“It’s just another blatant attempt at censorship and a total waste of taxpayers’ money,” Cambria said.
Cambria is a 1st Amendment attorney who has represented several prominent public figures including Larry Flynt and Marilyn Manson.
Cambria’s response comes in the wake of several conservative citizens groups’ criticism of presidential candidate Mitt Romney. The former Massachusetts governor also was a Marriott Corp. board member for 10 years and is the subject of conjecture for numerous conservative groups accusing him of turning a blind eye to the hotel chain’s sale of in-room, PPV sex videos. The Republican candidate is running on a conservative, family values, pro-life platform.
Cambria goes further to say that Ohio’s Citizens for Community Values is targeting LodgeNet Entertainment Corp., a company that supplies content to hotel networks.
A news alert received by the AFF from conservative activist group Focus on the Family Action, said “family activists” will meet with representatives in August from the Justice Department to call for an investigation of Lodgenet.
CCV President and Executive Director Phil Burress is quoted in the news release as saying, “Why is LodgeNet permitted to deal in hardcore, sexually explicit, clearly prosecutable material? The U.S. Supreme Court set down guidelines for what is prosecutable.”
Focus on the Family Action Senior Analyst Daniel Weiss is quoted also, stating, not only did Miller vs. California determine that states could ban hardcore pornography, federal law prohibits obscene material from being distributed across state lines.
“He’s got that wrong,” Cambria said. “Mr. Burress [and Mr. Weiss] fails to recognize that the Miller test protects adult expression. It does not condone it. He confuses sexually explicit with obscene. 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.”
According to an article posted on the Christian Broadcasting Network, the CCV and various antiporn lobbyist groups have been campaigning against in-room adult entertainment sold by hotels for several decades.
Several antiporn crusaders also are quoted within the article, stating their reservations about Romney’s stance on antiporn issues, while citing that Romney apparently claims to have been unaware of the profits being made from Marriott’s sale on in-room adult videos.
“This man is very knowledgeable about the issues. But for him to not know anything about what Marriott is selling; I found that very interesting,” said Burress in the CBN article.
“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 said. “What better acceptance can you have than widespread consumption by adults?
“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.”
