LAS VEGAS — Adult industry attorney Marc Randazza is featured in Las Vegas CityLife this week, discussing a variety of subjects, including porn, his college days and why Nevada needs to put in protection laws helping those who want to freely exchange ideas.
Randazza, who was named to XBIZ World's Top 50 newsmakers last year and was sworn into the Nevada Bar at the AVN Awards last week, says that he's chosen to defend pornographers and the surrounding industries because after New York Times vs. Sullivan was ruled on, media law was somewhat "already done."
(New York Times vs. Sullivan established the actual malice standard that has to be met before news reports about public figures can be considered to be libel.)
Randazza said: "Today, that vanguard is the adult entertainment industry."
"When people in the adult entertainment industry get prosecuted for obscenity, what's happening to them? That's a producer of films being threatened with prison because the government doesn't like the content of that film," Randazza said. "There is no civilized first-world society that should tolerate that.
"People like Larry Flynt and John Stagliano and Max Hardcore, when they fight these cases, they risk — and frankly, they do go to jail for it — when people risk that, when they don't plea out, when they say they're going to stand up for the 1st Amendment, these people are doing more for your liberty and my liberty than anybody in the military."
Randazza said that his true heroes are those who have put up a fight over speech, including that speech communicated through pornography, for all of our liberty.
"Larry Flynt has gotten some recognition, but I think it'll be a hell of a long time before we see a Larry Flynt square in Washington, D.C., or a monument to Max Hardcore or John Stagliano. But you know, by all rights, there should be. However, I recognize them."
The full Las Vegas CityLife article is available here.
