It's time to rid England's countryside of Neolithic gay porn

The Cerne Abbas Giant should not be censored or destroyed because it is a harmless artifact of local culture. Unfortunately, Pro’s hostility towards the Giant seems rooted in little more than juvenile homophobia.1. The Cerne Abbas Giant is not obsceneIn characterizing the Giant as an example of “Neolithic gay porn,” Pro grossly misinterprets a harmless work of art that is actually quite common throughout all human cultures. Nothing about the Giant is remotely gay or pornographic. To begin with, the Giant is a solitary figure, and he isn’t engaging in any sexual activity. While the naked Giant does appear to have an erection, he isn’t touching or gesturing lewdly toward his genitals. Instead, the Cerne Abbas Giant is a rather innocuous example of a phallus, a “symbol or representation of the penis.” [1] Phallic art and architecture are quite common in cultures throughout the world, [2, 3, 4, 5, 6], so no “unsuspecting tourist” wandering through Dorset would be exposed to anything he or she hasn’t already seen thousands of times before.Pro makes repeated allusions throughout his opening argument tying the Cerne Abbas Giant to homosexuals and homosexuality. As a threshold matter, these allegations are unfounded. Pro did not offer any evidence to support his claims that the Giant was created "by stone age gays," that the Giant himself is supposed to be a "giant gay," or that local homosexuals are the ones responsible for keeping it on display. More importantly, however, is the fact that such allegations - even if they were true - are irrelevant. The sexual orientation of the people who create or appreciate particular works of art cannot serve as a justification for censorship. Would my opponent support bans on the literature of William Shakespeare or the music of Elton John?To the extent that my opponent finds the Cerne Abbas Giant itself homoerotic, this probably says more about my opponent than it does about the Giant itself.2. Local communities have the right to determine their own moral standardsIn the leading American case to reconcile permissible restrictions on obscenity with the human right to free speech, the U.S. Supreme Court emphasized that local communities have the right to arrive at their own definition of "obscenity":"It is neither realistic nor constitutionally sound to read the First Amendment as requiring that the people of Maine or Mississippi accept public depiction of conduct found tolerable in Las Vegas, or New York City . . . People in different States vary in their tastes and attitudes, and this diversity is not to be strangled by the absolutism of imposed uniformity." [7]If the people of Dorset find the Cerne Abbas Giant to be harmless, that should end the discussion. What right does my opponent have to impose his own prudish morality on others? While people may indeed have "a right to live in an environment free from huge sexually-explicit hillside chalk engravings," they also have the right to live in an environment with sexually-explicit hillside chalk engravings. Every community has the right to choose for itself what it deems appropriate.3. Tourists assume the risk of witnessing uncomfortable things when visiting foreign locations.My opponent professes a desire to protect the delicate sensibilities of "unsuspecting families . . . [and] decent, law-abiding tourists." No tourist, however, should be "unsuspecting" when visiting a foriegn community. Unless told otherwise, all tourists knowingly assume the risk that they may be exposed to certain cultural works or practices that would be considered taboo or offensive in their own communities. If a tourist wishes to avoid exposing themselves or their children to uncomfortable material, they have the obligation to vet their destinations ahead of time. Tourists have no right - legal or otherwise - to censor material considered acceptable by a local population.4. Censoring the Cerne Abbas Giant would harm DorsetBecause the Giant is a centuries-old relic of local culture, its censorship or destruction would harm the community of Dorset, England. To begin with, Dorset denizens would be offended if an external governing body determined that such a major part (pun intened) of their local heritage was too offensive or inappropriate to display. Additionally, censoring or destroying the Giant would probably eliminate the primary reason most tourists visit Dorset in the first place, costing the Dorset community untold thousands of valuable tourism dollars.Whatever inadequacies or insecurities the Cerne Abbas Giant may trigger in my opponent, they certainly don't justify inflicting the kind of emotional and financial harm that would result from censorship.Sources:[1] http://www.merriam-webster.com... [2] en.wikipedia.org/wiki/phallus[3] Danielou, Alain. The Phallus: Sacred Symbol of Male Creative Power (1995)[4] Friedman, David A. A Mind of Its Own: A Cultural History of the Penis (2008)[5] http://www.globalpost.com... [6] http://cabinetmagazine.org... [7] Miller v. California, 413 U.S. 15, 32-33 (1973)