Has Verizon Forfeited Common Carrier Status? 721
An anonymous reader writes, "Freedom of speech, the future of the Net, you name it. In October, a U.S. vigilante group asked Verizon to cut off Net access to Epifora, a Canadian ISP that hosts a number of (entirely legal) web sites offering support to minor-attracted adults. Shortly thereafter, Verizon gave 30 days notice to Epifora, ending a 5 year relationship. Telecos have traditionally refrained from censoring legal content, arguing that as 'common carriers' it is outside of their scope to make such decisions. Furthermore, they have refrained because if they did so in some cases, they might be legally liable for other cases where they did not exercise censorship. The questions are: has Verizon forfeited their claim to common-carrier status by selectively censoring legal speech that they do not like? And can the net effectively route around censorship if the trunk carriers are allowed to pick and choose whom they allow to connect?"
The correct answer: (Score:5, Insightful)
Seriously though, Common Carriers should really not be censoring ANY content if they want to be common carriers. Here in the real world, though, Verizon and all of the other big telcos have the FCC in their pockets, so I wouldn't hold my breath on anything happening to them because of this.
Legislation, Corporations, and Censorship (Score:3, Informative)
Censorship is an ethical cancer. There can be no legitimate justification for it. This will not stop either the corporations or the legislators from implementing as much of it as they can get away with.
Re:Legislation, Corporations, and Censorship (Score:5, Insightful)
Yes, because you still have the unlimited right to yell, "FIRE!" in a crowded theater not on fire. Or incite a riot.
Face it, there is NO such thing as unlimited freedoms, and for good reason.
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And then when [parent] ends up dead, it's of course not MY fault or YOUR fault. Just because we incite violence doesn't mean we have ANY culpability. Right?
Re:Legislation, Corporations, and Censorship (Score:5, Informative)
Right. Just words. In the USA, they're a crime where the constitution has been violated by the government. As long as we understand that "crime" simply means "behavior forbidden by arbitrary and illegitimate government edict", rather than "behavior that causes harm."
Your words may (or may not) signal intent. Words are like that. I'd take your words in context, and I probably wouldn't worry much about them if the context was normal — conversation, joking, etc. If, on the other hand, you had a gun in your hand and were pointing it at me at the time, I'd do my best to disable you right there, because that's no simply longer an act of speech, now, is it?
There is nothing in the constitution that can even remotely be construed as a "right to not be offended by another's speech", and in fact, the first amendment explicitly goes the other way, because it is obviously much more important that we hear what you have to say than it is we protect our pissant little preconceptions from the fact that you wish to say it.
To put it another way, perhaps more easily understood by the "mommy protect me" contingent, I would far rather you tell me you intend to do my family in so I can keep it in mind, than you be forbidden from mentioning it so I will have no clue that you are thinking such things.
Re:Legislation, Corporations, and Censorship (Score:4, Informative)
Re:Legislation, Corporations, and Censorship (Score:5, Informative)
Nope, that's a crime. The crime is called assault. However, it's grey (as it should be) and subject to interpretation. You did not commit assault, for example, because from context, it's clear that you were making an example. If you sent that comment as email to a particular recipient, without any context that indicated that you were being hypothetical, THEN it would be assault.
The simple version is: if a reasonable person would assume that the comment constituted a credible threat of violence, then it's assault.
IANAL, as you may have guessed, but I've had to look into what does and does not constitute assault and/or battery in the past.
Re:Legislation, Corporations, and Censorship (Score:5, Insightful)
The basis for determining what is and is not a crime falls largely on the existence and extent of the Mens Rea. It's why there are different degrees of Murder and Manslaughter. It's also why the threat to rap and kill a family can, in one case, be totally legal, and in another case, be Assault.
- Greg
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"In some jurisdictions, assault is used to refer to the actual violence, while in other jurisdictions (e.g. some in the United States, England and Wales), assault refers only to the threat of violence, while the actual violence is battery."
This is why you hear the term "assault and battery".
Re:Legislation, Corporations, and Censorship (Score:5, Insightful)
That's not censorship.
Censorship would be the gov't throwing you in prison for warning people about the danger of fire. Your example is the gov't throwing you in prison for knowningly and willfully endangering people's lives by shouting something you a) know to be untrue, and b) know will most likely cause a panic-stricken stampede for the exits.
Quite honestly, saying that not being able to yell 'fire' in a croweded theater is like saying that your right to bear arms is infringed by not being able to shoot people at will.
Re:Legislation, Corporations, and Censorship (Score:5, Insightful)
For instance, if I published a full-page ad in your local paper calling you a pedophile, I would have the full legal right to do so. If you could demonstrate that I caused you financial losses from such a thing, and damages, then I could be sued for libel.
Re:i can drive any time i want to (Score:4, Insightful)
Driving drunk is not an essential liberty, and not having drunken idiots driving around all the time provides a hell of a lot more than temporary security. Since the liberty is not essential and the security is not temporary, Franklin's quote is not even partially applicable.
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Yes, because you still have the unlimited right to yell, "FIRE!" in a crowded theater not on fire. Or incite a riot.
Yes you do have that right. Only thing is that you will likely be charged for inciting violence/panic. Censorship is never the answer.
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And as for inciting a riot, I think people
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these pervs aren't in theatres propositioning kids (that's the rough equivalent to yelling FIRE in a theatre). They are at their computer discussing the nature of the laws and/or MAYBE how much they would "like" to yell FIRE in a theatre.
As soon as it is illegal for me to say "mmmm fire" on the Internet, I'll move to China. So I guess these pervs might have the right to say "mmmmm young girl" on the Internet in the same light. that changes the mi
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Responsibility (Score:5, Insightful)
Mod me to hell and gone, I don't care, but this is yet another prime example of people simply refusing to take responsibility for their own actions. How about you yell fire 10, 50 or a hundred times, till people get the "joke" and then on the 101st time, there really is a fire, and a crowded cinema full of people die, because they stopped believing you.
Communication is an important thing, and it depends on meanings of words and short phrases. In certain circumstances, you actually want to be able to convey huge volumes of data with only one or two words. If someone deliberately and willfully tries to erode the data content of that word or phrase (by censorship, by the childish bullshit outlined by the parent, or even by propaganda/google bombing/whatever), then they all deserve to be slow roasted. Its hard enough to move ideas between people as it is, without additional static clouding things.
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i'm pretty sure that's the entire point, so that they basically train you to think whenever the fire alarm goes of "oh great. another fire drill..." in the event that there actually is a fire you'll just act like it was any other boring fire drill and calmly wander out.
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You are a judge. You are presiding over a corruption case. Several of your colleagues have been killed presiding over similar cases. Now you are threatened if the defendant, the brother of the mayor, doesn't walk. Still okay?
A man walks up to you on the street with an M16, points it at your face, tells you that he is going to kill you. You happen to have a gun and you sho
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Sadly, you've offered little information to support your claim.
You state "There can be no legitimate justification for it.", but I beg to differ. Rather than ask you to prove your statement, I will merely offer examples of what "I" believe to be "legitimate" justification.
Subject suffers from a kidney disease. A result of this condition is a bed wetting problem. Currently, there is a law that protects the subject from ridicule by preventing this informat
They should split the business (Score:3, Interesting)
Business 1 is their common carrier business which does not do any censoring etc, but just provides common carrier services.
Business 2: Value added services (hosting etc). This business then does all the censoring etc.
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Political Maneuvering (Score:3, Interesting)
I cannot check the article, (slashdotted), and since no link to the sites in question was provided, I am left to trust that the sites were good-natured content, and entirely legal, instead of deciding for myself.
I also wasn't able to find out the name of the vigilante group, as it wasn't included in the summary. For all I know it could be the ACLU.
The discussion should be about the principal of c
Re:Political Maneuvering (Score:5, Informative)
I found a site called corrupted-justice.com which is a site critical of Perverted Justice, and discusses a number of cases where they clearly violate the law and most people's ethical standards in a "the ends justify the means" sort of way.
In fact, I also found quotations from Perverted Justice and thier founders saying basically "we have no interest in protecting children, that's not what we're about, we simply hate pervs and want them to suffer miserably". Corrupted Justice seems to imply they use 15-17 year old "minors" in some of their stings as "bait" and tell them to engage older adults in sexual discussions.
I don't know, that sort of "by all means, hell with the law" approach is disheartening.
I also found that the websites hosted by Epifora include sites like www.boychat.org and www.girlchat.org.
Doing some more digging, they seemed to be linked to some sort of organization called "Free Spirits" (www.freespirits.org) which claims it is a "support group" for pedos, but it also says that it is very opposed to illegal content.
Of course, there is absolutely nothing saying that Epifora wasn't hosting child porn on their server, but I have a feeling that the FBI or RCMP or whatever would have beat down the door if there was any evidence of that, rather than Verizon quitely unplugging their upstream. In addition, comments from Canadian law enforcement mentioned elsewhere in this thread seem to lean toward their content having been audited by both law enforcement and MCI's legal team in 2001 and found to be entirely legal.
So a conclusion? Verizon pulled the plug because they didn't want to be listed as a "corporate sex offender" on the perverted-justice.com website. They had a meeting where lawyers said "we choose the better of two evils" and they chose to shut down the Epifora ISP and face the unlikely circumstance their "common carrier" status was put in jeopardy, rather than face the guarantee that "perverted justice" will be posting fliers on their headquarters with pictures of decapitated children or somesuch that say "VERIZON DID THIS".
Stew
More information of "Free Spirits" (Score:5, Informative)
Creepy, but doesn't sound illegal to me...
Civil liability? (Score:3, Interesting)
Any lawyers, care to comment??
Re:Civil liability? (Score:4, Informative)
Re:The correct answer: (Score:5, Insightful)
Refusing to carry packets from pedophiles means that Verizon is no longer a common carrier. It picks and chooses the packets it carries, and thus is responsible for whatever illegal content gets through the filter. In other words, from now on everytime Joe Public downloads an mp3 over Verizon network, the RIAA gets to sue Verizon. Everytime Joe Pervert downloads kiddy porn, the Verizon execs are hauled to prison. And so on.
Or that's how it shoul go. Verizon, being a large corporation, is not likely going to actually be held accountable to the laws. It has too much money to bribe the authority with.
Perhaps. And a business decision with consequences for free speech in another country. Which rises the question: when a corporation wields power that rivals a government, shouldn't it be held to the same standards - First Amendment in this case ?
Verizon is not a private enterprise in any meaningful way. It has more shareholders than some nations have citizens. As this matter proves, it holds power to silence entire web forums not owned by it. It is, for all intents an purposes, a nation-equivalent entity. It should be treated as one.
Any sufficiently powerful organization is indistinguishable from a government. They should be treated accordingly, and held to the same standards as governments. Currently, we allow much too much leeway for international corporations - they have a right to do anything to benefit themselves, and any attempt to get them to behave is decried as limiting the freedom of markets. I say it's about time to put an end to this insanity.
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Actually, in my neighborhood there's a more direct argument. There's a phone line coming into my house. That line is owned by Verizon, and no other company can use it, even with my permission. But the clincher is: N
phone net neutrality..? (Score:2)
A Team of Lawyers (Score:4, Funny)
Next
Common Carrier? (Score:5, Insightful)
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WRONG!
That legal urban legend has been wandering around the net for many years, but it has never actually been true, at least under US law. ISP's have never been common carriers as ISP's (which is part of why the ISP/ILEC wall exists in ILEC-
yes, no, maybe. (Score:3, Insightful)
"minor-attracted adults" (Score:4, Insightful)
Possibly NSFW? (Score:3, Funny)
As eager as I am to rally behind censorship, I'm not too keen on gay shirtless men popping up on my monitor as I eat my lunch. My Christian coworker might think odd things of me.
Re:Possibly NSFW? (Score:5, Funny)
Or, he may not :-)
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that his coworker might secretly be into it. As it seems the louder they protest, the more likely they are to get caught with a gay prostitue and a dose of meth in the closet.
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So, you need to be protected from the evils out there on the big wide web? I'll make it real simple for you: quit reading slashdot at work.
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I'm not sure why what someone else thinks of you is that important though. Does said person worry about what you think of him/her?
Your Christian coworker probably already thinks odd things of you, now that person will see that and think it's a confirmation of their suspicions.
PJ group "vigilantes"? (Score:2)
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-Ella, 16
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"...when in fact the guys they "sting" destroy their own lives."
How so? By seeking support at legal sites? Is getting Verizon to censor legal content an example of that "sting"? Nice leaping to conclusions, krell. Good thing you aren't in "law enforcement". Just a member of the mob.
"We're gonna have a first class trial followed by a first class hangin'."
Definitely NSFW (Score:2)
The parent post really should be updated advising of that.
Probably not (Score:2)
Let me predict the tags (Score:4, Interesting)
Maybe itsatrap as well.
Why do we have tags if the same braindead ones are displayed for most of them?
No (Score:2)
Likewise, theoretically "Pall Mall" and "Camel Club" clothing isn't advertising for cigarettes. And Microso
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Right to Refuse (Score:4, Insightful)
The right to refuse business is a long-standing tradition, at least in this part of the world. Verizon can generally choose not to do business with whomever they wish, with certain provisions relating to discrimination.
It is not censorship, it is Verizon's right to say "you can believe and say whatever you like, but please take your business elsewhere." Last time I checked, pedophiles were not a protected class under the U.S. Federal Civil Rights Act, or the Americans With Disabilities Act.
So no, I do not believe Verizon's status as a "common carrier" would be in question with regards to this matter. But thanks for asking!
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Verizon is (in theory) not responsible for anything put onto their networks because they're a "common carrier." They take all comers who can pay without worrying about the content. Therefore, if kiddie porn is being transmitted through Verizon's lines, it's not Verizon's fault because they have taken absolutely ZERO responsibility for the con
Re:Right to Refuse (Score:5, Informative)
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The right to refuse business is a long-standing tradition, at least in this part of the world. Verizon can generally choose not to do business with whomever they wish, with certain provisions relating to discrimination.
True, but in doing so they lose a group of special privileges allocated to those that are "common carriers" and who just carry the mail and don't know what's in it. For example, common carriers are not prosecuted for transporting drugs, death threats, child pornography, or government secre
Why risk it? (Score:2)
I don't think that Verizon actually wants to be an internet censor. It's more work for them, and it doesn't serve any of Verizon's corporate goals.
Even odder, and unmentioned in the summary, is that the group is apparently part of a reality TV series funded by NBC. They supposedly complained
minor-attracted adult? (Score:4, Insightful)
Notwithstanding the common carrier issue and the legality of the material, it bothers me to see the mainstreaming of pedophilia with terms like this. Years ago I worked at a Montreal ISP. Someone notified us of one of our user's 'secret' webpages--a page not linked from his home page, requiring you to know the exact URL. The page was a collection of links to NAMBLA and like organizations and websites, including a message board for "child lovers".
On the message board, pedophiles alternately discussed sitting in parks watching children play, and discussing how they "came out" to themselves and each other, and accepted themselves for who they are. What was most subtly grotesque was the manner in which they'd adopted the rhetorical stance of the queer community. They talked about 'coming out', and about accepting themselves, and reclaiming terms like 'boy lover'. They were mentally and emotionally setting the stage for the same sort of battle for public acceptance that the gay community has fought and mostly won over the last few decades.
I don't want them to 'come out', I don't want them to have supportive underground communities, and it was saddening to see the entirely appropriate discourse of public acceptance of homosexuality and queer identity perverted like this. This is exactly the slippery slope that the right uses to justify non-acceptance of gays, and we need to bring a big heavy boot down on crap like 'minor attracted adult' to demonstrate that we can make moral choices about who we will accept and who we won't.
The world's a better place because homosexuality has been mainstreamed. It'll be a better place still when pedophilia is absolutely and explicitly denied the same path and the same acceptance. It starts by calling bullshit on terms like 'minor attracted adult'.
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How can you argue with logic like that?
Obvious answer (Score:2)
Mark Foley?
I haven't RTFA, or tried to follow any links. But what if they aren't talking about a support group of that sort, but rather a group that works to find psychological help for people with this problem so that they can be stopped. What if a person finds themselves as a "minor attracted adult" and knows this is wrong, and wants to seek help? What options do they have?
Should we castrate them and lock them up in jail? Even if they've c
Re:minor-attracted adult? (Score:5, Informative)
Consider a moment if was 18 and I liked a 17-year-old girl, I could be considered a "minor attracted adult" - but pedophile? I think not.
Now, all that aside, I really have no idea what the site was about at all, and I decline to comment about Verizon's action at this time.
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Someone who's attracted to teenagers, probably: in Canada, the age of consent is 14, so most teenagers can legally have sex with adults. The term "pedophile" typically refers to those who are attracted to pre-pubescent children, not adolescents.
Re:minor-attracted adult? (Score:5, Insightful)
That's fine, but it is free speech. Better to have people discussing this than for it to be a forbidden topic that festers in darkness.
They were mentally and emotionally setting the stage for the same sort of battle for public acceptance that the gay community has fought and mostly won over the last few decades. I don't want them to 'come out', I don't want them to have supportive underground communities, and it was saddening to see the entirely appropriate discourse of public acceptance of homosexuality and queer identity perverted like this.
The important question is why? What is it that is different between pedophiles and homosexuals? Why should society accept one and not the other? Is there a fundamental difference of ethics in your mind that you can explain or are you just reacting emotionally?
This is exactly the slippery slope that the right uses to justify non-acceptance of gays, and we need to bring a big heavy boot down on crap like 'minor attracted adult' to demonstrate that we can make moral choices about who we will accept and who we won't
The "slippery slope" is a logical fallacy. What we need is reason and rational dialogue. We need an understanding of why pedophilia is wrong, not just an angry, emotional attack upon it.
The world's a better place because homosexuality has been mainstreamed. It'll be a better place still when pedophilia is absolutely and explicitly denied the same path and the same acceptance. It starts by calling bullshit on terms like 'minor attracted adult'.
I disagree. The "negativity constant" of a word is how much people react negatively to a given word. It is an emotional response, conditioned by society. Pedophiles are people who are attracted to minors. Rather than reacting to either set of terminology it should be made clear why either people who are attracted to minors or pedophiles should be forbidden from acting on their attraction.
In my mind the ethical principal is quite simply, responsibility. Children are not granted all the rights of an adult, nor are they held entirely responsible for their decisions because they have not yet developed the capacity to make rational, informed choices about their lives. As a result, they are taught to obey their elders as a matter of principal and to cede their will to authority figures, who "know better." They place great trust in their elders and society and that trust in turn engenders a greater responsibility for society to protect them. Sex with children is wrong similar to the way rape is wrong. A child is not socially in a position to make a correct choice and does not have the critical thinking capacity to properly make major life choices.
Sex is a major life choice, both from an emotional and social perspective and from a health risk perspective. Until a child reaches an appropriate level of maturity, every member of society is responsible for making sure to go out of their way to avoid letting children make such choices, whether they think they are ready for it or not.
Now no one with any reason believes that a child magically becomes responsible at the age of 18. Some people develop faster than others. I don't think some 25 year olds are ready to make life choices yet, while some 15 year olds are. Society has chosen an arbitrary age of 18, but ethically, we need to be aware that it is wrong to take advantage of immature 18 year olds. Let the ethical principal, not the law guide one's decision making in this regard.
I pity people who find themselves sexually attracted to children, but I do not forgive them any unethical actions they take. By understanding the issue, however, I think we can more intelligently make decisions and promote understanding within society, both of why one group should be legal and another not, and how we should all act with regard to the issue. Reason, not emotion should guide us.
Re:minor-attracted adult? (Score:5, Interesting)
Attraction to those under the age of the majority. That includes more than prepubescent children.
"it bothers me to see the mainstreaming of pedophilia with terms like this."
Has it occurred to you that it may be a tactic to bash those who can't be shown, or even suspected, of pedophilia at all?
"They talked about 'coming out', and about accepting themselves, and reclaiming terms like 'boy lover'. They were mentally and emotionally setting the stage for the same sort of battle for public acceptance that the gay community has fought and mostly won over the last few decades."
What is the problem with this? So far you've described no criminal behavior at all. Are you advocating keeping people with this condition be as emotionally deprived as possible? How is that a help to society?
"I don't want them to 'come out', I don't want them to have supportive underground communities, and it was saddening to see the entirely appropriate discourse of public acceptance of homosexuality and queer identity perverted like this."
It isn't perverted. Being closeted for them is no different. Plenty have said the same things about gays.
"This is exactly the slippery slope that the right uses to justify non-acceptance of gays, and we need to bring a big heavy boot down on crap like 'minor attracted adult' to demonstrate that we can make moral choices about who we will accept and who we won't."
My moral choice is to accept what everyone's condition is. There is a big difference between accepting a person's condition and accepting their actions. It is child molestation that is the issue and nothing you've described has anything to do with that. You just seemed consumed by hatred and fear of those you don't know.
"The world's a better place because homosexuality has been mainstreamed. It'll be a better place still when pedophilia is absolutely and explicitly denied the same path and the same acceptance. It starts by calling bullshit on terms like 'minor attracted adult'."
I don't agree with any of that. First, homosexuality hasn't been mainstreamed outside progressive areas. Second, pedophilia is a condition that people develop outside their choice, and it's child molestation that has to be prevented. Finally, you have no idea why the term "minor attracted adult" was chosen and you have no basis for declaring that it means "pedophile" (or more accurately "child molester in your usage).
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Everyone. Not all minors are children, and there's a reason it's called "sweet 16". People become sexually mature before they turn 18. There's absolutely nothing wrong with being physically attracted to sexually mature people. It's natural, it's normal, in fact if you don't find 17 year old hotties attractive, I'd say there's something wrong with you.
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Stop them on the beaches. Don't let them set the terms of the debate in their favour.
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Really, if we could just learn to accept murders as the small price of helping those who do the murdering - would that not be a wonderful thing? Murderers are simply crying out for help - and our answer is to incarcerate and/or kill them as punishment?
We could save so many lives in the end - and though we would have to accept a few crimes now - imagine what a better place the world would be.
Since our countr(ies)
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"minor-attracted adults" What? (Score:2)
I can't believe political correctness has filtered down to the point where we don't want to offend the pedophiles!
God forbid we make anyone uncomfortable about their perversion.
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Speak for yourself. (Score:3, Funny)
Severing a business relationship is censorship? (Score:2)
Is it censorship? It might be censorship if, after they connected through another provider, were subsequently blocked. It might be censorship if the order for disconnection was at the demand of a government entity. From what I have read, it's a vigilante group and not a government entit
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FCC ended Common Carrier status already (Score:2, Informative)
This news.com [com.com] story pretty much sums it up from summer of 05
Slashdot Newspeak (Score:2)
Minor-attracted? It's paedophilia. Look it up.
That being said, it's not the ISP or carrier's duty to shut anyone down except for abuse or by subpoena. That's why Verizon did the wrong thing and there's no reason to use doublespeak like "minor-attracted" to su
Conspiracy Theory (Score:3, Interesting)
What if this is Verizon DELIBERATELY blowing their common carrier status as an end run?
If it is, watch for them doing a lot more of this in the future. Then when they start blocking access to Google (or whateveR) they'll say, look, we're policing our own network now. We're NOT a common carrier.
And thus kill Net Neutrality.
I make no claims as to the correctness of this theory. It's just something that occured to me.
I'll tell you what's perverted... (Score:4, Insightful)
Perverted Justice is getting thier way, and our society is eating it right up. These narrow-minded souls and others like them have already twisted the english language in such a manner as to cause (in many people's minds) to equate "pedophile" with "child molester", even though a simple etymological study of the words in question would quickly reveal that one has nothing to do with the other. I would think that here on Slashdot we geeks would be more intelligent than this. Then again, I might as well be Don Quioxte arguing about the differences between a hacker vs. a cracker. Even so, words help to define and propel thoughts, and what was once a valid word to describe a legitimate topic has now taken on a wholly wrong and sinister definition.
Why on earth is it that our society can't seem to fathom the idea that there could actually be people out there who truely and honestly love children (without any sexual connotations), on a level that isn't just mere lip-service meant to console the consciences of the "think of the children" moral hypocrites? The fact that this self-same group targets and rallies against such people, while entrenching the concept of "pedophile=child molester", further gives lie to their hypocrisy: This process has little to do with "thinking of the children", and everything to do with "thinking of myself and my power". What these people hope to acheive with this power is anyone's guess, but I can guarantee it will not be something free-thinking people will enjoy.
Instead, we are now a nation who constantly "thinks of the children", while simultaneously fearing them. This fear brings a cost onto our society, as such fear (ie, the legitimate fear of being branded a new-speak "pedophile") causes legitimate teachers and counselors to avoid working with children closely, doing what they do best - teaching, counseling, mentoring, and consoling. Our society, by deligitimizing contact between children and adults (including parents, on many occasions!), is slowly raising a generation of individuals who have never had honest adult guidance. Rather, the little guidance they may have had (from parents or others) was presented to them couched in fear, uncertainty, and doubt. These children aren't robots, they are picking up on these notions. One has to honestly wonder what effects such watered down (and dishonest through ommission) interactions will have on these children as they grow into adults. I sincerely doubt they will be good. In fact, it seems like it would serve to cause more of the same "for-the-children" behavior from these children-turned-adults, or it will flip 180 degrees from where it is today. Both of these outcomes are equally extreme, and neither are a world I want to live in.
Despite all of these cries of "for the children", though, our society continues to turn a blind eye toward the other side of the coin: The sexualizing of children and youth by the media. We the people legitimatize it by doing nothing about it - by letting it continue and expand in scope. By continuing to buy (for ourselves, and for the children, too) and consume the products being advertised, we are effectively saying out of one side of our mouths "this is OK", but lest any member of that society espouse an attraction to these youthful portrayals, we pounce on them and decry "PEDOPHILE" - figuratively rending the individual who dared to utter such thoughts limb-from-limb (interestingly, though, this seems to only apply to certain sub-groups within the larger whole - but this goes well outside the scope of this rant). We ostracize them as a pariah to the group. T
Re:Has Slashdot been duped? (Score:4, Interesting)
If by "support" they mean support groups like AA where "minor-attracted adults" seek help in not acting on impulses and addictions, then not really; it bears distinguishing between pedophiles and people who recognize that their attractions aren't healthy, even if they feel natural.
If "support" is more like a NAMBLA textbook for seduction, then a euphemism it is.
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I was thinking about this, and also wondering if there might be a distinction in the actions taken. Maybe you're a "minor-attracted adult" until you actually *do* something, at which point you become a pedophile. So maybe it's like the distinction between "someone with homicidal thoughts" vs. "a murderer". I don't know, though, because I'm a little frightened to google for "minor-attracted adults". Who knows what's going to come up, or what list it might put me on?
Re:Has Slashdot been duped? (Score:5, Funny)
Obligatory: Galaxy Quest (Score:2)
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Not if you're on Verizon.
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That it does. Why not rename the whole spectrum?
Creepy flasher guy in the park - Genital Display Engineer
Pedophile priest - Faith-based Genital Manipulation Facilitator
Gary Glitter - Overly-Child-Friendly Entertainment Provider
Any others?
Re:Has Slashdot been duped? (Score:5, Insightful)
Depends on the age, and the law now doesn't it?
If the age of consent is lower than that of the age of majority (ie, a minor) you could be referring to a 17 year old potentially.
Here in Canada, the age of consent is 14 as long as you're not in a position of authority over the minor in question, with people making noises about raising it to the age of 16.
If I look at a 17 year old girl, am I a pedophile? I think not. I could legally have sex with her, but since she's half my age, I probably don't stand much chance/wouldn't have much in common with her anyway, so I'm not gonna go out and try. But, it hardly makes one a pedophile to stare at her b00b13z, she's merely a minor, but one who is legally allowed to have sex -- including with a dirty old man like me if she so chooses.
I don't know anything about the sites in question (and TFA seems to be slashdotted already), but there is not an immediate transition from "minor" (not old enough to vote or sign contracts) and "child" which is implied by pedophile. Depending on where you live, there are a few years of late adolescence which is a gray area.
Of course, now that I've tried to point out the distinction between being attracted to a minor and what it means to be a pedophile, I'm sure I'll be accused of being one, or at the very least supporting them. Which I don't. I'm merely trying to point out that "minor-attracted" might, in fact, NOT mean pedophile.
Cheers
Re:Has Slashdot been duped? (Score:4, Informative)
You are exactly right of course. "Minor-attracted adults" aren't uncommon at all since "minor" is an arbitrary age that is typically older than the age of sexual maturity.
Google Cache of TFA (Score:2)
Apparently the ISP got cutoff because of Perverted Justice, which is funded by NBC.
And I just saw this article on Fark: "Dateline NBC" finally kills itself a pedophile [go.com]
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People incorrectly toss around the "pedophile" label for anyone doing or thinking something they deem inappropriate with someone a lot younger than them. In reality, a pedophile is someone interested in pre-pubescent children... which is a whole 'nother category than a lot of those who get incorrectly labeled such.
Amazing how many hypocrites on here will cry "burn in hell, pedophiles!" at someone interested in POST-pubescent minors, and then proceed to go jack of
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Whether or not you consider them different moral issues is your issue.
KFG
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"Epifora, a Canadian ISP that hosts a number of (entirely legal) web sites offering support to minor-attracted adults." You have got to love the way they say, "Minor-attracted adults". The way we put that is pedophile. Not even the person posting the story was willing to put their name on it. Without knowing the websites it is hard to tell if they where legal in the US or not. Notice no links to the sites, no titles of the sites, no nothing.
Yeah, no kidding. I spent about 5 seconds trying to parse "minor
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Kind of hard to judge with absolutely no real information, but that has never stopped anybody on Slashdot before.
If the ISP shut anyone down without a court order, regardless of what content they're hosting, then they've forfeited their common carrier status in my mind. If they found the site and thought it was illegal, they should have contacted the authorities. Otherwise, they should have done nothing. With the facts we have, we can answer the question asked in the summary.
RE: Okay... (Score:4, Interesting)
"The company's clients host a number of websites and chatboards-- such as Boychat.org and Freespirits.org-- with a pederastic slant."
The article also seems to indicate that they would be legal in the US:
"With its transgressive content, Epifora had faced scrutiny before. After a July, 2001 report in Canada's National Post, MCI-Canada approached the Ontario Provincial Police for an opinion, and inspector Bob Matthews, of the OPP's "Project P" declared the material on Epifora's servers in compliance with the Criminal Code. That says a lot, as Canadian law sets a higher bar than the US and most other countries, making no distinction between, say, photographs of minors having sex, textual descriptions thereof, or even speech "advocating" such acts."
Furthermore, I believe you are missing the point:
Weather or not you agree with what is being said, free speech is protected by law in Canada and in the US. The issue here is weather or not Telcos should be able to censor content by refusing to provide access to their backbone. Verizon is refusing a Canadian ISP access to the backbone because they host a few websites that Verizon doesn't like.
The websites are legal in Canada for sure. Should Verizon be allowed to do this? I don't think so. This is a slippery slope that nobody wants to end up at the bottom of.
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Since more than one person has stated that they are not work friendly I have too question if they are in fact legal in the US.
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Apparently by "we" you mean "us gay bashers" since the sites are apparently simple gay men sites.
"Without knowing the websites it is hard to tell if they where legal in the US or not."
So go ahead an label them pedophile sites. Good job.
"Kind of hard to judge with absolutely no real information, but that has never stopped anybody on Slashdot before."
Not even you.
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Yeah, 'cause here in America it's the law that's repelling 14-year-old children from 50-year-old men and women...