Judges refuse to overturn Net obscenity law

A special three-judge panel declined to overturn a 1996 federal law prohibiting anyone from sending obscenity across the Internet. The New York panel on Monday rejected arguments from Barbara Nitke, a fine art photographer who specializes in sadomasochistic imagery, who had filed suit in December 2001 to overturn the law.

The lawsuit had targeted the Communications Decency Act's restrictions dealing with obscenity and community standards, arguing that applying old-fashioned geographical rules about what's acceptable makes no sense on the Internet. The judges agreed that Nitke was right to be worried about being prosecuted under the law--but concluded that she did not provide sufficient evidence to justify striking down that portion of the CDA.

[rpphoto555]

The end of freedom, the end of America

The judges decision in this case is a worst-case scenario of
narrow-minded fascist behavior that makes them enemies of the
real American people, people who believe in freedom and the right
to be ourselves.

[unknown unknown]

This would seem to defy precedent...

set by the Supreme Court in ACLU v. Reno in which an 1997 amendment to the CDA of 1996 would have made it illegal to transfer material deemed "harmful to minors" over the internet without age verification. The amendment defined material harmful to minors as "that, in context, depicts or describes, in terms patently offensive as measured by contemporary community standards, sexual or excretory activities or organs.". The court ruled this would be tantamount to a "heckler's veto" in that such a law would require publishers to make their content acceptable to the community with the harshest standards and this would be an undo burden on protected speech.

http://www2.epic.org/cda/cda_decision.html

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Definition Please?

How does the law define obscenity?