When a Washington, D.C., grand jury handed down federal obscenity indictments against John Stagliano and his companies Evil Angel Productions and John Stagliano Inc. on April 8, the action seemed to be not only a money-consuming, selective prosecution, but also an exercise to justify the continuation (and budget appropriations) of the Department of Justice's Obscenity Prosecution Task Force.
Times are grim, gas is creeping toward five bucks a gallon, the war in Iraq is dragging on, working people are losing their homes to dubious mortgage deals, and who - beyond a few Christian-right zealots - really gives a damn about any crusade for a smut-free America? According to rumors emanating from FBI rank and file, many agents have little enthusiasm for assignment to the bureau's Adult Obscenity Squad. For individual agents, the job is to combat terrorists, organized crime or corporate fraud - in other words, catch real criminals - rather than chase the producers of films and videos of people having sex. The standing of the Adult Obscenity Squad sank even lower in the bureau when fresh scuttlebutt claimed that the Department of Justice was diverting money from kiddie-porn investigations to keep the squad funded.
Unless the November presidential election proves otherwise, many changes have occurred over the past four years. We are no longer living in 2004, and I doubt - although I could be wrong - that Janet Jackson's Superbowl breast-flash still could spark the kind of witchhunt that banished Howard Stern to satellite radio and made indecency Moral Enemy No. 1. John Ashcroft and Alberto Gonzales are gone from the Department of Justice, and the drapes are off the art deco nudes that decorate the interior. Michael Mukasey, the next-in-line attorney general, seems to have his work cut out for him: legitimizing the sundry illegalites of the Bush adminstration, from waterboarding to wire tapping.
To paraphrase the gay activist group Act Up, porn is here; get used to it. Adult entertainment is an industry with an estimated annual gross of $10-$14 billion, and, if the TV comedians are to be believed, it's fully integrated into contemporary U.S. culture. Reasonable precautions are taken to firewall it from children and those who find it objectionable. Gratuitous spamming is a thing of the past. All kinds of erotica are available online, where they are private and bother no one unless deliberately sought out. Consumers have what they want. The repressed and vulnerable don't have to see it. Everyone should be happy, except invasive proactive moralists who feel the need to control and censor everything that moves (and much that doesn't).
Thus, when Stagliano was indicted, my first reaction was "Why the hell bother to stage one more judicial cluster circus, especially after last year's failure to convict Jeff Steward and JM Prods for American Bukakke 13?" The answer is, of course, is that it's good for the prosecutors on the Department of Justice's Obscenity Prosecution Task Force. Many still believe it's a gig where careers are made. One day, a warrior against indecency. The next, a Republican congressman. After that, who knows? The polluted skies are the limit. (And let's not forget that Ann Coulter made her bones digging sexual dirt on Bill Clinton.) I don't know whether Pamela Satterfield, who is leading the prosecution against Stagliano, has political ambitions, but plenty around her do. This gives them more than enough incentive to keep porn a hot issue, regardless of whether the majority of the public is concerned.
The belief that the country would be a better place if porn were eradicated is tired. The nonsense, demagoguery and especially selective prosecutions like that of Stagliano are outmoded, ineffective and just plain wrong. According to all practical logic, adult entertainment could operate as is and hardly be noticed by anyone except its millions of consumers. The truth is that the only obstacles to end it all are the vested interests in Washington who need a war on porn to maintain their power and funding.
Mick Farren blogs at Doc40.Blogspot.com.
This article initially appeared in the August 2008 issue of AVN Online magazine. To subscribe, visit AVN Media Network.
