Bill Would Extend Online Obscenity Laws to Blogs, Mailing Lists 443
Erris writes "Senator John McCain has proposed a bill to extend federal obscenity reporting guidelines to all forms of internet communications. Those who fail to report according to guidelines could face fines of up to $300,000 for unreported posts to a blog or mailing list. The EFF was quick to slam the proposal, saying that this was the very definition of 'slippery slope', and citing the idea of 'personal common carrier'." From the article: "These types of individuals or businesses would be required to file reports: any Web site with a message board; any chat room; any social-networking site; any e-mail service; any instant-messaging service; any Internet content hosting service; any domain name registration service; any Internet search service; any electronic communication service; and any image or video-sharing service."
Re:What's that smell in the air? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:What's that smell in the air? (Score:2, Insightful)
playing the pedo card (Score:1, Insightful)
The more is censored... (Score:5, Insightful)
Give people their free speech. If you don't like what they say, don't listen, but respect their rights.
And it's both sides... (Score:4, Insightful)
So who do we vote for now? Democrats had their fun with censorship in the 80s and 90s, now it's Republicans turn.
Come and join us in the land of the free... (Score:4, Insightful)
Remind me why you chaps had the revolution again? There was something in there about Freedom, but its all been lost in the noise.
Re:Wtf (Score:3, Insightful)
I'm far from pro-sex-offender, but I think we have a problem when we're putting streakers and 18-year-olds hooking up with 17-year-olds in the same category as child molesters and rapists. You can't get away with the same restrictions on minor sex offenders as you could on major ones, in my opinion. I can see "If you're a rapist, then no MySpace", but I can't see "no Facebook for dumb drunks who streak in the dead of night".
Re:Anti obscenity laws? (Score:3, Insightful)
Seriously though, this kind of thing scares the hell out of me. I think that things like the "barely legal" scene and other pornography that depicts or 'disguises' older women as teenagers is pretty fucking pathetic, but that just means I don't engage in it, doesn't mean I'm going to go out and "ruin" it for anybody else. Nobody is hurt by it and it sure as shit isn't my place to decide what consenting adults can look at or even produce.
If anybody can explain to me why these so awfully 'moral' people want to fuck with everybody else quietly minding their own business, I'd really appreciate it.
he wants obscenity reported? (Score:5, Insightful)
He wants obscenity reported? Please report to him that the following message was posted:
(The easily offended should skip the rest of this post.)
(Last chance to look away...)
Fuck Senator John McCain. Fuck him up the ass hard with a big thick dildo with built-in violet wand [sexuality.org] until the santorum [spreadingsantorum.com] runs down his legs. Tie him down and fuck him and give him the golden shower he wants and deserves, until he admits his wretchedness, admits what a bootlicker he is, admits that he gets off on being a slave, because he can't handle freedom.
Re:Actually (Score:5, Insightful)
- Over 12 million living in poverty
- 40-50 million without health care
- 25% of the worlds prison population
- 46800 car deaths in 2005
- Every 90-second a car is colliding with a train due to lacking regulations if crossing.
- Higher education costs and arm and a leg and your first born.
This country has some serious problems to deal with, but obscenity is not one of them!
Well, if this passes... (Score:5, Insightful)
Seriously, who would risk running a public forum in the face of fines like that? Even major players like Amazon would most likely be forced to take down public comment sections lest something slip through. Slashdot, Fark, Kos, Pandagon, Redstate, LGF, whatever your online bitching kink is, it's going away.
And suddenly Americans would have to go onto foreign servers just to find a forum to exercise their free speech rights.
See, here's what REALLY pisses me off. McCain isn't stupid. He's many things (repeating many of which, at this point, could possibly get me jailed), but stupid is not one of them. Either he's offering up this bill with no intention of seeing it passed, or he recognizes the death of free speech on the American internet as an acceptible price to pay for his rise to power.
Every time I see a bill like this, I grow a little less convinced that there's any way we'll be able to reclaim our government from these assholes.
Extension of McCain/Feingold (Score:5, Insightful)
What a scummy little man.
Don't count on it. (Score:3, Insightful)
Right up until they build a National Firewall. Which of course, is the only way to keep our children safe. And to keep out the terrorists. And Mexicans.
When a law doesn't work, the politicians don't just give up and say "well, hey, that was a really dumb idea! Let's never do that again!" No, instead they find a way to make it enforceable. Which is why you always have to be concerned when someone is passing an unenforceable law. Look at what it would take to make it enforceable on everyone, and that's what they're going to be asking for next year after it gets passed, and falls flat on its face.
Re:Wtf (Score:5, Insightful)
That depends, are these "rapists" free? If you committed a crime and are released from prison, it's my position that you've paid your debt to society. If you haven't, then shouldn't you still be in prison? If we are pushing this once a criminal always a criminal mantra then why even let convicts out of jail in the first place if we are just gonna let the free world become another prison cell, gradually restricting their access to resources.
Either sentence them for longer, clean up the system, or do something that works. Don't punish them after they've already been punished. It's bad enough that they won't ever be able to vote or get a job better than grocery bagger, you have to start restricting their online rights to save "children" from "potential risks." How about _not_ scaremongering about children and saving our rights instead?
It's a slippery slope, first, restrict rights for convicts. Then, outlaw things to make everyone a potential convict. Bang...restricted rights. With the way people talk about online piracy, it's only a matter of time before that's criminal, and then after that's criminal maybe restricting the rights of those who have been convicted upon release.
I hate to be paranoid, but in Philadelphia they've installed security cameras on the streets. It's not long before you pick your nose and it's on the evening news.
Re:Come and join us in the land of the free... (Score:2, Insightful)
Everyone wants to dump on the US at every chance they get, but you could at least try to base it on REAL shortcomings.
This is one guy, out of 100, in the senate, proposing something that the senate, the house, and the president would have to approve of.
Then it would have to stand-up to court challenges, which this is practically guaranteed not to.
And after that, it could also be voted out by any subsequent congress.
The moral of the story is, you're bitching about nothing at all. Lots of noise has been made, by people like yourself, about the US' recent actions, but we've handled far worse over the past 230 years, and with a little time, everything eventually gets worked out for the better.
Re:hahaha (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:John McCain loses more of my respect every day (Score:4, Insightful)
When will Democrats stop trying to play on the Republican's field? GET THE HOME COURT ADVANTAGE, FOLKS! Run on your issues, make them *your* issues. Stop trying to look like a Republican.
Damned if you do, damned if you don't (Score:5, Insightful)
Every now and then, somebody would set up a website on their system and upload kiddy porn.
He tried being a good citizen and reporting it. Several times. The authorities didn't follow up, they simply made angry threats to arrest him.
His company now silently deletes kiddy porn sites.
Playing devil's advocate, though, how is this proposal different from the existing legislation that requires health care providers to report suspected child abuse?
Re:Actually (Score:3, Insightful)
I consider myself a moralist, but I don't even want to be put in the same company as your average evangelical censor.
Re:hahaha (Score:5, Insightful)
Marriage was around long before any of the major religions of today (Islam, Christianity) and served as a political bond joining property and fortune well before Christ, Mohammed, or Zeus. Religion may want to co-opt marriage (and I can certainly understand why, it's a control mechanism similar to, and related to, sexual control) but history doesn't support the claim that marriage is religious.
As for the government's interest, this is relatively natural: When you join in property, medical and fiscal responsibility, residence, and income, only a perfect government would be able to keep its hot little hands out of the pot. And hoo boy, is our government not perfect!
Religion's no better. As soon as sexuality and joining come into it, next thing you know there is some person trying to tell you exactly how you should be managing your affairs. One wife, not two. Opposite sex partners only. This age disparity, and no more. This color, and not that. This religion, and not another. History supports a much wider set of joinings, and for very good reason -- they're perfectly natural.
So to your idea of religion having all there is to say about marriage, I say, "take off, eh?" Marriage should be what the partners (2...n) say it is, and the rest of us should respect that. It should not be subject to Christian or Muslim or even ancient Greek sensibilities. When people want to join together and seek their fortune and lives together the rest of us have only one job: Get the heck out of the way.
Re:hahaha (Score:2, Insightful)
Then, and only then will we have "gotten the heck out of the way." But then again, it's not about marriage... it's about securing property and assets... so it IS economic, and not social. Therefore, it should be called something else and regulated by the government.
Problem solved.
Re:hahaha (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Wtf (Score:3, Insightful)
I shouldn't have a choice.
It simply a matter of... (Score:4, Insightful)
Most elected officials already have a set philosphy in place when they are elected. Unless something drastic happens, their views won't change.
However, it's more of the public's fault since we elect these people to represent us in the first place. So if your poll is true... American's are some of the worst voters out there.
Re:hahaha (Score:3, Insightful)
As in most expensive, or best value for what you get?
Re:Little Nit (Score:5, Insightful)
I think it is very clear what it should mean. A declaration of partnership based upon serious, long term commitment by individuals who are both capable of understanding that precise commitment up front (the classic definition of intelligent, informed consent) and able to represent that fact in a legal and comprehensible manner. Such declaration may be public, or not, and it should -- not does, but should -- carry with it such legal obligations as the participants have agreed upon, and no others. Socially, it's dead obvious: "This is my partner, please treat them as you would me." Simple, easy to deal with, no worries.
When people say "we're married", that's what I think of. As to the specifics, these only matter when legal issues come up; and that is why paperwork stating the terms is such a good idea in today's world. Otherwise, some idiot could tell you you could not have a say in the treatment of the love(s) of your life if they were in the hospital, or that you could not have a say in the schooling of your offspring. Marriage, in the end, is a state that is intended to benefit the individuals involved. Not the rest of us as onlookers. If they wanted our opinion, surely we would have been invited to the ceremony, or made signatory on the paperwork.
Yes, however what you are arguing for here isn't "specific" meaning, it is canned meaning. I would argue that every human partnership involves different stakes, different foundations, different preconceptions, different commitment, and therefore just as when forming a specific type of business, you'll want a specific type of agreement tailored to your union. What those specifics are matter primarily to the members of the union, and are otherwise not much of anyone else's business until such time as a question of parenting or hospital visitation or the like comes up; at that time, you whip out your paperwork, point to the appropriate clause, and you're done.
Communications about what a union means would be vastly enhanced by a thorough hammering out of what one is agreeing to, it seems to me. Opportunities for improvement abound: No wife would find she had unwittingly become a dishwasher or drudge; no husband would find that his wife's last day of interest in sex was the day before they were married; no child would find itself stripped of a parent. Services to assist in hammering out such agreements would become widely available; sounds optimum to me.
Oh, I'm being perfectly honest. And honestly, what you want for anyone's marriage but your own and your offspring's is completely irrelevant to me. What I say is marriage for me, is marriage. Period. You don't have even a fraction of a say. Honestly. :) When it comes to you telling me what marriage is for you, then I'll listen, and I'll respect that, all the more so if you can make it clear. Marriage isn't religious to or for me, because religion doesn't intercept with any part of my life. Consequently, I don't give a flying hoot what any religion has to say about my marriage, or lack thereof, any more than I would if an astrologer tried to tell me I should live in some particular fashion. Superstition isn't a solid enough foundation for any fraction of a relationship I enter into, I can assure you. If it is for you, that's something else entirely, and I encourage you to have it your way. And I promise not to bother you about it; if that's the way you and your partner(s) roll, by all means, have at it.
Re:hahaha (Score:1, Insightful)
Man, don't you miss the days when "society as a whole" recognized that it was okay to have slaves? I heard that maybe one or two slaves believed it was wrong or something, but that doesn't matter... society as a whole said it was all good!
Re:Little Nit (Score:3, Insightful)
Clearly this isn't limited to homosexual relationships- heterosexual marriages often (usually?) end in divorce, and often the participants in the original marriage get remarried, thus opening it up to "You're not my real father" or "why should I support your kid" types of situations. Additionally, the phrase "both parents give their children full affection" in the context of heterosexual marriage implies that homosexual couples are unfit parents, unable to give the child their full affection. In any case, any given set of a man and a woman can crap out a child, regardless of whether or not it is wanted. It takes extra effort for a homosexual couple to obtain a child, thus ensuring the child is loved and wanted.
* Men and women desire exclusive access to their spouse - sexual, emotional, financial, mental, etc... Relationships with more than two people do not have the exclusivity privelege enjoyed by married couples. That is, one "spouse" will have to be shared by more than one of the other "spouses".
If the individuals in question desire exclusive access to their spouse, then they should not enter into a polygamous relationship. However, that should be left up to the individual consenting adults to decide if they want to enter into a plural marriage.
* The couple as a whole makes more intellectually and emotionally balanced, and less self-centered decisions. The complementarity of the sexes forces the couple to consider both feminine and masculine points of view when making decisions. A relationship between two men could exist without any consideration of how their public decisions (i.e. voting, politics, charity, etc...) affect women. Likewise, the relationship of two women would be unlikely to create any sense of understanding or compassion for masculine points of view.
The exclusively-male and exclusively-female couples should then balance each other out
To use your logic, the public decisions of heterosexual voters don't exactly show any sense of understanding or compassion for the homosexuals who want to get married, eh?
* The union of man and woman usually produces offspring, and the raising of children provides a service essential to the future of the state. Unions of only men or only women do not have the procreative potential and do not provide the essential service of future generation to the state. This reason alone would be sufficient for the state to recognize a union of one man and one woman as distinct from civil unions for the purposes of law.
I didn't realize there was a shortage of children in this country. In any case, I don't think allowing two men or two women to marry each other will contribute to a decline in the birth rate. Generally, people who are heterosexual enter into heterosexual relationships and get married and have children, while people who are homosexual enter into homosexual relationships, don't get married, and don't have children. Do you really think that if homosexual marriage was allowed, a bunch of straight people would suddenly say "enough of this opposite-sex crap. I'm off to get gay-married, to live a childless life of debauchery!"
On the contrary... (Score:1, Insightful)
Add to this the poster's failure to include the contextual data needed to correctly interpret that survey results. The poster neither provided the name of the original source nor a direct link to any of the survey data used. This, combined with the middle ground fallacy result is the appearance of bias on the part of the poster. Right or wrong, the poster's arguments remain unconvincing to anyone who does not already share a similar point of view.