Larry Flynt: Move along, nothing to see here

Pornography magnate Larry Flynt has a lot to lose from government regulation of his industry. Large, established companies like his--Larry Flynt Productions makes and distributes about 500 adult movies a year--would almost certainly have to obey any laws that California and/or Los Angeles county put into place.

If production companies have to pay for HIV testing (currently the performers pay for their own tests), Larry Flynt will be footing that bill. If condoms are required for sex scenes, Larry Flynt's pocketbook will feel the loss from the reduced market demand for depictions of safe sex. If minimum standards of treatment for sex workers are instituted, Larry Flynt will have to pay to raise those standards from their current, almost nonexistent level.

So, naturally, I suppose, Larry Flynt is opposed to government regulation of porn. He has penned an op-ed piece in the Los Angeles Times (reg. req'd.) to make his case. In it, Flynt makes these arguments:

1. Trust us, we know what's best. Flynt seems to think that simply because they are successful businesspeople, he and his fellow producers should be trusted to take care of their business themselves. Flynt:

The adult film industry in Southern California is not being run by a bunch of dirty old men in the back room of some sleazy warehouse. Today, in the state, XXX entertainment is a $9-billion-to-$14-billion business run with the same kind of thought and attention to detail that you'd find at GE, Mattel or Tribune Co.

Funny he should mention General Electric. GE considered itself a responsible member of the community, too. It also dumped PCBs into the Hudson River, creating a decades-long toxic problem. GE needed more regulation, to say the least. Not exactly a useful example for Flynt to bring up in his argument.

"Those of us who are in the business want to protect our investment," says Flynt. "We are not going to do anything that is stupid or shortsighted. We are most certainly not going to do anything that we believe will harm another human being."

But what happens when those two values--protection of investment and protection of human beings--come into conflict? What if it is in producers' financial interest to exploit, coerce or trick performers?

Flynt is ignoring reality. In interviews, he often says that his company specializes in "plain vanilla sex," rather than in the extremes that are becoming common in the porn market. But nowhere in his L.A. Times op-ed does Flynt acknowledge that, industry-wide, more and more extreme sexual acts are being demanded of younger and younger performers. While Flynt himself apparently doesn't wish to head into that growing freak-show market, he does know it exists, he knows it is growing, and he knows that Lara Roxx was infected doing her first "double-anal" scene.

This was an act she apparently didn't even know was going to be required of her when she arrived on the set and was thrust into an unexpected re-negotiation of her contract with producer/actor Marc Anthony. Lara Roxx:

"When I got there, me and Marc had a little conversation, because [Roxx's manager] Thomas Hope told me I was going to do a d.p., and so I get there and Marc Anthony tells me it's a d.a., which stands for double anal. And I'm like, 'What? I've never done a double anal.' And he's like, 'Well, that's what we need. It's either that or nothing.' And that's how they do it."

Marc Anthony may not be a "dirty old [man] in the back room of some sleazy warehouse," to borrow Flynt's phrase, but he doesn't exactly come off like Mr. Rogers in this anecdote.

This is who we're supposed to trust to self-regulate?

(Note: Anthony does not dispute that Roxx came to the set unaware of the double-anal requirement. He blames "a miscommunication.")

2. The current outbreak isn't really so bad. "[T]he industry's approach to HIV safety is working," says Flynt, adding that "only two people have tested positive in the current scare."

Let's see... Two people contract the virus that causes AIDS, dozens of others are quarantined, and a "$9-billion-to-$14-billion" industry has to shut down for two months, putting thousands out of work.

Well, hey, it's better than having rules.

3. If bareback is outlawed, only outlaws will ride bareback. A condom law "would drive the industry underground or out of state," says Flynt. "The net result would surely be more HIV infections." But where? The government of the state of California protects Californians. If Porn Valley picks up and moves to Arizona to practice unsafe sex, then Arizona deals with that (and we can help them--we have experience now). We don't let companies dump poison into streams just because some other state might let them do it.

I don't have anything against Larry Flynt. In fact, I dedicated my last play to him. I am in awe of the strength he has shown in his battles for the First Amendment. In every case, his opponents were wrong and he was right. In every case, Flynt persevered with admirable courage. A true patriot, the man went to jail for the Constitution.

But he's wrong on this one. He's thinking with his wallet. The sex workers who are currently so ill-treated in his industry do matter. Instead of fighting the inevitable, Larry Flynt should be using his position in the industry to fight for them.

More here:

"Let them eat HIV: Who failed Lara Roxx?"

"Regulating porn"

"Porn matters"