This story is fiction. Actually, the year being 2063 should have been enough to clue you in about that.
I don't care how old are. I don't care how young you are. However, the law does care, so if you are too young, go away (or at least try not to get caught).
If this story is against the law where you live, then like the young folk, go away. Or at least...
North Robert High School
10:12 A.M. Wednesday, December 5, 2063
“Even the words have a history,” I began. “Erotica, of course, is related to erotic, which itself comes from the Greek God Eros, son of Aphrodite, Greek Goddess of love, beauty, and sex. He was known to shoot arrows which made anybody struck by them fall madly in love. If this sounds familiar, it is because another name for Eros is Cupid. Yep, the little baby angel with the bow and arrows.” I held up a pic of a traditional Valentine cupid, and left the girls to wonder how this pagan Greek God became identified with a holiday named after a Christian saint.
“Also in ancient Greece,” I continued, putting the cupid down, “there were a number of different types and social classes of prostitutes. We will be studying prostitution in more detail in January, but for now suffice it to say that ancient Greece had several types. One of these was called porne, and in addition to having sex for money, they wrote sexy poetry. Now, poetry written by porne would be ‘porne graphy,’ or ‘pornegraphy.’ This came into English as the word ‘pornography.’ Today, of course, the word is used to refer not to poetry but to pics and video. I should also add that porne were fairly well respected in old Greece, though they weren’t the highest class of prostitute.”
I could see that the idea of well-respected hooker-poets seemed strange to most of the girls, but that they also seemed interested in the idea. The lessons I would be teaching on this subject in January would be well received.
Time to move to the third word. “The word ‘obscene’ appears to have Latin roots, rather than Greek. Actually, the history of this word is rather vague, but the original meaning was probably ‘filthy,’ or something like that. In currant legal terms, obscenity refers to material so far beyond the pale that it no longer has the protections of the First Amendment.”
They were all listening, but they also looked a bit bored. Well, this information was in their textbooks, so it wasn’t like I was giving them any Grand Revelations. Besides, legal terms with Latin roots just didn’t have the appeal of Greek Gods shooting arrows or high-class prostitutes reading sexy poems to Aristotle. Still, it was part of the lesson.
I added, “Many consider the infamous ‘S.L.A.P.S. test” an embarrassing artifact of the 20th Century.” This got me some puzzled looks, so now I knew who hadn’t studied last night.
“And what, you may ask, is a S.L.A.P.S. test?” A glance showed that at least half had no idea. “Each letter stands for something, and this slappy acronym is one of the three tests to determine obscenity. The three tests are still legally valid today, including S.L.A.P.S., it’s just that the tests are hardly ever used anymore. They were, all three of them, quite popular with federal and state governments two decades or more into the 21st Century.”
They were paying attention now, but mostly because they wondered just what the Hell I was talking about.
“The three tests are, first, that obscene material must ‘appeal to prurient interest.’ Basically, this means that it gives some erotiphobic government busybody a hard-on.”
A few laughs, but my definition was pretty accurate.
“The second test is that, in order to be obscene, the material must be in violation of community standards. Of course, what is in violation of community standards differs from community to community. Also, if the material is popular in a community, it is sort of hard to make a showing that it is somehow against the standards of a community that is buying it up like hotcakes. Not that prosecutors haven’t tried.”
A few chuckles, and a few snarls. Government boogiemen were as attention-holding as divine archers.
“Now, even if something fails the second test, community standards, it is not obscene if it does not appeal to prurient interest. That is why racist, sexist, and other bad -ist material is not obscene. And, of course…”
“Hold up! Hold up, Coach!”
I gave Violette Ross a look that seemed (I hoped) to say, “Pardon me, young lady.”
Violette blushed, but continued on. “Sorry to interrupt, Coach, but I need some clarification on this. So, if I wanted to, say, hold a rally and declare that Hitler was a wonderful guy, and he was right about Aryan supremacy, and America would be better if we got rid of anybody who wasn’t an Aryan, whatever that means, that would be protected, but if I then flashed my pussy at the crowd, that I could then be arrested?”
“Don’t try it in my neighborhood,” Saffron Pakeim snorted.
“Violette has asked a great question,” I said, “with a great hypothetical. Now, Saffron, I take it that the sort of rally and speech Miss Ross speaks of would fail the community standards test in your neighborhood, even minus the pussy flashing?”
“Well, yeah.” She looked at me as if she couldn’t understand why the question even needed to be asked. “You’d have to look hard to find any full-blooded whites at all, much less an ‘Aryan,’ whatever that means. A tall blonde white guy, right? Try to hold a rally like that, and you’d better have police protection. I mean, I know free speech and all, but… IS something like that covered by free speech?”
“Actually, yes, it is,” I told them, “While it obviously is in violation of community standards, if it does not appeal to prurient interest, then it is not obscene, and won’t even be subjected to the S.L.A.P.S. test. Now, add in the vaginal flashing, and suddenly, we have both community standards violation *and* prurient interest, and the speech is now officially obscene, *IF* it fails the S.L.A.P.S. test. If it passes that, then it is still not obscene. Offensive, yes. Awful, horrible, and just plain evil, but not obscene. Obscenity needs sex, violation of community standards, and no S.L.A.P.S. value. Actually, I thought Violette’s sexy flashing was the only good part of the whole thing.”
The girls just shook their heads.
“Finally, we get to S.L.A.P.S. The final hurdle which must be cleared if one wishes to produce obscene material, which isn’t easy, let me tell you.” A few giggles, but they were getting the point.
“S.L.A.P.S. stands for Serious Literary, Artistic, Political, Scientific. So if your work appeals to prurient interest, is in violation of community standards, and is completely, absolutely, totally lacking in *any*, much less any *serious*, literary, artistic, or political value, BUT it has serious scientific value, then it is *still* not obscene under the law. Try again.”
“Hold on!” Violette again. “The way you’re talking, how could anything ever be declared obscene?”
“Usually,” I told the class, “by picking juries made up of very sheltered souls who know nothing about the *actual* standards of the communities in which they live, and by employing a very high standard of ‘serious,’ so high that practically no work of fiction could ever meet it, except perhaps ‘literary,’ and by insisting that only text can have literary value.”
“So if somebody wrote a story about this class,” the girl was really trying to digest this, “whether or not the author goes to jail could depend on whether or not some jury thinks it’s well-written?”
“Yes,” I admitted, “though text has traditionally gotten away with more than any other medium. And besides, a story about this class would have a lot of scientific and historical content. If somebody had written it in the early years of this century, it would also be fiercely political. And like I said, these standards, while still on the books, are almost never used any more.”
I looked over the class of now curious girls.
“How about we actually read the chapter today, on erotica, pornography, and obscenity,” I suggested, “like you should have last night, and then you will have time tonight to read today’s chapter.”
A chorus of groans, and then Amethyst popped out with, “I thought we were going to run around and hug each other today.”
“We were,” I told her, “and I don’t like to give homework every night, because I know that other teachers hand out homework too, and I don’t like to put my students in the position of having to decide what homework to do because you don’t have time to do it all. This is not fair to the students, and it isn’t fair to the teachers. But you ladies did it to yourselves.”
“But I *did* read it last night!” Caitlyn objected, “I really did!”
“Then you can read tonight’s assigned reading in class today, and tonight will be free for whatever. We were going to do the hugging thing today, tomorrow and Friday. Now we will just do it tomorrow and Friday. Now get to reading.”
There was an indistinct grumbling, but they all started reading. This didn’t happen every class, and it didn’t happen every year, but when it did happen, December was about the time it did. As the class activities moved closer to “actual sex,” there was a tendency to slack off on the academic side. This re-reading thing was the fairest solution I had been able to come up with. Actually, the most fair thing was probably to throw the quiz at them, and those who had studied would pass, and those who did not would fail. So this re-reading thing was the fairest solution I could come up with while also giving those who had slacked off a second chance. I looked over the firm young flesh of the sixteen nude girls I had just decided not to embrace today, and suppressed a sigh.
* * *