The U. S. Supreme Court has rejected calls to block a new Texas law requiring age verification for users of pornographic content. The law opposing the use of pornography by minors remains in force.
A pornography advocacy organization called the Free Speech Coalition (FSC) has asked the Supreme Court to block the Texas law. According to NBC News, “challengers said the 2023 law violates the First Amendment of the Constitution by requiring anyone on the platforms in question, including adults, to submit non-public information. “
Users are required by law to provide age verification data to protect youth from pornography.
“Specifically, the law requires adults to comply with intrusive age verification measures that require the submission of personally identifiable data over the Internet to access Internet sites containing intimate and sensitive content,” the FSC argued.
Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton responded by saying that the law “simply requires the pornography industry, which makes billions of dollars from the coal trade, to take commercially moderate steps to make sure those in the curtains are adults. “
“The Texas law was signed into law through Republican Gov. Greg Abbott in June 2023. The legislation, Texas H. B. 11811, was set to go into effect on Sept. 1, but was put on hold after the lawsuit filed through the Free Speech Coalition (an organization that includes Pornhub’s parent company) resulted in an initial injunction postponing its enforcement,” Variety reported.
“The law applies to online publishers whose content is made up of more than one-third ‘destructive sexual cuts to minors’ and requires them to determine the age of all visitors, a government-issued ID, or ‘public or personal transactional data. ‘” the outlet said. Added.
However, in March, a three-judge panel of the Fifth Circuit ruled in favor of the law, “overturning a lower court ruling that had blocked enforcement of the measure,” the Christian Post reported.
Due to age identity requirements, Pornhub went off in Texas earlier this year.
“My bill created an age verification requirement for online pornography internet sites in Texas to protect minors from accessing their destructive content,” Texas Sen. Angela Paxton said after Pornhub announced it would disable its use in the state.
“After a fierce fight against this practice, pornography is forced to comply with the law,” he added.
The Free Speech Coalition plans to keep fighting.
“We look forward to continuing this challenge, and others like it, in the federal courts,” the organization said. “The Fifth Circuit’s ruling remains in direct opposition to decades of Supreme Court precedent, and we remain hopeful that the Supreme Court will grant our request for certiorari and reaffirm its long list of cases that apply strict scrutiny to content-based restrictions on speech, such as those in Texas law that we have challenged.
Movieguide® has already reported on the risks of pornography:
The Wall Street Journal explains that “young people’s brains are more hardwired for arousal than adults’, with higher spikes in dopamine, a feel-good neurotransmitter released in anticipation of pleasurable activities. . . »
Pornography elicits the same brain reactions that drugs produce in an addict. Valerie Voon, a professor of psychiatry at the University of Cambridge, found that when her team showed pornography to young men with compulsive habits, their brain scans mirrored the brain scans of the drugs. addicts when they were shown pictures of drugs.
It also found that, among young people, pornography elicited “greater activity in brain praise centers than older participants when shown pornography. “
This is because “the emotional middle part of the brain develops faster than the component of the brain that controls impulses. “This disparity “helps explain why adolescents lack the adulthood to ‘suppress sexual desires, thoughts, and behaviors provoked through pornographic content,'” as a review of studies on the subject. . .
Because of ease of access, nine out of 10 American children notice pornography before the age of 18, the average age of exposure is 11, and 84% of males and 57% of those between the ages of 14 and 18 in the U. S. have been exposed.
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Now more than ever, we are bombarded by darkness in the media, movies, and television. Movieguide® has struggled for nearly 40 years, operating within Hollywood to push for uplifting and positive content. We are proud to say that we collaborated with some of the biggest players in the industry to influence and redeem entertainment for Jesus. However, the most influential user in Hollywood is you. The spectator.
What you pay attention to, look at, and read has power. Movieguide® needs to give you the resources you want to empower smart and beautiful people. But we can’t do it alone. We want your support.
You can make a difference with just $7. It just takes a moment. If you are able, please support our ministry with a monthly donation. Thank you.
Movieguide® is a 501c3 and all donations are tax deductible.
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