[ First | Prev | Next | Index | Wander ] [Image] Ron Romano CT, USA Cyberty! When Free Speech is Outlawed, only Outlaws will have Free Speech! Hey... the Second Amendment is dead, the Fourth is on the ropes and the Tenth is under attack—why leave the First running around loose to cause trouble...? As Americans, we're witnessing nothing less than the dismantling of our Constitution. But, since most of us don't even know what it says, that hasn't been much of a challenge. At least not until Cyberspace became accessible to We the People. Cyberspace provides anyone with a "public broadcasting" channel of their very own and easy, direct access to the text of laws, proposed laws, and the Constitution itself all with a mouse-click. Cyberspace has become "the great leveler". So, like the gun-control-junkies and the militia-control-junkies before them, the spin-control-junkies have magnified .01% of Cyberspace in order to judge, and ultimately subjugate, the other 99.99%. It happened on February 8th, 1996. We should get something straight up front here: * Before the CDA, there existed sufficient laws to protect children from the damaging effects of pornography and obscenity. * Period. * The Communications Decency Act is nothing less than an attempt by the Fearistocracy to cut off public access to Cyberspace. To quote Chris Coen, who very clearly spelled out the obvious: "As principle owner of an access and content provider, I have had to give this issue a lot of thought. … if they decide that service providers are responsible for monitoring and censoring the information on the servers they connect to the Internet, the effect could be devastating to users. … there is nothing to keep users from posting offensive binaries to alt.test or rec.pets.cats, even though those are not groups intended to carry such posts. ... The only answer for a provider of our size is to axe the whole service. … We also allow users to have home pages. ... what should we do when a user puts up a page on treating sexual dysfunctions or civil rights advocacy? ... Again, the only way we can avoid playing the role of big brother is to discontinue World Wide Web hosting altogether. … it could easily end up that only the wealthiest (and morally pure, whatever that means) interests are the ones providing content on the web. No more Sissy and Suck, no more ant farms or anagrams. Those types of things that make the web interesting, but they may end up as only brief sparks in the history of a medium that became nothing more than yet another method to pump advertising into consumers. The threat is not just to specific content, but to continued ability for individuals to publish and access information on the Internet." Obviously, the Fearistocracy responsible for the CDA has examined this same line of reasoning. But why would one want to remove the public's ability to publish information for all the world to see? Answer: Spin Control. Since one can't simply order people around (yet) in a Democracy, the simplest alternative is: manipulate them. Ever wonder why there's so much bad news? The reason is because the information we get from the "accepted" media is carefully sensationalized, filtered and spun to produce the type of fearful mindset that leads to 'public support' of inherently bad laws like the CDA. The same was done with the Brady Law. And the so-called "assault weapons" ban. Now a similar process has started, beginning with the media finger-pointing at the "militias" as culprits in the Oklahoma City Tragedy, to grease the skids for HR 2580, cleverly titled the "Republican Form of Government Guarantee Act". These guys are on a roll, and they know it. But what if there were a balanced coverage of the issues? Boggles the mind, doesn't it. Well, there is! Anyone with the time and inclination can, at this moment, find megabytes of data pointing out, for instance, the many ways in which our elected "public servants" have violated the trust that We the People have placed in them. Like any other body of data, one has to sift through it to separate the wheat from the chaff. But here in C-space, we now have the opportunity to do that for ourselves. As Cyberspace becomes more accessible to We the People, and stretches beyond those of us nerds who didn't trust government in the first place, this type of information becomes lethal. Only one group would fear its accessibility to the common person: the Fearistocracy. Cyberty (rhymes with Liberty) is my word for the new freedoms we, until February 8th, 1996, have enjoyed in this previously Undiscovered Country called Cyberspace. There's a lot going on here, under the covers, that many of the netizens and cybernauts don't consciously recognize. For instance, there are no artificial, geo-political borders in Cyberspace. Everything is potentially connected to everything. And, in much the same manner as the philosophy espoused in Truth & Hope, Everyone is ultimately connected to Everyone. We are drawn to this technology that connects our physical manifestations as separate human beings. I believe this is because it reflects our real connection as spiritual beings—a connection that we have sublimated, for whatever reason, as part of our human/material existence. In pursuing the activities facilitated through this new-found Cyberty, we come that much closer to recognizing our True Selves. We hardly need bureaucrats to tell us how to do that. Give me Cyberty or pass the bit bucket! Democracy Fearistocracy Honor & Trust Betrayal Truth & Hope [ First | Prev | Next | Index | Wander ] [ First | Prev | Next | Index | Wander ]