Deevers Rebuts “Absurd” Claims that Porn is Free Speech, Points to Constitutionality and Popularity of Banning Porn

OKLAHOMA CITY — In response to the proliferation of misleading claims online that banning pornography would violate the First Amendment, Sen. Dusty Deevers, R-Elgin, the author of SB593 to ban pornography, pushed back, explaining that pornography is not speech.

“Prostitution is a crime, and rightly so. Current law is contradictory in that prostitution magically becomes legal if you pull out a camera, call it ‘pornography,’ and publish the recording. This is absurd,” Deevers said.

“Pornography industry lawyers and opponents of SB593 claim that pornography is ‘speech’ and thus protected under the First Amendment. This is simply false. The First Amendment was written to ensure that Americans could speak their mind, discuss ideas, publish journalism, argue policy, worship God freely, and petition their government. It was not written so that prostitution could be recorded and published for all to see. Recorded prostitution is not ‘speech’ in any meaningful sense of the word. Any claim to the contrary is nothing but a desperate talking point pushed by those who profit from or promote the degradation of humanity.”

Deevers referred to the common law and early American enforcement of obscenity laws.

“Public indecency was a common law crime. Justice Rehnquist, writing for the plurality in Barnes v. Glen Theater, wrote that states can regulate public nudity, including at strip clubs, because ‘Public indecency, including nudity, was a criminal offense at common law, and this Court recognized the common-law roots of the offense of ‘gross and open indecency’ in Winters v. New York. Public nudity was considered an act malum in se.’

“In other words, if public indecency and nudity were common law crimes enforced by the Founding Fathers at the time immediately following the First Amendment’s ratification, then prohibiting the public publishing of nudity and prostitution cannot be presumed to violate the First Amendment. Furthermore, if nudity can be prohibited behind closed doors in strip clubs, it can certainly be prohibited on the internet, which has become a setting far more public than any club.”

Deevers also cited the Miller Test, the binding Supreme Court precedent from Miller v. California (1973), which established that content is “obscene” and may be prohibited if:

1. the average person, applying contemporary community standards, would find that the work, taken as a whole, appeals to the prurient interest,
2. the work depicts or describes, in a patently offensive way, sexual conduct or excretory functions specifically defined by applicable state law, and
3. the work, taken as a whole, lacks serious literary, artistic, political, or scientific value.

“Taken as a whole, there is no question that modern pornography appeals to the prurient interest and lacks serious literary, artistic, political, or scientific value,” Deevers said. “The only thing missing is prong 2: an Oklahoma law specifically defining and prohibiting pornography. That is where SB593 comes in.”

Deevers then pointed to the outdated underpinnings of other pro-pornography SCOTUS rulings and the statistics surrounding child exposure to pornography.

“Reno v. ACLU from 1997 struck down the pornography ban at issue in the case partly on the basis that ‘the Internet is not as ‘invasive’ as radio and television.’ How is that assessment looking 30 years later when the average age of first exposure to internet pornography is 12 years old? 15 percent of kids are exposed to it by the time they are 10. That is 15 percent of kids exposed to hardcore porn before they graduate elementary school. A decent society would not tolerate this, and it clearly disproves a key element of the reasoning from Reno,” Deevers said.

“Another reason that SCOTUS struck down the 1996 porn regulation is because of the vague definition of what was being banned. It sought to prohibit not only “obscenity” but “indecency,” a term which the act may not have sufficiently defined. SB593 is specific and defines pornography in a way that meets the obscenity standard of the Miller Test.”

Not only is state prohibition of pornography permissible according to the Constitution, it is also gaining public support. A 2024 YouGov poll found that support for a total pornography ban was evenly split among registered voters at 42-42, with 16 percent unsure. Republicans support banning porn by greater than two-to-one margins with 60 percent in favor compared to just 27 percent opposed.

“As pornography becomes more degenerate and widespread, support for prohibiting it is increasing,” Deevers said. “According to polls, Republicans, especially those in Oklahoma, can ban pornography knowing they have the support of their voters.”

Deevers closed with an encouragement to his colleagues and fellow Oklahomans to imagine a society without pornography.

“Pornography is only ever degenerate material that destroys marriages, destroys lives, and steals the innocence of the young. It is pure cancer to the soul and corrosive acid to the moral fabric of society, while having no redeeming value whatsoever.

“Let us strive to raise a generation of Oklahomans who will not be sexually assaulted by exposure to hardcore pornography from elementary school onwards. Let us break free from the propaganda of pornographers who would have us believe the meaning of free speech is the mass production and publication of the most hardcore, obscene, and often abusive material ever imagined by the human mind.

“SB593 is crafted for compliance with the Miller Test. The bill reflects the will of Oklahomans who recognize the immense societal harm caused by pornography, from its role in fueling human trafficking and child exploitation to its destruction of families and communities. Mayor Rudy Giulianni’s famously successful cleanup of New York City began with the removal of the porn theaters from Times Square. He knew that keeping smut out of busy public areas was instrumental to reviving society. In the form of modern cell phones, the busiest public area of all is now in the palm of our hands. We, too, can act to clean up the public square.

“Whether it is my bill or someone else wants to amend it or run their own: doing nothing is not an option. There is no excuse to continue exposing Oklahomans to obscene pornography. We must aspire to become a state free from this plague.”

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For more information, contact:  Sen. Dusty Deevers at 405-521-5567 or email Dusty.Deevers@oksenate.gov.