Bertrand Russell on PORNOGRAPHY    Frank Lynch, Hugh McLachlan and Christopher Nottingham

When one of the best and probably the most famous British philosophers of the twentieth century, Bertrand Russell, turns his thoughts to the question of the appropriate attitude and policy towards pornography, what he has to say is of interest. Particularly in the light of much current feminist thought, it might also be of interest to note what, writing about the issue in the 1920s, he did not say, that is, the arguments he neither used nor felt obliged to try to counter, those, for instance, concerning the nature and effect of the portrayal of women in pornography. Russell was an enthusiast for women's liberation and the cause of feminism. However, he was not an uncritical enthusiast. For instance, he writes: 'The attitude of Mary Wollstonecroft was thoroughly modern, but she was not imitated in this respect by the subsequent pioneers of women's rights. They, on the contrary, were for the most part very rigid moralists, whose hope was to impose upon men the moral fetters which hitherto had only been endured by women'. (p.69) It is the opinion of Bertrand Russell that '... there ought to be no law whatsoever on the subject of obscene publications'. (p.54) He bases his argument on two general grounds. He argues, first of all, that, despite the intentions behind any relevant legislation, the material which will be in effect censored will not be the targeted pornography so much as more worthy literary and academic works. He argues, secondly, that, given that pornography will, even in spite of its illegality, be available, it is better that it be available legally. Russell's first claim is that, as a matter of fact, legislation pertaining to pornography, in Britain, America and elsewhere has had the effect of suppressing literature and science rather than pornography. He quotes, for instance, the banning (for a time) in Britain of Havelock Ellis's Studies in the Psychology of Sex and the problems relating to censorship of staging the play, Mrs Warren's Profession. Russell concludes that: 'We may therefore, basing ourselves on a mass of historical evidence, lay it down that censorship will be used against works of serious artistic or scientific merit, while persons whose purpose is purely salacious will always find ways of slipping through the meshes of the law'. (p.92) He says of the relevant legislation: 'Lord Campbell's Act, as anyone may discover by reading the debates on it, was directed solely to the suppression of pornography, and it was thought at the time that it had been so drafted as to be incapable of use against other types of literature. This belief, however, was based upon an insufficient appreciation of the cleverness of policemen and the stupidity of magistrates'. (pp. 91-92) Legislation pertaining to pornography can have, as Russell suggests, the unintended effect of restricting the publication and distribution of non-pornographic material. However, is not Russell overstating his case when he claims that it has little or no effect on the publication and distribution of pornographic material? Perhaps not. Russell's case concerning the criminalisation of pornography is schematic rather than elaborate. Russell's case could be developed as follows. Suppose that you are a publisher or a book-seller and that you derive your income or the bulk of it from the publication or sale of non-pornographic books. You are likely to try to ensure that the books which you publish or sell are not published or sold illegally. You are likely to try not to run foul of an obscene publications act if one happens to be in force. Hence, the possible publication and sale of literary and academic works might be affected by the existence of legislation pertaining to obscene publications. Suppose that you derive your income from publishing or selling pornography. You might well welcome the existence of such legislation since it is likely to increase the (black) market price for selling pornographic books. Rather than trying to ensure that the material which you publish or sell does not run foul of the legislation, you are more likely to want to ensure that it does. If you are publishing or selling pornography you might well want your customers to be assured that what you have to offer is pornography. As a shopkeeper you would need to ask yourself in which publications are the customers likely to be interested: those of shop A, whose books and magazines have been passed as legally fit for your perusal; or these of shop B, whose books and magazines, although more expensive, have not? For the publisher and seller of pornography, the illegal category of 'obscene' and/or 'pornographic' might well set a target to be reached rather than, as for the publisher and seller of non-pornographic material, a potential trap to be avoided. Paradoxically, attempts to censor pornography might well have more effect on the publication and distribution of non-pornographic material than that of pornographic Ñ even though the actual books which are seized, confiscated and the subject of prosecutions tend to be pornographic ones. The alternative reason to oppose legislation concerning pornography or other 'obscene' publications is that: ' ... frank pornography would do less harm if it were open and unashamed than it does when it is rendered interesting by secrecy and stealth. In spite of the law, nearly every fairly well-to-do man has in adolescence seen indecent photographs, and has been proud of obtaining possession of them because they were difficult to procure'. (pp.92-93) Suppressors of pornography and other would-be-moralists, according to Russell, are guilty of producing in others, and of expressing, a prurient attitude towards sex. He writes: 'Nine-tenths of the appeal of pornography is due to the indecent feelings concerning sex which moralists inculcate in the young; the other tenth is physiological, and will occur one way or another whatever the state of the law may be'. (p. 93) He concludes: '...publications which are undoubtedly and frankly pornographic would do very little harm if sex education were rational'. (p.91) Russell has what might be called a 'displacement theory' of pornography. Pornography produces or, rather, triggers transient lust: '... but in any sexually vigorous male such feelings will be stirred in one way if not in another'. (p.93) The amount of lust which men experience will be related, according to Russell, to their physiologies whereas the occasion of the lust will be related to variable and varying social conventions. More pornography and more explicit pornography will not lead, overall, to more lust nor less and less explicit pornography to less lust since: 'The more prudes restrict the permissible degree of sexual appeal, the less is required to make such an appeal effective .... what was exciting in the Victorian age would leave men of a franker epoch quite unmoved'. (p.93) Although he relates this argument to his second ground for opposing legislation concerning pornography, perhaps he should have presented it as a separate third ground: namely that legislation to try to prohibit obscenity, or any related notion, is a waste of time, since the the successful prohibition of Z might lead merely to the serving of Z's function by Y and to the apparent desirability of prohibiting Y, whose successful prohibition would lead to its function's being served by X and so on and so forth. Another separate reason for resisting the illegalisation of pornography, perhaps the firmest ground of all, is discoverable in Russell's comments, although he does not develop it. Russell notes, as we have seen, that: '...nearly every fairly well-to-do man has in adolescence seen indecent photographs, and has been proud of obtaining possession of them because they were difficult to procure'. (pp.92-93) The illegalisation of pornography does not necessarily lead to the elimination of pornography. It is often unwise to introduce laws which cannot or will not be enforced. Posture politics, of which the advocacy of 'political correctness' is a sort, is common. It is very fashionable to consider the role of the state and the law in 'sending out signals'. People should be severely punished, one sometimes hears, for performing some action because of the 'signals' which that will send out and, correspondingly, they should not be treated leniently, on account of the 'signals' which leniency might send out. It might in some respects be reasonable to think of the state and the law in these terms. For instance, whether or not people are deterred from committing murder because of the fear of punishment, it is no doubt reasonable that murder is illegal and punishable severely. Independently of the effects of legalising acts which at present would count as murder, it might well be a bad idea to consider such legalisation because of what might be considered to be an expression of official approval of such actions. Even if only as symbolism and to give a 'signal', it is reasonable that killing people is generally illegal. In other respects, to focus on the sending of 'signals' can be inappropriate. For instance, sometimes, on the grounds of fairness and justice, it is appropriate that particular murderers are treated comparatively leniently because of mitigating circumstances, even if some people misunderstand or are ignorant of the relevant circumstances of the particular case, perhaps through a reading of a brief commentary in the press, and receive an unfortunate 'signal' from the reported leniency. The existence of particular legislation might or might not send out desirable 'signals'. However, what would happen in the event of an attempt being made to enforce the legislation? Consider, for instance, the Poll Tax [Mrs Thatchers unpopular head tax in 1980s Britain], in terms of the costs of trying to enforce it, indeed of trying and failing to enforce it. There was obviously a tangible cost in terms of the time of policemen, bureaucrats and court officials, who could have been doing other useful things otherwise. Perhaps more importantly, there was the intangible cost of the danger of the law in general being brought into disrepute because of the publicised and flagrant breaches of this particular legislation. Some people who had been happy to be and to be thought of as law-abiding became, through their failure to pay the Poll Tax, law-breakers and, often, were willing or even anxious to advertise their law-breaking. We might question whether this manufacture and flaunting of law-breaking, with the 'signals' it sends out, is desirable. The creation of law is often the result of the activities of criminals. In itself, is the creation of criminals and crime desirable? Sometimes, when an activity is made illegal, the activity ceases or at least becomes much less common but this is not always so. Sometimes when an activity is a problem, the problem can be solved by criminalising the activity. Sometimes the problem remains as an illegal, and consequently as a greater, problem. Consider, for instance, the experience of Prohibition in the United States. Did Prohibition reduce the problem of alcohol abuse? Probably not. Did it greatly reduce the consumption of alcohol or the number of alcohol users? Perhaps not. What it certainly did was to increase the number of crimes and criminals. It tended to bring the law into disrepute. In addition, it made many of the criminal providers of alcohol very rich. It encouraged the formation of criminal organisations whose activities are even now a growing problem. We must return to our main questions: whether pornography should be illegal, and whether Russell is right in maintaining that there should be no legislation concerning 'obscene' publications? Russell's comments are far from being the last reasonable words on the subject but they serve well as a benchmark. In addition, one should consider the possible and likely ill-effects of the illegal production and sale of pornographic material as a consequence of the non-enforcement (and possible non-enforcibility) of legislation concerning pornography. It may be that such legislation would bring the law into disrepute and render less likely the enforcement of other (and better) legislation, and it may manufacture crime and criminals and, for some people, make crime a lucrative business. We might wonder how Russell's contribution would be viewed if it were presented as a contribution to the contemporary debate, although there is not room here to explore many aspects, such as the implications of electronic media. Since Russell and his wife Dora were seen as the very epitome of progressive feminism in the inter-war period, his view on pornography would be treated with extreme disfavour by many, and certainly the most vociferous, of feminist writers of our own time. We might speculate that this indicates that the questions Russell raised are no longer pertinent, that they have been adequately answered. Alternatively it might be simply a case of contemporary feminism's lack of interest in the history of their own movement. This latter point perhaps is that as well as an indifference to a debate about the practical consequences of the legislation advocated there is an indifference to the history of the development of the debate in which they are currently engaged. We would suggest that this indifference to such issues would be greatly to the detriment of the respective feminists' case. All references in the text are to: Bertrand Russell, Marriage and Morals, George Allen and Unwin, (London, 1929). Address for correspondence:  Address for correspondence: Dr Hugh V. McLachlan, Social Sciences, Glasgow Caledonian University, Cowcaddens Road, Glasgow. Never mind what 'The Philosopher' says - take me to the bookshop to see Russell's book!