defined guidelines on how to avoid being prosecuted for operating an adult business, concluded members of separate panels on zoning and obscenity at Adult Entertainment Expo 1999 at the Los Angeles Convention Center.
But there are ways to minimize risk, according to panelists whose discussion ranged from whether adult businesses can remain in areas affected by zoning laws changes (it depends on the state) to the best types of civic involvement for adult video and book stores (charity functions are OK; little league sponsorship probably not).
Underlying it all was the belief by many experts that, regardless of the outcome of elections in 2000, there will be a new push to harass the adult entertainment industry. "There will be powerful scrutiny of this industry," warned Jeffrey Douglas, executive director and chair of the board of the Free Speech Coalition, a trade association which represents the adult industry. "The next administration, it's going to be very, very grim."
Douglas, a First Amendment lawyer and a member of both panels, said the industry has been lulled into a false sense of security because there have been few obscenity prosecutions during the Clinton administration. "The biggest danger facing the adult industry is our own ignorance," he said. "We've been living in this Never-Never Land for seven years."
Paul Cambria, a Buffalo, N.Y.-based First Amendment lawyer, counseled conciliation with local authorities. A willingness to voluntarily tone down signs and window displays may head off government action, he said. "Remember," he added, "they're litigating with no money out of their pocket...They're using your money to fight you."
Stores in the Bible Belt should weed out hard gay, she-male, lactating female, urination and interracial materials, Cambria said. That kind of material is hard to defend before a jury made up of six guys with pickup trucks. "The last thing they're going to do is say, 'Yeah, that shit's OK.'," he said.
Prominent First Amendment lawyer H. Louis Sirkin, of Cincinnati, urged video store owners to not be smart alecks by insulting government officials in the media.
Others suggested that the most effective way to avoid problems with the law is to lobby against legislation that is unfair to the industry. Kat Sunlove, the adult industry lobbyist in Sacramento, Calif., urged those who call on legislators to keep in mind her Five P's: Be pressed, poised, professional, polished and pretty. "Your image really matters," she said. "The point is, you need friends to keep the censors away or, at least, at bay."
Sherri Williams of St. Petersburg, Fla., who operates upscale Pleasure International adult stores in Alabama, said her lobbying efforts, along with a sympathetic media, helped prevent a discriminatory zoning law from getting passed.
Each panel drew nearly 100 audience members. Other panelists were Clyde DeWitt, AVN columnist and a Los Angeles-based expert on First Amendment law, and R. Bruce McLaughlin, president of McLaughlin Consulting Services, Inc., a Florida company active in the legal defense of adult enterprises.
