Slashdot Mirror
Illinois Politician Wants a Kill Switch For Anonymous Speech Online
New submitter OhSoLaMeow writes with a story at The Daily Caller with unpleasant news from the Illinois state Senate, where a state senator has introduced a bill that "would require anonymous website comment posters to reveal their identities if they want to keep their comments online." From the article (warning — obnoxious ads with sound): "The bill, called the Internet Posting Removal Act, is sponsored by Illinois state Sen. Ira Silverstein. It states that a 'web site administrator upon request shall remove any comments posted on his or her web site by an anonymous poster unless the anonymous poster agrees to attach his or her name to the post and confirms that his or her IP address, legal name, and home address are accurate.'"
Hardly. Unless your servers are located in Illinois the bill is meaningless.
"Lack of speed can be overcome. In the worst case by patience." --Znork
(cough)Democrat(Cough)
Both sides do this equally. It is just a matter of who is paying the bills today.
> betrayal of your constituents like this
In the 21'st century a politicians constituents are the various lobby interests that give him money to run the campaigns that get them elected. "citizens" don't come into the picture except as demographics to be manipulated by the advertising campaign.
I suspect this bill was advanced directly in the interests of one of the senators "constituents".
If they have nothing to do except introduce bullshit bills, we should stop paying them and send them home. We could use the money to hire better teachers, fix up a crumbling bridge or something.
doesn't mean freedom of anonymity...
I don't understand why people think that anonymity is or should be an unquestionably protected given.
While I disagree with this politician's proposal, I feel like we should make it clear that not all speech should be behind an anonymous veil. It's difficult to explore and draw the line but, for instance, if you call in a bomb threat or threaten someone's life over the phone and they use the appropriate means to track you down, I don't think you should be able to say that your speech should be anonymous and by removing the anonymity you're a treasonous free speech hater. However, if I want to criticize my leaders you shouldn't be able to trace whatever communications I use to do so in order to identify me. And I think we have court systems and warrants and wiretapping laws in place (or rather we should) that make this a process that does not become abused. When your words have a large amount of weight, they shouldn't be anonymous -- I think that testifying against someone is a great example of this. Can I anonymously swear to tell the truth and call you a pedophile and will you demand that be entered into the record in a court of law?
Another recent example I can think of that annoys me is when your "anonymous free speech" is equated to hundreds of millions of dollars or campaign donations. At that point we're talking about sums that can positively or negatively affect many lives and when it hits a certain point it should simply be published. This would reduce some of the legalized bribery in this country that is parading around as "free speech."
Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.
It doesn't actually say anything about anonymity although I understand how forcing identification could amount to fear of response and future duress. So at that point you need to involve a judge in the process of determining whether identification is needed without violating the first amendment.
My work here is dung.
Inconvenient Party affiliation omitted, twice in one day.
Back here we have a Democrat state senator Toni Harp from Connecticut trying to "Ban Kids From Using Arcade Guns." Now we have Democrat state senator Ira Silverstein of Illinois with another statist gem.
Could we please stop this game? When we're raging about Republicans there is no hesitation qualifying names with parties. I know it's inconvenient that all bad government isn't the fault of fundies, but pretending statists aren't a problem isn't helpful behavior.
Maw! Fire up the karma burner!
Already, Facebook and Google+ forbid anonymous postings. Facebook's comment system is used all over the web, so you can't post anonymously anywhere it is found -- you can, of course, violate their terms of service and use a *false* ID, but in that case, again, you can lose your voice and your posts at any time. For that matter, if you're not a Facebook member, you can't post at all on a Facebook comment system, either within Facebook or used externally.
You're looking in the wrong place for the real threat. The government isn't (really) looking to curb anonymous speech, just this one asshat in Illinois; and his stupid little idea isn't going anywhere.
Commercial interests, however, have a huge stake in making sure they know who you are, and are well into the process of making it standard. even here on slashdot, we have numerous naive koolaid drinkers who will blithely tell you that anonymous speech is a bad thing.
Slashdot itself starts anonymous speech at a lower value than speech with an ID, a slight, but not subtle, nudge to get you to provide your information to the world. Basically for anyone who utilizes the mod system here, anonymous speech is by default invisible. No, you can't count on the mods to fix all the cases that need fixing, either -- not enough mods or modpoints.
Seriously people... you're fighting the wrong fight. 1, support anonymous speech, and 2, don't feed the trolls. Get off Facebook and Google+ until or unless they come around. Or else swallow and don't spit when they don't let you post anonymously.
As a life-long citizen of Illinois, I've reached the point of saturation with the asshattery that goes on in Springfield and the true ruling city of the state, Chicago. This kind of thing simply doesn't register any attention anymore. We are numb, beaten into submission.
Most money has traces of drugs on it. If someone has a big stack of bills, and they are a not freshly printed a dog is basically guaranteed to find some trace of drugs.
Troll is not a replacement for I disagree.
Lots of stuff is unconstitutional (whether by a state constitution or the US Constitution) and is still enforced; the 4th Amendment in particular has been null and void for a long time ...
Much of the second as well. That's why you can't have machine guns, silencers, short shotguns, and a number of other guns or accessories in most states and to have them where the states don't ban them you must go through major federal hoops, (fingerprints, $200 tax per item, risk of federal prison {or a shoot the dog, stomp the cat, throw the pregnant wife against the wall and make her miscarry, raid} if the BATF {thinks} your paperwork is defective or you have something you didn't tell them about).
U.S. v. Miller (1939) said the fed could tax guns that AREN'T suitable for "militia" (military) use, in particular a short barreled ("sawed-off") shotgun (because Miller and his team weren't there to "bring to judicial notice" that they were also called "trench guns" and were an important weapon in WW I). The federal and state governments have taken that to mean they can tax any gun any amount, erect arbitrarily draconian red tape barriers, then bust anyone for screwing up the red tape or failing to pay the tax - "revenuer"/"untouchables"/Waco/Ruby Ridge style.
Bantam Dominique roosters crow a four-note song. Once you've heard it as "Happy BIRTHday" you can't NOT hear it that way
Its only a "reasonable" limitation on free speech. No different than banning assult rifles or 30 round magazines is a "reasonable" limitation on the 2nd amendment.
I fail to see the difference of one being reasonable and the other not.
Every elected official in this country takes an oath to uphold the laws of the nation. By introducing the Internet Posting Removal Act Ira Silverstein his demonstrated his contempt for the constitution and is unfit to serve in the Illinois state senate.
I am becoming gerund, destroyer of verbs.