Reason TV produced a video that debates the sensitive subject of whether or not revenge porn should be legal. The video considers the case of Nicole Coon, who found out that her ex-boyfriend put an explicit video of her on the Internet. Finding that she was unable to seek help from the authorities, she’s working to make it illegal for it to happen to anyone else.
In an interview with Reason, Coon said “I did it because I was happy and in love and I trusted someone. The experience has changed me as far as trust goes. My trust [in people] has gone down tremendously.”
Several states have already passed legislation criminalizing revenge porn, and nineteen other states are proposing similar laws. But should it be illegal?
Spokesman for the ACLU Lee Rowland worries about the First Amendment implications of making it a crime to post a photo on the Internet, regardless of the content. Laws like that could potentially be broadly interpreted and do more damage than good overall.
Rowland argues, “We always start out with the presumption that speech is protected by the First Amendment. It’s a messy, beautiful element of our constitutional tradition. Where the Supreme Court has acknowledged that you can assign penalties to behavior, it’s when that behavior is conduct rather than speech. And that’s what makes revenge porn so difficult, because the conduct is speech. The conduct of posting a photograph without someone’s consent is speech.”
Rowland is correct. Revenge porn may be dicey and unscrupulous, but it should not be illegal. Especially because the transfer of the photo or video is a consensual act, voluntarily performed. The argument that young people who make mistakes shouldn’t be punished in such a way does not merit the government being involved. It takes away the responsibility of parents to police their own children’s behavior when accessing technology. Perhaps if there were more incentives for adults to intervene, they would do so.
However, when consenting adults choose to create pornography, they should know that there is always a possibility that it could fall into the wrong hands. That is why you should never create something and put it online if you don’t want it to be seen by other people. The government should not be in the business of seeking retribution because some people make stupid mistakes. People who make stupid mistakes, should have to bear the consequences of those mistakes. That is how a free society polices itself without the need for force or coercion. Introducing legislation into this equation is asking the government to do the job that people need to be doing for themselves.
Don’t want to be the victim of revenge porn? Don’t make porn. Simple. End of story.
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