Mitt Romney, "social conservatives," and pornography

Today I saw a headline on a local newspaper: "Romney plans attack on pornography to try to woo social conservatives." (The online version of the paper puts it slightly differently: http://www.examiner.com/a-836030~Romney_plans_attack_on_porn_to_please_conservatives.html leaving out the word "social," but obviously it means the same.) I had originally, on seeing this headline, planned to write a post on how "social conservatives" are a cancer infesting the Republican Party and how Romney is turning me off more and more; I think that pornography is hardly the crowning issue of this campaign, but cracking down on it is as stupid as cracking down on alcohol in the 1920s was, and pornography actually has its good points; a person who might be impelled to commit a rape might be more harmlessly able to give vent to his feelings by looking at it, and certainly if Bill Clinton had looked at porn instead, he might not have wrecked Monica Lewinsky's life, to give two examples.

But on reading the article, I saw more reason to sympathize with Romney's position. He was not talking about porn in general, but about porn directed toward people's e-mail boxes against their wish. Just as I feel people should have the right to look at porn -- no matter how disgusting others might find it -- I also feel people should have the right to control what they look at in a negative way: to decide what they do not want to look at. And on that point I fully agree with Mitt Romney.