A senior RTE producer said the national broadcaster should not consider carrying advertisements such as those for brothels and massage parlours which recently resulted in the Irish Censorship Board banning the publication of In Dublin magazine.
However, keeping such advertisements out of RTE programming could not in itself be regarded as censorship, according to Ms Betty Purcell, editor of Questions & Answers, who spoke at the Humbert Summer School in Ballina at the weekend.
Ms Purcell was responding to a delegate at the school who said she was being contradictory in her contention that censorship did not have a role in the 1990s while also holding that RTE should not broadcast such ads.
"I wouldn't encourage RTE to carry such ads because there are standards in public service broadcasting which I believe should be maintained," Ms Purcell said. "I find it personally offensive to see these ads in publications myself, but that is not the issue here.
"The issue here is that State censorship is not fighting against the degradation of women, and society must provide alternatives so that women don't have to degrade themselves in this way.".
Ms Purcell added that advertisements which might be breaking laws should be dealt with in the civil courts, not through the censorship board.