Historical November 1983 report or notice. Original dates, prices and contacts describe the source period; current availability has not been established.
Dear Editor: This is a comparatively simple answer to Alderman McGuire’s legal analysis on obscenity on cable television. I am sure you will offer Morality in Media “equal time” on this vital subject so important to our families.
We cannot simply turn it off.
There is need for a city ordinance because federal and state regulation is not enough to control indecency on cable television in the city of St. Louis. Such laws have been struck down by lower courts in other cities, but this is not important. What is important is that the Supreme Court has ruled otherwise; in 1973 it defined obscenity and set up the criteria for judging obscenity, including the need for community standards to be involved as well as three other tests.
These are that materials are obscene which: 1. Taken as a whole appeal to the prurient interest in sex. 2. Portray sexual conduct in a patently offensive way. 3. Taken as a whole do not have serious literary, artistic, political, or scientific value.
There are those who say that freedom of expression is protected by the First Amendment and therefore obscenity is thus protected.
The Supreme Court has said, and has always held, that obscenity is not protected.
It is not protected expression. Obscenity is not a First Amendment issue.
It is a crime, and 90 percent of the traffic in hard core pornography in the country is controlled by organized crime.
This is a $6 billion industry which cares not one whit what youthful pollution it is sowing. Cable companies are at their mercy, because they will make more money if more cable is sold, and more cable will be sold, if exciting, arousing, indecent films are shown.
This public display of sex and the promotion of drugs are causing diseases, ruining the health, physically and mentally, of the young people of our country who should be training for our future leadership.
In 1982 there was a convention in New York City of 200 pornographic film makers.
Here the cable company officials assured the porno makers that they would continue to buy their product . . . films which are called Hard Rs. Video rights to these films are said to bring the porno peddlers anywhere from $40,000 to $100,000.
Our enemies in this battle for decency are men such as Al Goldstein, publisher of the notorious Screw tabloid.
He admits that cable TV is going to open the door for guys like himself, and he says that he “is into decadence and debauched excess.” He is talking about bouncing porno off a satellite, and by 1990 everything will be wide open . .. he personally promises (I quote), “Anybody who denies me the right to go on their system will be taken to court case by case.” These porno movie makers are laughing all the way to the bank.
We urge St. Louisans to go with the Supreme Court rulings and fight for decency in our homes and even in our community centers, where these films have been turned on by youths and this obscenity then can be viewed in groups.
If this is allowed, the crime rate will go even higher.
No wonder rapes and gang rapes are happening.
The intellectual pursuits of our youth will greatly diminish and animalistic desires will prevail uncontrolled when fed by sex films in homes, and drugs are pushed on tapes and films.
This ordinance is designed to safeguard public morality — not private morality. Private morals are private, but public morals are the business of the entire community and of the public officials empowered by the community to defend the welfare of that community and its families.
A community sets standards for itself and has a right to legislate to protect those standards. Atlanta, Georgia, and Jacksonville, Florida, both have vigorous enforcement under both local and state obscenity laws.
They are free of pornography today. Let St. Louis follow their example. Alderman Dee is to be commended for his dedication in presenting Board Bill No. 128.
We need the support of these aldermen to maintain the fine standards of the city of St. Louis, which traditionally has been a good city, dedicated to wholesome family living. Del McClellan Secretary — Morality in Media
Originally published in The Paper, November 1983.
Read this article in the original newspaper issue.
Archival transcription note: The letter’s legal interpretations, crime statistics, causal claims and quotations are the writer’s advocacy, not independently established findings. Signature retained exactly as Del Mc Clellan, Secretary — Morality in Media; no unverified expansion to another name.
Original source: SD_Times1983_11.pdf, printed page(s) 2; PDF page(s) 2.
