Pornography
MacKinnon, along with fellow radical feminist writer and activist Andrea Dworkin, tried to change legal approaches to pornography by framing it as a civil rights violation in the form of sex discrimination, and as human trafficking. They defined pornography as:
the graphic sexually explicit subordination of women through pictures or words that also includes women dehumanized as sexual objects, things, or commodities; enjoying pain or humiliation or rape; being tied up, cut up, mutilated, bruised, or physically hurt; in postures of sexual submission or servility or display; reduced to body parts, penetrated by objects or animals, or presented in scenarios of degradation, injury, torture; shown as filthy or inferior; bleeding, bruised, or hurt in a context that makes these conditions sexual.
In Toward a Feminist Theory of the State, MacKinnon writes, "Pornography, in the feminist view, is a form of forced sex, a practice of sexual politics, and an institution of gender inequality". As documented by extensive empirical studies, she writes, "Pornography contributes causally to attitudes and behaviors of violence and discrimination which define the treatment and status of half the population". (However, the evidence for this claim is not definitive; studies have also shown no relationship between pornography and discriminatory views nor violence against women, with some even suggesting pornography use could be correlated with more egalitarian views.)
In 1980, Linda Boreman (who had appeared, under the name Linda Lovelace, in the pornographic film Deep Throat) said her ex-husband Chuck Traynor had violently coerced her into making Deep Throat and other pornographic films. Boreman made her charges public for the press corps at a press conference, together with MacKinnon, members of Women Against Pornography, and feminist writer Andrea Dworkin offering statements in support. After the press conference, Dworkin, MacKinnon, Boreman, and Gloria Steinem began discussing the possibility of using federal civil rights law to seek damages from Traynor and the makers of Deep Throat. This was not possible for Boreman because the statute of limitations for a possible suit had passed.
MacKinnon and Dworkin continued to discuss civil rights litigation, specifically sex discrimination, as a possible approach to combating pornography. MacKinnon opposed traditional arguments and laws against pornography based on the idea of morality or filth or sexual innocence, including the use of traditional criminal obscenity law to suppress pornography. Instead of condemning pornography for violating "community standards" of sexual decency or modesty, they characterized pornography as a form of sex discrimination and sought to give women the right to seek damages under civil rights law when they could prove they had been harmed. Their anti-pornography ordinances make actionable only sexually explicit material that can be proven to discriminate on the basis of sex.
In 1983, the Minneapolis city government hired MacKinnon and Dworkin to draft an anti-pornography civil rights ordinance as an amendment to the Minneapolis city human rights ordinance. The amendment defined pornography as a civil rights violation against women and allowed women who claimed harm from trafficking in pornography to sue the producers and distributors for damages in civil court. It also allowed those who had been coerced into pornography, had had pornography forced upon them, or were assaulted in a way caused by specific pornography to sue for harm they could prove. The law was passed twice by the Minneapolis city council but was vetoed by the mayor. Another version of the ordinance passed in Indianapolis, Indiana in 1984, but was ruled unconstitutional by the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals, a decision summarily affirmed (without opinion) by the U.S. Supreme Court.
MacKinnon wrote in the Harvard Civil Rights-Civil Liberties Law Review in 1985:
And as you think about the assumption of consent that follows women into pornography, look closely some time for the skinned knees, the bruises, the welts from the whippings, the scratches, the gashes. Many of them are not simulated. One relatively soft core pornography model said, "I knew the pose was right when it hurt". It certainly seems important to the audiences that the events in the pornography be real. For this reason, pornography becomes a motive for murder, as in "snuff" films in which someone is tortured to death to make a sex film. They exist.
MacKinnon represented Boreman from 1980 until Boreman's death in 2002. Civil libertarians frequently find MacKinnon's theories objectionable (see "Criticism" section), arguing there is no evidence that sexually explicit media encourages or promotes violence against women. Max Waltman states that empirical evidence (based on changes to obscenity doctrine in Canada) suggests that civil rather than legal remedies may be more effective as a means of discouraging violence against women.
