Pirates porn, part 2: 'Pirates II: Stagnetti's Revenge' controversy at U. MD moves to statehouse

October 7, 5:35 PMSex & Relationships ExaminerSarah Estrella

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Sasha Grey in Pirates II: Stagnetti's Revenge, porn at center of MD censorship battle

In April, I reported on the controversy surrounding a screening of AVN Award-winning adult film Pirates II: Stagnetti's Revenge at the University of Maryland: State legislators intervened, threatening to pull the university's funding and promising to modify the State budget to punish any taxpayer-funded university publicly showing hardcore pornography.

The university cancelled the planned screening on campus, but did end up screening portions of the film anyway, taking the opportunity to make a teaching moment out of it, with a lesson about government censorship and the freedoms – and restraints – of any publicly funded institution.

Now, six months after the fact, Maryland legislators are making good on the threat: Check out this morning's stunner of an article in The Washington Post: Md. University System to Adopt Rules Governing Pornographic Movies

Via WashingtonPost.com:

State-funded universities have until Dec. 1 to write and submit policies on "the displaying or screening of obscene films and materials," according to language added to the state operating budget in April.

The General Assembly acted after portions of "Pirates II" were shown on the U-Md. campus in spring. State Sen. Andrew P. Harris (R-Baltimore County) had threatened to deny state operating funds to the university if administrators allowed a full screening.

Set aside for the moment the fact that Digital Playground's pirate porn epic could scarcely be considered "obscene" by contemporary standards and think about what such a policy could mean: The Maryland proposal would punish the state's public universities for – gasp! – screening adult material, otherwise legal in this country, for the over-18 crowds on campus who are – gasp! – legally allowed to view such material and are, after all, pursuing higher education. As P.J. Hogan (vice chancellor for government relations for the university) puts it in the Post article:

"We didn't ask for this, okay? This was forced upon us. Display of a pornographic movie with a discussion about pornography, free speech, filmmaking -- that to a lot of people seems very reasonable. Higher education is about ideas and discussion."

What will they seek to control next?