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from the a-marriage-is-formed-between-one-man-and-one-electronic-computing-device dept.
More than a dozen state legislatures are considering a bill called the "Human Trafficking Prevention Act," which has nothing to do with human trafficking and all to do with one man's crusade against pornography at the expense of free speech.
At its heart, the model bill would require device manufacturers to pre-install "obscenity" filters on devices like cell phones, tablets, and computers. Consumers would be forced to pony up $20 per device in order to surf the Internet without state censorship. The legislation is not only technologically unworkable, it violates the First Amendment and significantly burdens consumers and businesses.
Perhaps more shocking is the bill's provenance. The driving force behind the legislation is a man named Mark Sevier, who has been using the alias "Chris Severe" to contact legislators. According to the Daily Beast, Sevier is a disbarred attorney who has sued major tech companies, blaming them for his pornography addiction, and sued states for the right to marry his laptop. Reporters Ben Collins and Brandy Zadrozny uncovered a lengthy legal history for Sevier, including an open arrest warrant and stalking convictions, as well as evidence that Sevier misrepresented his own experience working with anti-trafficking non-profits.
The bill has been introduced in some form [in] Alabama, Florida, Georgia, Indiana, Louisiana, New Jersey, North Dakota, Oklahoma, South Carolina, Texas, West Virginia, and Wyoming (list here). We recommend that any legislator who has to consider this bill read the Daily Beast's investigation.
[...] It’s unfortunate that the Human Trafficking Prevention Act has gained traction in so many states, but we're pleased to see that some, such as Wyoming and North Dakota, have already rejected it. Legislators should do the right thing: uphold the Constitution, protect consumers, and not use the problem of human trafficking as an excuse to promote this individual’s agenda against pornography.
https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2017/04/states-introduce-dubious-legislation-ransom-internet
(Score: 3, Insightful) by fyngyrz on Wednesday April 26 2017, @09:33PM
You still have personal choice, even in such an extreme environment. You can choose to restrict your moves to a walled garden, such as Facebook, where the proprietors of the garden regulate what can be posted. It's their garden; they get to set the rules. You can create your own such garden. You can surf away when out on the open web. Your options should end, however, when you think for even a moment that you have the right to force anyone else to restrict themselves beyond the matter of informed consent. Likewise, in your home, you set the rules. Not me; not the government; when it comes to the available choices, you have a great deal of control, and reasonably so. It's your garden, essentially. You want a porn filter? Fine. Install and enjoy. You can set up a whitelist and see to it that you're in your own hand-crafted safe Internet space. But if you try to put such a thing on my computer, I will defend against that. And I don't give the south end of a northbound rat for any kind of porn, either way. See skin, don't see skin, meh. I'm more into geological porn. Naked crystals. Yum! And I like pinups. Preferably clothed pinups. Plumage is much more interesting to me than skin. I simply object very strongly to the idea that you have any right at all to force me to do anything that is in the realm of my personal, informed decision making. You can ask me to, and I respect absolutely your right to ask. And you will then endure me laughing at you, as I pursue the reciprocal right of appropriate information transfer when someone asks me to do something absurd.
Let me illustrate this for you. I am, in point of fact, highly offended by religion. I think it is a travesty; enormously harmful to raising children in a reasonable fashion, and in the public square, including on the Internet, any instance of it is the cognitive equivalent of a huge, steaming pile of dung. I am truly offended. However, I can ignore it; I can turn away; I can stop looking; and I can whine about it. At various times, I choose one or the other of these. What I do not do, however, is claim that because I saw it, I am forced to consume it, and so I should have the right to tell others they may not indulge in such practices. I have no right to not be offended, because now we're talking about force applied from me towards non-consenting others. That's out of bounds. Way out of bounds.
When the government coerces me with regard to religion: via blue laws in re business closures or consumption of alcohol, drugs, meats, etc.; expects me to "swear by god" or "on a bible" in court, imposes school prayer upon and/or forces my children to bear teaching that "creationism" is a valid scientific theory, etc. – they have picked a direct fight with me. Now it's not about offense. Now it's about abuse. Now we are at polar odds. I'm not just offended. I am injured and have no choice in the matter, informed or otherwise. I respond in various ways, from carefully and in detail informing my children that the government is wrong, stupid, and does not deserve their respect in these matters, to adjusting my votes, political contributions, and so on, and of course, never, ever participating in or consuming religious hokery.
You too can avoid encouraging or consuming in this thing that offends you, and – as far as I know – there is no circumstance where you can be compelled to participate. Further, should you be so motivated, you can construct a site that offers your opinions on the matter to the world, and attempt to sway others into avoiding porn in some way resembling how you feel it should be avoided. You can, as you have here, speak up in online fora and present your case. You won't see porn here – they don't allow images of any kind here at present, so you're in a perfectly safe space as far as that goes. The amount of freedom you retain, even in the face of potentially being offended here and there, is (well, should be) huge.
However... it seems to me that you are under the very mistaken impression that you have, or should have, a very specific right: the right to not be offended by what you see and hear as you explore the world. Such a right right cannot exist outside the bounds of pernicious or gross coercion, because it depends entirely on an authority you cannot derive from the principles of liberty – it is by its very nature an imposition on the rights of others to make personal / consensual informed choices for themselves. Therefore, the only way you can create such an imposition is via coercive force. At that point, you are swinging in range of other people's noses, and you deserve what you get, IMHO.
Your valid options, just as mine, are:
o Ignore whatever it is.
o Turn away.
o Stop exploring.
You can also, of course, whine about it. That is perfectly within your rights; but remember that everyone else has essentially the same options in re your whining:
o Ignore you.
o Turn away.
o Stop interacting with you altogether.
o Whine about you in turn.
If the actors / participants in the recording or performance are informed and okay with their actions; if the audience that wishes to consume the performance is informed and okay with their actions; then it's okay. End of story. Nothing says you have to participate in the performance, or hang around and consume any more of it than an identifying glance would subject you to; nothing says you have to think about anything you might have seen; nothing says you shouldn't, either – but there is not even a hint in any of that which says that you have any right to interfere.
If you wish to live in a world without other people making choices for themselves, then stock up on food, money for the tax man, lock your doors and shutter your windows. Otherwise, suffer along with the rest of us, and risk being offended by the personal and consensual choices of others from time to time. It's not all that hard to live with. Sometimes – frankly – it's quite funny.