms central to our free society, and preserving the creative freedoms that all Americans treasure. Every American would suffer the loss of freedom if this overzealous governmental intrusion into our rights of expression had been allowed to stand," Coolidge said.

But Oxley said the issue of protecting kids from Internet porn is not dead, and is sure to come before the Supreme Court again.

"I think that this is a real test case,” Oxley said, “as to whether the court will acknowledge that Congress does have a role in protecting children against Internet pornography. And if the decision is no, then it seems to me that we can safely say that the rights of pornographers on free speech grounds transcend the rights of parents to protect their children from this terrible stuff on the Internet, and that would be a sad day in American jurisprudence."

Concerned parents like Mindy agree. "If things do not change in this arena, on this issue in our country, we're going to lose kids more innocence that we care to dream, at this point," she cautioned.

As for Janell, she says she has learned a valuable lesson: "Don't get sucked into that,” she warns kids, “don't even click on anything you think is innocent. I mean, unless you know exactly where you're going, don't even surf for certain things, unless you have a certain address. It's so easy."

CBN News-Pro-Porn Rulings Put Children in Danger