The other way to go is to just talk about the moral issue. To paraphrase Benjamin Franklin, those who sacrifice liberty for safety deserve neither. That' s all you need on this issue. The thing I said in TheNew York Times, which I probably shouldn't have said, since it probably weakens our side, is that, if in a country of 260 million people, all the art that we have done completely freely does end up killing four people a year, that's OK. That's an argument you're not supposed to make because it goes against the weird zero- risk society that we're supposed to be going towards. Even if it would turn out that three people who were predisposed to violence--not just inspired by the stuff, but motivated-- committed a crime, that's OK.
One of the problems is that people confuse inspiration with motivation. If I'm the kind of person who's going to kill somebody, whether I do it Taxi Driver style, Beavis and Butt-head style, or Bible style is my decision. As far as I'm concerned, none of those ar- tistic things enter into it at all. If I'm going to [kill] you, I don't care very much whether I light you on fire and say, "Heh, heh, cool," or say, "Suck on this," and shoot you in the stomach.
No one has an idea really of where we should draw the line. What about the Bible? Every nut who kills people has a Bible lying around. If you're looking for violent rape imagery, the Bible's right there in your hotel room. If you just want to look up ways to screw people up, there it is, and you're justified because God told you to. You have Shakespeare and you have Sophocles--what are we going to do, lose Oedipus Rex if someone pokes an eye out?
Reason: People often say they want to get rid of "gratuitous" violence, but of course no study can show what violence is gratuitous and what violence isn't.
Penn: There's no way to tell. The fact is that violence gives you a rush. Violence is a good compositional technique to keep things interesting. If you want to do a movie in which the wife is becoming more educated and is losing respect for what her husband does, and that also has to show clearly that her husband's way of thinking and way of life, although less intellectual, is valid and important in society, you can do that with a garage mechanic and a slice-of-life style. But it's much more exciting to make Die Hard. One of the reasons that I think that movie is so successful is it deals with those very important blue-collar relationship themes. But it's more visually beautiful to show things blowing up. It just gives you more on the screen.
Some women--two women, really, I mean Catherine MacKinnon and Andrea Dworkin--will even talk about the fact that in porno movies there are more blowjobs than there is pussy eating. This is a big issue you will find in certain--I don't even want to use the word feminist--nut tracts. One of the reasons is, it is the only thing in pornography that's easy to shoot. You have a face and genitals at close proximity, and they're not between things that you can't shoot. I don't think that has to do with societal pressures; I think it has to do with the fact that legs are opaque. It's not a political issue at all.
Of course, you have people like Janet Reno doing the wonderful job of separating sex from violence, which is always [the censor's] technique. You get all your sex people to say, "We're just making love. We're not doing violence. What's wrong with us? Go after them." And then you get the Nightmare on Elm Street people to say, "At least we're not showing hard-core sex." You get those two groups to fight against each other.
Reason: Do you see a reason why Republicans seem so opposed to sex while Democrats seem so opposed to violence?
Penn: I covered the Republican convention for Comedy Central, and I said to Torie Clarke [Bush's campaign press secretary] when she sat down next to me, "Do you have any idea how many people like me there are? There are more than you think, and all you got to do is say 'I like porno. Faggots and foreigners are OK. I don't care what people say."' I told her if she said that, "you will move a couple million people over to the Republican Party, people who kind of like the stuff you're saying financially, the no-tax and-spend stuff, although you're not doing it. But the kind of [family values] stuff you're saying: Do you really think that this is buying you anything?"
I would talk to these people off-camera and they would say, "Well, of course I don't think there's anything wrong with porno. Of course Bush doesn't. Nobody does. But we need to do this as part of the whole platform." And I'd say, "You know, this may sound crazy, but you might want to consider going with what you believe, because there are many, many more people than you think who don't [care] about this issue."
I'm talking about people like my mom, who's never seen a Playboy and doesn't want to, who doesn't understand why people should complain about stuff that costs money that they don't want being out there. She says, "If you break into my house and open Screw magazine and staple it to the wall, I'm going to be angry. Until you do that, I have no problems. I don't want it. I also don't want a microwave. And the only danger I have is that you might buy me one for Christmas. But I tell you I don't want one and we're done. I don't want Playboy. I don't want a microwave. Why are these two issues different?"
Reason: I get the impression that you prefer the moral argument against restricting fictional violence--that you should be free to see what you want--over the statistically based argument.
Penn: Yeah, I kind of do. But I think both are necessary because, I suppose, there is a critical mass where if you could show me scientifically that putting a certain kind of program on TV killed 300,000 people a year, I couldn't argue with you.
Reason: Imagine you're testifying in front of Paul Simon, and he says, "Most Americans agree with me that media violence causes violent behavior." How would you respond to that?
Penn: Well, I would say, "Prove it." You can't prove it just by having a majority on your side. The majority of people can't decide what the speed of light is. And at some point, you've got to go--and I realize that people don't even hear this any more--with the First Amendment defense: Congress shall make no law. As Justice Douglas said, those are the only words you need in that amendment. "Congress shall make no law respecting the establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press...." Do we need to see it [before we decide]? No: Congress shall make no law. It's not, "Congress shall make no law, unless it's African-American people in Florida saying things about fucking women in the ass." No, it's Congress shall make no law.
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