

He sees the work as subversive not for its "too frank" portrayal of childhood sexuality, but instead for the primacy that the image takes over the text. Janssen places it at the one extreme of a late 20th-century visual and textual revolution that enabled parents to illustrate information that up to that time had been transmitted orally. I am not aware of any book comparable to this illustrated primer that fills the needs of sexual education so well." ĭ. Rohde claims that the book, "appropriately delves into the issues of breast feeding, adolescence, pubertal changes, menses, sexual anatomies, pregnancy, masturbation, contraception, sexual behavioral disturbances and venereal disease. Recent reviews Ī 2005 Amazon review by Dr. You know, Mom, it's PARENTS I'm worried about. The book is good for little kids because they don't know what society terms 'dirty' yet. The last part, though, with no pictures, looks interesting to read. The 13-year-old daughter of Chicago Tribune reviewer Carol Kleiman stated: Reviewer Linda Wolfe was more hostile in the New York Times, calling the book a "child-abusive joke". The Los Angeles Times called the photographs "aceful, charming, and elegant," yet accurately predicted, in a severe understatement of what actually happened, that the book "may start (an) uproar." The Washington Post, on the other hand, described the photographs as "beautiful, assaultive, grotesque, and seductive," and concluded that Show Me! was only suited for "avant garde" parents. Show Me! received mixed reviews from the mass media when it was first published. In New Zealand the book was banned by the Indecent Publications Tribunal in 1976. Public libraries there keep it on hand and out of print copies are openly sold at collectors' premium prices. It was never officially banned in Germany. By then over one million copies in seven languages had been sold. In its country of origin, Germany, the book first won several awards, even from church organisations, but due to rising pressure from a newly arising "moral majority" the publishers and McBride decided to take it off the market in 1996. Show Me! was not the direct subject of the Ferber case, but the book was prominently featured by both sides in the litigation, and it played a significant role in the oral argument before the U.S. Paul Ira Ferber, which held that the First Amendment protected the dissemination of non-obscene sexual depictions. The Court overruled a decision of the New York Court of Appeals, The People v. Martin's Press then pulled the book, stating that though they believed Show Me! was not pornographic, they could no longer afford the legal expenses to defend it, and they did not want to risk criminal prosecutions of their own personnel and/or vendors who sold the book. Ferber, which allowed the government to constitutionally ban the knowing distribution of even non-obscene "child pornography". Supreme Court issued a decision, New York v. The court granted the injunction because the First Amendment was interpreted to permit the banning of only obscene material. Martin's Press, criminalized the distribution of non-obscene "child pornography" in 1977, but the publisher promptly went to court and obtained an injunction against the State. New York State, home of the publisher, St.

However, starting in 1977, some states began to criminalize the distribution of even non-obscene so-called "child pornography," or "images of abuse," which arguably is not protected by the First Amendment. In all four cases, the judges ruled as a matter of law that the title was not obscene. In 19, obscenity charges were brought against the publisher by prosecutors in Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Oklahoma, and Toronto, Ontario, Canada. While many parents appreciated Show Me! for its frank depiction of pre-adolescents discovering and exploring their sexuality, others called it child pornography.
