I've just posted at BPPA about this as well.

I think a lot of this debate is confused by the unclear legal status of 2257 at the moment.

Basically, the earlier version of 2257 was fairly lax when it came to distribution, as opposed to production, of porn. Last year's amendments to 2257 greatly expanded the definition of "secondary producer" to include anybody distributing or showing pornographic images. In fact, one of the reason the amendments were so strongly opposed by free speech advocates is because of the effect that it might have on sexual expression, particularly the sex-related blogosphere who were suddenly all "secondary producers" of pornographic images they might make use of under normal fair-use provisions. The Sixth Circuit Court decision last year has left all of 2257 in legal limbo.

As it stands, I don't think they're in violation of 2257 right now, though I think when it comes to laws about potentially exposing such material to minors. On one hand, there are an awful lot of internet sites that violate this, however, John Stagliano is facing jail time for this, which is a clear signal that such laws are in effect. I really don't think there's an "educational" exception for allowing minors to see outright porn, so I think Stop Porn Culture is clearly in violation of the law here. What's particularly galling as that these are the kinds of laws that Stop Porn Culture is very likely to support when enforced against others.

I do think they need to be called out on the hypocrisy of this, in any event. If porn is really so harmful, both to the viewer and those being viewed, then surely what they're doing is further victimization. (I've even seen some anti-porn folks claim that viewing porn makes you a rapist by extension. So what are these people doing?) I don't believe this, of course, and I think their actions help undermine their case.

More importantly, its really rather disgusting the way they use the performers in the images as poster children for their political views on porn, on sex, and on gender. I'd put money on the likelihood that if there was some way of finding an polling the women on whether they agreed with the views of Stop Porn Culture, you'd see very little agreement.