Porn Is Here To Stay!
It was comforting to see a conservative Supreme Court justice (arguably the most conservative the Supreme Court justice) indicate in a speech last week that America will have to “tolerate” porn because there is a significant chasm between obscenity (not protected under the Constitution) and porn, although defining that difference remains problematic. As reported by Xbiz over the weekend, Justice Antonin Scalia said in a speech on the arts at the Julliard School, “The line between protected pornography and unprotected obscenity lies between appealing to a good healthy interest in sex and appealing to a depraved interest, whatever that means.â€
Couple of thoughts on this: First, Scalia represents one of the most brilliant legal minds to have ever hit the court (not really my opinion, but the consensus of the legal community). While I personally disagree with his brand of politics (he’s worked for the Nixon, Ford and Reagan administrations), there’s no questioning his mastery of law and legal precedence. He was editor of the Harvard Law Review, professor of law at the University of Virginia, University of Chicago, Georgetown University and Stanford University. However, his respect for precedence and strict interpretation of the Constitution has placed him quite squarely in the “Originalism” camp of legal thought, which essentially says that interpretation of the Constitution should remain consistent with the intentions of the drafters (or ratifiers of amendments). It’s hard to imagine the framers of our Constitution interpreting the image of a man ramming his penis into a woman’s anus repeatedly and then ejaculating onto her face as art or entertainment and therefore a constitutional right, but if Scalia wants to defend the performance of such acts as protected, well, maybe I’m an “originalist” too! (Actually, come to think of it, Jefferson rescinded the sedition acts and had been banging one of his slaves so, who knows?)
The other thought I had follows from the first: if there is ever to be an occasion in American jurisprudence where porn is interpreted as obscene and therefore illegal, it’s going to come from the left. To put a finer point on things, if there were nine Ruth Bader Ginsburgs on the court, the entire industry would be schlepping Chinese food instead of conducting AIDS tests. But fret not. The average tenure for a Supreme Court justice is 15 years. Bush just slapped in a fresh conservative and is about to do it again. With those appointments the 7-to-2 conservative skew (with Ginsburg and Stevens holding camp on the left) will remain in tact. In other words, what Scalia’s remarks really mean is that even if Bush is replaced by the most extreme leftist in the 2008 election, it’s not likely we’ll ever see the balance tip in favor of the activist left on the court even if such a radical serves for eight years. Porn is here to stay for at least another 30 years!!! Hooray. But remember to hold your nose and vote Republican every November.
