Net censorship growing worldwide Censorship of internet content is growing across the world. A survey by the Open Net Initiative (ONI) across 41 countries found that 25 applied content filtering to block access to particular websites. Web applications such as Google Maps and Skype as well as "subversive" websites featured on content blocking lists. Five …
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I post anonymously for the first time on this...out of fear for my freedom.
What constitutes "child porn"? Does this include blocking any archaeological images from ancient Greece or Rome that include "abuse" of children (an accepted social norm of that time), or a discussion of the history of boys in the various Navies of the 18th century? What constitutes a "child": is a 17 year old, legally married (at 15, which is possible in some parts of the United States) mother of two who appears in an "adult" situation considered a "child"?
What is morally reprehensible to a person, or a group or a culture is not necessarily reprehensible to others - or even legally prohibited, even when other individuals or groups find the situation morally offensive.
Much of the world finds homosexuality morally offensive. Many cultures find the consumption of alcohol morally offensive. Much of the world finds the worship of Jesus Christ morally offensive. Many cultures find women morally offensive in both visual presentation and in depiction of any role but that of a baby factory.
Do these examples warrant censorship? If you answer a mixture of "yes" and "no" then you see the problem that accepting blanket censorship imposes.
We should have the right to our own beliefs, and a right to NOT be forcefully exposed to beliefs that offend us. If a person knocks on my door and attempts to proselytize their beliefs to me I can tell them to go away - and they MUST by the laws of the country I live in. I can not, however, prevent them from constructing a large building for the purpose of expounding their beliefs with others that have a similar view. Nor can I prevent them from ATTEMPTING to contact me with their beliefs, no matter how offensive I find them.
Censorship is the slipperiest slope of human behavior that we all face today. ANY attempt to impose ANY form of censorship, beyond the very basic limit of "get off my property" is to open the door to prevention of the exchange of ANY ideas that SOMEONE finds unacceptable.
Dealing with individuals or groups that FORCE their beliefs on others - whether it is by refusing to leave your property when asked to do so or filling email with "spam" - is the only limit that needs to be enforced. If "inadvertently" getting to a "porn" site on the web is offensive to someone, they have the choice of leaving the site and not returning, or NOT "surfing" the Internet. I do not go to an exotic dance club or a church knowing that I will be offended just so I can demand that the offenders be punished.
Or maybe I SHOULD start attending worship services at churches that offend me, then call in the police to force these offenders to stop their practices - after all, I have the "right" to go there and I have the "right" to prevent them from offending me. At least that's what censorship would permit me to do.
It is our choice: we can live in a world that promotes free thought - even if it offensive at times to us - or live in a world where we fear our thoughts of freedom. It is truly up to us to decide.
Child pornography is illegal and a matter for police forces around the world. If people have found such material and not reported them, then you probably shouldnt be doing buisness with them or have them on your christmas card list.
The solution is simple, install your own web-filter if your mind will be shattered by politics you do not agree with, if you turn into a frothing at the mouth racist by reading anything published by the BNP. I hope we never reach the time when it is considered a good thing for any organisation to tell internet users what they can and cannot read, provided it is not accepted around the world as illegal (which is the case for child pornography)
"Burma, Iran, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, Syria, Tunisia, the United Arab Emirates, and Yemen" they are all Islamic States, except Burma which is primarily Buddhist.
This surprised me because we are all led to believe by the media that China has the most censorship.
Perhaps it's because the Internet is controlled by the Great Satan, according to President Ahmadinejad.
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The internet should not be filtered, rather if somoen posts illegal material in thier own country, that contry's judicial system should punish him in accordance with local laws, ideally making no distinction based on teh mode of distribution. i have already explained my ideas on the governance and regulation of the interenet based on cc-tlds and regional IP address allocations (in short, each cc-tld is only avaliable to IP addresses from that country, the laws of the country from which the domain coems are the laws which apply).
just as it would not be illegal for me to listen to hate speech on a US radio broadcats while in the UK, but would be illegal for me to broadcast hate speach myself, reading and posting on teh internet shhould be considered the same way.
BKB:
The point about censorship is that it is the power to *control*.
In 1984 Big Brother created "New Speak", a language that would effectively prevent the people from even *thinking* unacceptable things (Thought Crime).
If censorship is to happen it must be done on a stringent case-by-case basis and it must be done on "proof of harm". It's not enough to simply say "I don't like this, so you can't see it", there has to be demonstrable proof that allowing it would cause more harm than denying it.
For example the UK Government wants to make it an offence to possess "Extreme pornography" and some want to to block access to websites that show this material (even though it's entirely legal in other countries) based solely on the personal tastes and opinions of some prudish Home Office officials and the erroneous claim that it "caused" the death of Jane Longhurst (even though they admit that there is *no* credible evidence to prove a link between pornography and violence!) arguing that if someone doesn't see this stuff, they won't try to copy it (so what happened before the net existed?)
With child porn there is, of course, evidence of harm, but John Reid now wants to outlaw entirely fictional CGI images and, by association, Hentai Manga without any evidence of harm (and what's next? Outlawing Vladimir Nabakov's book Lolita or the Kubrick film of it?)
So it's not enough to say that "everyone agrees with this", censorship is a big hammer that threatens the rights of adults to make up their own minds what they see and read and it's not enough for a government to say "we're going to stop you seeing this for your own good".
My personal opinion is that all forms of censorship are wrong when they are against the freedom to express and to challenge accepted morality and normalcy whether political, scientific, religious or otherwise directed. In most of Europe we are fortunate to have the freedom to express ourselves and to defend that right; our forefathers fought for it and we should uphold it. It is our duty.
One European exception is the UK, my birthplace, where, increasingly, freedoms are being eroded by immigrants from more restricted nations, who have abused their UK gained freedom to petition against the UK people's right to free expression). A big issue for the U.K's European derived population is the meddling of non-Europeans in their (the U.K people's) legal, political and general sociological practices in an effort to restrict the very freedom won and upheld by the European derived UK people - those very freedoms that allowed those immigrants to emigrate from their home (usually restrictive) nations into which they attempt to convert the UK. Granted, not all non-European immigrants are the same and there are many who openly (and closetedly ) protest against their peers' wishes.
Coming from a country that is increasingly censored to protect others' (non-U.K popular) opinions, beliefs, morals social norms et alia, I can and will say that censorship is wrong. We have choice. We may choose to acknowledge something. We may choose to accept something. We may choose to ignore something. We may even choose, should we wish, censorship. It is because we can choose that we must choose against it and protest all forms of it whether they be abstract or concrete, internet or physical.
the web was created to send messages from one place to another it has since evolved into something much greater and "evil" but yet it reflects the real world the world is evil what is the point in blocking it. fair enough parents won't want there children looking at some of these "evil sites" but that is what web filters are for but they should be set up by the user of the internet and not by the government.
Another point is that with the current state of the technology the internet is built on its not possible to censor the net because its government programmers vs home programmers or hackers (the original meaning not the evil hacker) its a bit like the sony vs homebrew sony will never win there firmware was too weak to begin with.
Also (from for going on) the internet is way to large for its own good and its time for some world laws to be set because using the internet on a regions laws is impossible because where is the client and where's the server?... if the net is based on region laws then you shouldn't be allowed to access anything outside that region. we need a world order for the internet a bit like the UN but not so pointless.
There is a big difference between something thats illegal and something which needs to be censored, but that brings you onto freedom of speech.
I am an adult and its up to me what I read, look at or watch, not the government or the botherers out there who in probability havnt seen anything themselves but "have heard, apparently".
My mind is drawn back to the "Jerry Springer musical" and the outrage which spawned from it despite 90% of the people not having seen it and the complaints that it was shown on TV. Those people had the option to turn over, watching it wasnt compulsory! While I do not approve of many things, any type of porn including children etc, I have the choice of deciding to look at whatever I want and its not for someone else to tell me what I can or cant look at. If something is illegal then it should be persued by the authorities , just as I would be if I robbed a bank (which I can probably find plans for on the internet....now theres a thought!:-) and closed down. I know its not as simple as that otherwise we wouldnt be having this conversation.
I want to be free to decide myself what I want to see. Whatever you do to prevent access, someone will find a way around it, someone else will pay extra for the facility, a new industry will spring up and it wont have worked.
A lot of people have been arguing for censorship, for instance in the case of child pornography - mind you, I sincerely wish that child pornography did not exist - however blocking it by censorship is a double edged sword, censorship hides the existence of materials, but does not remove them, nor solve the real problem. Eventhough the ideals of those arguing for the censorship is commendable, they tend to forget that censorship has an adverse effect of also hiding the extent of the problem - out of sight out of mind.
Censorship has never solved any problems, and the only effect of censorship is keeping people ignorant of what is really going on. Hiding things like hate-speech, neo-nazi propeganda has a large negative effect, most people seem to forget that forbidding something, often makes it far more attractive, so if it is forbidden to access something, it suddenly becomes interesting, as well as driving these things underground, removes them from public debate, and places them in the dark, where they can grow, and followers reinforce each other's beliefs, until carrying it out seems natural to them - This is really dangerous.
Not censoring things like hate speec, etc has the tendency to weaken it, because it faces scrutiny, and because it is not illegal, it isn't nearly as interesting.
Making something illegal is a sure way of making it more facinating, and when it is driven underground, below the radar, evil concepts are able to thrive and grow, gaining strength, here the very same concepts would fade before the light of day.
Therefore I believe that censuring access to information, or expression is never a good thing, it only has negative consequences, and punishing people for 'thought' crimes such as racist propeganda does not make the problem go away, but just hides it. Letting people have a place to vent their rage, might prevent it being vented physically.
Mind you I firmly believe that the police should hunt down people producing things such as child porn, or actually carrying out acts of violence based on hate-speech and so forth, and I am an advocate of creating a global policeforce, specialized in hunting down these people. What I mean I seriously support actually solving the problems, and I do not believe in hiding them.
as, in the case of Child Porn, we might agree (subject to the valid question of what constitutes the offensive material), then the relevant question is not what gets censored but WHO DECIDES and if we want to avoid totalitarianism the only viable answer to that is We The People - either by referendum, or, if requests for censorship are sufficiently frequent, then by a properly selected Jury.
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