Massachusetts Bids To Restrict Internet Indecency 214
Remember the Communications Decency Act? Enacted 1996, found unconstitutional 1997. Or its successor attempt to reduce discourse on the Internet to what is suitable for 8-year-olds, the Child Online Protection Act? Invalidated 2003. Seven state laws attempting to restrict Internet content on grounds of decency have been struck down. Despite all this, Massachusetts has now added a couple of paragraphs to its (traditionally bricks-and-mortar) indecency law that applies a "harmful to minors" test to Internet content. The ACLU of Massachusetts and others have brought suit to block the law, which went into effect on July 11. Coincidentally, today a US appeals court tossed out the FCC's indecency policy.
Mature (Score:5, Insightful)
The irony here is regardless of some law, young kids see crazy hardcore sh*t on the internet every day. So I guess I'm revising my first sentence to say that I would rather raise the maturity of adults to cope with the fact that kids can handle adult content.
Re:Mature (Score:5, Insightful)
Unfortunately, common sense doesn't get people elected.
Only stuck down for vagueness (Score:4, Insightful)
The FCC's rules only got struck down for being too vague. If they formulate a list of what words they're not allowed to say (Carlin's list, for example), it would be allowed.
Re:Mature (Score:2, Insightful)
Sorry, Massachussets. (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Just remove the "I" and the "n" and I'm all for (Score:2, Insightful)
My agenda rarely aligns with the ACLU, but liberal legislators are always trying strip freedoms under the auspices of protection. Just leave people alone legislators, just leave them alone.
Re:Mature (Score:5, Insightful)
Putting kids on disney or nickelodeon and giving them access to nothing else is like putting them in a mcdonalds and never feeding them anything else. Sure, they won't die right away. They might even believe they like it. But you're depriving them of a whole world of healthy experiences.
And I'd argue that to some extent disney and nickelodeon are harmful to kids. They exist only to market products to your children. They use all sorts of psychological tricks on your children to manipulate them. Porn on the other hand is targeted towards adults. If a pre-pubescent kid finds porn, they say "ew" and click away to something else. It's really no big deal, unless it's some CP that some perv is trying to push on them. In that case, where do you think the pervs are going to go to find victims?
Re:uh, no, courts have rules kids must have porn. (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Mature (Score:3, Insightful)
The more I see from Massachusetts, the more the term "Mass Holes" apply. These issues were settled eons ago.
And let PARENTS, not the friggin' STATE, be responsible for the kids. Duh. Sick of the government trying to usurp my role as parent!!! CUT IT OUT ALREADY!
Re:Mature (Score:4, Insightful)
Being content when you know little is easy. Being content when you know much is hard. That's why character is valued.
Reasonable doubt? (Score:3, Insightful)
How do you prove beyond a reasonable doubt that something is "harmful to minors"?
Re:Mature (Score:5, Insightful)
I just put my 8 and 10 yr olds on disney.com or nickelodeon.com and they never bother to try to find the rest of the net.
...yet. My kids are the same age, and while not limited to those sites, they tend to only seek out stuff that I find appropriate, like cartoons and games. They also spend a lot of time on Wikipedia, but usually only to look up stuff they learned at school, or to look up the actors in their favorite shows.
At some point, though, usually around the beginning of puberty (closer than you think for your 10 year old), they're going to start seeking this stuff out. No matter what you try to do to stop them, they'll find it eventually just like we found it when we were their age. We found it in scrambled cable channels and back issues of Playboy, they'll find it online. The stuff they'll find is likely to be a lot more explicit than the stuff we were able to find, although some of the images I found on the Internet at the tender age of 13, *mumble* years ago, were pretty hardcore. Of course, now they have full-motion video instead of the still images and occasional VHS tapes we had, but the concept is much the same.
The trick with dealing with all this is not to go crazy when they inevitably find it, but rather to take the time to explain what they're seeing in the greater context of the world. Being taught that porn is shameful and that they've done something horribly wrong by looking at it will do far more damage than simply helping them to put porn in its proper context. On the other hand, ignoring it completely and leaving them to their own devices to gather explanations of what they're seeing will leave them with unrealistic expectations of sex and intimacy that will damage them in the long run as well.
The key to all this is explaining topics as they come up. Many parents get asked by their very young children about sex and, rather than trying to explain it in an age-appropriate manner (detailed anatomical diagrams are probably not appropriate for 5 year olds, for example, since they won't understand them anyway), they try to avoid the question, or worse make the child feel as if they've done something wrong by asking it at all. This leads children to believe sex is a topic to be avoided, and they'll learn to be embarrassed about it and not want to talk to you about it. Later, when they find all this hardcore porn, they'll hide it from you and you'll never know what they've found or have the opportunity to explain it to them.
If you raise your kids to understand that they can talk to you about anything and you'll do your best to explain it to them in terms they can understand, they'll be more likely to give you the opportunity to help them process indecent material in a healthy way. If you raise your kids to think of sex as something not to be discussed even with you, they'll end up finding the stuff anyway but likely will not deal with it in a healthy way.
Religion (Score:5, Insightful)
Religion is harmful to minors. Discuss.
Re:Mature (Score:5, Insightful)
>>>for people to realize there is a lot of stuff not produced for kids
Let's get to to the CORE of this issue - it's those damn Republicans and their bible-thumping conservatism. The sooner we kick them out of Masschusetts' legislature, the sooner we can repeal idiotic laws like this.
(someone whispers in my ear) Whaddya mean MA is a Democrat-run state?
Re:Mature (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:uh, no, courts have rules kids must have porn. (Score:4, Insightful)
... And any kid can go in to a walmart and buy a pre-paid master card to just buy it on the internet with anyway.
Re:Implications for separation of power... (Score:5, Insightful)
Clearly the Constitution needs to be amended that, if any representative violates his oath to observe the constitution, then he/she will be charged with treason. With greater responsibility comes greater rewards AND punishment.
Re:Mature (Score:3, Insightful)
the kids are fucking 8 and 10 you condescending piece of shit. i'm sure you spent your time contemplating the fate of the universe at that age, not sitting in the corner staring at a bug with your finger up your nose.
Re:Just remove the "I" and the "n" and I'm all for (Score:5, Insightful)
Its not just people claiming to be liberals that try to strip away freedom for your own protection. Those claiming to be conservatives do it just as much, and most likely more.
The words liberal and conservative used to have very different meanings. Now they are just different flavors of fascism.
Re:Mature (Score:5, Insightful)
Limiting your exposure to the Internet does not make you ignorant, nor stagnant, nor does exposure to it make you the opposite. It is just a tool and a repository of information. Because two kids don't skip all around the Internet to explore other options does not make them "less" in any way. They may choose to expand their minds offline with other activities, such as reading books or just going outside and using their imaginations.
That fact that you immediately assume they are "dumb" is a limitation of your character, not theirs or their parents'.
Constitutional vagueness (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Mature (Score:2, Insightful)
Yes. Feeling good is better than knowledge or truth. I would gladly trade my over awareness and depression for happiness and ignorance. Life is a single go around, I'd rather be happy then right. Took me 45 years to come to this conclusion. I would have had a better life if I stayed ignorant. So would you.
Re:Mature (Score:3, Insightful)
Rather than try and dumb down the internet to what is suitable for 8-year-olds, I would rather raise children to be mature and handle adult content.
Even if you could compress the maturity normally gained from 0-18 into 0-14 or 0-10, an eight year old will not be ready for everything that's on the Internet. And thinking back how simplistic my thinking was despite being a bright kid, I don't think you can compress it that much either. Children don't start out as little adults and expecting them to just deal with everything from day one is completely unrealistic. Oh they might "deal" in the same way as children growing up with alcoholics and abusers and drug addicts and many more worse fates than looking at bad stuff on the Internet, but not in a good way. Don't get me wrong, I'm far from a moral prude that thinks we should shield kids from everything bad until they're 18. But there has to be room to become mature, to gradually learn to handle adult content before you are that child. And for what it's worth, even outside the Internet I don't think the accelerated adulthood society has been pushing the last decades does children good. I see children now trying to dress, talk, act and be adults much earlier despite still being a little boy or girl on the inside. I think you lose a lot by fast tracking through your childhood.
Re:Religion (Score:5, Insightful)
Religion can't be all bad...
It made me the atheist I am today.
Re:Mature (Score:2, Insightful)
Further, while imagination is an important thing to cultivate, which is why I mentioned it earlier, it is limited always by the real knowledge each person so far acquires.
Re:Just remove the "I" and the "n" and I'm all for (Score:4, Insightful)
Yes, you're perfectly correct that they're neither liberal nor conservative. They aren't even left- or right- wing. They're all a bunch of fascists.
A conservative government would have a small footprint, providing minimal services and not spending more than it takes in.
A liberal government would have few, if any, rules.
I think I saw the quote here on /. first, but it's by Twain. "Censorship is saying a man can't have a steak because a baby can't chew it."
Re:Someone here tell me (Score:4, Insightful)
There isn't much argument for regulating it outside of the internet either.
Re:Mature (Score:4, Insightful)
This may surprise you, but it is possible for people to grow up and be intelligent, productive members of society without the Internet. I think it has even happened before, at least once or twice. :p
But in all seriousness, I DO think that your assumption was and continues to be unreasonable. Kids are not stupid simply because they fail to take advantage of any given potential. Some people become doctors, some people become computer programmers, and some people do both (few do both well). You might even be able to argue that any person could become either if they so chose. But not every programmer that fails to learn about being a doctor is stupid nor is every doctor that fails to learn how to program a computer. Exploring one potential takes time away from exploration of another.
I chose to become a computer programmer and know very little about being a doctor. I do not consider my "lack of interest in the potential of becoming a doctor" as any sort of measure of stupidity, laziness, or being less than any doctor I have met.
Re:Reasonable doubt? (Score:5, Insightful)
The same way it's always been done: offer speculation with no basis in reality, but treat it as fact.
Re:Mature (Score:4, Insightful)
The reply above is not "Troll", please mod up.
Kids of 8 and 10 are quite happy to play in those type of website. How can the other poster be so insulting and haughty considering that these websites are fascinating and interactive (for that age) and designed to suck kids in. The poster clearly has no experience with young kids.
Re:Mature (Score:2, Insightful)
It's unreasonable to extrapolate that conclusion for the same reasons it's unreasonable to extrapolate a poorly sampled signal. You don't have nearly enough data to support such a condescending and disrespectful conclusion.
How much time do the kids actually spend on the internet?
What activities do they enjoy outside the internet, and how long do they spend doing those activities?
At least those two pieces of information are absolutely critical to claiming any support for your statement. We don't need to actually answer those questions, because really it comes down to the fact that you're just a smarter-than-thou jerk. Feel free to explore the internet to get more opinions.
The Internet is rated R (Score:5, Insightful)
You want to censor the whole world, just so you can neglect your kids without remorse? F*CK YOU!
Re:Reasonable doubt? (Score:3, Insightful)
How do you prove beyond a reasonable doubt that something is "harmful to minors"?
Quite simple really. Just demonstrate that all the minors who viewed the material are now dead as a direct result.
Re:Mature (Score:3, Insightful)
"Expanding your mind without the internet" is as backward these days as "expanding your mind without books" was years ago. It may be possible, but you are placed at a huge disadvantage. Perhaps instead of encouraging his children to play games on the internet, he should be encouraging them to visit age appropriate educational websites.
Re:Just remove the "I" and the "n" and I'm all for (Score:3, Insightful)
The difference is that conservatives are being hypocrites when they support this stuff while liberals are being consistent with a general liberal philosophy that 'government knows best.' Obviously there are a lot of liberal ideologies out there and a lot of conservative ones as well, but the generalized conservative viewpoint of 'government should stay out of our lives' doesn't translate well to stuff like this, and when conservatives try to do it, they typically get in trouble when shoe-horning something like that into an otherwise conservative platform. You see conservatives try and justify this stuff all the time, but it's typically the same populist arguments that liberals use, e.g. 'declining moral values of society,' and that kind of thing. It's no less hypocritical when conservatives try to block more emotionally-charged issues like abortion. The late George Carlin quotes Reagan's 'government should be off our back' and then makes a crack about 'but they can be in a woman's uterus' in pointing out this inconsistency.
I wouldn't say that conservatives do it 'most likely more' as far as free speech goes, as the big nanny states are the ones that get away with this the most today -- look no further than Australia. The US is probably more 'to the right' on free speech issues than a lot of the 'civilized world' in that you see stuff like this struck down again and again.
Re:Mature (Score:3, Insightful)
At 8 I was programming on a Commodore 64, and at 10 I was exploring BBS's. At neither age did I find much amusement in watching talking sponges act like morons. While I certainly did enjoy SOME kids shows, and liked playing games as much as any child, there's no way in hell I would have turned down an opportunity to explore a worldwide repository of knowledge. I'd have to agree with the original commenter - such behavior certainly does demonstrate a lack of imagination and curiosity. It's not something that's unique to kids, either - plenty of adults seem to think that the internet is nothing more than facebook, e-mail, youtube, and online banking.
Harmful? (Score:5, Insightful)
Although it is the social custom in the US to keep kids in the dark over sexual content or cursing has anyone, anywhere, actually offered real proof that such things directly harm children? I suspect that kids walking by dear old dad watching hard core porn in the living room are probably not much interested and rarely suffer any harm from such things. If anyone is harmed by cursing and porn it is more probably adults who can't handle it.
Re:uh, no, courts have rules kids must have porn. (Score:3, Insightful)
the kid who is old enough to get to the store and buy a prepaid mastercard is at the age I'm not to concerned with.
The problem that most people refuse to recognize is that there are a whole lot of people that try to trick people into going to sites they never intended to go to.
So someone who manages to spoof my little pony site may lead kids to sites their parents don't want them going to.
Re:Mature (Score:3, Insightful)
It's the "they never bother to try to find the rest of the net." part that utterly disgusts us. Well, me anyway. They're so attuned to disney.com that they won't go anywhere else?
It's like you bring your kids to the library, and for some reason they have an infatuation with poems. And you're proud that they don't try to read a novel or something crazy like that.
Re:Religion (Score:4, Insightful)
Well, thank God for that!
Re:Religion (Score:5, Insightful)
I gave up trying to cure people of religion a long time ago.
A: It is every bit as egotistical as them attempting to impose their religion on others.
B: Religion is not malignant in most of the people that have it. It is even beneficial on rare occasions.
C: It doesn't work anyway. For those that are really harmed or harmful by their religion, their minds are so barred, chained and locked in ignorance and faith that they are unassailable by any morally acceptable action.
Re:Religion (Score:5, Insightful)
Yep, in today's narcissistic vengeful judgemental selfish money-worshiping greedhead society I can see where that's problematic. It could really screw a kid up.
What screws a kid up is that they are told this by the narcissistic vengeful judgemental selfish money-worshiping greedheads.
That, and you're really cherry picking the scriptures there. It's not any harder for me to pull peaceful-sounding nuggets of wisdom out of Mein Kampf.
Re:Just remove the "I" and the "n" and I'm all for (Score:1, Insightful)
Re:Mature (Score:3, Insightful)
Absurd. A bald exculpation for no other sake than the escape of condemnation.
Re:Mature (Score:1, Insightful)
Because Ted Kennedy was too big to fail. Seriously - the way the Senate is set up rewards people who have been senators longer with more power, to the point where it becomes more detrimental to a state to kick out a crap senator than to just leave him in.
It's the same reason Ted Stevens stuck around as long as he did - it would have been extremely harmful to kick him out earlier, because he had too much sway in the Senate.
This is the reason why we NEED term limits in Congress - but it will never happen, because the only people who can enact term limits are the very politicians who make a living being life-long Congress members.
Re:Mature (Score:3, Insightful)
That will probably take care of itself when some of those 8-year-olds grow up and go into politics...if any of them can manage to live a normal life after seeing Goatse that is.