cannot be held to same standards. It is not television and is not radio. It is different and must be treated that way" (Wired)In treating the Internet in a different way, is the government failing to achieve the success that previous media restrictions have had? This question lays out the third point of debate on censoring pornography on the Internet: it's social affects. The question being disputed is whether or not pornography is damaging to American society. The government has already defined child pornography harmful to youths and therefore outlawed by the Supreme Court, and some feminist activists are pushing for the same ban of pornography of women. Feminists Catharine MacKinnon and Andrea Dworkin have stated that pornography constitutes discrimination and violence towards women. In addition, Sut Jhalley's video "Dreamworld" claims to clearly show the obvious link between negative images of women and violence, using examples from film and video. These feminists and pro-censors gained more ammunition for their fight when a University of Michigan student was arrested for a story on a newsgroup describing an encounter of a female student. His story was a "violent narrative of rape and torture" and later emailed a friend that "just thinking about it doesn't do the trick anymore" (Diamond). It is in light of such incidents that lobbyists are pushing for a ban on pornography.The problem anti-censors are having with this feminist argument is their definition of pornography, which is "any expression that demeans women." Once again it is the vague terminology that is questioned. Censorship opponents are concerned that under this definition a great deal of educational and informative information would be removed from the Internet. Their argument also conjures up an interesting paradox within the feminist community. Nadine Strossen, president of the ACLU and also a feminist, stated that the MacKinnon and Dworkin idea of pornogr...
