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Originally Posted by SalesServiceGuy
That's irrelevant to the discussion. You need to educate yourself on free speech in America. Let's start here: Larry Flint owned Hustler magazine and on the front cover he published a picture of a famous preacher having sex with his mother. Offensive? You betcha. But still protected by free speech. Liberals have changed a lot since then. Now they want to cancel everything.
Flashback: Hustler Magazine Scores First Amendment Victory Against Jerry Falwell
In the 1980s, few figures loomed larger – or exerted greater influence – on the national stage than televangelist Jerry Falwell. Under Falwell’s stewardship, the Moral Majority political organization counterpunched the previous decade’s progressive strides, mobilizing various evangelical and rightwing Christian groups into a potent, unified conservative political force.
The Moral Majority’s agenda included opposition to homosexuality, abortion and the Equal Rights Amendment, which would have guaranteed equal rights for all citizens regardless of sex. Advocating for “traditional” family values, Falwell and his powerful organization are credited with delivering the crucial white, evangelical vote to Ronald Reagan during the 1980 presidential election.
Of course, that put him in the crosshairs of progressives. In its November 1983 issue, Hustler magazine published a satirical ad focused on Falwell. The piece was modeled on Campari’s popular advertising campaign, in which celebrities recalled their “first time” drinking the brand, a double-entrendre.
In the parody, a dignified headshot of Falwell complements a bottle of the imported aperitif, with a transcript of the supposed exchange written in-between. Asked by the interviewer about his “first time,” Falwell responds: “I never really expected to make it with Mom, but then after she showed all the other guys in town such a good time, I thought ‘What the hell!'” He then recounts a Campari-fueled sexual experience with his mother (and a goat) in an outhouse.
The ad concludes with Falwell highlighting his preference for Campari: “I always get sloshed before I go out to the pulpit. You don’t think I could lay down all that bullshit sober, do you?” (In small print at the bottom of the page, the magazine wrote, ”Ad parody – not to be taken seriously.”)
The fake interview was politically barbed, to be sure, not to mention crude. But it was also an oddly personal moment and a focal point in the ongoing culture wars. Eventually it would set a key precedent for freedom of speech.
For years, Falwell – who exercised his significant political capital championing conservative causes and bemoaning the porn industry – consistently singled out publications like Hustler, and its owner Larry Flynt, as corrupting players in American life. Flynt, in particular, typified “sleaze merchantry.”
To Flynt, however, Falwell was a hypocrite whose rhetoric caused outsized harm. Hustler (dubbed “the only honest publication out there” by its owner) began needling Falwell, publishing the advertisement featuring the Baptist preacher’s deceased mother. Falwell sued for libel, invasion of privacy and intentional infliction of emotional distress, demanding $45 million in damages, approximately $100 million by today’s standards.
Representing two wildly different points of view, the men’s feud punctuated cultural and religious backlash in the Eighties, as well as an ongoing debate about American values. In some ways, Flynt and Falwell’s backgrounds were actually not dissimilar. While Falwell was raised in Virginia, Flynt grew up in eastern Kentucky. Before joining the Navy, Flynt dabbled as a bootlegger; so had Falwell’s father. By the early 1980s, however, the two men had cut distinct and entirely opposite public profiles on their way to enormous self-made success. Whereas Falwell counted top national political leaders as allies and friends, Flynt was counseled by Ruth Carter Stapleton, sister to President Jimmy Carter, during his brief conversion to Christianity.
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