More Than 100 Members of Congress Sign Letters Urging Attorney General Holder To Enforce Federal Obscenity Laws

Violence against women, harm to children and sex trafficking cited as harms of porn

WASHINGTON, April 5, 2011 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- The following was released today by Morality in Media:

The War on Illegal Pornography announced today that more than 100 U.S. Senate and House Members, including nine Senate Judiciary Committee Members, have signed letters addressed to U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder urging that the Department of Justice (DOJ) and the FBI vigorously prosecute major producers and distributors of illegal adult pornography.

Sponsored by Senator Orrin Hatch (R-UT) and U.S. House Representatives Mike McIntyre (D-NC) and Randy Forbes (R-VA), the letters to General Holder state, in part, that: "In June 1998, when you served as Deputy Attorney General, you directed U.S. Attorneys to enforce these laws.  The need for consistent and vigorous enforcement is even greater today because both obscene pornography and evidence of its harms have multiplied since then.  Laws exist to respond to this crisis, but they need to be enforced."  Included in the 9 Senate Judiciary Committee Members signing the letter are John Cornyn (R-TX), Dianne Feinstein (D-CA), Amy Klobuchar (D-MN), Lindsey Graham (R-SC), and Jon Kyl, (R-AZ).  (Link to signed letter http://bit.ly/ibfTOc)

"In the past several months Congress has experienced a public outcry, with more than a quarter million people asking their elected officials to sign this letter.  The nation is flooded with illegal adult pornography in almost every medium, providing fuel to the fire of child pornography and yet, the Department of Justice has not indicted any distributers of such material in the past two years," said Trueman, Morality in Media CEO and former prosecutor at the Department of Justice.

Pornography addiction is rampant, leading to grave social costs documented by a plethora of researchers at http://www.pornharms.com and at a groundbreaking conference held by the Witherspoon Institute at Princeton University entitled, "The Social Costs of Pornography" (www.socialcostsofpornography.org). Violence against women, increased sex trafficking, divorce, addiction to pornography by children and adults and many more societal ills can be traced to pornography consumption, according to research.

"We are simply asking for the enforcement of existing obscenity laws which would shut down most of the hardcore pornography available today on the Internet.  We applaud Sen. Hatch and Representatives Forbes and McIntyre for leading an extraordinary bi-partisan effort to get the U.S. Department of Justice to begin enforcing obscenity laws," said Trueman.

About Morality in Media

Morality in Media, Inc., is the leading national organization focused on opposing obscenity and indecency through public education and the application of the law. MIM is leading The War on Illegal Pornography, a coalition of more than 70 national and state groups whose goal is to stop the distribution illegal pornography. For more information visit www.waronillegalpornography.com, www.moralityinmedia.org and www.pornharms.com.

SOURCE Morality in Media