Please stop the attacks on women and children by the criminals in the pornography industry. You have the ability to help millions of women and children by ordering that U.S. laws prohibiting distribution of hardcore, obscene pornography be vigorously enforced. Pornography harms women and children, as well as men, in many ways and that is why the U.S. Congress passed laws to prevent the distribution of hardcore adult pornography.

It is a violation of U.S. law for pornographers to distribute obscene (hardcore) pornography on the Internet, on cable/satellite TV, on hotel/motel TV, in retail shops, through the mail, and by common carrier such as FedEx of UPS. Imagine what a different country this would be if those laws were vigorously enforced as they once were!

Yet, Mr. President, your Attorney General, Eric Holder has refused to initiate any new obscenity prosecutions under these laws since you took office.

America is suffering an untreated pandemic of harm caused by pornography. A wealth of peer-reviewed research studies on this harm is catalogued on www.PornHarmsResearch.com. According to studies, children and adults are developing life-long addictions to pornography; on average American children are seeing hardcore pornography at age 11 and four out of five 16 year-olds now regularly access pornography online; 56% of divorces cite Internet pornography as a major factor in the breakup of the marriage; girls consuming pornography are several times more likely to engage in group sex than those who do not; significant and growing numbers of men in their twenties are developing “porn-induced sexual dysfunction;” and there is a very substantial increase in demand for child pornography because many adult-porn users are finding that they are no longer excited by adult images.

The images in today’s pornography frequently depict violence against women for the pleasure of the men involved, and these misogynistic images have a profound and lasting effect on those who regularly consume them. Pornography has become the leading sex-educator to many children and young adults. There is also growing evidence that pornography is causing a burgeoning demand for trafficked women and children.

Mr. President, we respectfully request that you order Mr. Holder to immediately begin enforcing adult obscenity laws. If he refuses, we respectfully request that you relieve him of his office for his continued dereliction of duty to enforce these laws. This failure has given preferential treatment to the criminals in the porn industry over the lives and safety of women and children everywhere.

Signed: