“I know it when I see,” said Supreme Court Justice Potter Stewart, referring to pornography in the landmark 1964 case of Jacobellis v. Ohio. The film in question, “The Lovers” by Louis Malle (1958), did not qualify as hardcore porn in the judge’s eyes, and the obscenity conviction of an Ohio theater manager, indicted for screening the art film, was reversed. But this case, with its famous statement, raises a good question: Where is the line drawn between erotic art and pornography?
-Salon
