KUAR | By Tess Vrbin / Arkansas Advocate

A proposed Arkansas law that would open the door to criminal liability for the distribution of “obscene” content by school and public libraries passed a legislative panel and will go to the House floor after being amended.

Senate Bill 81 would add the loaning of library materials to the statute governing the possession and distribution of obscene material. Arkansas’ definition of obscenity is “that to the average person, applying contemporary community standards, the dominant theme of the material taken as a whole appeals to prurient interest,” with prurient meaning overtly sexual.

The bill would remove schools and public libraries from the part of Arkansas law that exempts them from prosecution “for disseminating a writing, film, slide, drawing, or other visual reproduction that is claimed to be obscene.”