Crisis Conference in Columbus Ponders Porn Problem

LOS ANGELES—As the Columbus Telegram tells it, 140 people gathered in Columbus, Ohio recently to listen to Morality in Media’s Dawn Hawkins warn them about the dangers of internet porn. Some locals were also on the panel, including a priest, a pastor, a pediatrician, two police officers and a theologian. There must be a joke in there somewhere. In as sense, though, the joke was on Hawkins and MiM, whose single-minded obsession with porn obscures any ability they might otherwise have to assess where real evil lies. To do that, they lie in ways that have been copiously documented by AVN over the years, but which remains their stock-in-trade. Sometimes the audience eats it up; sometimes they'd rather get real. This meeting seemed more the latter, according to the Telegram, which reported, “Hawkins said the porn industry is violent, degrading and exploits women, and it isn’t always consensual adults performing the act. Some are trafficked into the industry." The paper quotes her as saying, “One thing people don’t realize is that performers in pornography are often forced and coerced," and also, “[Porn today is] not like Playboy was in the 1960s where it’s pictures of topless women. It’s a lot more deviant than that and harder in nature.” Hawkins also repeated the uncorroborated trope about kids accessing online porn beginning at a very specific age. “Because porn is accessed easier than before, children are watching,” reports the Telegram. “They can easily find it on the Internet. Hawkins said the average age a child is first exposed to porn is 11.” It all seemed to be going according to plan... until it came time for questions, at which point the audience seemed less interested in the MiM agenda than “one area of particular concern” that they wanted to talk about: child pornography. All of a sudden, the conversation began to get a little more grounded, with actual facts being placed on the record.   When asked about “the number of calls and tips about child porn" fielded at the Columbus Police Department, Capt. Todd Thalken replied, “It’s kind of a roller-coaster thing. Child porn is generally not a thing that people call you up about.” The Telegram reported that he told the crowd that over the past three years his department had received 10 reports of alleged child porn, but clarified that child pornography “can include adults exploiting children and teenagers or children who send explicit photographs on their cell phones.” He added, “It could be as simple as talking your girlfriend who is a minor into taking that kind of a photo or actually getting them to take a photo.” He did not say how many of those reports ended in charges being filed or a conviction, and did not even attempt to explain how the 10 reports might be associated with the adult entertainment industry. The other police officer, Jodi Hefti, did address technology and the internet, but only to explain where the locals now keep their contraband child porn; it is no longer film developers in town who report suspected crimes, she said, because people store them on computers and phones. None of which Dawn Hawkins rode into town to talk about. If it doesn't trace back to the porn biz, she isn't doing her job. Indeed, trying to make a connection (that has been proven not to exist) between the adult industry and child pornographers is a lot of what Morality in Media does these days as their political influence and fundraising capabilities wane; they have few other options but to exaggerate the role of the industry in the exploitation of children in order to light a fire under people who might not otherwise support their messianic mission. Whether they actually believe the nonsense they spew is beside the point; the damage they do in perpetuating such gross misperceptions is not only wrong on its face, it also actually harms the people who believe them by creating a false view of the reality of who actually engages in child sexual abuse. If anything has the potential to do real damage to children, telling people to fixate on the wrong people does far more than the adult entertainment industry will ever do! In that cruel sense, the people of Columbus unwittingly invited a wolf in sheep’s clothing into their community the other day. Hopefully, they will not live to regret it.