A court in Texas has ruled that adults can have lewd conversations with minors, overturning a law that made sexually explicit talk between adults and children illegal. The impetus for the ruling was a case in which a 53-year-old man sent a graphic text to a teen. While Judge Cathy Cochran didn’t excuse the text, she noted the rule as written would’ve made it illegal for adults and teens to discuss, say, Shakespeare’s Troilus and Cressida or the infamous “wardrobe malfunction” at the Super Bowl in 2004. She said the law “may protect children from suspected sexual predators before they ever express any intent to commit illegal sexual acts, but it prohibits the dissemination of a vast array of constitutionally protected speech and materials.”

State prosecutors took issue with Cochran’s decision. “Perverts will be free to bombard our children with salacious emails and text messages, and parents and law enforcement would be unable to stop it,” they argued. (Fox News)

Paul Asay has covered religion for The Washington Post, Christianity Today, Beliefnet.com and The (Colorado Springs) Gazette. He writes about culture for Plugged In and wrote the Batman book God on the Streets of Gotham (Tyndale). He lives in Colorado Springs with wife Wendy and his two children. Follow him on Twitter.