{"id":2399062,"date":"2025-02-05T07:35:00","date_gmt":"2025-02-05T12:35:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/just-like-prostitution-theres-no-first-amendment-right-to-porn\/"},"modified":"2025-02-05T07:38:36","modified_gmt":"2025-02-05T12:38:36","slug":"just-like-prostitution-theres-no-first-amendment-right-to-porn","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/just-like-prostitution-theres-no-first-amendment-right-to-porn\/","title":{"rendered":"Just Like Prostitution, There&#8217;s No First Amendment Right To Porn"},"content":{"rendered":"<aside class=\"mashsb-container mashsb-main mashsb-stretched\"><div class=\"mashsb-box\"><div class=\"mashsb-count mash-medium\" style=\"&quot;\"><div class=\"counts mashsbcount\">20<\/div><span class=\"mashsb-sharetext\">SHARES<\/span><\/div><div class=\"mashsb-buttons\"><a class=\"mashicon-facebook mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/sharer.php?u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.conservativenewsdaily.net%2Fbreaking-news%2Fjust-like-prostitution-theres-no-first-amendment-right-to-porn%2F\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Facebook<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-twitter mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/intent\/tweet?text=&amp;url=https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/?p=2399062&amp;via=ConservNewsDly\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Twitter<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-subscribe mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"#\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Subscribe<\/span><\/a><div class=\"onoffswitch2 mash-medium mashsb-noshadow\" style=\"display:none\"><\/div><\/div>\n            <\/div>\n                <div style=\"clear:both\"><\/div><\/aside>\n            <!-- Share buttons by mashshare.net - Version: 4.0.47--><p>in this article,the author argues against the classification\u200d of pornography as &#8220;speech,&#8221; particularly in the context of legislative attempts to prohibit it in \u200cOklahoma through Bill SB593. The author contends that\u2064 the advocates of pornography frequently enough defend it by appealing \u200dto notions of &#8220;choice,&#8221; despite the negative consequences of widespread access to explicit content, particularly for\u2064 children. They argue that pornography is harmful, \u200bequating it \u200dto a destructive force that undermines societal morals and\u2063 relationships.<\/p>\n<p>The piece draws on legal precedents, including *Barnes v. Glen Theater* and the \u2062*Miller Test*, to make the case that pornography lacks artistic or social\u200b value and can be regulated without infringing\u200d on First Amendment rights. The\u2063 author \u200balso points out that \u2064<a href=\"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/a-circuit-breaker-on-election-night\/\" title=\"The question looms: just how does it come to be that three quarters of Re...an and nearly one third of Democrat voters all believe that the election was stolen from Trump?\">public opinion<\/a> \u200bis shifting\u200d towards \u2062support\u200d for stricter laws against pornography, \u2064especially\u2064 among Republican voters.<\/p>\n<p>The author calls for a cultural \u200dshift towards virtue, highlighting the\u2064 urgent need to protect\u200b future generations from the harms\u200c of pornography.They conclude that it \u2062is indeed necessary to recognize that the defense of pornography as free speech is\u200d a flawed argument that \u2062threatens societal integrity.  <\/p>\n<p class=\"readmore\">\n    <button onclick=\"showReadMore()\" id=\"readmorebtn\">Read more&#8230;<\/button>\n<\/p>\n<hr id=\"line\">\n<span id=\"more\"><\/p>\n<div>\n<p>Few modern dogmas are more bewildering than the idea that pornography is &ldquo;speech.&rdquo; In response to SB593, my bill to abolish pornography in Oklahoma, virtually every detractor is laser-focused on the supposition that it violates their First Amendment freedoms.<\/p>\n<p>Like their cohorts in the pro-abortion movement, it is not surprising that pornography&rsquo;s advocates (imagine publicly outing yourself as a pornography advocate) appeal to &ldquo;choice&rdquo; rather than the characteristics of the disputed conduct because there is simply no defending the conduct.<\/p>\n<p>What kind of &ldquo;choice&rdquo; are we talking about? The &ldquo;choice&rdquo; to allow the most hardcore, obscene, and often abusive material ever imagined by the human mind to be easily accessible by anyone with a few clicks of a button? The &ldquo;choice&rdquo; to live in a society where the average age of first exposure to hardcore pornography is 12 years old? The &ldquo;choice&rdquo; to tolerate the reality that 15 percent of children are exposed to hardcore pornography before they graduate elementary school?<\/p>\n<p><em>That <\/em>choice? It sounds like a choice any halfway-decent person would emphatically reject.<\/p>\n<p>Pornography is only ever degenerate material that destroys marriages, destroys lives, and steals the innocence of the young. It is pure cancer to the soul and corrosive acid to the moral fabric of society, all while having no redeeming value whatsoever.<\/p>\n<h2>Prostitution with a Camera is Still Prostitution<\/h2>\n<p>Pornography is not &ldquo;speech&rdquo; in any meaningful sense. Prostitution is a crime, and rightly so. That is, <em>unless <\/em>the act is recorded on camera and published for all to view. Then, lo and behold! Prostitution magically becomes protected speech and the paramount example of what the Founding Fathers fought a revolution to protect!<\/p>\n<p>What are we doing here? No one seriously believes that the policy outcome we have arrived at is rooted in serious lawmaking and judging. But degenerates want porn, so these talking points are paraded about like a kinked-out perv flashing kids at a pride festival.<\/p>\n<p>Nonetheless, activist judges have ruled according to these demented ideas.<\/p>\n<h2>The Legal Case Against Porn as Free Speech<\/h2>\n<p>As it often is, the Common Law is instructive here. In <em>Barnes v. Glen Theater (1991)<\/em>, Justice William Rehnquist <a href=\"https:\/\/www.law.cornell.edu\/supct\/html\/90-26.ZO.html\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">wrote<\/a> for the plurality that states can regulate public nudity at strip clubs because &ldquo;Public indecency, including nudity, was a criminal offense at <a href=\"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/historic-6-3-supreme-court-decision-narrows-anti-hacking-law-to-avoid-criminalizing-commonplace-computer-activity\/\" title=\"Historic 6-3 Supreme Court Decision Narrows Anti-Hacking Law To Avoid Criminalizing \u2018Commonplace Computer Activity\u2019\">common law<\/a>, and this Court recognized the common-law roots of the offense of &lsquo;gross and open indecency&rsquo; in <em>Winters v. New York<\/em>.&rdquo;<\/p>\n<p>In other words, if public indecency and nudity were common law crimes enforced by the Founding Fathers and early Americans during the time immediately following the First Amendment&rsquo;s ratification, then prohibiting public nudity cannot be presumed to violate the First Amendment.<\/p>\n<p>Furthermore, Supreme Court precedent holds that nudity can be prohibited behind closed doors in strip clubs. Thus, it can certainly be prohibited on the internet, which has become a setting far more public than any club.<\/p>\n<p>More recently, the Supreme Court established the Miller Test in <em>Miller v. California (1973)<\/em>. According to the test, content is &ldquo;obscene&rdquo; and can therefore be prohibited if:<\/p>\n<blockquote>\n<p>the average person, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/mike-lee-introduces-two-bills-to-clamp-down-on-internet-pornography\/\" title=\"Mike Lee Introduces Two Bills To Clamp Down On Internet ...\">applying contemporary community standards<\/a>, would find that the work, taken as a whole, appeals to the prurient interest, (&ldquo;prurient&rdquo; meaning something that focuses attention on sex not in an academic setting but primarily as an appeal to the base sexual instincts)<\/p>\n<p>the work depicts or describes, in a patently offensive way, sexual conduct or excretory functions specifically defined by applicable state law, and<\/p>\n<p>the work, taken as a whole, lacks serious literary, artistic, political, or scientific value.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p>There is no question that modern pornography appeals to the prurient interest and lacks serious literary, artistic, political, or scientific value, satisfying points one and three. The only thing missing is point two: a state law specifically defining pornography according to <em>Miller<\/em>&rsquo;s definition of obscenity and prohibiting it. That is why I filed SB593.<\/p>\n<p>In response, pornography advocates point to <em>Reno v. ACLU (1997),<\/em> in which the court struck down the 1996 Communications Decency Act. But it is very important to assess <em>why <\/em>they struck it down.<\/p>\n<p>Primarily, it was because the act prohibited content that was not only &ldquo;obscene&rdquo; but &ldquo;indecent.&rdquo; The latter is a term that the <a href=\"https:\/\/amzn.to\/3YuVZYV\">court ultimately ruled unconstitutionally broad<\/a> and vague. The act was not well tailored to the Miller Test.<\/p>\n<p>Further, <em>Reno <\/em>also rested on the premise that &ldquo;the Internet is not as &lsquo;invasive&rsquo; as radio and television.&rdquo; How is that assessment looking in the year of our Lord two-thousand and twenty-five?<\/p>\n<h2>Public Opinion Shifting<\/h2>\n<p>Not only is state prohibition of pornography permissible according to the common law, common sense, and Supreme Court precedent, it is also gaining increased public support. A <a href=\"https:\/\/d3nkl3psvxxpe9.cloudfront.net\/documents\/Project_2025_poll_results_uMvZZXc.pdf\">2024 YouGov poll<\/a> found that support for a total pornography ban was evenly split among registered voters at 42-42, with 16 percent unsure. Republicans support banning porn by greater than two-to-one margins, with 60 percent in favor compared to just 27 percent opposed.<\/p>\n<p>As pornography becomes more degenerate and widespread, support for prohibiting it is increasing. Republicans, especially those in safe red districts and states, can ban pornography knowing they have the support of their voters.<\/p>\n<h2>Imagine a Virtuous Future<\/h2>\n<p>Mayor Rudy Giuliani&rsquo;s famously successful cleanup of New York City began with the removal of the porn theaters from Times Square. As David Marcus <a href=\"https:\/\/www.foxnews.com\/opinion\/online-porn-should-be-banned-overdue\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">wrote<\/a>: &ldquo;It was not a minor policy, what [Giuliani] understood was that those coursing avenues are the public square, and porn was choking the life out of it. Today the public square is in the palm of our hands, and it is time to tear down the virtual porn theaters.&rdquo;<\/p>\n<p>My youngest daughter is six. Half of American kids her age will be exposed to hardcore porn in the next 6-8 years if we do not abolish pornography. We may have failed every generation of kids for half a century, but there is no reason we have to fail them going forward.<\/p>\n<p>We are not duty-bound as Americans to tolerate the proliferation of prostitution footage. We are duty-bound not to. We must strive toward a society defined by virtue rather than vice. And we will not succeed in banning pornography until we rightly understand the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/lindell-counter-suing-dominion-alleges-racketeering\/\" title=\"Lindell counter-suing Dominion, alleges racketeering\">free speech case<\/a> for porn as the demented, abusive, society-destroying fiction that it is.<\/p>\n<hr>\n<p>      Dusty Deevers is a pastor at Grace Reformed Baptist Church of Elgin in Elgin, Oklahoma. He is also the state senator for Oklahoma Senate District 32 and a small business owner. He lives in Elgin with his wife and six children.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<p><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The notion that pornography is &#8220;speech&#8221; is perplexing<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3518,"featured_media":2399063,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mo_disable_npp":"","fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/thefederalist.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/02\/1544108261_9aef11185c_k-e1738613271190.jpg","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[33332,32311,9963],"class_list":["post-2399062","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-first-amendment","tag-free-speech","tag-pornography"],"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/thefederalist.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/02\/1544108261_9aef11185c_k-e1738613271190.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2399062","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3518"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2399062"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2399062\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2399066,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2399062\/revisions\/2399066"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2399063"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2399062"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2399062"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2399062"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}