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Author Topic: David Cameron's anti-magic "inquisition"...!  (Read 2962 times)

Sophia C

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David Cameron's anti-magic "inquisition"...!
« on: July 29, 2013, 08:20:53 am »
I'm trying to put out fires all over Facebook today. People are in a tizzy over this:

https://www.openrightsgroup.org/blog/2013/sleepwalking-into-censorship

I am *utterly* against censorship of any kind, and will be signing the petition about this regardless of the categories censored. However, the Open Rights group appears to have caused panic and outrage in the Pagan community by showing 'esoteric material' as an example of a possible topic that might be censored. And now there's this blog post, which is making people irrational before we have any idea whether this is actually a Thing.

The group has just edited its article, at the top, to point out that "the category examples are based on current mobile configurations and broad indications from ISPs," but people are still jumping on the WE R OPPRESSED bandwagon.

"Inquisition"....?!

Thoughts?
"We're all stories, in the end. Make it a good one, eh?"
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Sarah

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Re: David Cameron's anti-magic "inquisition"...!
« Reply #1 on: July 29, 2013, 08:44:24 am »
Quote from: Naomi J;117227
I'm trying to put out fires all over Facebook today. People are in a tizzy over this:

https://www.openrightsgroup.org/blog/2013/sleepwalking-into-censorship

I am *utterly* against censorship of any kind, and will be signing the petition about this regardless of the categories censored. However, the Open Rights group appears to have caused panic and outrage in the Pagan community by showing 'esoteric material' as an example of a possible topic that might be censored. And now there's this blog post, which is making people irrational before we have any idea whether this is actually a Thing.

The group has just edited its article, at the top, to point out that "the category examples are based on current mobile configurations and broad indications from ISPs," but people are still jumping on the WE R OPPRESSED bandwagon.

"Inquisition"....?!

Thoughts?

 
I don't really understand how this is any sort of censorship. Am I right In understanding that the person who pays the bill for the internet is the one who decides what to block? if so how is that censorship?
Knowing when to use a shovel is what being a witch is all about. Nanny Ogg, Witches Abroad

Sophia C

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Re: David Cameron's anti-magic "inquisition"...!
« Reply #2 on: July 29, 2013, 08:56:20 am »
Quote from: maybeimawitch;117229
I don't really understand how this is any sort of censorship. Am I right In understanding that the person who pays the bill for the internet is the one who decides what to block? if so how is that censorship?

 
Well, that is a good point. It's sort of 'offered' censorship. My concern is that other measures might be taken that go further - but, yes, the current plans are simply to put a checklist in front of people when they set up their home internet access, with category checkboxes that are ticked by default. It's the 'by default' that people are protesting, as well as the specific categories chosen (why some things instead of others?) But nothing is forced, no. A very good point.
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Aranel

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Re: David Cameron's anti-magic "inquisition"...!
« Reply #3 on: July 29, 2013, 09:02:38 am »
Quote from: maybeimawitch;117229
I don't really understand how this is any sort of censorship. Am I right In understanding that the person who pays the bill for the internet is the one who decides what to block? if so how is that censorship?

 
No, they don't get to decide, it's blocked for them. If you want to unblock it then you have to tell your ISP that you want to look at porn which is something people might not feel comfortable with doing.
I'm fully expecting to disappear off here and my other forums including all my self-harm and mental health support forums* as soon as this filter comes into place. Because the bill-payer for the internet in this place won't want their name to be on the list of porn-watchers.


*they're the kind which allow you to talk about self-harming and don't allow obnoxious people to lecture you on how you shouldn't do it just so they can stroke their own egos and based on my experiences with school/library filters, the websites that are full of the obnoxious people will be allowed and the websites that do actually help and support you, will be blocked

(will reply to the OP in a minute )

Sophia C

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Re: David Cameron's anti-magic "inquisition"...!
« Reply #4 on: July 29, 2013, 09:06:09 am »
Quote from: Aranel;117231
No, they don't get to decide, it's blocked for them. If you want to unblock it then you have to tell your ISP that you want to look at porn which is something people might not feel comfortable with doing.


My understanding is that all you have to do is uncheck the boxes when they come up in front of you. No phone calls to ISPs or anything complicated.

There is a potential issue for young adults living with their parents, if, say, they are Pagan and their parents would rather they weren't. But that's a slightly separate issue.
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Jenett

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Re: David Cameron's anti-magic "inquisition"...!
« Reply #5 on: July 29, 2013, 09:15:31 am »
Quote from: maybeimawitch;117229
I don't really understand how this is any sort of censorship. Am I right In understanding that the person who pays the bill for the internet is the one who decides what to block? if so how is that censorship?

 
There's several issues involved here:

1) The filters may also be used widely in public settings (schools, libraries, etc.) where there are a variety of users.

2) There's ongoing issues with filter providers in the US considering their lists of 'what is filtered' to be proprietary information - in other words, basically that you get to choose broad categories, but you don't get additional information about what that actually includes.

(And if you look at the blog post Naomi linked to, clearly people are confused about what 'esoteric information' means.)

3) Because of point 2, people often choose filters poorly. And then get exceedingly confused by why they can't access webpages. One of the arguments here is that rather than present a long list of filters that are preselected, present the list and require people to choose each filter directly. (This helps encourage people to think about what they're choosing. Doesn't solve everything, but it's an improvement.)

4) And filters are *still* not great technology: they have lots of both false positives (blocking stuff they shouldn't, like health information on breast cancer or cooking chicken breasts, rather than, say, photos of breasts) and false negatives (not blocking stuff they really ought to, if they worked like they should.)

You might find a blog post of mine from a couple of years ago,about filtering in a public library, interesting - some of it's not as relevant here, but some of it goes into the larger issues of filtering and problematic stuff about it: http://gleewood.org/threshold/2012/01/04/wicca-censorship-and-the-library/
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Aranel

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Re: David Cameron's anti-magic "inquisition"...!
« Reply #6 on: July 29, 2013, 09:19:59 am »
Quote from: Naomi J;117233
My understanding is that all you have to do is uncheck the boxes when they come up in front of you. No phone calls to ISPs or anything complicated.

There is a potential issue for young adults living with their parents, if, say, they are Pagan and their parents would rather they weren't. But that's a slightly separate issue.

 
It's still telling them though, which the bill-payer here won't do.

So I am screwed. Not just for being pagan, but the aforementioned self-harm sites (which I hold fully responsible for the fact I haven't cut in over a year), all my AR internet activism stuff, and tumblr.

Quote from: Naomi J;117227
I'm trying to put out fires all over Facebook today. People are in a tizzy over this:

https://www.openrightsgroup.org/blog/2013/sleepwalking-into-censorship

I am *utterly* against censorship of any kind, and will be signing the petition about this regardless of the categories censored. However, the Open Rights group appears to have caused panic and outrage in the Pagan community by showing 'esoteric material' as an example of a possible topic that might be censored. And now there's this blog post, which is making people irrational before we have any idea whether this is actually a Thing.

The group has just edited its article, at the top, to point out that "the category examples are based on current mobile configurations and broad indications from ISPs," but people are still jumping on the WE R OPPRESSED bandwagon.

"Inquisition"....?!

Thoughts?

 
I can see it happening. They're doing it for the children so they can block whatever the hell they like. Because think of the children!

Sarah

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Re: David Cameron's anti-magic "inquisition"...!
« Reply #7 on: July 29, 2013, 10:01:13 am »
Quote from: Aranel;117235
It's still telling them though, which the bill-payer here won't do.

So I am screwed. Not just for being pagan, but the aforementioned self-harm sites (which I hold fully responsible for the fact I haven't cut in over a year), all my AR internet activism stuff, and tumblr.


 
I can see it happening. They're doing it for the children so they can block whatever the hell they like. Because think of the children!

 
I actually think its really important that children can't access porn and  that adults can't access child porn
Knowing when to use a shovel is what being a witch is all about. Nanny Ogg, Witches Abroad

Aranel

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Re: David Cameron's anti-magic "inquisition"...!
« Reply #8 on: July 29, 2013, 10:12:47 am »
Quote from: maybeimawitch;117237
I actually think its really important that children can't access porn and  that adults can't access child porn

 
I'm all for children not accessing porn. Most people do tend to be. What I am against is that as a person who does not have, and never will have, children, I am forced accept censorship of perfectly legal things because of shitty parents who are too lazy to use the many, many measures available to them already to prevent their children from accessing porn.

(This is a general "you" to parents)
If you have children, you bloody well parent them. Don't demand that the government does your parenting for you at the expense of other people. If you're too lazy to bother doing then that you shouldn't have children. Having  children does not mean that society has to do your parenting for you and it also does not give you the right to demand that the rest of society curtails to what you want because you think you have a god-like status as a "parent".

Child porn is a separate issue which is already illegal and doesn't come under censorship of legal things.

Sarah

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Re: David Cameron's anti-magic "inquisition"...!
« Reply #9 on: July 29, 2013, 10:15:22 am »
Quote from: Aranel;117238
I'm all for children not accessing porn. Most people do tend to be. What I am against is that as a person who does not have, and never will have, children, I am forced accept censorship of perfectly legal things because of shitty parents who are too lazy to use the many, many measures available to them already to prevent their children from accessing porn.

(This is a general "you" to parents)
If you have children, you bloody well parent them. Don't demand that the government does your parenting for you at the expense of other people. If you're too lazy to bother doing then that you shouldn't have children. Having  children does not mean that society has to do your parenting for you and it also does not give you the right to demand that the rest of society curtails to what you want because you think you have a god-like status as a "parent".

Child porn is a separate issue which is already illegal and doesn't come under censorship of legal things.

 
But once you are paying for your own internet they won't be censored because you wont be ticking those boxes. And I actually think that parenting is a collective society responsibility
Knowing when to use a shovel is what being a witch is all about. Nanny Ogg, Witches Abroad

Aranel

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Re: David Cameron's anti-magic "inquisition"...!
« Reply #10 on: July 29, 2013, 10:28:25 am »
Quote from: maybeimawitch;117239
But once you are paying for your own internet they won't be censored because you wont be ticking those boxes. And I actually think that parenting is a collective society responsibility

 
Actually it still will be. Because it's enforced censorship. And if they've put this filter in place, who knows what else they will decide needs to be censored from everybody and not give people the option to uncheck a box about, because the system is now going to be there for them to do it. This is the beginning of a very, very slippery slope. We might not get quite like China but this is the beginning of the path.


Parenting is NOT a collective society responsibility. If a person has a child, they are responsible for parenting it. Nobody else it. I am not and no fucking way will I ever have anybody tell me I am responsible for somebody else's little brat.

Jenett

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Re: David Cameron's anti-magic "inquisition"...!
« Reply #11 on: July 29, 2013, 10:31:52 am »
Quote from: maybeimawitch;117237
I actually think its really important that children can't access porn and  that adults can't access child porn

 
Except that, y'know, the existing filters are actually *REALLY BAD* at both of those. Checking a little box is not sufficient to solve that problem. And people thinking the filters will catch it is even more of a problem.

(Filters of this kind also catch information that young adults who are, say, in abusive relationships, or being sexually abused by a family member, etc. may really really need. Which is to say, there can also be a lot of potential damage *from* filtering, not protection from damage.)

And, of course, if you look at the blog post Naomi linked, only one of those categories is pornography. (I think it's also entirely reasonable for parents to limit their child's viewing of violent material, extremist material, and a couple of other things. But the rest of it? If you want to filter it for your kids, I think you should have to make that decision and act on it, not have it directed by the ISP, and not through something as non-nuanced as a row of clicky boxes.)

I used to do volunteer work for the terms of service team for a sizeable online site, and the stuff that people post is, at times, exceedingly disturbing. But that's something parents can sort out for themselves, to their preferences. (Along with sensible things like appropriate supervision.) Pushing it at the ISP level is problematic unless it's very carefully designed, because of the lack of granularity and lack of information about what exactly is affected.
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Sarah

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Re: David Cameron's anti-magic "inquisition"...!
« Reply #12 on: July 29, 2013, 10:36:11 am »
Quote from: Jenett;117241
Except that, y'know, the existing filters are actually *REALLY BAD* at both of those. Checking a little box is not sufficient to solve that problem. And people thinking the filters will catch it is even more of a problem.

(Filters of this kind also catch information that young adults who are, say, in abusive relationships, or being sexually abused by a family member, etc. may really really need. Which is to say, there can also be a lot of potential damage *from* filtering, not protection from damage.)

And, of course, if you look at the blog post Naomi linked, only one of those categories is pornography. (I think it's also entirely reasonable for parents to limit their child's viewing of violent material, extremist material, and a couple of other things. But the rest of it? If you want to filter it for your kids, I think you should have to make that decision and act on it, not have it directed by the ISP, and not through something as non-nuanced as a row of clicky boxes.)

I used to do volunteer work for the terms of service team for a sizeable online site, and the stuff that people post is, at times, exceedingly disturbing. But that's something parents can sort out for themselves, to their preferences. (Along with sensible things like appropriate supervision.) Pushing it at the ISP level is problematic unless it's very carefully designed, because of the lack of granularity and lack of information about what exactly is affected.

 
I get all that, and I think this whole thing is sledghammer to nut and that Cameron doesn't give a crap anyway but I do believe we should be making porn much less accessible for children to get hold of
Knowing when to use a shovel is what being a witch is all about. Nanny Ogg, Witches Abroad

Sarah

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Re: David Cameron's anti-magic "inquisition"...!
« Reply #13 on: July 29, 2013, 10:37:18 am »
Quote from: Aranel;117240
Actually it still will be. Because it's enforced censorship. And if they've put this filter in place, who knows what else they will decide needs to be censored from everybody and not give people the option to uncheck a box about, because the system is now going to be there for them to do it. This is the beginning of a very, very slippery slope. We might not get quite like China but this is the beginning of the path.


Parenting is NOT a collective society responsibility. If a person has a child, they are responsible for parenting it. Nobody else it. I am not and no fucking way will I ever have anybody tell me I am responsible for somebody else's little brat.

 
It's not enforced if you CHOOSE it. And it's ridiculous to equate it to China
Knowing when to use a shovel is what being a witch is all about. Nanny Ogg, Witches Abroad

Skyth

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Re: David Cameron's anti-magic "inquisition"...!
« Reply #14 on: July 29, 2013, 11:05:21 am »
Quote from: maybeimawitch;117242
I get all that, and I think this whole thing is sledghammer to nut and that Cameron doesn't give a crap anyway but I do believe we should be making porn much less accessible for children to get hold of

 
I don't believe that porn shouldn't be accessible to children...especially not teens.  It just feeds into the whole 'sex is bad' message.

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