Pornography and free speech

Dear colleagues,

Could you please read the short essay on the relationship between free speech and pornography and comment on it here.

The essay can be reached at: The Light Millennium - Lightmillennium.Org

Notes:

The essay analyzes the term of "Pornography" within the concept of "Freedom of Expression":

Is its prohibition legitimate in relation to its potential harm to women?

EXPRESSIVE OR NON-EXPRESSIVE? For some, pornography has no value of expression. In Schauer’s view, there is hardly any difference between selling sex toys and selling a body via prostitution, ‘or the sex act itself’. ‘At its most extreme, hard core pornography is a sex aid, no more and no less’. Mackinnon, claims that in reality, pornography is a way of selling women and children: firstly, the real women or children are hired, secondly, they are used to produce sex materials which are sold to consumers. She asserts that ‘the so-called "speech," the materials themselves, is actually a product of crimes against women and children.’ She further claims that pornography is more act than thought, and that ‘that one can express the idea a practice embodies does not make this practice into an idea.’ One can infer that this approach attempts to reduce pornography purely to conduct with no implicit expression. However, those arguments cannot be applied persuasively where pornographic materials contain verbal or written statements. Moreover, speech that is protected by law is not limited to written or verbal statement. There are countless other means of expression such as marches, gestures, and silent gatherings; to regard all genres of sexually explicit materials as pure conducts with no implicit opinion seems highly doubtful. Flag burning illustrates this.

Mahmut ERDEMLI
Judge of Pendik/Istanbul

mahmuterdem68@hotmail.com