Parents' Empowerment Act

California Congressman Duncan Hunter (R) has introduced a bill in the House of Representatives called the Parents' Empowerment Act, and would allow parents of any minor to sue anyone who disseminates any material that they deem "harmful to minors."

My objections to this inane bill are shared with what CBLDF Director Charles Brownstein had to say about the bill, "It appears to allow for civil actions against any, or every, member of the dissemination food chain, from the retailer to the distributor to the publisher, of work that an individual parent may object to. So any citizen, using their own sense of what is obscene or harmful to minors, can bring suit. Considering that comics still suffer the cultural and legal stigma of being perceived as a juvenile medium, this bill could become a dangerous weapon in the hands of an individual who walks into a comic book store and is shocked to find that comics offer much more than Archie and Superman."