A raging debate exists today about the content of the internet and whether it should be regulated by the government. The key to this issue can be found by looking how history is only repeating itself: in the same way that governments and other organizations have tried to censor books in the past, the internet is now the target for censorship. The issues and arguments are the same, but the main difference is the playing field on which the battles over censorship are being fought. Until it is recognized by the majority of the public and government officials that free speech is as much a right on the internet as it is in printed and spoken word, the fight over whether the internet should be censored will continue to be fought. Although it is true that, by almost every community’s standards, many sites on the internet are obscene and degenerate, the government should not attempt to sacrifice free speech to make the internet a place free from all from materials that will offend the standards of the community. The United States government should continue to, as it has in the past, protect the First Amendment right to free speech even when that speech is offensive to the community as a whole. However, the rights given by freedom of speech do carry responsibilities. If the government is to stay out and let the people make value judgements about the content of the internet, netizens (citizens of the internet) must take responsibility for what they post. Also, parents need to take responsibility for what kind of sites they allow their children to visit, as well as providing some means of protection when their children are using the internet unsupervised.
The need for free speech on the internet can best be illustrated by comparing it to the way that the freedom of the printing press changed the society of the fifteenth century. Gutenberg’s printing press was a revolutionary invention that changed forever the way that the world would communicate. It made possible the mass production of printed information, allowing for the first time the spread of an idea from one person to a large and far reaching audience. The Catholic church was eager to use the printing press for its own uses, such as printing theological texts and printed indulgences, but it was worried at the same time because it could not effectively control everything that was printed. Only when the power to censor the printed word was taken away from the Catholic church was it possible for the people to have the freedom necessary for the technological and social advances that have shaped our world since then. Since the people needed no longer to blindly believe what the church told them was the truth, there were many discussions about the truth and whether the Catholic church was correct in all its beliefs. The invention of the printing press was one of the major causes of the Protestant reformation, which eventually led to the founding of the New World as the Protestants sought a land in which they would be free to believe and practice what they wished.
The printing press also provided a way for members of the scientific community to record and share ideas with other members, making possible many of the advances in the scientific world. The internet is an instantaneous means of communication, bringing the printed word to the next level and allowing advances in all areas of life. By the same token, the internet falls prey to the same faults that exist with the printed word. While it cannot be disputed that the internet is a great tool for good, since it is only a tool, it can also be used for evil. The conflict arises when the members of the community do not agree about what is good and what is evil, leading to one group attempting to censor the other group because it has different beliefs about right and wrong.
One of the first times that the government attempted to censor the use of the internet was in the case of Jake Baker. Baker wrote very graphic and violent stories and then posted them to a newsgroup, but when prosecuted for both these stories and email messages that he sent, he was able to defeat all charges against him based on his right to freedom of speech. Baker was described as a "quiet kid" and he was not the type to attract attention to himself, but when he wrote fictional stories and posted them to the alt.sex newsgroup, he showed a side of himself that excited and offended others (Wallace and Mangan 66). His specialty was "snuff" stories, written in the first person, which he posted so that readers of his stories would either be turned on or offended (Wallace and Mangan 66). He posted four of these sickening and obscene "snuff" stories, but it was the last one, posted on January 9, 1995, that got him into trouble with the University on Michigan where he was a student (Wallace and Mangan 66). The story was brought to the attention of the University by Richard DuVal, an alumnus of the University of Michigan, who was alerted to the story by a friend in Moscow whose daughter had read it (Wallace and Mangan 63). Richard was very disturbed by the story, and when he saw it had originated from his alma mater, he felt that he had to notify the University (Wallace and Mangan 63).
This story was much like the others that Baker had posted, sick and twisted accounts of the violent rape and mutilation of young women, but this time Baker had gone too far. In his final story, Jake used the name "Jane Doe" (a pseudonym), the name of a student with whom he had previously attended a Japanese class at the University (Wallace and Mangan 66). On February 9, after the University had suspended him and forced him to leave the campus because of his latest story, the FBI arrested Baker on the grounds that he had broken a federal statue prohibiting the threatening of someone by using interstate communications (Wallace and Mangan 69). The U.S Attorney was later worried that, because the story did not contain specific plans to carry out the crime and could be construed as merely the fantasy of a perverted mind, he might not be able to make the charge stick (Wallace and Mangan 76). In an attempt to strengthen his case because of his worries, the U.S. Attorney requested on March 15, 1995, that the one charge against Baker be dropped, but that five more be added (Wallace and Mangan 76). His request was granted, and now Baker was facing five counts of "knowingly transmitted communications in interstate and foreign commerce containing a threat to injure another person" (Wallace and Mangan 76). Ironically, Baker was no longer being charged for writing his story, but now he was being prosecuted for five email messages that he exchanged with a person named Arthur Gonda (Wallace and Mangan 76). In these messages Baker discussed with Gonda his detailed plans to carry out his fantasy of rape and torture on a young woman (Wallace and Mangan 76). Arthur Gonda has not been found, and officials believe that the name is a pseudonym since an Arthur Gonda does not exist in tax records and the letters of the last name can be changed to "Gonad" (Miller). On March 22, 1995, Baker’s attorney, Douglas Mulkoff, successfully petitioned the court to dismiss the charges against Baker, since the prosecution had not been able to prove that the content of the email messages were anything more than just a young boy’s fantasies (Wallace and Mangan 76-77).
Baker’s case is interesting because although the stories that he wrote could not be much more despicable and sickening, the FBI did not try to prosecute on the content of any of the stories. Instead they tried to prosecute him based on alleged threats that he had made, and even then they were unsuccessful in making the charges stick. While there is little acceptance for such filth in our modern society, the fact remains that it is protected under freedom of speech, and those who do not wish to be exposed to this sort of filth should look elsewhere for reading material. The fact that Baker was not convicted of any crime further strengthens the idea that the government cannot prosecute for obscenity on the internet without running the risk that it will fail because it is abridging the rights granted to us by the First Amendment.
Besides pornography on the internet, the government is also trying to restrict our freedom of speech by prosecuting online publishers of instructions for making bombs. Especially in the light of the recent terrorist activities such as the Oklahoma City bombing and the letter-bombing done by the Unabomber, the government has recently been more actively attempting to prevent the publication of bomb recipes on the internet. Instructions for making plastic explosives, blowing up cars, making pipe bombs, and other explosive devices can be found quite easily by just using an internet search engine to do a simple search on the words "bomb" and "recipes". These sites usually contain disclaimers and warnings, but the fact remains that if one follows the instructions, he will either be injured or produce a deadly weapon. To the dismay of the government and many organizations, there are two main obstacles preventing the censorship of bomb recipes.
The first obstacle is that it is not technically feasible since many of the sites that publish the recipes are not located on servers within the physical borders of the United States, but rather in other countries such as Great Britain and Sweden (Berman). In order to prevent all postings of bomb recipes, all governments would have to come to an agreement as to what should be blocked from the internet. The global scope of the internet makes it next to impossible for any one government to control it effectively. This concept of the global scope of the internet is eloquently expressed in the Cyberspace Declaration of Independence, "Cyberspace consists of transactions, relationships, and thought itself, arrayed like a standing wave in the web of our communications. Ours is a world that is both everywhere and nowhere, but it is not where bodies live" (Barlow).
The second obstacle that the government faces is that it cannot prevent publication of instructions for making bombs without abridging our freedom of speech. Executive Director of the Center for Democracy and Technology Jerry Berman testified in May of 1995 to the Senate Judiciary Committee, saying that just publishing recipes to make bombs should be protected by the First Amendment. He supported his assertion by citing the Supreme Court’s decision in Brandenberg v. Ohio, 395 U. S. 444 (1969), in which a "two-pronged test" was established. He said that this test consisted of whether the publication "is directed to inciting or producing imminent lawless action" or "likely to ... produce such action" (Berman). Since the publication on the internet of just the recipe for a bomb cannot be proved to be inciting or producing imminent lawless action, nor is it likely to produce such an action, the publisher of the recipe cannot be prosecuted. Although Berman makes a good point, it is difficult to distinguish the line between publications that are likely to incite an action and those that are just providing information. The thing to remember is that once again, the crux of the issue has already been dealt with, and just because these publications are now on the internet does not mean that the government needs to develop a whole new set or laws.
Although so far we have looked at individual areas of attempted censorship by the government, by far the widest reaching legislation that the United States has tried to implement is the Communications Decency Act, otherwise known as the CDA. On February 8, 1996, President Clinton signed the CDA into law as a part of the Telecommunications Reform Bill of 1996. Since the Telecommunication Reform Bill was "the first major overhaul of telecommunications law in almost 62 years," some members of Congress decided it would be a good time to try to tack on a censorship act, which became the CDA (Federal Communications Commission). The CDA contained three controversial provisions for new categories of felony crimes, the first of which was if a person
Fortunately, having seen the CDA coming and realizing that it stood on weak legal footing, the ACLU and other organizations challenged it in the United States Supreme Court on the same day that President Clinton signed it into law. They outlined how the CDA restricts the freedom of speech provided by the First Amendment and is therefore unconstitutional. In their Brief of Appellees, one of their main arguments was that although the courts had in the past ruled that free speech could not be forced to conform to contain only what was allowable for minors, this was in essence what the CDA would do. Since it would be difficult, if not impossible, for companies to determine whether a person accessing their site was a minor, they would have to censor what they put on their site to fit within the guidelines for what the government thought that minors should be able to view (ACLU et al. (1)(A)).
Another of the ACLU’s main arguments was that "even the CDA's total ban will be ineffective at ridding online networks of ‘indecent’ material" because of the global nature of the internet (ACLU et al. (2)(B)(1)). In order to fully protect the minors of this country, the United States would need to enforce its standards around the world. No longer can the government censor obscene materials by preventing it from crossing the physical borders of the United States. Because of the strong argument made by the ACLU and other groups, the Supreme Court declared the CDA unconstitutional on June 26, 1997 after hearings were held on March 19, 1997. The overturning of the CDA is most significant when we look at the reasoning behind why it was declared unconstitutional. When the Supreme Court held it up to the First Amendment, it fell short, illustrating again that the government really does not need to develop extensive new regulations to control content on the internet, it only needs to apply the constitutional standards established and already proven to be effective.
Since it is unconstitutional to allow the government to control the internet through restrictive legislation, parents have the responsibility to guide their children so that they can enjoy the internet without running across materials which may be harmful to their emotional and mental well being. According to the Voters Telecommunications Watch in their pamphlet "A Guide to Internet Parenting," parents should protect their children from obscene pornographic sites by spending time with them on the internet and discussing what is appropriate to look at. Parents should also instruct their children never to talk with people they don’t already know, give away their full name, address, or phone number, or look at sites on the web containing material that they would not be allowed to watch on TV (Voters Telecommunications Watch). If parents proactively guide their children’s use of the internet and show them good sites to visit, such as the Lego site and Yahooligans, their children will be less likely to visit undesirable sites, and they will be more likely to develop a healthy understanding of the internet.
Another way that parents can control their children’s use of the internet is by using filtering software to prevent access to pornographic or hate sites. A few of the available programs are CyberPatrol, CYBERsitter, and SurfWatch, all of which work by creating lists of sites that "are deemed inappropriate for access by children" (Center for Democracy and Technology (III)(A)). The greatest threat that exists to filtering technologies is that one or two software packages may predominate, leading to less competition between companies. Once there are just a few companies, the danger exists that these companies will create a narrow definition what they feel is appropriate for their users (Center for Democracy and Technology (III)(B)). When parents use filtering software, they must still monitor an guide their children, since filtering software cannot block every inappropriate site. Another problem is fostered by the vastness of the internet, causing filtering companies to resort to blocking sites based only on key words, which ends up blocking sites that would not considered pornographic. For example, CYBERsitter "blocks the web sites of the National Organization for Women, the International Gay and Lesbian Human Rights Commission, and the Penal Lexicon -- a UK-based web site dedicated to raising awareness of prison conditions in Great Britain" (Peacefire). Whatever parents decide to use to protect their children, they should not give to their children the impression that the internet is a forbidden place, as this will only peak curiosity in the children’s minds that will make it more likely that they will seek out sites that they know their parents would not approve of. They must also be consistent in their approach to all sources of entertainment, not letting children watch things on TV and then telling them that they should not look at those things on the internet.
As we have seen, we must constantly be on guard against infringement of our First Amendment rights on the internet since the government has in the past attempted to censor the content of the internet and what people communicate across it, and they will continue to do so in the future. The government claims to be trying to prevent anarchy and terror by censoring the internet, but if they are allowed to do so, anarchy and terror will reign, but the source of the anarchy will then be the government. The United States of America was founded on the Constitution and the Bill of Rights, and if we allow these to be undermined, the very foundations of our country will be compromised. The US cannot maintain its place of power and influence in the world if we allow the very values that brought there to be thrown aside and trampled on in the name of protecting our children. We cannot allow the government to destroy our children’s future in their name. The beauty of free speech is that rather than needing to silence the minority that proclaim and display what we do not wish to hear and see, the majority can simply drown them out with the sheer volume of good and valuable information. As long as the majority of the netizens of the internet continue to be responsible in using this valuable resource, it will continue to grow and evolve as a civilized community without the restrictive hand of the government. As you consider which side to stand on in the fight for free speech on the internet, take careful consideration that you do not silence the good with the bad by allowing the government to control what should be controlled by the conscience of the internet community.