Interview: Two Censorware Experts

This week's interview topic might almost be called "Censorware: Threat or Menace." Our guests are both experienced anti-censorship activists; Jim Tyre is a founding member of the U.S.-based group , The Censorware Project and is also closely allied with Peacefire.org; Irene Graham is a Board Member of Electronic Frontiers Australia (EFA), an on-line civil liberties group (not related to EFF) who also maintains this site. Chosen questions will be forwarded to Jim and Irene Tuesday. Their answers will be posted Friday.

Comments

Censorship: problem or symptom?

[Signal 11]

I believe censorship is a result of various groups / countries wanting to protect their cultural identity (which includes their social taboos). The second thing I want to put forward is the fact that the internet is a culture-neutral medium - it breaks down the traditional geographical barriers that seperate us from other countries. Witness cultural exchange programs, founded under the premise that communication == exchange of ideas. That generally promotes a "blending effect" (for lack of a better description) between cultures.

My question is simple: in light of this, attacking censorware is only attacking the symptom, not the cause. What solutions do you believe are reasonable for accomodating the concerns of these groups? Going one step further, should they be accomodated?

What can we do?

[Ex-NT-User]

It seems the majority of governments that are instituting censorship legislation are doing this "behind their populations backs". And certainly without majority support of the people they govern over. Mailing/calling our representatives doesn't seem to help much since they just blow us off for special interest groups.

So what can we as individuals do prevent this? What other avenues can we take?

Ex-Nt-User

A conundrum

[jd]

Given the popularity of community-based systems (whether that's at the level of the family, a school, or the general public), and given the preference to have these set up as single-user machines, is there a serious alternative to filtering software? (A long-winded argument, to explain the question follows.)

Yes, I know the 1st Amendment argument, but let's reverse this for a moment. Let's say I don't want ads from Microsoft on my computer. I am entitled to set up filters, screening them out, and Microsoft's 1st Amemdment rights don't apply. I'm not stopping them speaking, but I have the absolute right not to hear, and my right overrides any rights to speak they may have.

But on a community-based computer, advertisers and sites I personally deem offensive to me can shove what they like down my throat, and there is nothing I can do to stop them. My boundaries, and my right to protect them, cease to exist.

IMHO, this is not OK. I should have the same rights not to see anything I choose not to see in the library or in the home. They're my eyes, and they don't belong to any damn advertiser or web master.

It's my opinion that the problem is not with the ability to filter, but rather the ability to choose -what- to filter. If a child (or an adult) chooses to not see sex & violence, that should be -their- perogative, and nobody else's, and no website should have the power to dictate otherwise. The converse should also be true, though if a child is frequently accessing material child psychologists deem age-inappropriate, their parents might want to see a family therapist.

(A child being blocked from age-inappropriate material isn't, IMHO, a 1st Ammendment issue, but a mental health one. If someone wallpapers over the cracks of a subsiding house, they can hide the problem, but it doesn't make it go away. If a child is prevented from expressing the symptoms of some family problem, it doesn't cure the problem, but it can make the child seriously ill.)

Children do not have a natural urge to look at stuff that has no meaning or relevence to their age. They -do- have an urge to explore, though, which should be encouraged. They encounter something meaningless to them, they'll probably ask about it and move on. It's not going to hold any interest for them.

There is an exception to this. Children from severely dysfunctional families, with seriously screwed-up family dynamics, where their parents are living a gigantic lie, 24/7, are much more likely to behave in ways that do not reflect their age. They'll start by being child adults, and grow up to become adult children. These are the sorts of kids likely to be repeat visitors to porn sites, cos they're the only kids who will find any meaning there. Sex gets approval, approval is what these kids often crave, so porn is a way to get that.

Blaming or shaming either group of kids is not going to do any good. Healthy kids are just that. Kids. Blaming them for being kids is stupid, and probably the act of an Adult Child, so hateful that their own childhood was stolen that they're hell-bent on robbing everyone else's.

Ill kids aren't to blame for being ill. They're simply kids under extreme circumstances. Send the whole family into therapy, and there's a chance you'll fix the problem. Throwing blame around fixes nothing, and just adds to the very disease that made the kids ill in the first place.

Children, Indeed.

[poohbear_honeypot]

It seems to me that often the battle cry "Protect the children" is really expressing the ideal "Protect everyone from what society says i should be afraid of". Most issues that revolve around censorship deal with taboos that simply don't make sense anymore. A taboo about sex made sense when sex directly lead to pregnancy. With education, it doesn't anymore. Rather than hiding, perhaps we should educate. Not everyone will make the right choice, but that is their right. To choose.

---
Joseph Foley
Akamai Technologies

Free speech in other countries

[/]

As more countries' citizens get exposed to the internet and to the ideas of unbridled free expression, do you see further local pushes to enshrine free-speech protections in their charters or constitutions? Or do you see technology being harnessed to keep the masses in check as it has for millennia?

Question for Roblimo

[Otter]

This week's interview topic might almost be called "Censorware: Threat or Menace." Our guests are both experienced anti-censorship activists

As someone who diverges from the Slashdot party line on this topic, I have this question: If you're going to ask two people to participate, mightn't it be more informative to get two viewpoints?

A proposal

[dclydew]

It is obvious that "censorware" is a fatally flawed tool. Using technical solutions for social issues doesn't work. However, it's also clear that many parents don't want a T-1 full of porn available to their child every Monday through Friday. So I'd like feedback on the following proposal:



In areas where minors have access to public internet services (school/libraries), they would be given an account. This account would be accessible via a smart "library" card. The account is identified by account# only. These account#'s are logged along with sites that are visited by minor. At the request of a parent/gaurdian, a report can be generated so that they can determine if their child is acting within the acceptable boundaries set by the family unit. No one else would be permitted to use this reporting tool. This takes censorship out of the hands of everyone except the people legally responsible for the minor.



I belive that this approach removes all unnecessary layers of argument and leaves us with one question:

Should anyone (parents/gaurdians included) have the right to control what their child sees/hears/views for entertainment/etc. ?


This question obviously has a precedence: Children under 18 are not permitted to purchase pornography, tobacco, etc. However, a parent could permit their child to have such things. Perhaps by purchasing the items for the minor.


Please give me your thoughts....

Rhetoric of anti-censorship

[H3lldr0p]

What arguments have you used to try and persuade people that censorware is not an acceptable answer to whatever problem they are currently having with the world at large?

I ask for two reasons. I have been a fan of Bradbury for some time and will always suggest that everybody needs to read _Fahrenheit 451_, but I have also recently read Ken Burke's "Rhetoric of Hitler's 'Battle'". He argues therein that _Mein Kamf_ should not be censored on the grounds that history might repeat itself if we are unaware of what has gone on before.