See no evil
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Date Posted:
May-11-2010 15:14
119
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Australia may soon face internet censorship laws similar to those applied in communist China, as Senator Stephen Conroy, Minister for Broadband, Communications and the Digital Economy, pushes for a mandatory Internet Service Provider (ISP) filtering of the web.
Let’s leave aside the argument about whether the filter will actually work (many experts think it won’t), the question that needs to be answered is whether we support the idea in the first place. We’d say that given the filter is being introduced, ostensibly, to block extreme pornography sites, it’s pretty hard not to support it.
Let’s just be clear: we’re not talking about your bookmarked soft-porn here. We’re talking about extremely unpleasant stuff like child porn and bestiality, footage of severe real-life violence, or any detailed instructions in crime, violence or terrorism. These kinds of materials are by and large illegal anyway – it seems only logical to try to find a way to prevent them being disseminated via the web, straight into the bedrooms of kids.
But what concerns internet censorship dissidents is that the government’s argument that they’re acting in our best interests could also be used to block a wide range of topics that grown men and women should have access to. Internet forums that discuss issues like euthanasia, abortion, racism and even sensitive political material can be refused classification and may fall onto the secretive “blacklist” of banned sites.
The question you need to answer in your own mind is this: does the protection of children trump your right to make your own decisions about what you can and can not view on the internet? If you trust the government not to abuse its power, you might say yes. But if you’re uncomfortable giving that kind of decision-making authority to Canberra bureaucrats, you’ll probably think otherwise.
What do you think? If you agree with the filter, what websites should or should not be blacklisted?
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