Mike Hogan made it clear to the High Court yesterday that he has no intention of becoming Ireland's answer to Larry Flynt, the US publisher of Hustler magazine portrayed on screen by Woody Harrelson.
While Mr Hogan had been "accused of the lowest of crimes", he did not want to wage an ongoing feud with the Censorship of Publications Board. In Dublin was not a "top shelf" publication and he wanted it to resume its rightful place alongside "most reputable publications" like the Spectator, Magill, Business & Finance and Private Eye, his counsel said.
Matters such as freedom of expression "were for another day", Mr Joe Finnegan SC added. What Mr Hogan was concerned about was his livelihood, the reputation of a "flagship" publication and the jobs of 37 employees.
Mr Finnegan told the court the censorship board had left In Dublin's publishers in the dark as to which advertisements carried by the magazine were objectionable. Could it be the ads for adult shops, the "health studio" ads or the ads for "chatlines"? they had wondered.
"What is a chatline?" Mr Justice O'Donovan asked counsel, his broad smile suggesting he had a fair idea. However, the judge did not take Mr Finnegan up on his offer to make available a selection of magazines "which make very interesting reading".
Spread out in front of both sets of counsel were a wide variety of publications, Hot Press, the Star, Ireland on Sunday and a selection of mainstream men's magazines.
Counsel for In Dublin felt their ads for health studios were no more offensive than "massage" ads carried (until this week) by the Examiner.
Mr Justice O'Donovan was invited to peruse some of the articles and illustrations from In Dublin objected to by the complainant in a letter to the censorship board. Several covers of In Dublin featuring scantily-clad young women were passed around, undermining the normally staid atmosphere of the High Court.
In reference to one - a photograph of a naked TV presenter sitting astride a chair turned backwards a la Christine Keeler - the complainant had written: "The board may be interested to know that an enlargement of this cover appeared as a poster on two sites in Dublin." There was a good deal of objectionable textual matter to be found in every issue, the complainant had told the board.
The board wrote to Mr Hogan saying it had no wish to have to consider prohibition of his "eminent publication" but it had to `consider the complaint with care.
Mr Hogan wrote back to say it had been his "considered opinion for some time that a number of adverts which have appeared in the Personals section of In Dublin have exceeded what I would believe to be the acceptable norms for personal advertising".
However, the board was unimpressed by Mr Hogan's efforts in subsequent issues to tone down the offending ads and went ahead with a six-month ban.
Mr Hogan circumvented the ban by publishing an almost identical magazine called Dublin. His counsel conceded to Mr Justice O'Donovan that this had represented "thumbing the nose at the board to some extent" and admitted that demand had been better for Dublin than it had for In Dublin.
Mr Hogan left it until yesterday to offer the censorship board what it wanted, a "sanitised" version of In Dublin, which would not contain advertisements for escort agencies or health studios.
Counsel for the board, Mr Diarmuid McGuinness SC, made it clear it was too late for such a compromise as the board could not revoke, amend or withdraw its prohibition order.
Mr Justice O'Donovan will attempt to resolve the impasse when he delivers his judgment this morning.
