Librarians To Sue Over Mandatory Censoring 206
JasonMaggini writes: "ZDNet reports the American Library Association is
planning to sue over the new federal law that is putting Web filters on public school and library computers. Great article title, too: 'Filter THIS!'"
Re:Why do the _Librarians_ care? (Score:1)
Idiot! (Score:1)
These things censor a lot more than porn, as one of the previous Slashdot aticles on this showed. In one case it censored out the site of the company that made the software!! Sometimes you can't look up information on breast cancer because the word breast gets censored out.
I don't think that a 5 year old child should have access to a computer at all. I also don't think that it's a good use of my tax dollars to have computers in school. Schools need teachers, not computers. There is nothing that a kid needs to research on a computer that they can't get out of a book. It's bullshit to think that these kids need computers to research on the web. All the web is good for at that level is plagiarism. The school library should have books and if not then the parent should take their kids to a public library and check a book out for them. Of course too many parents are too self-involved to realize that its THEIR job to watch their kids. Or even to help educate them. Expecting software to take care of your 5 year old is the stupidest thing I have ever heard of....
The people who are most likely to think that libertarians are perverts are fascist dunderheads like yourself. Go find some totalitarian regime to live under, we like freedom here in America.
One word.... (Score:1)
Re:Fsck Government Funding (Score:1)
Yes, it is often usually with sexual connotations, which is not the theme you were looking for; but, there's always a but on
There's nothing 'geeky-cool' about saying 'fsck' when you mean 'fuck'. Say what you mean, don't censor your own posts in a censorship debate.
BTW, how accurate a depiction of you is this:
age: early-to-mid-thirties
hair: brown, fuzzy
real name: mabel (maybe agnes)
height: 5ft 1in
talents: scone baking
notes: former Amish, now forsaken that path for the heady revelries of Mormonism and bake sales
???
Re:My library NEEDS it... (Score:1)
You think that's chewing gum on the underside of the tables?
Re:My library NEEDS it... (Score:1)
Sueing water, galaxies and Pi (Score:2)
Re:My library NEEDS it... (Score:2)
Filtering in a Library, how about a Stupid Filter (Score:2)
Re:Not just filters, here is the legality of it al (Score:2)
It's stupid to sue and whine about this. Look for other avenues for constructive energies. I can pretty much assume about 60%+ of you have not visited a public library off-campus in at least a year. And if so, then what are you bitching about? Don't make a fight just so you can say you defended your unborn child, you don't even know their take on it.
I don't feel any of my rights as a public citizen will be taken away or violated, and yes I live in the states, if they install this software. I have access at home, at work, and friends houses.
If a child has to research porn and is under the age of 18, the school he is attending has issues that need to be addressed before you whine about him not being able to do that research at a public library.
Using reason to fight legislation? (Score:1)
I'm not sure what would be unfortunate about this idea working. Life would be so much easier if using reason and logic against bad legislation (among other things) worked.
What is unfortunate is that pointing out why the filtering software doesn't work simply won't change anybody's minds in government. They think their constituents want them to "do something about all that filth on the Internet!", so they assume that means use filters. Other options probably never even came up.
(Gee, I wonder if Mattel has some lobbyists working the child protection committees...)
Re:Sueing water, galaxies and Pi (Score:2)
What do you think Brown V. Board of Ed was?
The cure of the ills of Democracy is more Democracy.
Re:You spoke too soon... (Score:1)
What qualifies as a 'filter'? (Score:1)
Can I build a list of a few hundred sites, add in anything linked from persiankitty and call that our adult filter? (We already use an X-stop for children whose parents ask us to filter.)
Re:Fsck Government Funding (Score:1)
What's so hard to understand? Spam is wrong and porn is not.
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Re:The best filter (Score:2)
That's ridiculous: it's nobody's business what I read. The exact opposite is the obvious solution: provide visual shields so that nobody can be offended by what is on my screen. Problem solved.
--
Did any one else.... (Score:1)
Fear my low SlashID! (bidding starts at $500)
Re:The best filter (Score:1)
Ah yes, that reminds me of the Apple ][s at in the high school library. (I was in HS in the early 80s.) Initially the machines were in a secluded area, allowing me and my friends to play zork on them to our heart's content. The librarians didn't like this so they moved them out into the open where the screens were easily visible.
After that I had to resort to writing countdown timers in applesoft that would continuously beep when they hit zero. Of course I was sure to disable control-reset. Then there was the time I downloaded a dingbats-like font to the library's Imagewriter. I actually got called into the principal's office for that one. The funny thing was, all you needed to do was turn the fucking thing off to fix it.
Re:The best filter (Score:1)
As for myself, I don't support censorship. The "back button problem" is not in itself an argument for censorship.
I do find it troubling, however, that purveyers of commercial porn on the net have no ethical problems with:
1) writing their sites to disable the back browser.
2) Using dictionaries to fool search engines.
3) Placing viruses on computers that redirect modem calls to a pay sex line somewhere in the Cayman Islands.
4) Placing a shitload of cookies on your computer, and advertising software that claims to "clean up" the cookies "so that wife/boss/husband won't know"
5) Generally abusing aesthetic discretion in the worst possible manner.
All of these problems can be eliminated through browser plugin. I, for one, would be most interested in a browser feature that accepts cookies only from named sites (e.g slashdot, nytimes, userfriendly, linuxvideo) and rejects the rest. Internet Explorer does this-- but only by rejecting cookies from all but trusted sites. This does cause a problem, because I really don't trust slashdot with my registry, etc, but certain other sites may need high level access to Windows.
(Netscape has similar issues...)
Damn it! I want fine grain control over my "browsing experience"
Re:The best filter (Score:2)
Re:Unwhackable... (Score:2)
"Sir, you've been hogging the color laser printer all day. We appreciate the revenue, but others are waiting"
Re:Use Junkbuster, make it easily disabled (Score:1)
Re:Use Junkbuster, make it easily disabled (Score:1)
Use Junkbuster, make it easily disabled (Score:2)
Re:Sueing water, galaxies and Pi (Score:1)
Yep, a lot harder in the US. Ordinary laws need a simple majority of quorum in the House & Senate, plus signature of the President (or 2/3's vote to override veto in both House/Senate). Constitutional amendments need 2/3's of both House & Senate, plus ratification by 75% of states.
(OK, there is an alternative, 2/3's of the states could call for a constitutional convention, but it would still require the ratification by 75% of the states).
All spelled out in the US Constitution [unc.edu], Article Five.
Re:Using reason to fight legislation? (Score:1)
If you talk about wasting taxpayers' money, some of the conservative folks who came up with this idea just might listen to you.
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Re:The way to fight this thing.... (Score:3)
I've also drafted a letter to Ralph Nader, explaining to him that he really was wasting his time crusading against the Corvair - I mean, they worked so poorly, why on earth did he get so worked up about them?
Thanks for pointing out the flaw in my logic.
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The way to fight this thing.... (Score:4)
Sure, you can argue all day long about infringing rights, etc, and a lot of people will just figure you want to see porn.
But show Joe Sixpack that he can't get any information on Superbowl XXX at his local library when this goes into effect, and you might get some grass roots support.
The evening news might pick stuff like that up - they won't give a rat's ass about cyber-rights.
Sad, but true, I think.
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Lame Troll (Score:2)
What a pathetic effort.
And by the way, public institutions (in the US) have the duty to uphold the US constitution. Including the bit about free speech.
Steve M
The Right to Speech Does Equal Right to be Heard (Score:2)
From the first amendment to the US constitution:
Congress shall make no law ... or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press, ..."
Congress has passed a law that abridges speech and and the press.
You may not like goatse.cx but unless they are doing something illegal, they are protected.
Freedom of speech means nothing if it only applies to government approved speech. And by mandating filters the government is has stated that anything that is blocked is unapproved speech.
Steve M
Re:The Right to Speech Does Equal Right to be Hear (Score:2)
And you continue to miss the point.
The governement (US) cannot put limits on how a message can be distributed. End of story. To pass such a law would be limiting the press.
As to your specific examples:
Computer shows disney.com and not goatse.cx - censorship? Yes it is censorship if there is a law that says you cannot show goatse.ex.
CNN shows Bill Clinton speak and not me - censorship? Not censorship as long as there is no law that bans CNN from showing you speaking.
As to your specific question:
The lack of coverage is not the issue. The law disallowing 'coverage' is the issue.
The constitution doesn't say congress shall pass no law ... except when it comes to the internet. It says congress shall pass no law. Period.
Steve M
Re:The Right to Speech Does Equal Right to be Hear (Score:2)
It doesn't matter that you are running out of examples, as your examples are irrelevant. And you continue to miss the point.
As to Ice-T, there was no law that said his ablum could not be published. And it was censorship. But censorship in and of itself is not illegal. Federally mandated censorship is not allowed under the US constitution.
As to Andrew Dice Clay that fact that he has other outlets is again irrelevant to the issue at hand as there is no law preventing MTV from airing Dice Clay.
Censorship is not the issue. Federally mandated restrictions on speech is.
Here is the issue in bold (kinda like raising one's voice when speaking to foreigners):Manadated limits on speech or the press are not allowed under the US constitution.
Here is the first amendment to the US constitution:
Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.
The law as passed limits the press. Regardless of whether it is censorship or not, it is forbidden by the US constitution.
Note that it doesn't say laws limiting speech can be passed as long as other outlets are available. Also note that is says nothing about the media of the speech. It is short and to the point. It simply says no law.
Ignoring for a moment that filtering software doesn't work, libraries are free to choose to install such software. And it may make sense to do so in the childrens section of the library.
And you probably would have the right to sue for a free speech violation in your library scenario. But you would probably run afoul of other laws for protection of minors.
So I'll ask you a question, which part of "Congress shall make no law ..." don't you understand?
Oh yeah, the reason the Spice channel isn't found between CBS and NBC is that it is a pay cable channel.
SteveM
Re:But they already censor... (Score:1)
The argument you're missing is that these filters aren't as smart as the humans that filter the book selection.
The online filters work as if you could get "Mein Kampf" in German because it only filters on English words and you couldn't get "Business @ the Speed of Thought" because the person writing the "book filter" didn't like Bill Gates. There was a report that at least one of the filters blocked liberal sites and none of the ultra-right-wing nuts' sites, and also prevented you from reading articles negative to their product, or belonging to people who had complained.
That is not a good thing. Do you really trust a third party to restrict your access to information? Should children also be prevented from buying sweets because they should eat vegetables instead? Or should they be allowed to learn that vegetables are better for you than sweets?
Re:But they already censor... (Score:1)
while the child learns why the rules exist.
A filter just does the "no" part, and does not answer the "why not" part. (Though the "why not" will usually be "because some arbitrary adult decided it for you".)
(perpetuates the myth that sex is a purely physical act, that sex is only about gratifying yourself, that sex outside the bounds of marriage is OK)
That's your political or religious agenda - others have different opinions on both porn and sex. Why should your opinion carry more weight than their?
So we have to filter.
No. What you fail to understand is that the filter does not know whether the person sitting in front of the computer is a child or adult. Children aren't allowed into violent movies either, so you will have to filter away violent content. And so on. And why should only children be protected? Blacks may not want to find white supremacist doggerel. White supremacist in turn may not want NAACP yadayada. Women abused on religious gounds may not want any pro-Christian content to appear. NAMBLA may be offended if you can read that sex with children is wrong.
Where do you stop?
(I won't even bother to stress the fact that the "children" are the users most likely to know how to bypass the filters in the first place.)
MOD UP the above comment!!!! (Score:1)
Re:The best filter (Score:1)
But would this stop all the oh-so-EVIL pornographic stories stored as ascii text files?
Re:Its a public Library - so what? (Score:1)
This comment should be moderated into the toilet.
Dork.
Re:Cool (Score:1)
Re:Why do the _Librarians_ care? (Score:5)
Re:Fsck Government Funding (Score:1)
Re:Michael Sims shut-down Censorware Project site (Score:1)
It's "he said, she said" at its best, and neither Sims' side nor the above sound like they're based entirely in reality. Each person indicates that they did *NOTHING* wrong and a set of events happened independently of them. BS. Something hadda have happened.
It's cool that you opt to believe the above, Seth, but since you'd already left...how do YOU know what happened?
-Jer
Re:Michael Sims shut-down Censorware Project site (Score:1)
Obviously the site is down. Obviously it's owned by Mr. Sims. It stands to reason that he took it down. The entire rest of the narrative lacks definitive content or evidences of any sort. Sorry, I'm just cynical I guess...
-Jer
Foil the Filters contest (Score:2)
That reminds me of one of the winners of DFN's Foil the Filters [dfn.org] contest, a former science teacher's website [northcoast.com] with a filtered forum. When postings starting showing up spelling "class" as "cl***", he removed the filtering software and hasn't used it since.
The winner of the contest was Carroll High School's library, whose censorware blocked the high school's own website for using the word "high".
--
Congress shall make no law abridging the freedom of s***ch, or the right of the people peaceably to ***emble, and to pe***ion the government for a redress of grievances.
Re:The best filter (Score:2)
That will probably eliminate a lot of porn. Whether it's the right way to do it, though, depends on why someone wants to eliminate porn.
If we're eliminating porn because we want to stop people (who want porn) from getting porn, then your idea works. Likewise, the idea also works if we're eliminating porn in order to conserve bandwidth.
If we're eliminating porn because we want to stop people (who don't want to accidently see porn) from accidently seeing it, then that idea doesn't work. In that case, it seems like we want the monitors facing away from public areas.
Perhaps the anti-porn people need to be clearer about their purpose and agenda, so that we can better serve them. *evil grin*
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Re:The way to fight this thing.... (Score:1)
Show me Joe Sixpack at the library looking up the Superbowl and I'll show you this nice anti-tiger rock I have for sale...
FP
No, you read it wrong (Score:3)
They've *always* had an anti-censoring stance.
:)
-Chris
...More Powerful than Otto Preminger...
Re:My own experience in the school system. (Score:1)
Re:The best filter (Score:2)
rotten.com [rotten.com]'s standard response to those who complain about children accessing their site is exactly that: "The net is not a babysitter".
If parents want a machine to raise their children, they should use the old friend television. It's all nice and sanitized for their protection.
Re:You spoke too soon... (Score:2)
K ujqwnf jcxg ytkvvgp kv vq urnkv vjg uvtkpi kpvq c yqtf nkuv, tqvcvg vjgo, vjgp fq c itgr cickpuv c fkevkqpcta nqqmkpi hqt ocvejgu. Kv rtqdcdna yqwnf jcxg hqwpf vjg rnckpvgzv cwvqocvkecnna.
Symmetrical encryption is much nicer to use.
Re:If filtering actually worked.... (Score:2)
Probably a combination of negative reviews, saying how trivial it is to defeat some of this software also there is actually some profanity on there. But the profanity is in copies of emails sent sent from the staff of a filtering software company to unhappy customers. (The most likely point being are the kind of people who use this sort of language exactly "moral guardians".)
Re:Its a public Library - so what? (Score:2)
This is not to say that the points you made are meritless, only that they do not prove the point you suggest they prove.
Re:Its a public Library - so what? (Score:2)
As to the first issue, I think they legally can.
Case law suggests otherwise. Mainstream Loudoun, et. al. v. Board of Trustees of the Loudoun County Public Libraries, No. CV 97-2049, (E.D. Va. 2000).
Re:Its a public Library - so what? (Score:3)
The simple fact is that public institutions have a right, nay, a duty to censor material. Do you want your 5 year old child to be able to see goatse.cx at school? I wouldn't. A public institution should confirm to public tastes and decencies. Anything else would be scandalous.
Bunk. In fact, it is settled law that it is unconstitutional for a public library to censor material. The only subtle issue in the cases is what types of conduct constitutes censorship.
Its not as though they are censoring useful information anyway. Everything they censor is useless porn. The only people who want to see that stuff are libertarians and perverts, who are both the same in many respects anyway.
Bunk. Thanks to the affirmative efforts of folks like Seth Finkelstein, it is also well-established that much substantive information is routinely censored by commercial filtering programs.
Re:Government Database (Score:2)
Re:Lame Troll (Score:2)
I bought the comp-u-geek shirt, but when I opened the box, 8000 shirts spawned out.
Re:wouldn't .sex make this easier (Score:2)
not really. maybe the USian porn. You'll still have porn on most country TLDs, and no US law can do anything about it. and then there's ofcourse the definition of porn.. nudity? hardly.. intercourse? what about sex ed? remember.. you probably had pussy on your head when you were born..
//rdj
Re:the kids NEEDS it... (Score:2)
until the kids discover cache-surfing
Re:Use Junkbuster, make it easily disabled (Score:2)
//rdj
Re:Use Junkbuster, make it easily disabled (Score:2)
P.S. Did you also notice that not all the kids were crowding around that bottom shelf?
//rdj
What the filtering companies offer (Score:2)
In fact, they cannot sell their product unless they can convince the public that they can offer the second internet to children.
The rest of us know that there is only one internet and there is no way to seperate out the 'safe subset'. Parents don't like hearing those words, they don't want to believe that there's only one internet, and it's an unsafe internet. Filtering companies want parents to believe that the choice exists.
Maybe if we offer alternatives (like my other post) to parents, they will stop believing the fiction of a 'safe internet', and look for alternatives that are reasonable.
Despite what filtering companies want us to believe, One does not have to believe in filtering to believe that parents should have choices for their children.
If filtering actually worked.... (Score:5)
Stuff which is obviously smut with no value. (pictures, stories, etc) doesn't have a place in libraries.. But, say, an educational site on masturbation (with pictures) is not something I'd call smut and should be allowed to go through. Now, some people feel that anything touching on sex should be blocked, and they would use filtering as an excuse for these excessive blocks.
The problem is that the filtering is ineffective. Automatic filtering cannot and does not make the above distinction. Human-based filtering suffers from a lack of manpower (of about 5 orders of magnitude). Thus, there is no way to do the ideal. There's no way to even approach the ideal.
As peacefire showed, a noticable fraction of the yahoo porn listings were let through by these 'filters'. Similarily, every few seconds, a child is blocked from a legitimate site.
So, in independent tests, filtering let's half of the outright porn through, and bans a lot of legitimate material.. To me, this is like indiscriminate shooting. Let's go into a bad neighborhood and shoot people at random. We might hit some guilty people by chance, but we'll hurt a lot of innocents.
If you can't see the peacefire web site, try turning off of your filters. Most filtering programs have the site classified as everything from porn, to nazi's, to military, to gambling.
If an only if you can show me filtering that does it's job, will I ever accept it. Blocking 90% of the million porn sites leaves 100,000 left; why bother? Using filtering as a way to censor knowledge from your children is bad. (Masturbation, alternate religions) And no filtering program must be allowed to block any educational site, whether that site deals with sexuality, learning about hate-groups, military strategy, guns. For the gains, 100,000 porn sites instead of a whole million, the cost is too much.
Since such a program cannot and does not exist, the most the libraries can do is to put the responsibility on the parent. No one under 18 is allowed internet access. A parent can permit access by their children and can choose among the options:
1. No access allowed.
2. Access allowed only if with an adult. Parent can later review visited websites.
3. Access allowed, parent has the ability to review visited websites. (With an optional time-limit for number of hours)
4. Access allowed, parent does not have the ability to review visited websites. (with an optional time-limit for number of hours)
All access is full access. If a child is with a parent, they get access through their parent's card. No one is allowed to sit in front of the computers without a card. (So a stranger cannot offer a a child access unsupervised.) The parent gets the flexibility for what level of monitoring, if any, their children get. It's also open; the child knows whether or not what they visit will be reviewed by their parents.
Heh.. With some GUI-ified TCL scripts and a squid proxy, this kind of system would be pretty trivial to set up.
Re:Google... (Score:3)
http://www.google.com/search?q=cache:slashdot.org
the censorware proxy blocks it. Luckily, however, it doesn't block the ip address converting system proudly displayed in this season's issue of 2600. >:) Keep freedom of speech in schools alive. Please.
Re:Fsck Government Funding (Score:2)
Government Database (Score:4)
-Vercingetorix
I've been there (Score:4)
The nature of the ALA (Score:3)
Re:the kids NEEDS it... (Score:2)
Sad but true that these venerable institutions have to help kids through adolescence because the internet has reduced the number of hard copies to be stolen and hidden and found by mothers so that she can ground you. It's too bad that libraries have to have computers at all.....but if they have them then they have to have the right to be free. The biggest failure here is of the parents.
The best filter (Score:4)
The library in the town my family lives in has an internet policy something like this:
Kids under 12 must be accompanied by a parent/guardian or relative over 18.
Kids 12-18 must either be accompanied or have a form on file signed by a parent/guardian stating that the parent understands that there may be material on the internet that they do not approve of, and that the child has permission to use the internet alone.
Everyone 18+ must have a signed form on file stating that they understand that viewing of pornography is against library policy, punishable by revoking of internet privileges.
Having a policy like this (and enforcing it) has pretty much killed any talk of filtering there.
Re:..and then have libraries fall apart.. (Score:2)
The federal government should not be able to tag on conditions to providing essential funding. It's like if you paid me to write you some software and I took your money then said I wasn't going to write it for you unless you quit smoking.
Really, it's just plain theft and extortion.
Rich
Re:But they already censor... (Score:2)
1) This is all about public schools ***and*** libraries. NOT public schools' libraries. I'm much more worried about censoring public libraries.
2) The federal government shouldn't be bothering with this, except to limit what grounds libraries _can't_ censor on.
I don't see a problem with libraries--and definitely school libraries--deciding not to pick some stuff up, but the government shouldn't be the ones to tell them what to carry or not.
Re:Fsck Government Funding (Score:3)
That is the whole point of the issue. I - and zillion other people like me - have no beef with "advanced", "politically incorrect", etc... art, speach, whatever. The beef is, we don't want it to be paid for by our tax dollars.
For example, the now-infamous NYC fight between Rudy Guliani and the museum wasn't over the museum's right to display the stupid painting (and kill me if I consider that piece of s**t - pun intended - art), like all the librul noismakers made it sound. It was over the fact that said painting was displayed with PUBLIC FUNDS. They wanna do it in private museum - sure, i have no problem with that (other than wondering about sanity of the artist, critics and viewers). But I don't want my tax money used for it. This has NOTHING to do with First Amendement which deals with laws restricting speach - merely with not having to pay for it. Ditto NEA issue.
Arts should be like science - if you want to fund whatever you want, you either make it worth the money and submit a proposal to NSF, or seek private funding.
-DVK
P.S. Now let's see how far down this gets moderated in the name of freedom of speech ;)
One way to kill this (Score:3)
Public libraries should not be dissemninating advertising at taxpayer expense, right?
Re:Back to trusting... humans. (Score:4)
I mean come on, which are you going to fear more, filtering software that gives you a nice, pretty "That page is unviewable" message, or a pissed off teacher yelling "Billy! What are you looking at! Go to the principal's office..."?
MyopicProwls
Not just filters, here is the legality of it all (Score:2)
Govt has no right in censorship of its people. The US Govt should not have the authority to deem what material is appropriate for it's people. That is one of the freedoms here in the United States. We do not live in China where the govt dictates our lives. If a legal adult is at a library looking at inappropriate material or reading "questionable" materials, that is his/her choice... the Govt has no rule on what is appropriate or not for it's legal adult citizens.
Re:Fsck Government Funding (Score:3)
Except that you'll also hear people complaining about things like the MAPS Realtime Blackhole List because it's going way too far. I'd say that the overall opinion on the matter was very strongly leaning toward the "blocking whole blocks is evil" side, not the "it's OK" side.
Ultimately, though, you're missing an important point. Spam blocking is about me controlling what I see by filtering out unwanted messages. Filtering is about other people controlling what I see by deciding which content is OK. MAPS RBL got blasted because its policy changed from the desirable (letting me block messages from known spammers) to the undesirable (blocking messages for the political reason that their originator was associated, however distantly, with spammers). If you can't see the difference, you're blind.
Re:Fsck Government Funding (Score:3)
This just isn't as good an argument as it sounds at first. The big problem is that by restricting public funds to art that doesn't offend anyone, you inherently reduce it to the most boring, insipid of the lot. A substantial role of art is to provoke thought and controversy, so by preventing funding of controversial art you eviscerate the purpose of funding it in the first place.
But if you truly follow the NSF/NIH model, you're not going to prevent funding of offensive art. Why? Because NSF and NIH fund projects based heavily on peer review, and depend on the informed opinions of top people in the field about what areas of science are most worth investingating. If you translate that into the NEA, you'll wind up with funding for art projects being doled out on the advice of other top notch artists, most of whom won't share your opinion about the undesirability of controversial artworks.
Just so this doesn't seem completely academic, the Vietnam War Memorial in Washington, DC is a great example of what I'm talking about. The Memorial Wall was the winner as judged by a panel of artists, but the politicians didn't like it because it inherently presents the decisions about the war in a negative light. They wanted to kill the proposal in favor of a conventional monument with a statue of a group of Nam era soldiers that wasn't going to offend anyone, but wound up compromising by building both. Today, everyone knows about the Wall, and it's one of the most popular monuments to visit in DC and just about nobody knows or cares about the other half. If you base your decisions on the principle of not offending anyone, you're going to get the half that's ignored, not the half that's considered the greatest war monument in the world.
Re:Its a public Library - so what? (Score:3)
Do you believe that people should be able to look up sites like americanwicca.com using public computers? I assure you that most censorship solutions will try to block everything to do with wicca...
Re:Sueing water, galaxies and Pi (Score:2)
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More power to the ALA (Score:2)
Other people have brought up my my main objections to filtering: filters suck, blocks sites about VD, impotence, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera.
I really haven't seen my point directly stated, so here it is...
So what if people see porn. If an adult wants to walk into his local public library and see porn, good for them. SO WHAT??? The public library in my area is set up so the content of the monitors is very private, and seeing someone else's screen is quite hard. You can only see it if you try.
But what about my youngster? Well, the best method for encouraging/stopping your kid from seeing or liking porn is talking to them. If you say, "Little Timmy, in real life we don't do it like this, or with animals, et cetera...", you can basically stop the child from reacting to porn in a proactive way. Porn, in many ways, is like a violent video game, if they understand what's involved, they won't be "scared for life."
Just my .02.
Google... (Score:3)
The Right Filtering Solution (Score:2)
Why Library Filtering Happens (Score:2)
1) The people who should be advocates for library users (library boards and staff) lack spines;
2) The poor, who depend on libraries for their web access, don't contribute to political campaigns.
Case in point: Memphis/Shelby County Public Library resisted installing filters for years(well, at least a couple), until a local archconservative anti-pr0n crusader, your stereotypical suburban soccer mom basically, was elected to the county commission. Somehow, she ended up on a budget committee, and threatened to cut the county's contribution to the library system by 25%--some $4M--if they didn't install filters, which they wasted no time whatsoever doing. Never mind that the library has otherwise successfully resisted responsibility(or, more to the point, liability) for babysitting children, including allowing the little varmints access to Playboy and The Joy of Sex. Never mind Peacefire [peacefire.org]. Never mind that this latter-day Comstock represents a district where most households have their own computers(and do you think that Dick and Jane are even slowed down by the filter that Mommy put on the family PC? Doubt it!), whereas most of the people actually affected by this decision live in the inner city. Point is, libraries are a big, slow-moving target for social conservative politicians looking for an easy score, which is to say, all of them.
The thing that gets me is that so many of these people, who are otherwise more than enthusiastic about homeschooling and free exercise of their religion and so on, are so insistent on the public library being responsible for enforcing morality. They just don't get it that the only filter that works is what they teach their kids regarding right and wrong--no, not what they tell their kids, but what they can make their kids believe.
Re:No, you read it wrong (Score:2)
Librarians have had an anti-censorship stance longer than Libertarians.
Re:If filtering actually worked.... (Score:2)
It is a popular double-think these days to assert that "knowledge is power" and "children should be given access to all knowledge." These do not co-exist well. If knowledge and ideas are so powerful, children aren't equiped to handle them. (Most children, of course, don't know they aren't--that's why they're "childish.")
I respect the power of a car. It is a tool that can be used well for its intended purpose. It's also a terrible killing machine when wielded irresponsibly. I might let my 10-year start the car, but he can't drive it, yet. (He probably thinks he could--and some can, but believe me, he couldn't.) My government even has a law that says he can't.
Re:Back to trusting... humans. (Score:2)
Maybe next time I should just come out and say it, considering you got higher moderation points... (sniff)
Back to trusting... humans. (Score:3)
At least in school, the computer lab "teacher" can somewhat look over the kids' shoulders, but that sure leaves libraries in a bind. Hate to say it, but we really don't have much else of a choice but to go back to trusting humans.
Re:My library NEEDS it... Open Source Filtering? (Score:2)
Try this new-fangled thing called education. You can try to ward children from untoward and unpleasant influences and hide from them things that make us uncomfortable like sex, violence, and whatnot... but the world will show it to them sometime when our gaurd falls. The only TRUE defence is education, raising your children to be strong, sensible, and to know right from wrong. If you street-proof your children, that goes a lot further (as does regular participation in the life of your child, rather than letting the child meander through life unsupervised and unattended) than any step to "protect the innocent" ever will.
Pleasure in the job puts perfection in the work.
There was never a genius without a tincture of madness.
Unwhackable... (Score:3)
The existing laws against public indecency should surely suffice.
Re:The best filter (Score:3)
Re:Its a public Library - so what? (Score:2)
But they already censor... (Score:2)
All this is fine with me. Filtering is a good thing with regards to children. It may be okay to say "Shit, fuck, pour hot grits down my pants" on Slashdot. Sometimes you actually get mod'd down for saying that. In the classroom you're sure to get detention.
You might get expelled for for bringing naked pictures of Natalie Portman or other pornographic (insert your own definition of that here) materials to class and showing them to your friends. Why? Because it's disruptive to the learning environment. Besides, why should our tax dollars be used to deliver potentially offensive/disruptive/abusive/racist/etc content when there are so many other things of educational value to have access to.
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Fsck Government Funding (Score:4)
I am definitely for government addressing inequities in resource distribution, opportunity, and the restrictions of democratic rights. I am not for a government using its federal funds to control workplace activity to the point where the first amendment is either broached completely, or the interpretation of the first amendment is put into the hands of commercial surf-protection software concerns.
The only hope here is resistance by anyone who has a principled stand on freedom of speech, i.e. the people. The librarians here are of course an example of such resistance. They are using the judicial system to challenge a (constitutionally) unfair regulatory infringement on their civil rights.
However, the government will eventually push this far enough that it is better to seek funding from alternative sources. Eventually, the government will not be a viable source of funding for the best artists and social programs- the ones that are decidedly politically incorrect.
This can lead to a degradation of those agencies that receive such funding, but I hope that private and charitable sources can step in, without restricting the freedoms of those who they presume to help.
They're censoring computers in the library..right? (Score:3)
Well, now look what porn has gone and done!
Here is what I think. These computers that are receiving the filterings are at the libraries. So, if you are looking for something on the computer, and it brings up a "questionable material" page...then go check out a book in the library on the subject...shut up! I know this really sucks...but hey, your at the LIBRARY. Usually when I am at the library I read actual books, not go online and burn my eye's out worse than they are already.
Did I mention this really sucks? Some of the reasons this sucks; some libraries won't have the material the internet does. Some people don't have computers at their disposal, hence the library (free information) has them. Whatever book your looking for could be checked out. And filtering, censoring just plain sucks. If someone wants to look at a particular subject matter or material, I think that person has a right to read/see/research whatever he/she is looking for.
If I have missed anything...please list more suckiness below. Who is this really hurting? Who is this really helping? I think this is going to prove malicious to the human mind. Whenever you censor or "prohibit" things, people tend to get upset. And usually tend to rebel in some sort of way. I hope the sys admins at libraries are ready for an assault on the censory systems, and even the network. I totally disagree with this plan.
My library NEEDS it... (Score:2)
Filtering does no good (Score:3)
Please also note that I believe filtering the internet in public schools is an attempt to restrict freedom of speech, especially when "contraverisal" topics such as abortion are filtered to "protect the students". That was the reasoning behind the filtering at my school.