SUSAN JACOBY
Susan Jacoby (b. 1946), a journalist since the age of seventeen, is well known for her feminist writings. “A First Amendment Junkie” (our title) appeared in the Hers column in the New York Times in 1978.
A First Amendment Junkie
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It is no news that many women are defecting from the ranks of civil libertarians on the issue of obscenity. The conviction of Larry Flynt, publisher of Hustler magazine — before his metamorphosis into a born-again Christian — was greeted with unabashed feminist approval. Harry Reems, the unknown actor who was convicted by a Memphis jury for conspiring to distribute the movie Deep Throat, has carried on his legal battles with almost no support from women who ordinarily regard themselves as supporters of the First Amendment. Feminist writers and scholars have even discussed the possibility of making common cause against pornography with adversaries of the women’s movement — including opponents of the Equal Rights Amendment and “right-to-life” forces.
All of this is deeply disturbing to a woman writer who believes, as I always have and still do, in an absolute interpretation of the First Amendment. Nothing in Larry Flynt’s garbage convinces me that the late Justice Hugo L. Black was wrong in his opinion that “the Federal Government is without any power whatsoever under the Constitution to put any type of burden on free speech and expression of ideas of any kind (as distinguished from conduct).” Many women I like and respect tell me I am wrong; I cannot remember having become involved in so many heated discussions of a public issue since the end of the Vietnam War. A feminist writer described my views as those of a “First Amendment junkie.”
Many feminist arguments for controls on pornography carry the implicit conviction that porn books, magazines, and movies pose a greater threat to women than similarly repulsive exercises of free speech pose to other offended groups. This conviction has, of course, been shared by everyone — regardless of race, creed, or sex — who has ever argued in favor of abridging the First Amendment. It is the argument used by some Jews who have withdrawn their support from the American Civil Liberties Union because it has defended the right of American Nazis to march through a community inhabited by survivors of Hitler’s concentration camps.
If feminists want to argue that the protection of the Constitution should not be extended to any particularly odious or threatening form of speech, they have a reasonable argument (although I don’t agree with it). But it is ridiculous to suggest that the porn shops on 42nd Street are more disgusting to women than a march of neo-Nazis is to survivors of the extermination camps.
5 The arguments over pornography also blur the vital distinction between expression of ideas and conduct. When I say I believe unreservedly in the First Amendment, someone always comes back at me with the issue of “kiddie porn.” But kiddie porn is not a First Amendment issue. It is an issue of the abuse of power — the power adults have over children — and not of obscenity. Parents and promoters have no more right to use their children to make porn movies than they do to send them to work in coal mines. The responsible adults should be prosecuted, just as adults who use children for back-breaking farm labor should be prosecuted.
Susan Brownmiller, in Against Our Will: Men, Women, and Rape, has described pornography as “the undiluted essence of antifemale propaganda.” I think this is a fair description of some types of pornography, especially of the brutish subspecies that equates sex with death and portrays women primarily as objects of violence.
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The equation of sex and violence, personified by some glossy rock record album covers as well as by Hustler, has fed the illusion that censorship of pornography can be conducted on a more rational basis than other types of censorship. Are all pictures of naked women obscene? Clearly not, says a friend. A Renoir nude is art, she says, and Hustler is trash. “Any reasonable person” knows that.
But what about something between art and trash — something, say, along the lines of Playboy or Penthouse magazines? I asked five women for their reactions to one picture in Penthouse and got responses that ranged from “lovely” and “sensuous” to “revolting” and “demeaning.” Feminists, like everyone else, seldom have rational reasons for their preferences in erotica. Like members of juries, they tend to disagree when confronted with something that falls short of 100 percent vulgarity.
In any case, feminists will not be the arbiters of good taste if it becomes easier to harass, prosecute, and convict people on obscenity charges. Most of the people who want to censor girlie magazines are equally opposed to open discussion of issues that are of vital concern to women: rape, abortion, menstruation, contraception, lesbianism — in fact, the entire range of sexual experience from a woman’s viewpoint.
10 Feminist writers and editors and filmmakers have limited financial resources: Confronted by a determined prosecutor, Hugh Hefner1 will fare better than Susan Brownmiller. Would the Memphis jurors who convicted Harry Reems for his role in Deep Throat be inclined to take a more positive view of paintings of the female genitalia done by sensitive feminist artists? Ms. magazine has printed color reproductions of some of those art works; Ms. is already banned from a number of high school libraries because someone considers it threatening and / or obscene.
Feminists who want to censor what they regard as harmful pornography have essentially the same motivation as other would-be censors: They want to use the power of the state to accomplish what they have been unable to achieve in the marketplace of ideas and images. The impulse to censor places no faith in the possibilities of democratic persuasion.
It isn’t easy to persuade certain men that they have better uses for $1.95 each month than to spend it on a copy of Hustler. Well, then, give the men no choice in the matter.
I believe there is also a connection between the impulse toward censorship on the part of people who used to consider themselves civil libertarians and a more general desire to shift responsibility from individuals to institutions. When I saw the movie Looking for Mr. Goodbar, I was stunned by its series of visual images equating sex and violence, coupled with what seems to me the mindless message (a distortion of the fine Judith Rossner novel) that casual sex equals death. When I came out of the movie, I was even more shocked to see parents standing in line with children between the ages of ten and fourteen.
I simply don’t know why a parent would take a child to see such a movie, any more than I understand why people feel they can’t turn off a television set their child is watching. Whenever I say that, my friends tell me I don’t know how it is because I don’t have children. True, but I do have parents. When I was a child, they did turn off the TV. They didn’t expect the Federal Communications Commission to do their job for them.
15 I am a First Amendment junkie. You can’t OD on the First Amendment, because free speech is its own best antidote.
SUMMARIZING JACOBY
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Have I adequately previewed the work?
Can I state the thesis?
If I have written a summary, is it accurate?
Does my summary mention all the chief points?
If there are inconsistencies, are they in the summary or the original selection?
Will my summary be clear and helpful?
Have I considered the audience for whom the author is writing?
Suppose we want to make a rough summary, more or less paragraph by paragraph, of Jacoby’s essay. Our summary might look like this:
Paragraph 1. Although feminists usually support the First Amendment, when it comes to pornography many feminists take pretty much the position of those who oppose the Equal Rights Amendment and abortion and other causes of the women’s movement.
Paragraph 2. Larry Flynt produces garbage, but I think his conviction represents an unconstitutional limitation of freedom of speech.
Paragraphs 3, 4. Feminists who want to control (censor) pornography argue that it poses a greater threat to women than similar repulsive speech poses to other groups. If feminists want to say that all offensive speech should be restricted, they can make a case, but it is absurd to say that pornography is a “greater threat” to women “than a march of neo-Nazis is to survivors of the extermination camps.”
Paragraph 5. Trust in the First Amendment is not refuted by kiddie porn; kiddie porn is not a First Amendment issue but an issue of child abuse.
Paragraphs 6, 7, 8. Some feminists think censorship of pornography can be more “rational” than other kinds of censorship, but a picture of a nude woman strikes some women as base and others as “lovely.” There is no unanimity.
Paragraphs 9, 10. If feminists censor girlie magazines, they will find that they are unwittingly helping opponents of the women’s movement to censor discussions of rape, abortion, and so on. Some of the art in the feminist magazine Ms. would doubtless be censored.
Paragraphs 11, 12. Like other would-be censors, feminists want to use the power of the state to achieve what they have not achieved in “the marketplace of ideas.” They display a lack of faith in “democratic persuasion.”
Paragraphs 13, 14. This attempt at censorship reveals a “desire to shift responsibility from individuals to institutions.” The responsibility — for instance, to keep young people from equating sex with violence — is properly the parents’.
Paragraph 15. We can’t have too much of the First Amendment.
Jacoby’s thesis (i.e., major claim or chief proposition) — that any form of censorship of pornography is wrong — is clear enough, even as early as the end of paragraph 1, but it gains force from the reasons she offers throughout the essay. If we want to reduce our summary further, we might say that she supports her thesis by arguing several subsidiary points. Here we’ll merely assert them briefly, but Jacoby argues them — that is, she gives reasons:
Pornography can scarcely be thought of as more offensive than Nazism.
Women disagree about which pictures are pornographic.
Feminists who want to censor pornography will find that they help antifeminists to censor discussions of issues advocated by the women’s movement.
Feminists who favor censorship are in effect turning to the government to achieve what they haven’t achieved in the free marketplace.
One sees this abdication of responsibility in the fact that parents allow their children to watch unsuitable movies and television programs.
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If we want to present a brief summary in the form of one coherent paragraph — perhaps as part of an essay arguing for or against — we might write something like the one shown in the paragraph below. (Of course, we would introduce it with a lead-in along these lines: “Susan Jacoby, writing in the New York Times, offers a forceful argument against censorship of pornography. Jacoby’s view, briefly, is….”)
When it comes to censorship of pornography, some feminists take a position shared by opponents of the feminist movement. They argue that pornography poses a greater threat to women than other forms of offensive speech offer to other groups, but this interpretation is simply a mistake. Pointing to kiddie porn is also a mistake, for kiddie porn is an issue involving not the First Amendment but child abuse. Feminists who support censorship of pornography will inadvertently aid those who wish to censor discussions of abortion and rape or censor art that is published in magazines such as Ms. The solution is not for individuals to turn to institutions (i.e., for the government to limit the First Amendment) but for individuals to accept the responsibility for teaching young people not to equate sex with violence.
In contrast, a critical summary of Jacoby — an evaluative summary in which we introduce our own ideas and examples — might look like this:
Susan Jacoby, writing for the New York Times in 1978, offers a forceful argument against censorship of pornography, but one that does not have foresight of the Internet age and the new availability of extreme and exploitative forms of pornography. While she dismisses claims by feminists that pornography should be censored because it constitutes violence against women, what would Jacoby think of such things as “revenge porn” and “voyeuristic porn” today, or the array of elaborate sadistic fantasies readily available to anyone with access to a search engine? Jacoby says that censoring pornography is a step toward censoring art, and she proudly wears the tag “First Amendment junkie,” ostensibly to protect what she finds artistic (such as images of female genitalia in Ms. Magazine). However, her argument does not help us account for these new forms of exploitation and violence disguised as art or “free speech.” Perhaps she would see revenge porn and voyeur porn in the same the way she sees kiddie porn — not so much as an issue of free speech but as an issue of other crimes. Perhaps she would hold her position that we can avoid pornography by just “turning off the TV,” but the new Internet pornography is intrusive, entering our lives and the lives of our children whether we like it or not. Education is part of the solution, Jacoby would agree, but we could also consider….
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The example above not only summarizes and applies the other techniques presented in this chapter (e.g., accounting for context and questioning definitions of terms and concepts) but also weaves them together with a central argument that offers a new response and a practicable solution.
What does Susan Jacoby mean by saying she is a “First Amendment junkie” (para. 15)?
The essay is primarily an argument against the desire of some feminists to censor the sort of pornography that appealed to some heterosexual adult males in 1978. How does the context of the article’s publication reflect events and perspectives of that period? How are conditions different now, and how do these new contexts offer ways to support or challenge Jacoby’s argument?
Evaluate the final paragraph as a conclusion. (Effective final paragraphs are not all of one sort. Some round off the essay by echoing one or more points from the opening; others suggest that the reader, having now seen the problem, should think further about it or act on it. No matter what form it takes, a good final paragraph should make the reader feel that the essay has come to a satisfactory conclusion, not a sudden breaking-off of the argument.)
This essay originally appeared in the New York Times. If you’re unfamiliar with this newspaper, consult an issue or two in your school library. Next, in a paragraph, try to characterize the paper’s readers — that is, Jacoby’s audience.
Jacoby claims in paragraph 2 that she “believes … in an absolute interpretation of the First Amendment.” What does such an interpretation involve? Would it permit shouting “Fire!” in a crowded theater even when there is no fire? Posting racist insults on the Internet? Spreading untruths about someone’s past? (Does the First Amendment, as actually interpreted by the Supreme Court today, permit any or all of these claims? Consult your reference librarian for help in answering this question.)
Jacoby implies that permitting prosecution of persons on obscenity charges will lead eventually to censorship of “open discussion” of important issues such as “rape, abortion, menstruation, contraception, lesbianism” (para. 9). Do you find her fears convincing? Does she give evidence to support her claim? Explain your responses.