Adult film screening sparks controversy at Maryland

Maryland state legislators threatened to withhold funding from the University of Maryland after the student union planned a screening of the X-rated film “Pirates II: Stagnetti’s Revenge.” After the university canceled the event earlier this month, a group of student activists screened a portion of the film anyway in response to the proposed legislation.

The original screening, planned for April 4 by the student union, was canceled by Linda Clement, vice president of student affairs, after the legislation to withhold funding was introduced. Clement’s assistant Kathy Broady said Clement would not comment on the decision.

Despite the official cancellation, a group of student activists unaffiliated with the student union chose to show 30 minutes of the film on April 6, Mary Yanik, president of the university’s Feminism Without Borders group wrote in an e-mail to The Herald. Yanik co-organized the event and her group officially endorsed the screening.

In response to the first planned screening, State Sen. Andrew Harris, R-Baltimore County and Hartford County, proposed an amendment to the capital budget that aimed to encourage universities to develop policies restricting presentations of pornographic films on campus, Harris’ assistant, Kathy Szeglia said.

Harris did not oppose student groups showing pornographic films, Szeglia said. Rather, the legislation aimed to restrict university-sponsored events during which adult content would be shown.

Kenton Stalder, another co-organizer of the second screening, expressed disappointment that the university “caved in” to Harris’ threat.

“It seemed absolutely ridiculous … and a waste of Senate time,” Stalder said.

“I think withholding funds was a clear overreaction and made the showing of this movie into a much bigger deal that it ever would have been,” Jonathan Sachs, the president of the University of Maryland Student Government Association, wrote in an e-mail to The Herald.

Although he did not attend the Monday screening, Sachs wrote that he was surprised the screening had turned into a big event on campus.

Before the attention from the legislature, “this movie was a joke and a lot of Greeks were going to go see it,” he wrote, referring to members of the Greek fraternity system.

The second screening included a panel of professors who spoke about censorship and academic freedom, Stalder said.

“Censorship does not help to resolve the potential problems with pornography, and certainly isn’t helpful to women involved in the industry,” Yanik wrote. “The autonomy of this university is essential to its academic freedom, educational integrity and democratic dignity.”

Since 2005, more than 50 universities and colleges in the US and Canada have requested copies of either Pirates II, or its predecessor, “Pirates I,” according to Christopher Ruth, spokesperson for the film’s production company, Digital Playground.

Ruth said no school had encountered this degree of resistance to showing the film in the past, adding that he did not know of any other school’s canceling screenings of the film. The University of California, Davis; Northwestern;  and Carnegie Mellon University are among the other colleges that have screened Pirates II.

Ruth said Pirates II is unique among pornographic films in that it “appealed to different people.”

“These screenings allow students to gather together in an academic environment to discuss ... all kinds of issues as such sexuality, gender roles and pornography,” Ruth said.

But Szeglia said the screening did not offer educational value. “The students (at the University of Maryland) invited Planned Parenthood to talk about safe sex but the irony is that the movie is not about safe sex,” Szeglia said, referring to plans for the original, canceled screening.

“I know some students would like to portray this as a free speech issue,” Harris said in a statement. “It is not. This is about the use of taxpayer dollars and the Maryland General Assembly acts every day on issues concerning the use of taxpayer dollars. Just because someone is on a college campus they do not have a right to spend the hard-earned money of Maryland’s taxpayers on something as detrimental to our society as hard-core XXX pornography.”

In response, Stalder said the screening was entirely funded by student fees and not university money.

At Carnegie Mellon, screening pornographic films has been a decade-long tradition, according to Tomasz Skowronski, a senior and current chair of the university’s Activities Board.

“Pornography is so pervasive in American society and it’s nothing new,” Skowronski said.

Students ranked Pirates II, which was shown last semester at the university, among one of the most popular films — alongside “WALL-E” and “The Dark Knight” — out of about 40 films shown last semester.

Pornographic films are “largely for entertainment,” Skowronski said. “The films are funny and people laugh and cheer and have a great time,” he said.

Though some students protested the showing of Pirates II at Carnegie Mellon, Skowronski said school officials did not express any concerns to the Activities Board.

“I’m sure there is a line, but we have not crossed that yet,” Skowronski said.

At Brown, pornographic films have been screened in a more private setting: Male Sexuality Workshop classes. The films were shown in an educational setting with goals for the exploration and discussion of pornography, MSex facilitator Cameron Rementer ’10 wrote in an e-mail to The Herald.

Rementer  wrote that universities should be a place of free expression, adding that legislature and administration have no role in stripping students of such rights.

“I believe that undue government influence in universities and colleges is a grave threat to intellectual freedom,” he wrote.

Andrew Vottero ’09, a former MSex facilitator, wrote in an e-mail to The Herald that he personally would consider screening pornographic films to the general public at Brown.

“There are many cases in which such a screening could be educational and interesting and fun, depending on how it was structured and what the goals of the presentation were,” he wrote. “If it bothers you or you are not interested, don’t go. I think that it’s as simple as that. And I think that Brown students would probably love it.”