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From: mp@allegra.UUCP (Mark Plotnick)
Newsgroups: net.movies,net.college
Subject: Re: Censorship at Indiana University
Message-ID: <2838@allegra.UUCP>
Date: Fri, 5-Oct-84 14:39:18 EDT
Article-I.D.: allegra.2838
Posted: Fri Oct  5 14:39:18 1984
Date-Received: Sat, 6-Oct-84 05:01:25 EDT
References: <553@pucc-i>
Organization: AT&T Bell Laboratories, Murray Hill
Lines: 73

Like any good controversy, there are more than 2 sides to the issue here.
First, some background.

MIT's movie committee (LSC) shows almost all the feature movies at MIT
(about 180 per year), and in general 2 or 3 of these were X- or XXX-rated.
They never got a lot of flak about this practice (I'm told the executive
committee that screens the movies always tried to pick ones with
minimal offensiveness) until they decided to show Deep Throat.
Evidently there's some legal precedent in Massachusetts and other
states that means you can be busted if you try to show D.T or Beyond (or
is it Behind?) the Green Door.  A dorm at Harvard tried to show D.T. a
couple years ago and that was shut down by the police.  Although the
MIT administration really doesn't like censorship, the last thing they
want is bad publicity (some outside groups planned a protest and had
notified police and area TV stations), so they pressured the committee
into cancelling the film.  One of the Deans said that since MIT is a
private institution, the first amendment didn't apply in this case.

This led to the formation of a committee of students (mainly from LSC
and women's groups) and administration members to discuss the issues.
The problem is of course more complex than freedom of expression on one
side vs. morality on the other.  Here are some of the points (I wasn't
a member of the ad-hoc committee, I just read the minutes and talked to
committee members who were also on LSC):

- the movies were offensive to some portion of the students (it wasn't known
how large this portion was; the protests had been organized by non-MIT groups,
although several MIT groups had also let their objections be known).
but the movies were also enjoyed by a large segment of students.
Something like 40% of the entire undergraduate
population goes to see the the X-rated movie that is shown at the beginning
of each semester.  There was talk of a campus-wide referendum
but that would not really change anybody's mind since if even 1% of the
community found the movies offensive that would be reason enough for some
people to want to ban them.
I don't know if the referendum ever took place; if it did, it would have
happened this spring when I wasn't on campus.
- some MIT employees did not want pornographic movies shown, because it
would degrade their workplace.
(a mild counterargument to this is that the movies aren't shown during
working hours, and almost none of the employees go to LSC movies anyway).
- there were objections to MIT (and its students' tuitions) implicitly
supporting the pornography industry by merely allowing the movies to be shown.
LSC is a self-supporting student activity, but MIT pays for heating and
lighting the auditorium.
- many people thought that the tradition of showing an X-rated movie at
the beginning of each term was inappropriate, especially for incoming
freshmen.
- LSC argued (in addition to the freedom-of-speech issue) that nobody was
being forced to go to these movies if they didn't want to; people who
were offended by the movies could simply stay at home or go into Cambridge
or Boston or do a thousand other things.  Attendance was limited to
MIT/Wellesley students and staff (no outside rowdies) who were over age.
- there were some reported incidents of women being harassed by male dorm and
frat members after these movies.

The committee made its report, and the Dean for Student Affairs published
some guidelines, some of which say (I'm doing this from memory; maybe
some of the mit-eddie crowd can add anything I've left out):
- XXX or unrated movies should be reviewed by a student/administration panel.
- the movies cannot be shown on registration day (the first day of the term),
and can't be shown in the main auditorium (the main auditorium is close to
the 2 women's dorms).
- advance notice should be given so that alternative events (e.g.
DSA-sponsored movies and parties) can be scheduled for the same time as the
movies.

The above restrictions have yet to be thoroughly exercised.  LSC finally
showed another X rated movie at the end of last term.
Threatened protests never materialized, and according to the LSC minutes,
the leader of the protestors showed up to watch the movie with a date.

	Mark