By Stewart Tongue
YNOT – Republicans have added specific language to the party’s 2012 platform urging federal prosecution of pornography created by, for and about consenting adults.
“Current laws on all forms of pornography and obscenity need to be vigorously enforced,” the plank reads, according to a draft obtained by Reuters.
Reportedly, the plank was laid by Patrick Trueman, president of Morality in Media and former chief of the Child Exploitation and Obscenity Section within the U.S. Department of Justice. Trueman told Reuters the language is intended to bolster anti-porn activists’ position that explicit materials be removed from all public sales channels, including hotel pay-per-view, cable and satellite television, the internet and convenience stores.
Pornography is “a growing problem for men in their 20s,” Trueman told Reuters. “It’s changed the way their brain maps have developed. This is the way they get sexually excited.”
Though arch-conservatives within the GOP have insisted “somebody do something” about explicit adult content for years, the addition of specific language to the party’s platform during a presidential election year may force a good many candidates to straddle a very thin line between the party’s goals and big-business campaign donors — not to mention the effect an effort to shut down the multibillion-dollar adult entertainment industry could have on the economy and tax bases.
Thankfully for candidates, the party’s platform is non-binding statement of principles, not necessarily objectives.
