Researchers at the University of New Hampshire's Crimes Against Children Research Center report that a fourth of young people who use the Internet regularly are exposed involuntarily to pornography on the Internet in the course of a year. Other key findings:
The Kaiser Family Foundation in the fall of 2001 found a much higher incidence of involuntary exposure among 15- to 17-year-olds (PDF document): 70%, but the Kaiser study wasn't limited to exposure during the preceding year. The Foundation also found that 63% of young people favor the federal law requiring Internet filters on computers in federally funded schools and libraries.
The New Hampshire study involved a national telephone survey of 1,501 boys and girls between the ages of 10 and 17. Results have been reported in the March 2003 issue of the journal Youth and Society, and can be found at this link (PDF format).
If you go there you may notice that the researchers didn't get everything quite right. For example, on page 340 they refer to "child pornography (of which transmission is illegal)..." Child pornography is illegal, of course, but the implication -- that all other forms of pornography are legal -- is simply incorrect. Federal law and the laws of most states ban pornography -- whether it involves adults or children -- that fails the three-part obscenity test handed down by the United States Supreme Court in 1973 in the landmark case Miller v. California. The test provides that pornography is illegal under the obscenity laws when, in broad terms, it is found by a jury or judge to include three elements: an appeal to lust, a patently offensive depiction of sexual conduct, and a lack of serious literary, artistic, scientific and political value.
On page 333 the New Hampshire researchers say, "There is little scientific evidence" on the question of whether or not exposure to sexual material is harmful to children. Little evidence of harm to children? Perhaps it depends on how one asks the question. The UN and others report that a million boys and girls worldwide are exploited each year as prostitutes, strippers and porn video performers. Researchers at the University of Pennsylvania report that as many as 325,000 American boys and girls are among the exploited ones. Professor Richard Estes, who wrote the Penn report in September 2001, said "Child sexual exploitation is the most hidden form of child abuse in the U.S. and North America today. It is the nation's least recognized epidemic."
Also on page 333, the New Hampshire researchers point to studies "suggesting that nonviolent pornography exposure has few clearly demonstrated effects except to promote more permissive sexual attitudes among those repeatedly exposed." But researchers at the National Foundation for Family Research and Education (NFFRE) in Canada have found that exposure to pornography puts viewers at increased risk for developing sexually deviant tendencies, committing sexual offenses, experiencing difficulties in intimate relationships, and accepting of the rape myth. "Our findings are very alarming," said Dr. Claudio Violato, a professor at the University of Calgary and Director of Research at the Foundation. The study was published in March 2002 in the scientific journal Mind, Medicine and Adolescence. Others, including clinical psychologist Dr. Victor Cline, have come to similar conclusions.
For the first time, the Internet is considered an important information source by more Internet users than any other news source. At the same time, the Internet's credibility as a reliable information source has declined. The 2002 UCLA Internet Report, third in an annual series begun in 2000, showed that the Internet was considered very important or extremely important by 61.1 % of Internet users, followed by books (60.3 %), newspapers (57.8 %), television (50.2%), radio (40%), and magazines (28.7%). But in 2002, only 52.8% of Internet users said most or all of the online information is reliable and accurate, down from 58% in 2001 and 55% in 2000.
Late in 1964, students at the University of California at Berkeley used heated rhetoric and defiant confrontation to assert, and win, their right to engage in political speech on campus. They outraged much of the public, risked expulsion and went to jail for what they correctly called the Free Speech Movement, for that is what it was at first. Later on, at one point, they earned the epithet "Filthy Speech Movement."
The movement leader in 1964, a student named Mario Savio, is remembered for a powerful speech he made from the roof of a police car at a critical moment in the confrontation. What he did first revealed something decent in the man. Before climbing onto the car, this fierce opponent of university policy removed his shoes to avoid damaging the car. The police car was damaged, though not by Mario Savio, and the students who were there collected money among themselves to pay for the repairs.
Mario Savio didn't get a degree at Berkeley or anyplace else until two decades later, when he earned a bachelor's summa cum laude and then a master's, both in physics, from San Francisco State University, where he joined the faculty. Mr. Savio died in 1996 at age 53, too soon to see how some of today's Berkley students are using their free speech. And how Berkeley accommodates them.
Today, the university not only permits but also pays for a web site used by an organization called the UC Berkeley Queer Alliance/Queer Resource Center to publish, among things, the location of men's rest rooms around campus where so-called "glory holes" have been drilled through the stall partitions to facilitate anonymous homosexual couplings.
While this web site is an affront to commonly held norms of sexual morality, the university apparently considers the affront to be insufficient cause to do anything about it. But long-standing policies at Berkeley prohibit damage or misuse of university property and "conduct which threatens or endangers the health or safety of any person." That ought to be enough to go on. Men's room partitions are damaged by the "glory holes." More importantly, AIDS and other sexually transmitted diseases are a real danger for active homosexuals and for students who use the stalls for conventional purposes, unaware of the danger of infection. And there is the chance someone will be assaulted by a sexual predator drawn to these locations by the Queer Alliance/Queer Resource Center web site.
Mario Savio and the young men and women of the Free Speech Movement 35 and more years ago had a serious and worthwhile purpose, and deserve credit for what they accomplished. They did it to secure the constitutional right of public political discourse at Berkeley, not for sexual intercourse in a public place.
What's wrong with these people today?
There were complaints in England when the Ann Summers "sex shop" chain (legal in the U.K.) put up advertising posters featuring a photo of a semi-naked woman with her hands cuffed behind her back and the slogan "Lancashire Hot-bot." Some people complained the image could make a domestic violence problem in the country worse. An Ann Summers spokesperson said, "The image is meant to be lighthearted and fun." Oh. Well, that explains it, then.
Public nudity is against the law in New York. Going nude in 20-degree temperatures during a snowstorm in Central Park is something else. The New York Post reported February 8 that 30 women took off their clothes, ran across the snow and threw themselves on the snow-covered ground near the landmark Bethesda Fountain as an act of protest against President Bush's plans for war with Iraqi. Their idea was to position themselves so their bodies formed the words, "NO BUSH." They were two persons short, so the formation looked like "bO BUSH." No arrests were made. Plans to disarm Saddam Hussein went on apace.
The Roper Center for Public Opinion Research, at the University of Connecticut, in January put out a review of data (PDF format), collected from several surveys over the last three years, that the Center said reveals not a wall of separation between church and state but a line, and a shifting line, at that.
The Center reported, "Large majorities (58%) of Americans see the strength of our nation as residing in religious faith. More than three-quarters of those who think religion is increasing its influence on American life (37% do) see this as a good thing, while a nearly identical proportion who believe it is losing influence (52% do) see this as a bad thing. Nearly 60% think it's appropriate for presidential candidates to discuss their religious beliefs in public, while half say they would be more likely to vote for someone who draws emotional strength from religion. We see many reasons to support public funding for religious organizations to provide social services, and far more good than harm in allowing prayer in public schools.
"Yet a considerable amount of discomfort underlies these seemingly strong endorsements of religion in the public sphere. Many people say they would be bothered by elected officials who relied on church leaders for advice on how to vote on specific legislation... Americans think it is wrong for clergy to discuss political issues or come out in favor of candidates."
How, one wonders, do the American people expect religious faith to be the strength of the nation while religious influence is so restrained?
Broadcasting & Cable magazine ran a story January 20 that began this way: "Critics of TV violence are urging FCC Chairman Michael Powell to restrict on-screen mayhem just as the agency does with sexually explicit programming, but the top industry regulator last week was skeptical that the FCC has the authority to move on its own." Sounds like good news for mayhem—on screen and off.
The New York Times reported January 25 that "Broadcast television, under intensifying attack by saltier cable competitors, is pushing the limits of decorum further by the year, and hardly anyone is pushing back." The story ran under this headline: "Few Viewers Object as Unbleeped Words Spread on Network TV." The likelihood is that a lot of people have just given up trying to get the FCC to enforce the broadcast indecency law.
Over at Showtime on the premium portion of cable, Penn & Teller began a new series in January with a show the New York Times (2/24/03) said, "is devoted to dumping cold water on self-proclaimed mediums who say they schmooze with the dead." Penn Jillette told the Times, "'You'll notice more obscenity than we usually use. That's not just because it's on Showtime and we want to get some attention. It's also a legal matter. If one calls people liars and quacks, one can be sued.' Cussing them out, however, 'is pretty safe.'" If only they had mothers who dared to wash their obscenity-filled mouths out with soap. For that, we can thank Supreme Court Justices in the last century who rewrote the First Amendment to reflect their own secular and libertarian views.