Revisiting Jerry Falwell’s Mother and Stanley Fish

Prof. Stanley Fish
This essay is not about Jerry Falwell’s mother instead it is about Stanley Fish says about Free Speech. What does Jerry Falwell’s mother to do with this? In 1983 Larry Flynn, publisher of Hustler, published a parody interview with Jerry Falwell in which Mr. Falwell remises about his first time. In this case his first time was with his mother in an outhouse! Mr. Falwell sued and lost. The various courts ruling that Larry Flynn’s freedom of speech rights were trumped Jerry Falwell and his mother’s damaged reputations. Well some people were disturbed by this outcome. One of them was Stanley Fish a Professor of Duke University and a noted Post-Modernist thinker. But then Prof. Stanley Fish entitled a collection of his essays There’s No Such Thing as Free Speech and it’s a good thing too.1 The book contains a essay on Freedom of Speech, with the title above which is also used as the title of the book, which is about how Freedom of Speech doesn’t really exist and an essay about the libel case involving Jerry Falwell.

Through it all Prof. Fish manages quite simply not to get it.

For example he says:

“Free speech” is just the name we give to verbal behaviour that serves the substantive agendas we wish to advance; and we give out preferred verbal behaviours that name when we can, when we have the power to do so, because in the rhetoric of American life, the label “Free Speech” is one you want for your favourites to wear. Free speech, in short, is not an independent value but a political prize, and if that prize has been captured by a politics opposed to yours, it can no longer be invoked in ways that further your purposes, for it is now an obstacle to those purposes.2

Later Prof. Fish articulates the idea that freedom of expression assumes that some speech is meaningless or wrong to say. Really?

Prof. Fish is articulating a position which states that the demand for “Free Speech” is always inherently political and used to advance a position and that it is not a independent position. In other words it is always political and that no one really believes in “Free Speech” as an abstract value.

By arguing that “Free Speech” is political Prof. Fish brings it into the argument for debate, by assuming it is political he can argue that limitations on it are merely like “Free Speech” political positions. Thus Prof. Fish can argue for limitations on speech.

But then Prof. Fishes' point is that the crowd of anti “politically correct” pundits etc., have captured the ground of “Free Speech” so that arguments for “Free Speech” by “Liberal” or “Progressive” groups etc., have conceded that ground to the enemy so that the debate must shift to how “Free Speech” isn’t real and how it can be and is limited, so we can then discuss what can be banned.

One wonders how Prof. Fish with his assumption that “Free Speech” is always political tailors with people like Prof, Chomsky’ defence of Holocaust deniers like Robert Faurisson right to speak.3 Prof. Fish seems to think that “Free Speech” is purely a political act designed to advance a particular political position. This is false. To quote Chomsky:

But I’m saying if you believe in freedom of speech, you believe in freedom of speech for views you don’t like. I mean Goebbels was in favor of freedom of speech for views he liked. Right? So was Stalin. If you’re in favor of freedom of speech, that means you’re in favour of freedom of speech precisely for views you despise, otherwise you’re not in favour of freedom of speech. There’s two positions you can have on freedom of speech, and you can decide which position you want.4

Prof. Fish seems to be totally unaware of this sort of position.

Prof. Fish then goes into a rather useless rant about how speech related injuries can be hurtful and painful and should not be trivialized and then Prof. Fish talks about how a recommended solution that the solution to this is more speech trivializes the harm. That speech operates in the real world and that to treat speech like it was mere ideas forgets that they are actions.5

This of course a straw man and Prof. Fish’s statement that the more speech argument trivializes the “harm” speech can do is a nice example of Prof. Fish indicating that he is in the end not very radical at all. Chomsky among many others can tell him how the media is constrained by market and other forces to marginalize and largely shut out opinion contrary to powerful interests. Such that more speech is indeed a powerful tool and very much in the interest of the powerless and marginal. Further that constraints on speech will be controlled directly and / or indirectly by these powerful interests, so just how would the powerless and marginal benefit from that? Chomsky and others like him have a powerful distrust of the state and its various institutions and Prof. Fish is here indicating quite strongly an almost childlike trust in such things.6

The speech codes that Prof. Fish is here defending are of course under control of the institutions in question and Prof. Fish’s trust in the good faith of those institutions is touching and frankly naïve.

But then Prof. Fish “knows” that “Free Speech” is always about politics:

When the First Amendment is successfully invoked, the result is not a victory for free speech in the face of a challenge from politics but a political victory won by the party that has managed to wrap its agenda in the mantle of free speech.7

Really? I just wonder how this explains the ACLU defending the rights of Klansmen, Neo-Nazi and Fundamentalists to “Free Speech”. Given that the ACLU routinely defends groups and people whose positions are radically different from and contrary to ACLU positions on all sorts of issues.8

Prof. Fish does not seem to understand that the ACLU position and those who think along the same lines, is that you give opinions you despise freedom to be expressed, precisely to defend your own freedom to express your own opinions. Not as he seems to think that “Freedom of Speech” will lead in the end to “right” or “true” opinions to dominate. As for the Prof. Fish’s argument that speech can cause “harm”, well so what! The problem is that which speech causes “harm” is very much a personal matter. I have little doubt that I could easily find Conservative pundits, Fundamentalists who regard the speech of Fish and others like him has “grievous and deeply wounding”9, and of course causing untold harm, and therefore it should be suppressed.

Prof. Fish seems to be totally unaware that there are other grounds for attacking so-called Conservatives wrapping themselves in the mantle of “Free Speech”. One of course is the unmitigated hypocrisy of such a stance when many so-called Conservative pundits routinely call for the suppression of speech they do not like, and in fact have engaged in quite disgusting campaigns of attempted suppression. Or that Conservative educational institutions, Fundamentalist schools etc., routinely suppress “Free Speech” and other First Amendment rights but that Conservative pundits etc., pass over these offences in silence.10

Further that speech codes can be defended on the grounds that they are often vastly less restrictive than the arbitrary authority and grounds which the authorities who run those institutions can discipline for “bad” behaviour or words. Further that it is important to realize that these institutions being private institutions have a greater right to regulate the behaviour of the people who are privileged to be allowed into them. These arguments may be good or bad but they are certainly better than the convoluted stew that Prof. Fish argues for.11

But then in a rather convoluted series of passages Prof. Fish ends up arguing for regulation of speech, because in the end Prof. Fish doesn’t wish to hear speech he doesn’t like. Of course Prof. Fish is utterly unaware that there are people who don’t want to hear his opinions and wish to suppress them, using the very same logic he does.

What does this have to do with Jerry Falwell’s mother?


Reverend Jerry Falwell Well in 1983 Larry Flynn published, in his sex magazine Hustler, a vicious parody of Reverend Jerry Falwell reminiscing about his first time; first time having sex that is. Making it problematic Reverend Falwell was describing having sex with his mother in an outhouse. That is definitely really nasty! Certainly this is to put it mildly tasteless and certainly going after Jerry Falwell is one thing but his mother also?! Jerry Falwell sued for libel.

But then Prof. Fish ruins the whole thing by a couple of statements such as:

So what we have here is a false and malicious depiction of two people with the avowed intention of wounding one so that his ability to function as a minister of the gospel would be destroyed.12

Well poor Reverend Falwell! I note that Prof. Fish says this after admitting that the article says very clearly that it is a parody. It is rather interesting that Prof. Fish avoids any mention of Reverend Falwell’s own very well developed capacity for malice and cruelty. As for being a minister of the gospel many would disagree with that. But then the phrase is purposely designed to raise sympathy for Mr. Falwell. Forgetting of course that in the departments of political and economic power Falwell vastly exceeded Flynn. We are not talking about an innocent here. Then Prof. Fish makes it very clear that he doesn’t like Flynn very much or pornography or considers pornography a form of legitimate “speech” because it is not about politics. At this point Prof. Fish makes the comment about the founding fathers would not have considered obscenity true speech. So!?13 At that point it is hard to take Prof. Fish seriously.

This entire spiel is designed to once again support the idea that certain types of speech should be suppressed in this case pornography. This requires, in the present example, a demonization of Larry Flynn. I will simply tell Prof. Fish that he should read Gore Vidal’s essay Sex is Politics,14 if he seriously thinks pornography is not a form of speech.

Larry Flynn

Later Prof. Fish makes some comment that we already regulate speech with the rather obvious implied and direct contention that we should continue to regulate speech.15 Prof. Fish once again doesn’t get it. Everything that exists in human life is regulated one way or the other that is the nature of human existence and frankly even the most extreme free speech absolutist knows this. (Prof. Fish creates a rather absurd caricature of such a person). After all everyone with any sense knows about yelling “fire” in a crowded theatre when there is no fire is not protected speech. The point is how much / how speech should be regulated. By redefining the issue to whether or not speech should be regulated at all Prof. Fish avoids this problem. Of course setting up the straw man of the position that the alternative to that position is one of no regulation, and demonstrating that such a position is simply stupid Prof. Fish once again tilts at windmills.

It is of interest that Prof. Fish admits that attempts to define a rational basis for declaring something obscene are contradictory, difficult and absurd but draws no conclusions that perhaps this indicates that trying to do so outside very narrow range of limits perhaps should not be done. Instead Prof. Fish believes that this indicates that perhaps deciding what is obscene should be deduced entirely outside rational discourse. Which of course would make it possible to ban pornography because he finds it personally icky. One again Prof. Fish forgets that many people might find his type of discourse also personally icky and so therefore it should be banned.

Now regarding the above case I wonder if Prof. Fish is ready to allow everyone to be sued who refers to someone has a “son of a bitch”, because after all such a statement calls someone’s mother a dog. In this case the piece was clearly indicated to be a parody and not to be taken seriously, and it is clear that the piece was an attack on Reverend Falwell not his mother. So frankly I agree with the verdict that rejected the libel claim. Despite Prof Fish’s insinuations the fact that Larry Flynn publishes pornography is simply not relevant in this case. But then it is clear that Prof. Fish doesn’t like Larry Flynn or pornography. So he is here basically arguing for allowing the suppression of pornography on the grounds it is not legitimate “speech”.

That said I still find the parody piece offensive and it would have been nice if Larry Flynn had published an apology to Jerry Falwell’s mother.16 In my opinion the piece was unnecessarily tasteless and Jerry Falwell’s mother should have been left alone.

In the end Prof Fish seems to have problems with freedom so I quote:

Those who do not understand that freedom has value in itself, though its expression necessarily produces evil as well as good, are poorly suited to the culture of democracy.17

1, Fish, Stanley, Oxford University Press, New York, 1994.

2, IBID, p. 102.

3, A lot of nonsense as been written about this. I would just note that Chomsky’s defence of Robert Faurisson is solely a defence of his right to speak and not be silenced, not of Robert Faurisson’s utterly repellent views. I will forgo linking to or referring to any of Robert Faurisson’s works. You just need to Google to find his filth. See Wintonick, Peter, & Achbar, Mark, Manufacturing Consent: Noam Chomsky and the Media, Black Rose Books, Montreal, 1994, pp.175-191.

4, Wintonick et al, p. 184.

5, IBID, pp. 108-109.

6, See Chomsky, Noam, & Herman, Edward S., Manufacturing Consent, Revd. Edition, Pantheon Books, New York, 2004.

7, Fish, p. 110.

8, See the ACLU website, Here.

9. Fish p. 109.

10, See for example Wilson, John K., The Myth of Political Correctness, Duke University Press, London, 1995, and Jenkinson, Edward B., Censors in the Class Room, Discus Books, 1979. See also Weiner, Jon, Historians in Trouble, The New Press, New York, 2005. A classic action is the ouster of Ward Churchill who was ousted from his tenure position at the University of Colorado over alleged academic misconduct when the actual reason, (as determined by a trial) was some controversial, and frankly rather disgusting statements regarding 911 he foolishly uttered and wrote. I will not repeat them, just Google. Well Prof. Churchill won his wrongful termination suit. Basically a lot of so called Conservative pundits and others went baying for his blood and to get him turfed. They got more than they bargained for from Prof. Churchill. I still find his comments repellent but frankly the Universities teem with Profs having disgusting opinions that is no reason to fire them. See The Ward Churchill Trial, Here.

11, See Wilson, pp. 90-135.

12, Fish, p. 120.

13. IBID, pp. 120-133.

14, in The Second American Revolution and other Essays 1976-1982, Random house, New York, 1982.

15, Fish, pp. 128-130.

16. As far as I can tell Hustler never printed an apology to Jerry Falwell’s mother. I in all modesty suggest the following:

Mrs Falwell we would like to apologize for unintentially causing you pain and anguish. It was our intention to hit that hypocrite turd of a son of yours and it was a mistake to drag you into our dispute with him. So once again our sincere apologies.

17. Revel, Jean-Francois, The Totalitarian Temptation, Penguin Books, New York, 1977, p. 17.

Pierre Cloutier

Pornography Ancient and Modern

The following Post

contains some sexually explicit images

If you might be offended

Please do not read!!

An issue guaranteed to get people’s blood boiling is the issue of pornography. This is one of those heat and little light issues. Unlike the case of a writer like the Marquis de Sade whose writings, who I have previously written a blog on, are indeed truly disturbing in that they do combine sex with horrific sadistic violence and therefore legitimately call for consideration and concern. Although not in my opinion banning. It is interesting that so called “ordinary porn”; just seems to bring out the holier than thou in people.

Of course a ‘hot button” issue like this one is exceptionally useful in keeping peoples mind off real issues and have them getting obsessed with what their neighbours are doing.

Pornography is one of those issues and it has been and is exceptionally useful in getting people’s minds off the important stuff.

Of course porn has been around a very long time and has not always caused the same level of hysteria and sheer mockish stupidity.

For example lets us look at such things as this rather interesting Herm from ancient Greece with their very erect penises and stood on street corners in many Greek cities.

A Herm
Or how about this much larger than life size penises from Delos.

Phalli at Delos
There is also this painting from Pompeii which is shall we say explicit.

Mural from Pompeii

And for you fans of the truly kinky how about a little bestiality.

The god Pan making it with a goat
The above is not my cup of tea or dare I say of much interest to any but a small minority of humans.

What is of interest is how such images did not disturb the equilibrium of Greco-Roman society. It simply never occurred to anyone that such images were problematic and disturbing. They might be refined, well done or crude and tasteless but they would not have been considered some sort existential threat to that society.

The result when these items were rediscovered was some of the most absurd stupidities by the modern guardians of morality. There is in Naples a collection of art and artefacts collected from Pompeii called The Secret Collection, which until very recently was kept locked away from regular museum goers least its pornographic and erotic images, confuse and scandalize the poor simple minded average museum visitor.1

I would think that the ancient Romans and Greeks would have laughed quite loudly at such no-nothing brainless idiocy.

Considering that Greeks and Romans considered public displays of phallic imagery as a good luck charm they would have been quite non-plussed by so many moderns getting hysterical about it.

So what really bothers moderns about porn?

The answer is quite simple. Porn shows sex. Now if it was really about issues that you would think are legitimate problems and concerns you would not see the level of hysteria over it that is indeed there.

This level has its roots in the idea that sex is dangerous and needs to be controlled and regulated and that it is a dark and mysterious force that is tainted with diabolical and evil qualities.2

I remember a series of programs called A Third Testament, (1976) narrated by Malcolm Muggeridge from the mid 70’s. In an episode about the Russian novelist Leo Tolstoy Malcolm refers to “CCC-ARNALL – PP-LEASURES!!. While saying that Malcolm squints, furrows his forehead and looks like he is having a severe migraine combined with a coronary. Like a vast number of older people Malcolm, who when he was younger indulged deeply in “carnal pleasures”, now that he was older and past all that, he thought it would be a good idea to deny other people “carnal pleasures”. No doubt having both satiated himself and gotten too old to indulge in “carnal pleasures”, it would be most satisfying for him to deny others “carnal pleasures”. The look of satisfaction that crossed his face as he talked about denying others “carnal pleasures” indicated that despite his supposed wish to help others escape being enslaved to “carnal pleasures”, that he was just has enslaved to them as ever. Only in this case being unable to enjoy them himself he would get perverted pleasure from denying others similar “pleasures”.3

It is indeed remarkable how obsessed so many of those who complain about other people being obsessed with sex are with sex. Instead they think constantly about how wicked it is for other people to have sex and how they have to be brought under control and how wicked them having sex is. Like the most sex obsessed orgiest these people never stop thinking about sex, only in this case how wicked and evil it is and how other people are having it and how they have to be stopped. Thus like Malcolm Muggeridge they writhe in prurient ecstasy at the thought of “CCC-ARNALL - PP-LEASURES!!” and think constantly and obsessively about sex.

One could go into the roots of this obsessive prurience but it is not necessary except to note that it seems to be at least partially related to a certain style of Christian values.

This notion of sex has dangerous, disgusting and prurient and this obsession with what other people are doing is behind most of the anti-pornography hysteria that exists in our society. This hysteria has lead to a seeming inability to discuss pornography in any sort of rational manner.4

Now it can easily be argued, and in my opinion obviously true, that pornography has problematic aspects.

For example. It is true that much pornography is in fact involves the use and rather unpleasant exploitation of the women, and yes sometimes at least men involved in producing it.

There is of course the issue of child porn and bestiality, which involves issues of consent and exploitation.

There is also the problem of extremely violent pornography that sexualizes, rape, sadistic, brutal degradation and humiliation, especially of women.5

Those are genuine issues of concern and certainly subject to analysis and critique. What are not reasonable are the following pieces of nonsense.

The idea that pornography is responsible for the subordination of women. A position advanced by the late Andrea Dworkin and by Catherine McKinnon. Are they seriously advancing the position that the existence of pornography is the main reason why women are oppressed? A position whose light headedness should cause it to float away and disperse.

Lets see most Muslim states especially the more religious ones prohibit most pornography and Scandinavian countries have lots of available porn. Guess which countries women have a better, socio-economic and political position in? Would it be sensible to argue that pornography caused women to have a better position in Scandinavia? Of course not but that is where this sort of logic leads us.6

Another popular idea, adopted for example by Courts in various places is the idea that pornography causes “harm”. In Canada this idea largely via Catherine A. MacKinnon, has caught on with the courts basically as a way of avoiding the old “community standards” rule which was pretty useless and the old “artistic merit” debate.7

It is ironic that the so-called anti-pornography Feminists who use this argument allow themselves to be allied to anti-pornographic so-called “Christian” groups who are quite convinced of the harm done by Feminist speech and the need to curtail, if not eliminate that form of speech.

The problem is the “harm” described is pretty nebulous and lacks concrete specifics. Finally even if it causes “harm” is that a reason to ban it? Well it can be easily shown that Hitler’s Mein Kampf caused and causes real harm. Yet it is available. So are the works of Karl Marx and of countless thinkers whose ideas were used as an excuse by some to cause mayhem.

One could of course easily list all sorts of works that incited people to resist or rebel violently; say the works of Thomas Paine? So the “harm” idea in my opinion is nothing more than the old disgust, prurient argument. I.E., “this is revolting and disgusting so of course it causes harm”. Even assuming pornography causes “harm” is that a reason to ban it, after all lots of speech causes harm and is not banned.8

It is routine among anti-pornography crusaders to demonize the makers of pornography. A favourite story is the infamous snuff film story. What is fascinating is that despite decades of efforts to track down this elusive film we have yet to find a real snuff film. I.E., a film of an actual person being killed as the “climax” of a sadistic sex scene in a porn movie. It appears that certain films have had simulated death, although even those are very hard to find, but that a bona-fide for real snuff film seems to be nonexistent. Frankly that surprises me given just how perverse and vicious humans can be. The language of disgust is generally in full flower when anti-pornographers describe the makers of pornography. It seems to do so because anti-pornographers conceive of the world in manichean terms of the sons of light against the sons of darkness. They also seem to have no desire to find out in any depth or detail how the pornography industry actually works.9

Another argument, very frequently used, is that pornography is not “speech” and hence not eligible for being protected by freedom of speech guarantees, like the Canadian Charter of Rights or the American Constitution. The argument is that the guarantees only protect “political” speech. This is an interesting argument although in the end it amounts to the usual disgust argument. I.E., “pornography disgusts me so it isn’t legitimate speech”. Well lots of speech disgusts me such as Holocaust denial bilge and Racist vomit and Stalinist excrement but I would never dream of banning it because I find it disgusting. Of course there is Gore Vidal’s answer to this point of view “Sex is politics”. In fact his point is that sex is deeply political given that it is about on the most intimate level about how we relate to each other.10

By giving pornography deep existential importance and allying it to fundamental forces of society the anti-pornographers have elevate pornography from a diversion to a fundamental cosmic principle. It is not and never was.

Perhaps the most significant development in the pornographic industry lately has been the development of cams and other recording devices that make it very easy for people to make their own pornography. Thus escaping the censor and the prurient prude. Just how are the anti-pornographers going to control and regulate that?

The Greco-Romans had it right Pornography is nothing to get your knickers in a knot about.

1. Mulas, Antonia, Eros in Antiquity, The Erotic Art Book Society, New York, 1978., pp. 9-13.

2. See Richards, Jeffrey, Sex, Dissidence and Damnation, Routledge, London, 1991, pp. 22-41, Moore, R. I., The Formation of a Persecuting Society, 2nd Edition, Blackwell Pub., London, 2007, pp. 94-116.

3. For more information on A Third Testament, see Here

4. See Footnote 2.

5. For a overview of these issues see Diamond, Sara, Pornography: Image and Reality, in Women Against Censorship, Edited by Burstyn, Varda, Douglas & McIntyre, Toronto, 1985, pp. 40-57.

6. See Dworkin, Andrea, Pornography: Men Possessing Women, Plume, New York, 1991, MacKinnon, Catherine A., Are Women Human?: And Other International Dialogues, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 2006.

7. The main case in question as been R. v. Butler, [1992] 1 S.C.R. 452, which uses this frame work and adopted largely from Catherine A. MacKinnon’s ideas.

8. See the essays in Burstyn, Varda.

9. For more about the apparent non-existence of snuff films see Stine, Scott Aaron, The Snuff Film: The Making of an Urban Legend, Here.

10. For the view that pornography is not real speech see McKinnon, Catriona, Toleration: A Critical Introduction, Routledge, London, 2006, pp. 137-152. For the view of sex as politics see Vidal, Gore, Sex is Politics, in The Second American Revolution and other Essays 1976-1982, Random house, New York, 1982.

Pierre Cloutier