7/6/07
LOS ANGELES, CA. “It just another blatant attempt at censorship and a total waste of taxpayers’ money,” said Atty. Paul Cambria.
Cambria, AFF general counsel, was responding to a right wing group’s call for a federal investigation into adult pay-per-view movies available in hotels across America.
Phil Burress, president and executive director of Ohio’s Citizens for Community Values (CCV) is targeting a movie supplier, the LodgeNet Entertainment Corp.
“Why is LodgeNet permitted to deal in hard core, sexually explicit, clearly prosecutable material?” Burress says “much of the contents are prosecutable under the U.S. Supreme Court ruling in Miller vs. California.”
He’s got that wrong,” Cambria stated.
“Mr. Burress fails to recognize that the Miller test protects adult expression. It does not condemn it.
“He confuses sexually explicit with obscene,” Cambria explained.
“Under the Miller test, entertainment can be sexually explicit and hardcore and nevertheless not be illegal.
“This is particularly true when it enjoys widespread acceptance by the average adult as a form of entertainment.”
“Obviously the average adult has expressed an overwhelming acceptance of this kind of entertainment delivered in the privacy of their home away from home hotel room, Cambria noted.
“What better acceptance can you have than widespread consumption by adults,” he said.
The CCV said they will meet with the Dept. of Justice next month and formally request the investigation into LodgeNet.
“The hotel room is an extension of a person’s home while they are traveling. And, we need to keep the government, the police and the prosecutors out of our homes and away from our choices of entertainment,” Cambria concluded.
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