Boston

[Burt, David]

  >Sounds good, Brian.  Let us know when you have a definition of
  >pornography that everyone involved will agree on, and when you have a
  >mechanism that will block access to sites with pornography with
  >sufficient reliability to satisfy everyone involved.

  >Thomas "...But I Know It When I See It" Dowling
  >tdowling at ohiolink.edu

But if pornography is impossible for librarians to define, then why are
there no public libraries in the U.S. which carry "Hustler" in their
periodicals section, or "Deep Throat" in their video section?
Librarians can argue about whether or not "Madonna's Sex" is/is not
"hard core pornography", and I'll agree that "Madonna's Sex" falls into
a borderline area where it could or could not be called "pornographic".
But there are such gray areas in *all* literary genres.  Take Westerns,
for example.  Let's say there are several things which define a Western
as a Western, say set in the second half on the 19th century, in the
western half of the  U.S., etc.  But what about a book that's set in
1900 Nebraska?  Is it a western?  Could be, could not be.  But based on
your "because there are gray areas, therefore you cannot make any
meaningful distinctions" line of reasoning, it is pointless to try to
define what a Western is.

The fact is, there is broad agreement among public librarians about what
constitutes "hard core pornography".  The proof of this is that you
don't find books and videos with titles like, well you know what I mean.
  I've yet to meet a librarian who thought that it was appropriate to
carry "Hustler" or "Deep Throat" in a public library.  But if librarians
can't define pornography, how can this be so?   What librarians *don't*
agree on are works which are borderline.  Fine, let's continue to argue
about borderline books like Madonna's Sex, and the end result is that a
few materials get in that shouldn't, and  a few get excluded that
should.  But so what?

Librarians *do* agree that

1)  There is a body of material called "hard core pornography".
2)   It doesn't belong it children's rooms.

While I find the filtering sentiment understandable, I think there are
better policies to handle this.  Possible solutions include:

1) Don't allow adults to use the Children's Internet Workstation.
2) Require parents to sign a release, which explicitly warns them that
children may find pornography.
3) Position PC screens  near the Children's librarian's desk.
4) Tell children they cannot access pornographic sites.

I'm afraid that we will see more draconian solutions imposed by
politicians if public libraries do not take some of the steps suggested
above.  Local TV stations around the country have discovered that "Your
Tax Dollars Pay For Pornography In The Children's Room At YOUR LIBRARY!
The Story At Eleven!"  makes an excellent promo.  This pushes some
pretty hot buttons.  I don't think that "sorry, but we don't act in loco
parentis" will unpush them.


David

          ***********************************************************
          David Burt, Information Technology Librarian 
          The Lake Oswego Public Library 
          706 Fourth Street, Lake Oswego, OR 97034
          URL:          http://www.ci.oswego.or.us/library/library.htm
          Phone:     (503) 635-0392 
          Fax:           (503) 635-4171 
          E-mail:      dburt at ci.oswego.or.us