See my previous post. While there may be no good reason to not go back to it, it could take a long time to get there - and if it is as damaging as some say it is then why expose someone to it while you're waging the battle? If it takes 5 or 10 years to battle back up hill why not pull away from it for the good of the family until it gets back to where it should be?
My other thoughts are not that we need the laws, we need to change the hearts and minds of the people. Change that and there will be no market for such things, and you do that one soul at a time. These things exist because people want them, are we as christians (or pick a faith and insert) doing our job of winning people over? Is it that the core of this problem that satan has turned the tide and we hope that the best way to turn it back to is take control of the airwaves, et al?
We can battle in the courts and congress all day long, but we should also be working hard to set examples and point out the resultant evil brought about the things which we find wrong. Legal battles come and go, and change from decade to decade, getting the minds of the people to repent and not desire such things would accomplish more.
I understand both sides of this issue, and I wish things would change in some ways - but the apostles did a darn fine job living in a seriously corrupt time and place because they were not of the world.
No,some people have ALWAYS wanted pornography and worse.Some past eras were filled with it;some went far too far in the other direction.
Tiberius Caesar was fond of pornography,as well as being a pedophile.He was laughed at and reviled ( behind his back of course)for both.He was also BRIBED with rare and ancient porn.
Restoration England was one endless porn/lascivious/decadent era.Cromwellian times was the complete opposite of the spectrum.
Victorian England lent it's Queen's name to a time now used, along with "Puritanism" (shades of Oliver Cromwell!)with prudery;wrong in both cases.Some of THE best written exotica/sexually laced books,comes from the late Victorian period.
And,FWIW,the pull back from debauncery and prurient things, actually started when Queen Victoria was a tiny child,at least a full decade prior to ascending the throne,in reaction to lascivious/free for all times.
It's the swing of the pendulum,is all. Winning over hearts and minds,by people, is NOT what changes the culture.It's when it gets so bad, that there is a moral outcry,from just about everyone,that things change.Unfortunately,we just haven't hit bottom yet and it's patently obvious, from some of the posts to this thread,that some will NEVER see the "bottom",no matter HOW low it all gets.