EU Internet Content Regulation

ChuckB writes, “The Register has a story, EC
seeks to stamp out Net child porn, racism and spam, which reports on the EU’s Safer Internet Plus initiative. “Children should have the right to use the internet freely to chat,
to learn or to play games, but to move freely online, children must be protected from the risk of being exploited by adults.” (Erkki Liikanen, EU enterprise & information
society minister) The initiative is directed at racism & violence as well as pornography, and filtering is one of four approaches it takes to the issue. For more information, see the Safer Internet Plus website.”

March 13, 2004 by Anna Uncategorized 10

Anonymous Patron says:

March 13, 2004 at 7:32 am

where are the usual suspects?
Shouldn’t all the free speech advocates be denouncing this proposal for trampling on the rights of minors to view whatever they want?

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Fang-Face says:

March 13, 2004 at 9:30 am

Re:where are the usual suspects?
Oh, we don’t have to. We can always count on some troglodyte to crawl out from some rock and do it for us.

I find it rather amusing piece of double think, though, that the EU is control of what children see and where they surf as the foundation of some kind of bill of rights. They should just stick to run of the mill “We Must Protect The Children” mantra.

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Anonymous Patron says:

March 13, 2004 at 8:25 pm

Re:where are the usual suspects?
I knew that I could count on you. Congratulations for being utterly predictable!

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ChuckB says:

March 13, 2004 at 10:43 pm

We agree on one thing, at least

I find it rather amusing piece of double think …

I agree, it is doublethink (hence the title of my journal entry on the subject from last night).

The article also makes clear that there are plenty of secular authoritarians out there, who think they know better than we do what our children should see. In fact, judging from the EU-wide scale of this program, it appears that the danger from secular authoritarians there dwarfs that from religious authoritarians here.

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Fang-Face says:

March 14, 2004 at 7:18 am

Re:We agree on one thing, at least
. . . it appears that the danger from secular authoritarians there dwarfs that from religious authoritarians here.

Alas, it would be a mistake to think so. Authoritarianism is much of a muchness. Right-wing, left-wing, secular, relgious; the end result is the same in every event. I have no doubt that if Afghanistan hadn’t been bombed even further back into the stone age when it was the Taliban would have triggered a religious war. The resulting holocaust would have been analogous to the holocausts of Hitler and Stalin, and those were political. We could look to the Witch Hunts of Europe from late 15th through the early 18th centuries for a precedent on that. Or the religious based rioting and lynch mobs in Khandahar(?).

Yes, I saw the stress you put on the word “secular”. I have not missed the fact that not all repression is religious based. The concerns over S215 of the Patriot Act, for instance. And I have opinions about left-wing censorship that are as strong and as convoluted as my opinions about Ms. Tweet. But I’ll let them lie, for now. 🙂

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ChuckB says:

March 14, 2004 at 7:36 am

Re:We agree on one thing, at least

Alas, it would be a mistake to think so.

I think you misunderstand my point. My point is that the secular filtering (or censorship, if you prefer) advocates in Europe have made a good deal more progress toward a comprehensive program of Internet access for children than the religious filtering advocates here in the U.S. have. From the story, e.g.:

The EC wants to establish hotlines for the public to report illegal Net content.
…
The programme will cover mobile and broadband content, online games, peer-to-peer file transfer, and all forms of real-time communications such as chat rooms and instant messages.

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ChuckB says:

March 14, 2004 at 12:44 pm

Re:We agree on one thing, at least

And I have opinions about left-wing censorship that are as strong and as convoluted as my opinions about Ms. Tweet.

I have no doubt that they are both strong and convoluted. However, you seem to direct your invective chiefly at religious people (witness your homepage), as if being religious (or at least conservatively religious) makes one automatically both authoritarian and stoopid.

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Fang-Face says:

March 14, 2004 at 6:11 pm

Re:We agree on one thing, at least
People who respect the civil liberties and human dignity of others are not so newsworthy. The majority of the people we hear about in the news are those who are authoritarian and stoopid. And you are ignoring the part on my index page where I welcome those who think for themselves and invite their dissenting opinions as long as they disagree with me intelligently. For comparison: you qualify on that score, Tomeboy does not. You are willing to engage in mutual dialogue and the free exchange of ideas.

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tomeboy says:

March 15, 2004 at 8:11 am

tripping over his own tautology
>>â€¦where I welcome those who think for themselves and invite their dissenting opinions as long as they disagree with me intelligently. For comparison: you qualify on that score, Tomeboy does not. You are willing to engage in mutual dialogue and the free exchange of ideas

Not to fret Fang. No threat by moi to pick on you on the Angelfire home turf. Just the thought of fire-breathing cherubim is enough for me.

Speaking for intellectually diminutive. You are right to assume that many of us lack the subtle sophistication of word parsing to discern your snobby brand of censorship, â€œDummies not Welcomeâ€?.
Sort of a cyber Jim Crow?

Itâ€™s obvious, so I’ve been told by the smart people, that you reserve the right to self-exemption to your home rule of “idiots need not apply”. Unless , ad hominem reâ€?buttâ€?als are now indicative of intelligent, mutual dialogue.

Best â€œButtheadâ€?

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Anna says:

March 15, 2004 at 11:28 pm

More from ChuckB

ChuckB submitted this as a separate story, but I think it’s more appropriately placed here in the comments section.

ChuckB writes “When I submitted the story on the EU’s Safer Internet Plus initiative, I forgot to ask the obvious questions: do any LISNews readers know any European librarians? If so, what do they think about the filtering initiative? Do their professional organizations have policy statements on the matter? How about intellectual freedom guidelines like the ALA’s Library Bill of Rights?”

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