On Obscene Obscenity Laws... Date Tuesday, April 23, 2024 - 09:32 PM PST Topic Rant “Any person who knowingly promotes, conducts, performs, or participates in an obscene show, exhibition, or performance by live persons or a live person before an audience is guilty of a misdemeanor of the first degree.” When you get down to it, there are some ironically obscene obscenity laws in existence. I think back to Mae West being arrested and briefly imprisoned for putting on a stage show titled, Sex, and how prudish and wrong it is to punish someone for what they consider to be their artistic ideas and visions (or even not artistic; it shouldn’t actually matter,) just because it doesn’t meet a set of assumedly agreed upon values. I mean, who’s to say what’s obscene? If you do not allow children under 18 in, and you give fair warning about what people are about to see, why is that illegal? I find this particular obscenity law to be unjust. It’s just slightly too puritanical for me to let it slide, at least with no strings attached. I can understand parents not wanting something that is “considered” obscene in their neighbourhood, however, that is not part of the law. If the law was more specific, and stated that in extremely suburban areas you should have better judgement, or we will for you, then I could almost see that as fair; but to prohibit it entirely is absurd to me. “The average person applying contemporary community standards relating to the depiction or description of sexual matters would find that the material taken as a whole appeals to the prurient interest in sex; and (3) The material lacks serious literary, artistic, political, or scientific value;” I think this definition of ‘obscene’ in regard to this law, is contradictory. First of all, it has too much sway to it. “The average person blah blah blah…” Well, that’s a little too loose for my comfort. People could easily debate what the average person is for the rest of time, and I think that no law should have anything in it that is that easily debatable. Secondly, I don’t understand why the material has to have serious value. Without being obscene, any of Mel Brooks’ films have no serious literary, artistic, political, or scientific value, yet they are embraced by society nonetheless; so, why should material that is debatably obscene have to have serious literary, artistic, political, or scientific value. I think that’s a bit double edged. The way I would show civil disobedience would be to put on an obscene show. I honestly wouldn’t put one on just to show civil disobedience, however, if I thought of an idea, but I was afraid it might be considered obscene, I would go right ahead and put it on anyway, because I think that it is a right that we all should have. I would obviously give proper warning; I don’t see any point in corrupting society of course, but, if it is something I believe in, and I have the desire to stage it, there should be no law impeding me. I would really only do this if it was something I felt strongly enough about to face the consequences. If I did have an idea that came along that I felt that strongly about, I would then have made that choice to face my consequences. I would expect to either be sent to prison, or more appropriately, sentenced to a hefty amount of community service; possibly even more appropriately sentenced to watching Disney movies while listening to Doris Day records, and drinking wholesome milk for the rest of time. This article comes from Shmeng http://www.shmeng.com/ The URL for this story is: http://www.shmeng.com/modules.php?op=modload&name=News&file=article&sid=617