Some examples of the ACLU defense of child porn:
1997â Reno v. American Civil Liberties Union was a landmark decision of the US Supreme Court unanimously ruling that anti-indecency provisions of the 1996 Communications Decency Act (CDA) violated the First Amendmentâs guarantee of freedom of speech. (x)(x) The CDA imposed criminal sanctions on anyone who knowingly (A) uses an interactive computer service to send to a specific person or persons under 18 years of age, or (B) uses any interactive computer service to display in a manner available to a person under 18 years of age, any comment, request, suggestion, proposal, image, or other communication that, in context, depicts or describes, in terms patently offensive as measured by contemporary community standards, sexual or excretory activities or organs. (x)
2003â The American Civil Liberties Union today welcomed a federal appeals court ruling that a law meant to safeguard children against Internet pornography would block lawful and valuable speech for adults. (x)
2010â The ACLU of Delaware wrote: âThe ACLU does not support pornography or child porn. However, we do oppose virtually all forms of censorship. Possessing certain books or films, even pornographic ones, should not make one a criminal. Once society starts censoring âbad or offensiveâ ideas, it becomes very difficult to draw the line. As the saying goes, âone manâs art is another manâs pornography.â As for child pornography, the ACLU supports the right of the government to prosecute the makers of child pornography for exploiting minors.â (x)
(This one isnât pornography but is just a nice bonus) 2000â The American Civil Liberties Union of Massachusetts has decided to defend a group that advocates legalization of sex between men and boys in a $200 million federal lawsuit brought by the family of a murdered boy. [âŚ] Mr. Roberts and other A.C.L.U. officials said Nambla [North American Man/Boy Love Association] did not advocate the rape and murder of children. It advocates changing the law to make sex between men and boys legal, and political advocacy, Mr. Roberts said, is protected speech. (x)
2014â âA new Arizona law making ârevenge pornâ illegal is so broad it criminalizes booksellers, artists, news photographers and even historians and is therefore unconstitutional, the American Civil Liberties Union of Arizona said in a federal lawsuit filed Tuesday. The civil rights group said the law can make any person who distributes or displays a nude image without explicit permission guilty of a felony. The group says that violates the First Amendment.â (x) Said law, Arizona House Bill 2515, stated âIt is unlawful to intentionally disclose, display, distribute, publish, advertise or offer a photograph, videotape, film or digital recording of another person in a state of nudity or engaged in a sexual act if the person knows or should have known that the depicted person has not consented to the disclosure.â (x)
On laws that would allow recourse for rape porn victims:
1988â The ACLU sues Bellingham, Washington for passing Andrea Dworkin and Catharine Mackinnonâs Antipornography Civil Rights Ordinance that defined pornography as a civil rights violation against women, and allows women who had been harmed by pornography to sue the producers and distributors in civil court for damages. (x) As Dworkin described it, âUnder this law, it is sex discrimination to coerce, intimidate, or fraudulently induce anyone into pornography; it is sex discrimination to force pornography on a person in any place of employment, education, home, or any public place; it is sex discrimination to assault, physiÂcally attack, or injure any person in a way that is directly caused by a specific piece of pornographyâthe pornogÂraphers share responsibility for the assault; in the BelÂlingham version, it is also sex discrimination to defame any person through the unauthorized use in pornography of their name, image, and/or recognizable personal likeness; and it is sex discrimination to produce, sell, exhibit, or distribute pornography.â (page xxxii) Additonally, Nadine Strossen, president of the ACLU from 1991-2008, wrote against Mackinnon and Dworkin extensively in her 1995 book âDefending Pornographyâ (excerpt here) and in 2006 wrote that âThese [Dworkin-Mackinnon Antipornography Ordinance] laws are so vague and sweeping that they endanger all expression with any sexual content, including expression that is especially valuable to women, sexual- orientation minorities, and advocates of their rights.â (page 57)