Government Censorship On The Internet Essay Research

Paper

Government Censorship on the Internet

Thesis: Government Censorship would damage the atmosphere of the freedom

to express ideas on

the Internet; therefore, government should not encourage censorship. Introduction I. In the Internet

community, there is a large volume of technical terms.

For this reason, it is first

necessary to examine the terminology specific to Internet. 1.The internet is a world wide computer

network. 1.Electronic mail (email), which is one component of the Internet,

approximates person

to person letters, memoranda, notes and even phone calls. 2.Another term that is often used is

electronic news

(enews/Usenet), enews is a

broadcast, free to the Internet medium. 3.The term FTP is also frequently used. File transfer protocol

(FTP) started as an

Internet archival and retrieval medium, somewhat analogous to

traditional libraries. 4.The world-wide web (WWW), which is another component of the Net,

can be used

to “publish” material that would traditionally appear in

journals, magazines, posters,

books, television and even on film. 2.It is also essential to give a brief history on the internet. 3.The

U.S. government is now trying to pass bills to prevent misuse of

the Net. II. In order to understand the need for the ever-growing body of

legislation, it is important to

explore the controversy, and the current problems involved with the Net as

it exists must be

introduced. 1.The problem that concerns most people is offensive materials such as

pornography. 2.Another crucial internet crime is the stealing of credit card

numbers. III. One reaction to this inapplicability has been the “Censor the Net”

approach (the censorship

bill), we are now to compare its advantages and disadvantages. 1.First, the meaning of “Censoring the

Net” must be explained. 2.However, many experts have pointed out that government censorship is

not possible. 1.First, it is not fair to exclude the freedom and damage the

atmosphere of freely

expressing ideas just for the safety of children. 2.Most internet users are enjoying their freedom of

speech on the

Net, which is

supposed to be protected by our First Amendment. 3.Additionally, only a very small portion of the Net

contains

offensive material, most

people do not use the Net for pornography. 4.It must be understood that censoring the Net is

technically

impossible. 5.While people are concerned about Internet pornography, it should

be recognized that

pornography is sometimes legal; for example, pornography is

legal in video and

magazines. IV. There are many alternative measures to government censorship which

would prevent misuse of

the Net and would have the same effects as censorship. 1.It is very important for parents to provide

moral guidance for their

children, and parents

should have this responsibility. 2.However, at the same time as we carry out moral guidance, we have

to

come out with some

short term approaches to solve the problem in a more efficient way as

well. 3.An alternative to government censorship is the technological fix,

which would prevent

misuse of the Net and would have the same effects as government

censorship. 1.One example of technological fix is the “SurfWatch” software. 2.Also, commercial

Internet service providers, such as “America

Online”, allow parents

to control what Internet relay chat (IRC) sessions are available

to their children. 3.Another technological fix is for parents and guardians to have a

separate “proxy

server” for their children’s web browser. 4.There are no computer programs to automatically and

reliably classify

material; only people

can do it. As a result, while practicing technological fixes, the

classification of the contents of

the material when posting is very important. 5.Nowadays, most internet users classify their postings

with standard

categories, and leave

signatures at the end of postings. 6.The combination of the installation of censoring software and the

classification of materials is

a much better solution than government censorship. Conclusion Bibliography

The Internet is a wonderful place of entertainment and education but like

all places used by millions

of people, it has some murky corners people would prefer children not to

explore. In the physical

world society as a whole conspires to protect children, but there are no

social or physical

constraints to Internet surfing. The Internet Censorship Bill of 1995, also known as the Exon/Coats

Communications Decency

Act, has been introduced in the U.S. Congress. It would make it a criminal

offense to make

available to children anything that is indecent, or to send anything

indecent with “intent to annoy,

abuse, threaten, or harass” (”Stop the Communications …” n.p.). The goal

of this bill as written

(though not as stated by its proponents) is to try to make all public

discourse on the Internet

suitable for young children. The issue of whether is it necessary to have

censorship on the Internet

is being argued all over the world. There are numerous homepages on the

World Wide Web

discussing this issue, or asking people to sign the petition to stop

government censorship. The Internet was originally a place for people to freely express their

ideas worldwide. It is also one

of America’s most valuable types of technology; scientists use email for

quick and easy

communication. They post their current scientific discoveries on the

Usenet newsgroups so other

scientists in the same field of study all over the world can know in

minutes. Ordinary people use

the Net for communication, expressing their opinions in the newsgroups,

obtaining up-to-date

information from the WWW, acquiring files by using FTP, etc. Censorship

would damage the

atmosphere of the freedom to express ideas on the Internet; therefore,

government should not

encourage censorship. In the Internet community, there is a large volume of technical terms. For

this reason, it is first

necessary to examine the terminology specific to Internet. The Internet is

a world wide computer

network. The “Net” is frequently used in place of Internet. In the words

of Allison and Baxter, two

experts on Internet Censorship at the Monash University, “the Internet is

comprised of various

digital media subsuming many of the distinct roles of traditional media”

(Allison and Baxter 3).

Bibliography

allison and baxter 3