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Porn czarina, ACLU lawyer split over individual vs. community rights By
Steve Day
Paula Houston, Utah's new "porn czarina," told a USU audience Thursday that community standards should outlaw obscene materials, while Utah's ACLU legal affairs director said basic rights guaranteed under the First Amendment should not be subjected to a majority vote. Houston, ACLU lawyer Steven Clark and Lutheran pastor Barry Neese took part in a panel discussion dealing with the problems of pornography and the issue of balancing freedom, morality and the role of government. The talk, in the Ellen Eccles Conference Center auditorium, was journalism and communication department's final Media & Society lecture of the year. Concerns with the creation of an official state office that regulates obscenity and pornography -- two separate definitions, with the first being illegal and the latter, although perhaps sexually explicit, illegal -- raise the question of what is the appropriate role of the state in regulating adult-oriented expression. Critics complain that the government is meddling in matters of individual rights and the efforts of Houston's new state office are unconstitutional. In appointing the nation's first porn czarina, Utah Attorney General Mark Shurtleff said, "I, for one, will not allow pornographers to hide behind the Constitution." Houston works with police departments in their investigations to determine whether a violation of community standards has been committed. The issues brought up concerning community standards are: what are they, who decides those standards for that community, and how will the standards be decided. Houston says community standards are gauged by what members of that community say -- whether they are offended by something or not. Houston said determining a community standard is not that difficult. "You're dealing with a resonablness kind of standard. It's not too far right or too far left," she said. "It's what a reasonable person would think, given the information that they have in that certain event." Clark's concern regarding the Obscenity and Pornography Complaints Ombudsman, as Houston officially is known, is that her duties could violate First Amendment rights. Clark said he is nearly a First Amendmen absolutist, meaning he almost never would restrict freedom of speech, press, religion, assembly or right to complain to government. Clark said, "When it comes to our basic simple rights, we don't put them up for a majority vote. We carve them out and give them special protection and we say no matter how offensive, or how upsetting to some people, rights of free expression, rights of religion, and other fundamental rights are beyond the pale of majority action." Clark also referred to the clear and present danger doctrine, first expressed in World War I by Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr., which says that unless expression unless incites immediate unlawful or harmful behavior, it is protected by the First Amendment. Pastor Neese of Prince of Peace Lutheran Church in Logan said, "The communal value which I see is for the protection of children and women, and sometimes men." Neese added that this communal law is established for the protection and well-being of the community. "We need to take a look at that which does more good for all than harm," he said. "Each of us has a responsibility in how we view porn." Houston has been Utah's Obscenity and Pornography Complaints Ombudsman since January . Utah is the first in the country to create an official state office to deal with the problems concerning pornography. Houston said her job is mostly educational: It's to help people understand what obscenity is and the differences in legal and when the line has been crossed to illegal. Houston added that her job also involves informing citizens of what they can do and what actions they can take against pornography and obscenity that they might encounter.
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