From the report of the Attorney General’s Commission on Pornography (1986):
…Increasingly, however, the peep show, often combined with an outlet for the sale of pornographic books and magazines, is a major form of meeting consumer demand.
The typical peep show is located on the premises of an “adults only” establishment selling large numbers of pornographic magazines, along with some other items, such as pornographic text-only books, sexual paraphernalia, sexually oriented newspapers, and video tapes. The peep show is often separated by a doorway or screen from the rest of the establishment, and consists of a number of booths in which a film, or, more likely now, a video tape, can be viewed. The patron inserts tokens into a slot for a certain amount of viewing time, and the patron is usually alone or with one other person within the particular booth. The peep show serves the purpose of allowing patrons to masturbate or to engage in sexual activity with others in some degree of privacy, at least compared to an adult theater, while watching the pornographic material. In a later section of our report describing these establishments we note in detail the generally unsanitary conditions in such establishments. The booths seem rarely to be cleaned, and the evidence of frequent sexual activity is apparent….
We have spent a considerable amount of our time attempting to determine whether there is a connection between the pornography industry and what is commonly taken to be “organized crime.” After hearing from a large number of witnesses, mostly law enforcement personnel, after reading a number of reports prepared by various law enforcement agencies, and after consulting sources such as trial transcripts, published descriptions, and the like, we believe that such a connection does exist.
…we are not reluctant to conclude that in many aspects of the pornography business that La Cosa Nostra is getting a piece of the action.