Originally Posted by Snake Doctor

I see the morally superior pornographers are out in full force on this one. Why am I not surprised?

To me, it's like this. Max pissing in a girl's mouth, displayed on a billboard in the middle of town. That's obscene.
Max pissing in a girl's mouth, recorded on DVD, and shipped in a plain brown wrapper to someone who specifically requested that material and paid money for it, is free expression.

If you can't make that distinction, then you're not intelligent enough to understand the rest of this post, so please put me on ignore right now.

All freedoms come with a price.
Extreme pornography is the inevitable consequence of the free expression clause, the same way Scientology or the Branch Davidians are the inevitable consequence of the free exercise clause, the same way that the National Enquirer is the inevitable consequence of a free press, the same way that the Montana Militia Men are the inevitable consequence of the 2nd amendment.

Max Hardcore hasn't made your life harder anymore than the Jehovah's Witnesses have made life harder for Catholics. (Many communities directed laws against the Witnesses and many court battles ensued, but it didn't make it harder for anyone else to practice their religion)
The National Enquirer's constant publication of erroneous reports doesn't hurt the New York Times.
The Montana Militia Men don't make it harder for you to own a shotgun.

If there is any place where there should be a wholehearted embrace of the 1st amendment it should be here. Free expression can't just apply to things you like or things that don't offend you, it HAS TO apply to things that make you sick to your stomach or else it isn't really freedom.

Those of you who say Max was "asking for it" are delusional. "Asking for it" would be pissing in a girl's mouth in the middle of Times Square. He filmed sex acts (granted, deviant sex acts by almost anyone's standards) between consenting adults, and sold copies of the film to other adults who specifically requested it. There is absolutely NOTHING wrong with that.

Televangelists make me sick to my stomach. I want to puke every time they speak in tongues or plant a staff member in a wheelchair so they can "heal them" or say that god's blessing awaits you if you just send money to their ministry.
I would rather watch 10 straight hours of Max taking a shit than 10 minutes of a televangelist.
Just because they offend me doesn't mean they don't have the right to do what they do. (They, by the way, do it in the middle of Times Square) Their offensiveness is even more egregious, because they specifically target their speech at people who don't wish to hear it, rather than limiting it to people who request it. Yet their rights are sacrosanct, and Max apparently has no rights.

Stick that in your irony pipe and smoke it.

Originally Posted by Snake Doctor

Honestly I think that this case is a slam dunk for Max on appeal.

The prosecution failed to show the entire video(s) to the jury. That alone could be game, set, match. The Miller test requires that the material be taken as a whole, the prosecution didn't show the whole work to the jury, game over.

There was also the issue that Max didn't mail the DVD's, another company took the order and mailed the DVD's, yet Max was convicted on 10 counts of something that he plainly didn't do.

There were also several other issues that I read about in the trial coverage that are definitely going to be brought up during the appeal.

Now that the case is out of the hands of jurors who were sick to their stomach from watching the films, and in the hands of jurists who care about the law and proper procedure, I think Max's chances are very good.