Hollywood to America: You Must Watch Our Smut

It isn't enough for Hollywood to get paid for their trash, consumers must watch the garbage in unedited form to make sure that viewers either have to manually fast-forward or otherwise endure pornography that is completely irrelevant to the storyline. Hollywood says that editing their films destroys the "creative intent" of movie producers.

Exactly what does a nude Kate Winslet add to the storyline of Titanic… well, besides masturbatory material?

Christians and other groups have responded to the trend of Hollywood being barely able to make a movie without some B-rate actress flashing the audience by setting up companies to siphon out the irrelevant content. Again, in cases where people buy these movies with the cleaned content, Hollywood gets paid full price. They make exactly as much as they would if someone bought the unedited film some place else.

There is simple economics involved. This is a free country, if people demand porn; they can get porn (despite the clear objectification of women and harm it does to society). However, if people want movies without the extraneous and non-plot enhancing nudity, violence, or profanity, that is something that presents a clear and present danger to our nation. In this case, we cannot allow supply to meet demand.

Here's the interesting feature, by pursuing this line of litigation with firms like Clean Flicks, Hollywood is causing direct harm to their bottom line. Instead of allowing consumers to buy the films edited to their standards, it generates a conflict. Consumers are now faced with the choice to either buy the film that they object to as-is, or to not buy it at all. This litigation has made the voice of the American Family Association, Coral Ridge Ministries, and the like that much louder. Ever better, it gives a catalyst to help propel the nascent efforts of a Christian movie-making industry into a viable movement.

The ability to choose to terminate a pregnancy (or more accurately, murder their child) is celebrated. The ability to choose the gender of one's sexual partner is hailed. The ability to choose to have sexual relations outside marriage (or adultery for that matter) is elevated to civil right. In all areas of American life, the right to choose whatever one wills is held up as the central and united ideal. That is, until someone chooses to express their Christian values in their economic activity. (Or for that matter, if they dare utter the name of Christ in anything that can be labeled a "public square".)

Hollywood, in rejecting a compromise that allows everyone to benefit, has chosen to bring the culture war to the forefront and fired the opening volleys. They believe that their monopoly on American moviemaking gives them the right to dictate what society's values should be. As a result, they've directly attacked one their streams of revenue.

Hollywood has the right to produce trashy films, or to attempt to integrate trashiness in films that can stand on their own without it. However, the consumer has the right not to buy such trash.

With the incredible success of films like The Passion of Christ, Lord of the Rings, and other family-friendly films one would think that the movie industry would see that there is an untapped market to be exploited. Instead, they've chosen against their financial interest and decided to alienate that market. In a free market, businesses that tell their customers that their values don't matter tend to not do well in the long term. Time will tell how long it will be until another entity fills the void.

John Bambenek is a columnist for the Daily Illini and an academic professional at the University of Illinois. He blogs at Part-Time Pundit.