Does the porn filter set a presidence for wider censorship of the internet

[rob4001]

I do not trust the uk government. At first it comes under the guise of 'well think of the children' then the powers leech into other areas.

As reported here https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/ukn...d-punting.html

[TooNice]

The precedence is already set by Cleanfeed over a decade ago. That one likely face less public resistance given what it seeks to block (and generally less known), but the lack of transparency actually make it easier to expand into other domains without the public knowing. I also don't view an age filter as real censorship since the content is technically accessible to adults. And since it's made the news, minors won't take long to figure ways around it (for those who don't already).

[Corky34]

Yea we're way, way, past setting a president, you only have to look at the wiki entries for what's blocked and/or censored in the UK to see were a long way down that road.

I was going to write a long rant about my feelings on the subject but I've come to accept that the majority of people in the UK are perfectly happy with the government protecting them from nasty people on the internet, that most people are happy to give up their liberties in favor of security.

[kalniel]

Above two posts have summed it up well IMHO. It's definitely not a precedent, we're well past that.

It's hard to judge what the majority want - even by referendum it seems. But certainly it seems a lot of people do not want the freedom to promote hate speech, bigotry and discrimination for example - all things that a truly censor-free internet would enable. On the other hand, a lot of people don't want to be prevented from being able to talk about duck houses or Winnie the pooh. So a balanced approach seems prudent.

[peterb]

And in other news, Facebook is not giving a platform to organisations such as the BNP. Is that justifiable censorship?

But does a Government have a responsibility to protect vulnerable people from exploitation?

And then that leads to the question of how vulnerable people are identified and what degree are they being exploited?

[TeePee]

And in other news, Facebook is not giving a platform to organisations such as the BNP. Is that justifiable censorship?

But does a Government have a responsibility to protect vulnerable people from exploitation?

And then that leads to the question of how vulnerable people are identified and what degree are they being exploited?

Facebook, as a private entity, should be able to block whoever they like (with very few exceptions). If the government were blocking the BNP from the internet, as an opposition political party, then the chair would legitimately be against the wall.

[Saracen999]

Facebook, as a private entity, should be able to block whoever they like (with very few exceptions). If the government were blocking the BNP from the internet, as an opposition political party, then the chair would legitimately be against the wall.

I have a ot of sympathy with that view, but there's two points go raise ....

1) While Facebook (et.al.) are a private entity in the strictly corporate legal sense, they also (IMHO) kinda transcend that sort of relatively simplistic definition, by virtue of their scale, and the breadth of spread of their tentacles.

I wonder if we need to be thinking rather more 'out of the box' than that?

2) Re: banning the far right, there's something ..... "of the night" about a bunch of Californian liberal billionaires banning legal and British political groups and parties.

I used to have a Latin phrase, "Quis custodiet ipsos custodes?" as my sig. Litdrally, "who guards the guards"- but a broader interpretation would be "Who watches the watchers?"

Simply because of the breadth and scope of their operations, this move worries me because of the "thin end of wedge" principle.



Oh, and there's a pragmatic reason or two why banning thrm isn't a good idea. For a start, they'll find another platform in another guise, and it givex them grounds to claim persecution.

But more importantly I've always felt most modern political extremists were thrif own worst enemies. Oh, some are good rabble-rousers when preaching to the already converted, but the more they're exposed to the wider public, the more they do a great job at showing themselves up for what they are.

There's an old adage that goes somethjng like "sunlight if the best disinfectant" . By banning them, FB afe helping prevent the sunlight of public scrutiny from reaching them.


Besides, cynic that I am, I doubt FB's motives, especially give the timing. This is likely to be to try to fend off, or at least de-fang, incipient government regulation or legislation

[philehidiot]

The problem here feels like it stems from the book "rules for radicals" where it is simply put that the fear of something indescript is worse than the reality. You can see that in your daily life, you're having a problem with your relationship and you can't quite put your finger on what it is but it has a real, physiolological and psychological impact (excuse all spelling, I've just arrived home from two days of hell, involving an inability to wash, eat properly, drink, speak my mind, having to follow orders in the most manky conditions possible... no, I wasn't on military exercise, I was with the mother in law to be and I'm now exhausted and quite drunk) and the effect and the fear of what it could be ("is this the end? do I need to divorce? What's going on?") is worse than the currently ill defined problem. So, whaddya do? If you've any sense you talk through it with your partner, pin down the problem and verbalise it. You make it both manifest and manageable because it's identified and in front of you. That in itself relieves a lot of the cortisol mediated stress response which makes you feel so bad (I dread to think how bad I'd have been over the past couple of days if I actually produced cortisol). And once you have identified the problem you can then consider rational solutions. Until that point a few things happen in that it remains irrational and also causes projection which is why you'll end up shouting at your partner and blaming them, seemingly totally irrationally, for something that just isn't anything to do with them but is actually a reflection of your poor adaptation to the current, poorly identified stressor.

That make sense? No. Fine. More beer.

So in rules for radicals it basically makes you withhold information from the people that will allow them to correctly identify and assess the threat. Perfect example of this is Tommy Robinson. He is NOT far right. I don't know what to make of him (I see things I dislike but nothing in proportion to how he is portrayed) but I have spent quite a long time trying to find out (I was reading a facebook page which proported to expose him today and I couldn't find anything actually factual or far right) what he actually stands for. Therein lies the crux of the matter. We are now forbidden to find out what he stands for because he has been silenced and all we get is "far right" "EDL founder". Vague terms which we fear and don't reflect reality. He doesn't want an ethnostate, seems to identify with left wing working class values quite a lot and he left the EDL because it was getting radical elements within it, taking it in a direction he didn't want to go and he couldn't stop it. So they deny us information and freedom of speech so we will fear him based on their vague terms which kinda imply he's the new Hitler but without saying that. He apparently says things and instead of treating us like adults the press say "it's so vile we can't repeat it!" To which I say "JAHOVA!"

So, you hold back on freedom of expression and you can create a monster which people fear and then also make an example out of that monster, to raptuous applause. It's a method of control and also a method of narrowing the Overton Window into a box that handily surrounds the off the shelf morality dictated by the government taking this action.

The horrendous side effect is obvious. Those who are REALLY dangerous go underground. They can't express their views and have them chopped to peices in public, demonstrating to everyone how bad these ideas are. I've fought with holocaust deniers on Facebook before and the freedom of expression meant we could have that heated, but respectful argument in public. I'm not going to call someone evil for denying the holocaust, but I will call the misinformed and I will challenge them on those grounds - gets you a lot further than calling them a Nazi and slandering them. There was a guy who denied the holocaust in some European country where it was illegal. He wrote a book on it and was sent to jail. In a free society he'd never have written the book as he'd have expressed the idea in the pub and it would have been shot down. When he got to court a historian who specialised in the holocaust utterly destroyed him. It was a massacre when these ideas were challenged in the light. If you force these people underground they create echo chambers and no one can challenge the ideas before they become entrenched.

I am not a free speech absoluteist. You can't incite violence, you can't yell "fire" in a crowded theatre. Do I think you should be able to be racist? Well, actually yes. Because you will pay one HELL of a social penalty for that these days. Granted I do agree it took laws originally to stamp out racism. I think people should be allowed to be racist and so on. BUT it's when it comes to actions you actually have a problem. If someone has racist ideals but treats everyone the same and would never insult a black person based on their race, I ask you what is the problem? If they want to voice their opinion to like minded people but it's in private and no one gets hurt at all, what is the problem? It'll probably come out and they'll get told why they're wrong and they'll pay a social penalty but should such speech be prohibited by law? No. Now, if they are abusing a black person or a blind person whilst on public transport and being an outright prick, you have an issue. That's verbal abuse and should be treated as such with the idiot being kicked off, ideally several miles walk from their stop. If it carries on, it's harrassment and the police should be informed and the person prosecuted.

Freedom of speech exists in two places. Anandtech comments and IRC. The internet as we knew it is sanitised, public and prone to getting you absolutely screwed for comments you made several years ago.

Freedom of speech allows you freedom of thought which is essential to getting things to work better. Does this mean you can be an abusive prick? No and we punish people for that. The open marketplace of ideas is essential to progress of mankind but that is being quashed by a government which is scared to have people speak their mind.

Remember that report that showed that people are more influenced by the comments section of a newspaper than the article? Well, why do you think they all disappeared? Dissenter comes along and is called racist by people who want to again turn it into a vague boogie monster and justify banning it.

/ramble. If any of this made sense, I apologise in advance. I am seeing at least 21 spelling mistakes. Please feel free to destroy my attempt at an argument. I want my bed.

[Zak33]

precedent - not president or presidence

just saying as it's a very important word

[Zak33]

in Answer to the OP, yes it's a worry

Because primarily no one really knows what the adult verification system will be in future, nor who will have access to the contents of it. It seems to be a license to attract hackers and then black mail

From my own personal postion I worry about web censorship because what I see as OK is already different to what other people see as OK. Here in Mod/Admin terms, where I would swear a bit, the other guys won't and so I toe the line. I am effectively ceonsored, but I choose to allow it- it's my own control.

Porn is step one - its thr future censorship that worries me -if I want to buy a gun and the website is censored for reviews of that gun. Or I want to learn how to field dress an animal I hunt, and I can't see it online because it's offended someone.. I'm stuck.
Because what is porn? Who's decided it?

Is it a large bouncing pair of hairy testicles, slathered with yoghurt? I guarantee someone somewhere is getting off on that, though it might not be you or I. It might also be a cure for an itchy sack.
Is someone gonna ban pictures of M Monroe licking her lips..... cos lets be honest... she was not eating a burger. What about the tennis girl scratching her butt, poster? Japanese cartoons of little girls in mini skirts?

Will all Swedish washing machine repair men from the 70's, and window cleaners from the 80's need your credit card or passport details to confirm you are allowed to laugh your heart out at the sillyness of it all?

Viz last year summed up my despisal of Game of Thrones thus "Save money on Game of Thrones Box Sets by watching Lord of the Rings interspersed with 10 minutes of porn" - I consider some of the GoT scenes pretty hardcore.. and that's mainline TV

[Corky34]

It's sort of funny how the age of consent is 16 but only over 18's will be able to view online porn, i guess from 16-18 they'll have to do it in a dark room.

[TooNice]

That is always something I've been amused with.

[Ttaskmaster]

It's sort of funny how the age of consent is 16 but only over 18's will be able to view online porn, i guess from 16-18 they'll have to do it in a dark room.

Even sort-of-funnier that, in some countries, you are considered old enough to kill someone and/or die for your country, but not old enough to have a beer...

[philehidiot]

Even sort-of-funnier that, in some countries, you are considered old enough to kill someone and/or die for your country, but not old enough to have a beer...

Oh I just binned my old hip flask from school. I opened it up and it had loads of mould in it. My immune system is suppressed and I keep ending up in hospital, so it wasn't worth the risk.

So many lack of memories.