Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Posting-Version: Notesfiles $Revision: 1.7.0.10 $; site uiucdcs Path: utzoo!watmath!clyde!cbosgd!ihnp4!inuxc!pur-ee!uiucdcs!mcewan From: mcewan@uiucdcs.CS.UIUC.EDU Newsgroups: net.legal Subject: Proposed pornography ordinance Message-ID: <39400010@uiucdcs> Date: Mon, 11-Nov-85 17:14:00 EST Article-I.D.: uiucdcs.39400010 Posted: Mon Nov 11 17:14:00 1985 Date-Received: Wed, 13-Nov-85 07:24:43 EST Lines: 46 Nf-ID: #N:uiucdcs:39400010:000:2342 Nf-From: uiucdcs.CS.UIUC.EDU!mcewan Nov 11 16:14:00 1985 The following is a definition of pornography taken from a proposed anti-pornography ordinance (see the article titled "Re: At Last: Sojourner on Dworkin-MacKinnon" in net.women for more details): > > "Pornography is the graphic sexually explicit subordination > of women through pictures and/or words that also includes one or > (i) women are presented dehumanized as > sexual objects, things, or commodities; or > (ii) women are > presented as sexual objects who enjoy pain or humiliation; or > (iii) women are presented as sexual objects who experience sexual > pleasure in being raped; or > (iv) women are presented as sexual objects tied up or cut > up or mutilated or bruised or physically hurt; or > (v) women are presented in postures of sexual submis- > sion, servility, or display; or > (vi) women's body parts-- > including but not limited to vagina, breasts, or buttocks--are > exhibited such that women are reduced to those parts; or > (vii) women are presented as whores by nature; or > (viii) women are > presented as being penetrated by objects or animals; or > (ix) women are presented in scenarios of degradation, injury, > torture, shown as filthy or inferior, bleeding, bruised or hurt in > a context that makes these conditions sexual. My objection is that the definition is so vague that it is not clear what is and is not covered by it. Does the phrase "sexually explicit" have a precise legal definition? If I get turned on by leather coats in a Sears circular, does that make it "sexually explicit"? I'm not being facetious here - I've seen many things that I thought were perfectly unoffensive and had no sexual content denounced as "pornography". The sections of the definition are sufficiently broad to cover anything that passes the "sexually explicit" part - for instance, section vi could be applied to any picture of a woman. My impression is that this law is designed to give its supporters a cannon they can point at anyone publishing anything they don't like. Scott McEwan {ihnp4,pur-ee}!uiucdcs!mcewan "A flash in front of my eyes ... I blink ... open my eyes to ... discover I am a dog in a pickup truck full of garbage ... no one but me sees the lid blow off the can ... it's 14 miles to the dump ... this is ... at last ... heaven."