[Prev |Next |Index] 02.22.96, taggarj@peak.org, Corvallis, OR USA

                           24 Hours of Democracy
                             and maybe more...

                            by Jonathan Taggart
                             aka The Professor
                              taggarj@peak.org

     Why am I doing this? Hundreds if not thousands of people are already
writing essays and with the amount information available to people on the
net, chances are no one will ever see this. So why do I write this? Because
I can.
     The internet is free. We are our own governing force and we decide
what is right and wrong. Censoring the entire net is like saying no one can
own a gun since all criminals use guns. We are not all pedophilic leches
who send bomb recipes to each other. We use the internet to learn and
communicate with others.
     I have met people from all over the world that I would never have if
not for the net. My friends from high school and junior high are scattered
all over the country, even the world, yet I can still talk to them pretty
much any time I want. And we can talk about anything we want... supposedly.
     Uncle Sam wants to monitor what I say to MY friends. This is not his
job. This is my job. If my friend does not like what I say, then they
either talk with me about it or they ask me to stop. It's that's simple.
The people who provide the internet connection for me are not responsible
for what I say, despite what the government would like to have happen.
     Our founding fathers never could have imagined in their wildest dreams
the internet, television, radio, faxes, cellular phones, and all the other
high-tech equipment that we use to communicate with each other.
Nevertheless, we still have that basic right of Freedom of Speech. It does
not matter how we speak. Just that we keep doing it. To quote Stephen
Hawking: "All we have to do is make sure we keep talking."
     Fight the governments decision to censor what we do and say. Do not
think that you are the only one fighting and that you can not make a
difference. You can. We all can. This wondrous tool is ours and we do not
want to lose it.

                          [24 Hours of Democracy]