Pornography

Although people throughout history have represented sexuality in literature and art, pornography did not ∗∗emerge as a mass industry until the late 1950s, eventually breaking into mainstream distribution outlets and growing to an estimated $12 billion-a-year business in the United States by the end of the 20th century. Although still proscribed by law in a variety of ways, pornography is increasingly mainstream in contemporary culture.

The terms obscenity and indecency have specific legal meanings. Pornography is sometimes used to describe all sexually explicit books, magazines, movies, and Internet sites, with a distinction made between soft-core (nudity with limited sexual activity, not including penetration) and hard-core (graphic images of actual, not simulated, sexual activity including penetration). Pornography also is often distinguished from erotica (material that depicts sexual behavior with mutuality and respect), leaving pornography as the term for material depicting sex with domination or degradation. Laboratory studies of pornography's effects commonly use three categories: overtly violent; nonviolent, but degrading; and sexually explicit, but neither violent nor degrading.

Indecency, a term from broadcasting (over-the-air radio and television), defines a broader category that can be regulated: language or material that, in context, depicts or describes sexual or excretory organs or activities in terms patently offensive as measured by contemporary community standards for the broadcast medium. The Federal Communications Commission administers indecency regulations.

In the 1973 Miller v. California decision, the U.S. Supreme Court established a three-part test for defining obscenity (material that appeals to the prurient interest, portrays sexual conduct in a patently offensive way, and does not have serious literary, artistic, political, or scientific value) and identified contemporary community standards as the measure of evaluation. Although a strict application of state and federal obscenity laws could lead to prosecution of much contemporary pornography, enforcement usually occurs only where there is political support from citizens. This prosecuto-rial discretion means material for sale openly in one jurisdiction may not be available in another. However, the availability of mail-order and computer pornography ensures that graphic, sexually explicit material can be obtained easily anywhere. The only exception is child pornography-material that is either made using children or in the digital age, made through the use of technology that makes it appear the sexual activity uses children. The former is illegal without question [Page 520](New York v. Ferber, 1982) and available only underground; the legal status of the latter remains uncertain (Ashcroft v. Free Speech Coalition, 2002).

As legal prohibitions have lessened, a once-underground industry with ties to organized crime has become a routine business with its own trade magazine, Adult Video News. Heterosexual pornography makes up the bulk of the commercial market. There is a significant amount of gay male pornography available, with a smaller amount of material produced commercially for lesbians. Pornography is distributed using all communication technologies: print, photographs, film, telephones, video, DVD, and computers. Playboy Magazine, which debuted in December 1953, was the first sex magazine to break into mainstream distribution channels. In the 1960s and 1970s, pornographic films moved into public theaters. In the 1980s, video swamped other forms, with the number of new pornographic video or DVD titles released each year increasing from 1,500 in 1986 to 13,000 in 2005. Computers emerged as a major vehicle for pornography in the 1990s.

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