Earlier this week, Attorney General, John Ashcroft lobbed an incendiary round directly at the online adult industry. In a Wired News article , Ashcroft is quoted as saying he wants to imprison sex-site operators who feature obscene images on their site.Earlier this week, Attorney General, John Ashcroft lobbed an incendiary round directly at the online adult industry. In a Wired News article , Ashcroft is quoted as saying he wants to imprison sex-site operators who feature obscene images on their site. This is not necessarily a surprise coming from an ultra-conservative attorney general, but at the same time, I must admit that my level of concern rose when reading the comments being casually tossed back and forth between Ashcroft and the House Judiciary Committee.
Rep. Bob Goodlatte (R-VA) appears to side with Ashcroft. He more or less accused our industry of a ‘”cyberattack” on “our nation’s children.” I think most, if not all, adult webmasters would agree with me when I say that we don’t want kids viewing adult material any more than anyone else does. The very notion that we want to “attack children” with our product is ludicrous. At the same token, I think Ashcroft and the other conservatives who share his view are partially right when they target on-line adult.
“What?” you say? “Heresy!” Well, allow me, as a member of our industry, to be critical of our business for a moment.
Let’s consider child porn. Child pornography is heinous by all accounts. But how is our industry involved? I don’t think we are, really; Child porn is a crime. It is perpetrated by individuals who are criminals. I don’t consider it to be a part of online adult any more so than a brutal murder by handgun is a part of a sport shooting association. The real problem, and the one I think Goodlatte is directly addressing in his comment, is that our industry is responsible for turning the Internet into a sex circus.
Admit it, it’s true. Who hasn’t received porn spam? A friend of mine was shocked when he set up email addresses for his kids, age 3 1/2 and younger. Almost instantly he began receiving hardcore, explicit offers for sex sites. I, for one, would not want my kids (and no, I don’t have any) going anywhere near a computer with online access. On one hand, you have open-minded people saying that parents, not the government, should regulate and monitor their kids’ activities, whether it’s television or net-surfing. I agree with this statement. HOWEVER, what happens when the adult industry moves into the mainstream’s turf to such an extent that escaping adult material is impossible? It’s one thing to keep Johnny off the Internet when Mommy’s not around, but what about Johnny having to walk to school surrounded by billboards for porn? Unfortunately, I can see why the government has had enough. We’ve learned how to manipulate the search engines to such an extent that even the most innocuous search (diapers?) frequently brings up adult sex sites. You can’t fire up your email client without wading through a sea of porn spam. In effect, the adult industry has gone from having a product carefully blocked off by blacked-out windows and zoning regulations to pushing it down the collective throat of the U.S.A. (and the world.)
I hope I don’t sound too pessimistic when I say that I think government intervention is the only way that the Internet’s going to be cleaned up. But, that’s how I feel. The industry is obviously not capable of recognizing its own excess and voluntarily observing limits. It’s always more extreme, more in-your-face, and driven by the almighty dollar. I’m certainly not accusing anyone in particular here – most webmasters I know are ethical and don’t want to push their product on anyone who doesn’t want it. But there are spammers and quick-buck operators who couldn’t care less about these facts. They will plunder all they can and leave us to clean up the mess.
My hope is that the U.S. government recognizes that the adult industry has a right to exist and thrive as a responsible business sector. It is up to the government to target operators who contribute to the problem. In my mind, I think the primary offenders are spammers. I will not support or condone the activities of spammers, ever, period. I don’t care how much money there might be in the process. Opt-in lists have been proven to be ethical ways to keep in touch with surfers who want to receive adult material via e-mail.
So, Mr. Ashcroft, I say: you’re right. The Internet DOES need to be cleaned up. But obscenity is a gray area – why not go after the people who are responsible for the problem? A properly censored paysite tour, or free site, is hardly contributing to the moral decay of the United States. I think stricter rules on spam and penalties associated with it would be a better way to go. The more intrusive the offense, the greater the penalty should be. Most of our industry simply wants to offer our product to adults who want adult material, period. Kids are terrible customers for a lot of reasons, so the logic behind a “cyberattack” on them is questionable at best.
In the meantime, I still believe our industry should do everything it can to keep its collective nose clean. That means clean tours, warning pages, strict T&C regarding spam, and avoiding extreme content. That last bit is optional, as I know there are plenty of fetish (etc.) webmasters out there, but I do feel fisting, peeing, fetish, BDSM, etc. content counts as ‘extreme’ content that is more likely to be targeted. Be careful, folks, and try to do the right thing. We can offer adult services without pushing it, unwanted, within our country.
