Kearns has contended: ‘The legal sense of obscenity was once confined to sexual immorality whereas in more recent times it has been rather artificially extended to cover the favourable presentation of drug-taking and acts that incite violence

Kearns has contended: ‘The legal sense of obscenity was once confined to sexual immorality whereas in more recent times it has been rather artificially extended to cover the favourable presentation of drug-taking and acts that incite violence. The consequence is that it is difficult to predict what further unpleasant portrayals will be found to come under “obscenity” as a now burgeoning legal term of art: in view of the current hostility to smoking tobacco, that exercise might soon be legally subsumed under the obscenity label.’ Do you agree?