Getting Aroused: What it takes to combat porn.

So, what is to be done? What can be done to reduce what Mr. Buckley has cited as the "pervasive presence" of porn?

Quite a bit, actually. We are not helpless in the face of this problem. Those who toil in the anti-pornography field say that a false sense of helplessness is one of the pornographers' best allies. People feel that they can do nothing, that all must submit, that the courts have ruled we have no choice in the matter, that this is the modern world-get used to it. Yet this is untrue. There are many things to be done, on a number of fronts: legal, policy, and social (and we will take these categories in turn, although the categories tend to blend).

What any anti-pornography campaigner requires, first and foremost, is bravery. He must be prepared to weather a storm of abuse, including, Comstockist! Prude! Censor! Hater of the Bill of Rights! The anti-porn cause calls for thick skin, and both legal and moral confidence.

Consider the case of Utah and the porn czar. Yes, Utah has a "porn czar," appointed earlier this year. She is a deputy attorney general whose job it is to advise communities and citizens what their rights are vis-a-vis the smut in their midst. It is, to many, a funny notion: Utah-stuffy old Mormon Utah-and a porn czar. Jay Leno duly lampooned the idea on The Tonight Show.

The "czar" is a seasoned prosecutor named Paula Houston, whose sexual standing was questioned early on by local reporters. It was bruited about that she-a Mormon and unmarried-was a virgin, which was too much! What would she know? But Ms. Houston replied that her sex life was irrelevant and that she would go about her responsibilities, heedless of gibes.

A porn czar-someone to guide people through the thickets of the law-is an attractive idea for states, and, indeed, several of them besides Utah have been considering it. The Utah governor, Mike Leavitt, has said, "If a state legislature is looking for a way to improve the world, this is not an illogical way . . ."

A high moment in anti-porn resolve occurred in 1986, when the report of the "Meese Commission" came out. This was a panel charged by President Reagan with investigating pornography and recommending a plan of action. When Ed Meese, the attorney general, announced the commission's findings, he did so in the Great Hall of the Justice Department, in front of two Greek statues of semi-nude figures. The media had a field day with this, insisting that the setting had "stepped on" Meese's "message," leaving him a laughingstock. Here is another challenge in the war against porn: fighting the contention that, as between classical sculpture and Larry Flynt, there is hardly any difference- it's all in the eye of the beholder.

The findings of the commission were, essentially, that pornography was not necessarily a "victimless" crime and that the Justice Department needed stronger tools to prosecute it, in the form of new legislation. The commission also urged the creation of a "strike force," to go after porn's major producers and distributors. In due course, the department got both its new legislation and its strike force. And that force struck, to beneficial effect.

Pat Trueman was a key Justice Department player at the time, and he still wages the anti-porn war as director of governmental affairs for the American Family Association. As he tells it, big-time pornographers were brought to trial all over the country and, for the most part, fell like ninepins. Using both obscenity and racketeering laws, the feds were able to make a serious dent in illegal pornography. The industry quickly cleaned up its act, staying away from "child-themed" videos, and scenes featuring rape, mutilation, incest, and the like. Pornographers would take action before the law could, knowing that the authorities were alert and determined. Vigorous enforcement took place during the administration of the first George Bush as well. It was, all in all, a hazardous time for pornographers.

Then came the Clinton years-a boom time for the porn industry, a holiday from anti-obscenity prosecution. Pornographers enjoyed virtually carte blanche, as prosecutors and activists will tell you. In fact, pornographers will tell you as well. A porn producer named Mark Cromer wrote a piece for The Nation last February, in which he said, "Whatever collective pain and persecution the industry suffered during the Reagan and Bush the Elder years, when Bill Clinton rolled into the White House . . . [pornographers] saw eight years of relative green lights and blue skies." As a result, porn "has grown into a multibillion-dollar business reaching into nearly every corner of America, culturally, politically, and even economically." (This is the same explosion documented by the New York Times's Frank Rich, in the article cited by Mr. Buckley.)

During the 2000 presidential campaign, Adult Video News-the trade journal of porn-referred to the "benevolent neglect that the industry has enjoyed under Janet Reno" and fretted over a potential Republican victory. George W. Bush was indeed elected, and he named as his attorney general the social conservative John Ashcroft-giving pornographers a fright. "Porn Valley," out near L.A., wrote Mr. Cromer, "heard thunderclaps." And as before, pornmakers quickly went about the work of "self-censorship"-for example, there would be no "sex in a coffin." (This also from Mr. Cromer.)

When asked, "What can be done?" anti-pornographers almost invariably say, before all else, Simply enforce the laws already on the books. This is the answer that politicians on the stump often give when avoiding the adoption of a hard position. But it is a true and right response in this case. Obscenity is illegal, not protected by the First Amendment. And John Ashcroft has made clear that he will-just as the porn industry feared-make anti-obscenity prosecution a priority of the Bush administration. Not even September 11 has changed that.

It matters greatly who controls the Justice Department, who controls the U.S. attorney's offices, who sets the legal and moral tone in America. As The Nation's journalistic pornographer put it, "George W. Bush and John Ashcroft have won half the battle simply by showing up."

One weapon in the anti-pornography arsenal is zoning: the practice by which cities and towns can sequester X-rated businesses, significantly improving "quality of life." This was a contributor to Mayor Rudolph Giuliani's success in New York. He took on a thriving sex industry- particularly in Times Square-and walled it off. He inaugurated a "new day," as anti-porn activists said. The civil-liberties union cried censorship; The New Republic cluck-clucked at the mayor's "Victorian crusade." That crusade was challenged in court, and it lost a few, minor battles. Overall, though, it prevailed. Giuliani said later, "Some people romanticize the way things were [before]. . . . They think it was somehow charming to have graffiti on every wall and sex shops on every block. But remember what it was really like: Remember the fear, and the disrespect for people's rights . . . It seemed like no one cared."

Janet LaRue, senior legal director at the Family Research Council, says that communities can do more than they generally know about the porn shops that blight them, the outlets known as "sexually oriented businesses" (or SOBs). Some communities have laws on the books that are going unenforced, and some can stand to pass tougher laws. Jay Sekulow is chief counsel for the American Center for Law and Justice. His group is a rich resource for communities, even offering a "model city ordinance." There is little question that communities interested in doing so can sequester and limit porn, if not ban it outright.

One particularly important arena in the porn wars is-believe it or not- the local library: Does it have the right to block access to Internet pornography using computer filters? Should it do so? In the courts now is a federal law denying funds to libraries that refuse to block Internet porn. If a practicing conservative politician has a porn issue, it tends to be this one. The American Library Association is adamantly, categorically opposed to any filtering at all.

A 1998 case in Loudoun County, Va., received national attention. The library there wanted to block access to Internet porn-but a district- court judge ruled that doing so would violate patrons' First Amendment rights. The principal group fighting the library called itself "Mainstream Loudoun," which is typical of the strategy employed by anti-anti-porn forces: Me mainstream, you fringe.

Libraries, however, have not proven to be completely helpless in the matter. In Minneapolis, a group of librarians filed a claim with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, asserting that a library full of porn meant a "hostile work environment" for them. They were exposed to porn every day-and, worse, they were exposed to men committing lewd acts at the computer terminals. The entire atmosphere was being fouled. The EEOC found that the librarians' claims were justified, and also that they were entitled to financial redress. Librarians from around the country are registering their dismay over porn; some are even resigning. They did not sign up to work in virtual porn emporiums, and they are particularly distressed when it is difficult to separate child patrons from Internet smut.

Some anti-porn activists have come up with an intriguing idea: Let there be a separate "domain" for Internet porn, and let all of that porn come under it. The domain would be ".xxx." So, just as we have ".edu" for educational websites, and ".gov" for governmental ones, we would have the triple X for pornography. This would be sort of an Internet zoning law, according to which all porn sites would be ghettoized. Monique Nelson, CEO of Enough Is Enough, says, "We support this for the same reason that in the physical world you can make a separate place for adult bookstores. You can regulate them. We feel that these same concepts should apply to the Internet."

Other activists disagree, however, saying that pornographers would never leave ".com" and the rest, and could never be forced to do so. Besides which, law enforcement might grow laxer with regard to Internet porn, thinking that, if it is walled off under ".xxx," it should be left alone-even if it is obscenity, or child pornography, and therefore illegal.

Pat Trueman-late of the Justice Department, now with the American Family Association-notes that it is impossible to take on the entire, vast sea of pornography; better to concentrate on a few big fish. His organization, with others, has been concentrating lately on a very big fish, Yahoo, the Internet portal. Yahoo is home to thousands of sex "clubs" that disseminate manifestly illegal pornography. Mr. Trueman would like to see the company prosecuted; in the meantime, he is all for public pressure, and is directing it.

We are hardly talking here about nudies on the order of Playboy centerfolds; we are talking about . . . well, Yahoo has clubs devoted to father-daughter incest, complete with pictures, of course. There is- as the American Family Association has reported-a Forced White Wife Club, which "has photos of a man forcing a handgun into the mouth of a woman he is violating." There is an Asphyxia and More Club, featuring "photos of naked women hung by the neck, and others strangled by men." There are Real Rape Fantasies clubs. There is Rob's Necrophilia Fantasy Club, boasting "autopsy photos of naked women and medical-school cadavers. There is also a photo of what appears to be an emaciated concentration-camp victim lying naked in a mass grave next to a deceased child. A sexually suggestive caption is provided." And so on.

Mr. Trueman's group, in concert with Concerned Women for America, the Family Research Council, and others, has been harassing Yahoo without let-up. These organizations issue press releases, write letters, and generally rally public opinion. They are urging a boycott of Yahoo and its advertisers-and there is some evidence that their pressure is working. The company had planned to sell porn videos over the Net, but changed its mind in the wake of negative publicity and a letter campaign. Yet the sex clubs remain, because they are fantastically lucrative for Yahoo, and for other such portals.

The "mainstreaming" of porn has meant that many big companies-some of America's most venerable-are now part of "the industry." AT&T, for example, owns the Hot Network, a cable channel that purveys hard-core porn. And then there are the major hotel chains, such as Marriott: They offer porn in all of their rooms, via cable, and this service is hugely profitable for them. Why not prosecute them, if these materials cross into obscenity? Failing that, how about old-fashioned shame? Marriott is known as a straight-laced company-what gives? Often a gust of public disapproval, or the mere prospect of a court battle, is enough to make a company desist.

Bob Rowling is a hero to the anti-porn community. Who is he, and why? He purchased Omni Hotels in 1996, and decided to remove the porn from his chain's rooms. The stuff simply offended him; he did not want to run that kind of business; and he took action, though that action cost him dearly, in revenues. Mr. Rowling is held up as an example of "corporate responsibility"-and of individual conscience, of course, too.

A brief word on advertising: It has, indeed, become "kind of porny," with the Abercrombie & Fitch catalogue-which caught Mr. Buckley's attention-serving as Exhibit A. The only way to do something about this is to object: to write in, to complain, to boycott. What is necessary here-in the words of one prosecutor/activist-is "the willingness of the average citizen to get off the couch."

In the case of Abercrombie, it appears that many customers got off their couches. The company has just announced that its next catalogue will be de-porned. Abercrombie brass explained that, in the wake of September 11, a more somber atmosphere should be maintained; but it is not unreasonable to think that public protest played some role-probably the major role-in the company's decision.

There are other anti-porn tools, other notions: Wall Street can be pressured, the mainstreaming of porn businesses resisted. The "responsible investor" can be invoked. Some groups call for more "cyber cops," officers who are trained to deal with Internet porn and its associated crimes. Before the Supreme Court now are several cases involving kids, pornography, and the Net-one of them is called Ashcroft v. ACLU. The anti-porn crowd stresses the need for judges who do not view the First Amendment as all-tolerating when it comes to smut.

Ultimately, our country probably needs to be "re-moralized," as the historian Gertrude Himmelfarb has written. And Americans need to care about this "pervasive presence." Think what happened to smoking in America when people generally, and elites in particular, became interested: It is now almost a pariah activity. Is pervasive porn a lesser social ill?

No serious anti-porn campaigner is a utopian. None supposes that porn can be made to disappear, or that the Constitution could allow such a thing. But defeatism is unwarranted: Illegal porn can be prosecuted, and legal porn can be discouraged. In this realm, a little stigmatizing can go a long way.

One wise specialist, with close ties to the current administration, says that, in the final analysis, "You have to ask, What do we as citizens want? It's the average Joe who's going to have a lot to say about this. Pornography has always been around, and always will be-but only recently has it really overwhelmed us. I mean, seven-year-olds are looking at it. We can step back. People of common sense and decent morals can say, Enough."

Yes. Enough.