Posted on 06/27/2005 6:16:50 AM PDT by OESY
What if, some years from now, a latter-day Andres Serrano turns up at the Drawing Center's new home at Ground Zero, with an American flag submerged in a tub of urine — calling it, say, "Piss Flag"? Or with an image of the Twin Towers covered in cow manure? Could such outrageous "art" be banned from the site?
If that sounds ridiculous, just think back a few years — to Serrano's "Piss Christ." Or to the Brooklyn Museum's 1999 exhibit, "Sensation" — featuring the Virgin Mary covered in elephant dung.
Gov. Pataki — despite his assurances to the contrary Friday, and despite what some newspaper editorialists may choose to believe — couldn't keep "Piss Flag" out of the Drawing Center even if he wanted to....
Defenders of trash, and compliant judges, would surely block any effort to "censor" works.
Similarly, "scholars" like, say, Ward Churchill — the nut who compared World Trade Center workers to Nazis — won't be easily stopped from gaining a forum at the International Freedom Center (IFC), also planned for the site.
Maybe these cynical showmen deserve that forum.
But not at Ground Zero.
And the only way to make absolutely certain that such vulgarity remains far from that hallowed ground is to ban these groups altogether, right at the start....
Following "Sensation," prominent Washington lawyer Leonard Garment argued (in an unpublished report for then-Mayor Rudy Giuliani, according to The New York Times) that "standards for government-funded culture will not pass constitutional muster if those standards discriminate... based solely on concepts such as decency or offensiveness."
No one would even bother to argue for the government's right to defund, let alone ban, political viewpoints — such as, say, Churchill's. Once the IFC and Drawing Center are up and running, there'll be no stopping them....
(Excerpt) Read more at nypost.com ...
Gov. Pataki — despite his assurances to the contrary Friday, and despite what some newspaper editorialists may choose to believe — couldn't keep "Piss Flag" out of the Drawing Center even if he wanted to....
Defenders of trash, and compliant judges, would surely block any effort to "censor" works.
It would be a real shame if someone were to trash this "piece of art". Yes sir it would be a real shame.
Goodie!
Another reason to never read the NY Post.
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