All the Ads Fit to Print

Free speech v. good taste.

The New Erotic Adventures of Casanova was the feature attraction at three southern California moviehouses on Aug. 22, according to the Los Angeles Times (circ. 1,021,000), while Jail Bait was at eight more local theaters. The next day those cinematic classics were still packing them in, but without benefit of the Times. The paper had become the latest and largest U.S. daily to close its pages to display advertising for pornographic films.

Since the New York Times two months ago announced that movie ads it deemed unfit to print would be restricted to 1-in., unillustrated notices of time and place, the urge to purge has spread. The Seattle Times, Sacramento Bee, Fresno Bee, San Diego Union, Long Beach Independent Press-Telegram, and various lesser papers have either banned sex-film display ads outright or placed so many restrictions on them that advertisers have taken their trade elsewhere.

Such righteousness does not come cheap. The L.A. Times, for instance, carried $1 million in porn-palace ads in the past year, and the New York Times grossed $750,000. But publishers are growing weary of watching their entertainment pages become newsprint versions of Times Square, and of being constantly outsmarted by porn princes. "They brought it on themselves," says C.K. McClatchy, editor of the Sacramento and Fresno Bees. "We tried to police them, but it got too tough. They always had a gimmick." One theater, McClatchy recalls, submitted an ad featuring a woman singing into what appeared to be a microphone; it was a cleverly disguised penis.

Bowdlerism is nothing new at American newspapers. Many dailies reject offensively prurient ads on a case-by-case basis, and some papers print them only after extensive doctoring. Vernon Johnston, advertising ombudsman of the Louisville Times and Courier-Journal, simply blacks out with his felt-tip pen any anatomical displays that trouble him. "They call me the mad brassiere artist," says he. Other papers have for years had policies banning or limiting adult-film advertising, among them the Detroit News, Cleveland Plain Dealer and Miami Herald. Wrote Herald Executive Editor John McMullan last June in welcoming the new puritan revival: "A newspaper, after all, is only a guest in your home."

The matter may not be that simple. "It's a blow to the concept of free speech, freedom of expression and the rights of people to have access to information," bristles Fred Okrand, a California lawyer for the American Civil Liberties Union. Other critics find it inconsistent that newspapers ban sex-film ads but not those for other questionable products, like liquor and cigarettes. Some newspaper executives believe it is futile to try to dictate morality at all. Says Louisville's Vernon Johnston: "We aren't going to make moral decisions for our readers and pretend these places don't exist."

The solution adopted by the New York Times and a few other papers--allowing tiny sex-film ads without illustrations--appears to be a reasonable compromise between free speech and readers' sensibilities. Some publishers find reason an inadequate guide in such an emotional issue as pornography. Conservative Publisher William Loeb's Manchester (N.H.) Union Leader, which has for years banned ads for X-rated films, this year extended the prohibition to R-rated films, such as The Exorcist and A Star Is Born.

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