FREE ESSAY ON INTERNET CENSORSHIP

INTERNET CENSORSHIP

Computer, Internet, Privacy
INTERNET REGULATION: POLICING CYBERSPACE
The Internet is a method of communication and a source of information that is becoming
more popular among those who are interested in, and have the time to surf the information
superhighway. The problem with this much information being accessible to this many people
is that some of it is deemed inappropriate for minors. The government wants censorship,
but a segment of the population does not. Legislative regulation of the Internet would be
an appropriate function of the government.
The Communications Decency Act is an amendment which prevents the information
superhighway from becoming a computer red light district. On June 14, 1995, by a vote of
84-16, the United States Senate passed the amendment. It is now being brought through the
House of Representatives. 1 The Internet is owned and operated by the government, which
gives them the obligation to restrict the materials available through it. Though it
appears to have sprung up overnight, the inspiration of free-spirited hackers, it in fact
was born in Defense Department Cold War projects of the 1950s.2 The United States
Government owns the Internet and has the responsibility to determine who uses it and how
it is used.
The government must control what information is accessible from its agencies. This
material is not lawfully available through the mail or over the telephone, there is no
valid reason these perverts should be allowed unimpeded on the Internet. Since our
initiative, the industry has commendably advanced some blocking devices, but they are not
a substitute for well-reasoned law. 4 Because the Internet has become one of the biggest
sources of information in this world, legislative safeguards are
imperative. 
The government gives citizens the privilege of using the Internet, but it has never given
them the right to use it. They seem to rationalize that the framers of the constitution
planned & plotted at great length to make certain that above all else, the profiteering
pornographer, the pervert and the pedophile must be free to practice their pursuits in
the presence of children on a taxpayer created and subsidized computer network.3 People
like this are the ones in the wrong. Taxpayer's dollars are being spent bringing obscene
text and graphics into the homes of people all over the world. 
The government must take control to prevent pornographers from using the Internet however
they see fit because they are breaking laws that have existed for years. Cyberpunks,
those most popularly associated with the Internet, are members of a rebellious society
that are polluting these networks with information containing pornography, racism, and
other forms of explicit information. When they start rooting around for a crime, new
cybercops are entering a pretty unfriendly environment. Cyberspace, especially the
Internet, is full of those who embrace a frontier culture that is222 hostile to authority
and fearful that any intrusions of police or government will destroy
their self-regulating world.5 The self-regulating environment desired by the cyberpunks
is an opportunity to do whatever they want. The Communications Decency Act is an attempt
on part of the government to control their free attitude displayed in homepages such as
Sex, Adult Pictures, X-Rated Porn, Hot Sleazy Pictures (Cum again + again) and sex, sex,
sex. heck, it's better even better than real sex6. What we are doing is simply making the
same laws, held constitutional time and time again by the courts with regard to obscenity
and indecency through the mail and telephones, applicable to the Internet.7 To keep these
kinds of pictures off home computers, the government must control information on the
Internet, just as it controls obscenity through the mail or on the phone. Legislative
regulations must be made to control information on the Internet because the displaying or
distribution of obscene material is illegal. 
The courts have generally held that obscenity is illegal under all circumstances for all
ages, while indecency is generally allowable to adults, but that laws protecting children
from this lesser form are acceptable. It's called protecting those among us who are
children from the vagrancies of adults.8
The constitution of the United States has set regulations to determine what is
categorized as obscenity and what is not. 
In Miller vs. California, 413 U.S. at 24-25, the court announced its Miller Test and
held, at 29, that its three part test constituted concrete guidelines to isolate 'hard
core' pornography from expression protected by the First Amendment.9
By laws previously set by the government, obscene pornography should not be accessible on
the Internet. The government must police the Internet because people are breaking laws.
Right now, cyberspace is like a neighborhood without a police department.10 Currently
anyone can put anything he wants on the Internet with no penalties. The Communications
Decency Act gives law enforcement new tools to prosecute those who would use a computer
to make the equivalent of obscene telephone calls, to prosecute 'electronic stalkers' who
terrorize their victims, to clamp down on electronic distributors of obscene materials,
and to enhance the chances of prosecution of those who would provide pornography to
children via a computer.
The government must regulate the flow of information on the Internet because some of the
commercial blocking devices used to filter this information are insufficient. Cybercops
especially worry that outlaws are now able to use powerful cryptography to send and
receive uncrackable secret communications and are also aided by anonymous re-mailers.11
By using features like these it is impossible to use blocking devices to stop children
from accessing this information. Devices set up to detect specified strings of characters
will not filter those that it cannot read.
The government has to stop obscene materials from being transferred via the Internet
because it violates laws dealing with interstate commerce.
It is not a valid argument that consenting adults should be allowed to use the computer
BBS and Internet systems to receive whatever they want. If the materials are obscene, the
law can forbid the use of means and facilities of interstate commerce and common carriers
to ship or disseminate the obscenity.12 When supplies and information are passed over
state or national boundaries, they are subject to the laws governing interstate and
intrastate commerce. When information is passed between two computers, it is subjected to
the same standards. The government having the power to regulate the information being put
on the Internet is a proper extension of its powers. With an information based system
such as the Internet there is bound to be material that is not appropriate for minors to
see. In passing of an amendment like the Communications Decency Act, the government would
be
given the power to regulate that material.
Bibliography
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