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Supreme Court Sides With Pornographers Again
eagleforum.org ^ | July 14, 2004 | Phyllis Schlafly

Posted on 07/13/2004 10:11:42 AM PDT by Tailgunner Joe

Do you ever wonder why the internet is so polluted with pornography? The Supreme Court just reminded us why: it blocks every attempt by Congress to regulate the pornographers.

From its ivory tower, the Court props open the floodgates for smut and graphic sex. Over the past five years, it has repeatedly found new constitutional rights for vulgarity, most recently invalidating the Child Online Protection Act (COPA).

This latest judicial outrage happened on the final day of the Supreme Court term, after which the justices headed out for a long summer break. Lacking teenaged children of their own, the justices closed their eyes to electronic obscenity polluting our children's minds.

For decades, pornographers have enjoyed better treatment by our courts than any other industry. The justices have constitutionally protected obscenity in libraries, filth over cable television, and now unlimited internet pornography.

The flood of pornography started with the Warren Court when it handed down 34 decisions between 1966 and 1970 in favor of the smut peddlers. In mostly one-sentence decisions that were issued anonymously (the justices were too cowardly to sign them), the Court overturned every attempt by communities to maintain standards of decency.

The judges' obsession with smut is astounding. Even though five Supreme Court justices were appointed by Presidents Reagan and the first Bush, graphic sex wins judicial protection in essentially every case.

Woe to those who transgress an obscure environmental law, or say a prayer before a football game, or run a political ad within two months of an election. They find no judicial sympathy, as courts now routinely restrict private property rights and censor political speech.

But the pornographers can do no wrong in the eyes of our top justices. The most explicit sex can be piped into our home computers and the Supreme Court prevents our democratically elected officials from doing anything about it.

COPA was enacted by Congress in response to the Court's invalidation of the predecessor law, the Communications Decency Act of 1996. But decency lost again when six justices knocked out COPA in Ashcroft v. ACLU.

COPA was badly needed, as filth plagues the internet, incites sex crimes, and entraps children. COPA banned the posting for "commercial purposes" on the World Wide Web of material that is "patently offensive" in a sexual manner unless the poster takes reasonable steps to restrict access by minors.

You don't need to look very far to find a tragic crime traceable to the internet. In New Jersey in 1997, 15-year-old Sam Manzie, who had fallen prey to homosexual conduct prompted by the internet, sexually assaulted and murdered 11-year-old Eddie Werner, who was selling candy door-to-door.

COPA did not censor a single word or picture. Instead, it merely required the purveyors of sex-for-profit to screen their websites from minors, which can be done by credit card or other verification.

But minors are an intended audience for the highly profitable sex industry. Impressionable teenagers are most easily persuaded to have abortions, and homosexual clubs in high school are designed for the young.

Justice Kennedy declared it unconstitutional for Congress to stop porn flowing to teens, shifting the burden to families to screen out the graphic sex rather than imposing the cost on the companies profiting from the filth. His reasoning is as absurd as telling a family just to pull down its window shades if it doesn't want to see people exposing themselves outside.

In a prior pro-porn decision, Kennedy cited Hollywood morals as a guide for America, but this time he relied on the prevalence of foreign pornography. "40% of harmful-to-minors content comes from overseas," he declared in holding that the other 60% of obscenity is wrapped in the First Amendment.

The Supreme Court insisted that individual internet users should buy filters to try to block the vulgarity. Should those who do not like air pollution be told to buy air masks?

The Supreme Court protects pornography in books, movies, cable television, and the internet, real or simulated, against all citizens' clean-up efforts. The Court is no longer the blindfolded lady weighing a controversy, but is dominated by media-driven supremacists forcing us down into a moral sewer.

This latest pro-porn decision was too much even for Clinton-appointed Justice Breyer. He said, "Congress passed the current statute in response to the Court's decision" invalidating the prior law; "what else was Congress supposed to do?"

The solution to these ills foisted on us by judicial supremacists is for Congress to exercise its constitutional powers to remove jurisdiction from the federal courts over pornography. The Court has abused its power, and it's Congress's duty to end the judicial abuse.


TOPICS: Constitution/Conservatism; Crime/Corruption; Culture/Society; Editorial; Extended News; Government; News/Current Events
KEYWORDS: copa; culturewar; demeaningwomen; eagleforum; hedonism; hollywoodmorals; hollywoodvalues; immoralwomen; lawlessness; lustoftheflesh; mockinggod; moralrelativism; mtvculture; oligarchy; phyllisschlafly; popculture; porn; pornography; protectchildren; romans1; secularhumanism; secularstate; sexualperversion; smut; supremecourt; tyrantsrule; vulgar; whateverfeelsgood
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To: Servant of the 9
I don't want to see any more 'interpreting' or 'the founders really meant' on the first amendment, than I do on the second Amendment.

Hate to break the news to you, but the "interpreting" is done by those who claim that pornography is "speech".

61 posted on 07/13/2004 11:07:18 AM PDT by inquest (Judges are given the power to decide cases, not to decide law)
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To: Tailgunner Joe
Better start building those jails and prepare for a slowdown of all things in this country as you will probably have to put at least half of the population in jail.

And how will you know who has it? Let me know when you send your Vice & Virtue squads around, I need to make sure I have enough ammo.

62 posted on 07/13/2004 11:07:30 AM PDT by Bella_Bru (It's for the children = It takes a village)
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To: Melas

Conservatives don't give a damn about the laws of those countries whose socialists have succeded in unionizing their whores.


63 posted on 07/13/2004 11:07:56 AM PDT by Tailgunner Joe
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To: jwalsh07
Then there is not an undo burden requiring porn companies to assure that the delivery of porn is not to minors through the use of an ID card. You can't have it both ways.

Please show us how to do that.

64 posted on 07/13/2004 11:08:06 AM PDT by Poohbah (Technical difficulties have temporarily interrupted this tagline. Please stand by.)
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To: Phantom Lord
"faster than a stripper can get naked"
just curious PL... how fast is that???
</ grin >
65 posted on 07/13/2004 11:08:13 AM PDT by Robert_Paulson2 (the madridification of our election is now officially underway.)
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To: Phantom Lord
"faster than a stripper can get naked"
just curious PL... how fast is that???
</ grin >
66 posted on 07/13/2004 11:08:19 AM PDT by Robert_Paulson2 (the madridification of our election is now officially underway.)
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To: Phantom Lord
You didn't see my ;-)???

I was being sarcastic.

67 posted on 07/13/2004 11:08:36 AM PDT by Bella_Bru (It's for the children = It takes a village)
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To: Poohbah

COPA.


68 posted on 07/13/2004 11:08:59 AM PDT by jwalsh07
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To: Phantom Lord
porn has been around since the beginning of man

So has "the world's oldest profession."

So has murder.

69 posted on 07/13/2004 11:09:10 AM PDT by Tailgunner Joe
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To: Tailgunner Joe
Conservatives don't give a damn about the laws of those countries whose socialists have succeded in unionizing their whores.

Just out of curiousity, how do you propose to keep pornography from other countries from being viewed by Internet users in the United States?

70 posted on 07/13/2004 11:09:23 AM PDT by Poohbah (Technical difficulties have temporarily interrupted this tagline. Please stand by.)
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To: Robert_Paulson2

Depends on the club and the pace of her first song.


71 posted on 07/13/2004 11:09:27 AM PDT by Phantom Lord (Distributor of Pain, Your Loss Becomes My Gain)
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To: Bella_Bru

I know.


72 posted on 07/13/2004 11:09:48 AM PDT by Phantom Lord (Distributor of Pain, Your Loss Becomes My Gain)
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To: Tailgunner Joe
Pornography is nothing but filmed prostitution. It should be completely banned.

What about scenes in non-pornographic movies where an actor and actress kiss and perform other sexual conduct? Is that nothing more than filmed prostitution?

73 posted on 07/13/2004 11:10:11 AM PDT by Modernman ("I don't care to belong to a club that accepts people like me as members" -Groucho Marx)
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To: jwalsh07

COPA didn't actually do anything about that issue.

Try again.


74 posted on 07/13/2004 11:10:22 AM PDT by Poohbah (Technical difficulties have temporarily interrupted this tagline. Please stand by.)
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To: Poohbah
Quite true. But minors can and do buy tobacco and alcohol routinely over the internet.

Some minors and majors also routinely rape and kill people even though those acts are proscribed by law.

75 posted on 07/13/2004 11:11:16 AM PDT by jwalsh07
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To: Tailgunner Joe
If you want prostitution to be legal, just say so.

I do, actually.

76 posted on 07/13/2004 11:11:33 AM PDT by Modernman ("I don't care to belong to a club that accepts people like me as members" -Groucho Marx)
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To: Tailgunner Joe

Your probably infavor of Alabama's law that makes it illegal to sell, or own a device for the manual stimulation of the genitals aren't you.


77 posted on 07/13/2004 11:11:58 AM PDT by Phantom Lord (Distributor of Pain, Your Loss Becomes My Gain)
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To: Melas
That's because Amazon.com is a RETAILER with a website. Amazon.com is in the business of delivering REAL goods to your house.

Amazon.com also delivers music downloads, e-books, and e-docs. Their checkout process is essentially the same.

www.xxxswedes.com may or may not be in the business of delivering real goods. It could just be in the business of charging $5 to view some pictures electronically, or maybe even for free. Either way, it's a Swedish website, and congress lacks the authority to do anything about it.

Are you saying Congress has no authority because the servers are offshore? The MP3-sharing people would love to hear that.
78 posted on 07/13/2004 11:12:44 AM PDT by babyface00
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To: Phantom Lord
Thank you for admitting that you support legalizing prostitution.

Like sell our organs. They are mine. I own them, and thus should be allowed to sell them if I want.

Of course you cannot sell your own organs, and this proves that your body is not your property.

When a woman gets an abortion, the clinic sells her baby's body parts for profit, but she doesn't see a dime.

We conservatives are going to fix the problem of mass baby-killing you social liberals are so fond of too

79 posted on 07/13/2004 11:13:02 AM PDT by Tailgunner Joe
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To: Melas

the religious law enforcement folks, disguising themselves as conservatives ARE the socialists amongst us these days.

They are liberal in their worship of govenment as the protector and provider of good... for all of us.

The idea of turning off their computer and NOT visiting such sites being a choice they can make, is superceded by the horror they sense, that somewhere out there, somebody is sinning on the internet... oh the horror of it.


80 posted on 07/13/2004 11:13:19 AM PDT by Robert_Paulson2 (the madridification of our election is now officially underway.)
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