TNA-GOLD 1/TNA-GOLD - Volume 1.iso/24hours/dennis_p.txt

INI File | 1996-03-11 | 16KB | 290 lines

[Prev|Next|Index] Thu, Feb 22, 1996 Dennis Paulson

DEMOCRACY IN CYBERSPACE

     By Dennis Paulson

     DEMOCRACY IN CYBERSPACE

     By Dennis Paulson

     │Ah, when to the heart of humanity Was it ever less than a
     treason To go with the drift of things, To yield with a grace to
     reason, And bow and accept the end Of a love or a season?▓
     --Robert Frost, late U.S. Poet Laureate

     Throughout our global village, democracy has been, for some, a
     lifelong love; for others, merely a season. Here in the U.S.,
     most have never traveled to nations suf- fering under the
     oppressive boot of dictatorship. Thus, we tend to take our
     universally- admired democracy for granted. . .UNTIL our
     Constitutionally-guaranteed freedoms are threatened.

     This │24 Hours of Democracy▓ celebration in Cyberspace provides
     Americans everywhere with a moment of reflection: to think about
     our freedoms, our democracy, and what they mean to us. . .perhaps
     to even imagine what life would be like if some of them were
     taken from us. WOULD we just go with the drift of things? Yield
     with a grace to others' reason? Bow and accept the end of a love
     or a season?

     Many noble Cyberspace pioneers have seen the possibility of
     Government censor- ship of our Internet coming for years, and
     worked tirelessly to both preclude its neces- sity, as well as
     prepare those who would stand up to fight it,if/when it finally
     arrived. A concerned parent, Bill Duvall, who 25 years ago wrote
     the original software which al- lowed access to the Net, later
     created the first product to make access to inappropriate
     material a matter of personal choice, creating the first true
     alternative to Internet censorship. Many such options now exist,
     but BUSINESS WEEK wrote 2.12.96 of Duvall's prod- uct: "SurfWatch
     is the easiest to use of all options, and was the only product
     that worked flawlessly with the new Windows 95 operating system."
     SurfWatch, of course, produces this alternative to Internet
     Censorship for all operating systems. Concerned parents may con-
     tact them at 1-800-458-6600, or their Website .

     Ignoring these technological alternatives, our Congress--under
     relentless lob- bying by America's politically-well-organized,
     extreme Religious Right--on Feb. 1st ap- proved landmark
     legislation dramatically restricting the First Amendment rights
     of ALL Internet users. And on Feb. 8th, President Clinton, with
     the stroke of his pen, trans- formed the Internet--literally
     overnight--from the freest communications medium in our nation,
     to the most heavily-regulated.

     In massive, spontaneous response, thousands of Websites around
     the world went black, in a 48-hour protest organized by Voters
     Telecom Watch and the Center for Democracy and Technology .
     Simultaneously, the Electronic Frontier Foundation sponsored a
     Free Speech Online Blue Ribbon Cam- paign to raise awareness
     about Internet free speech. The American Civil Liberties Union ,
     of course, immediately accepted the challenge, as did the Nation-
     al Writers Guild, et. al.

     Essentially, our Congress╣s unusually-swift passage--with no
     national debate-- of the Telecommunications Bill and its
     Communications Decency Act (CDA), which President Clinton signed
     into law two weeks ago, has provided us Americans already in
     Cyberspace with our first, serious wake-up call. Why? Because
     this Bill's CDA, because of its well- intentioned aim of
     protecting our children--and rightfully so--from obscenity and
     child- child-pornography, has temporarily lulled the unaware
     majority into going along with the drift of things, of yielding
     with a grace to this Act╣s seeming reason.

     The problem is two-fold. Instead of properly targeting obscenity
     and child- pornography--the transmission of which is ALREADY a
     violation of criminal law--this Act improperly targets so-called
     îindecent╣ speech on our Internet, which is supposedly protected
     by our Constitution╣s First Amendment. Concludes U.S. Sen. Russ
     Feingold, D-Wis.: │While doing nothing to further protect
     children online, the Act compromises the right of every American
     to free speech.▓

     As this law now stands, use of the excretory term, │piss,▓ if
     posted by you on usenet groups or the World Wide Web, qualifies
     you for a $250,000 fine and a two-year stint in a Federal prison.
     Likewise, the Louvre╣s Venus de Milo sculpture, as well as some
     of Michelangelo╣s paintings on the ceiling of Christianity╣s
     Sistene Chapel, could not be shown on our Internet. Similary, the
     BIBLE, itself, could not be printed in Cyber- space today, as it
     contains this dreaded four-letter, character-destroying word,
     │piss▓.

     President Clinton, quickly backpedaling in this Election year,
     has already an- nounced that he will not enforce the Act╣s ban on
     abortion information on the Internet. Women, after all, provided
     the margin of victory for Clinton in l992. And reproductive
     freedom of choice is obviously the Nineties╣ major debate issue,
     with opinions and feel- feelings on both sides running deep and
     even homicidal.

     Our President, however, has apparently left it for the Courts to
     decide whether or not American adults will be restricted to the
     online equivalent of fitting themselves into the miniature chairs
     reserved for children in bookstores and libraries across our
     land--locations, by the way, where many of these so-called
     indecent works of art and lit- erature are still available to
     America╣s children, from Mark Twain╣s HUCKLEBERRY FINN to lyrics
     by groups as diverse as the SMASHING PUMPKINS and those favorites
     of our Vice Presidential couple, the GRATEFUL DEAD.

     Following President Clinton╣s signing of this Bill two weeks ago,
     a Federal judge in Philadelphia, on Feb. l5th, issued a partial,
     temporary restraining order, pro- hibiting enforcement of the
     "indecency" provision of the CD Act, calling the statute "un-
     constitutionally vague". His studied apprehension was similarly
     voiced by concerned citi- zens in every corner of our land, such
     as U.S. Sen. Patrick Leahy, D-Vt, who joined ▓this protest by my
     fellow Internet users▓ by blackening his official Senate Website
     and speak- ing for the hearts of many mainstream citizens in
     concluding:

     │While I do not condone the transmission of obscene material or
     child-pornography on the Net, I believe the solution pro- posed
     in the Telecommunications law will do more to harm the use and
     growth of the Net, without combating the problem for which it is
     intended.▓

     Personally, having given this great nation three of the finest
     years of my life as a U.S. Paratrooper--including two in Asia--I
     have no intention of handing over the Constitutional Freedom of
     Speech I was told I dedicated those three years for. Further, as
     the parent of two young adults now climbing the academic ladder
     in the University of California system, I have a responsibility
     to my own children, and by extrapolation, all of our children, to
     see that these Constitutionally-guaranteed freedoms are not
     abridged (which would also set a VERY dangerous precedent in
     blurring what our nation has long maintained as a necessary
     separation between Church and State).

     Further, having taken my children, a decade ago, across the
     dictatorial nation of Communist China, and then spent three more
     weeks crossing the tiny, neighboring nation of Tibet--where China
     is presently in the 46th year of a now-terminal-stage gen-
     ocide-attempt--I KNOW what it looks like in a modern-day
     Auschwitz. . .once these precious freedoms are stripped away,
     little by little, just as they were in once-free Tibet.

     So here on this national day of celebration in our
     mightily-expanding Cyber- space Community--also marking the birth
     anniversary of our nation╣s first President, George Washington,
     who reportedly could not live with lies of any kind--it╣s approp-
     riate that we all spend a day reflecting on the long-term
     implications of what this Act could do to our precious freedoms.

     Read the various opinions of your Cyberspace sisters and
     brothers--click the 'Your Essay' link on the '24 HOURS OF
     DEMOCRACY' page --and look deeply within your own heart, to see
     what all this inspires in you. Only then should you decide
     whether or not you╣re just going to go along with the drift of
     things, yielding with a grace to so-called reason, bowing and
     accepting the end of a love or a season.

     Just as I and all conscious parents abhor having our children
     exposed to ob- scenity and child-pornography, we similarly abhor
     the mindless violence and gratuitous sex our television and movie
     industries promulgate today. However, as with the overre- action
     of this new Telecom Bill╣s Communications Decency Act--even
     though it will, in all probability, be overturned in the lawsuit
     filed (before the ink was dry on President Clinton╣s signature)
     by the Electronic Frontier Foundation, the American Civil
     Liberties Union, the National Writers╣ Guild, et. al.--we must
     also question whe- ther or not we╣ve used the brilliance of our
     technology as intelligently as we could, in mandating the use of
     the V-chip (so parents can control what their youngsters watch).

     Few would disagree with President Clinton╣s objection to the
     │hours of mind- less violence▓ our youngsters see on TV. And the
     chip, per se, is not the problem, IF it╣s used as a device by
     PARENTS to monitor programs. On the other hand, we should all be
     concerned what the role of government will be, and whether Wash-
     ington now intends to ultimately decide, for us all, what╣s
     appropriate?

     As things stand now, it seems the Telecom Bill╣s newly-mandated
     V-chip, rather than giving parents the control over what their
     children watch, could AUTOMATICAL- LY block such │violent▓
     programs as SCHLINDLER╣S LIST, or ROOTS, or THE BURN- ING BED,
     all of which were nationally-acclaimed for their significant
     contributions to public education and understanding regarding
     important social issues--the Holocaust, slavery, and domestic
     violence.

     While in Tibet╣s capital of Lhasa with my (then) l0- and
     l2-year-olds in l987, we were rudely awakened each and every
     morning by martial music and denunciations of His Holiness the
     Dalai Lama--that Buddhist nation╣s equivalent of Catholicism╣s
     His Holiness the Pope--blaring from shrieking, Big Brother-style
     loudspeakers on every street corner. And yet Tibet had been a
     relatively free nation for over a thou- sand years, prior to
     Communism╣s slow but persistent encroachment.

     What this │24 HOURS OF DEMOCRACY▓ celebration is all about, here
     in our exponentially-exploding Cyberspace Community (in 3 to 4
     years, it╣s estimated that one-quarter of all U.S. homes will be
     accessing the mighty Internet), is: 1) an organ- ized wake-up
     call in the face of these very real threats to our vaunted,
     American Free- dom of Speech; 2) a nationwide, essay-inviting
     teach-in on just what╣s at stake, now that this new Bill╣s
     Communications Decency Act provisions are attempting to pro-
     scribe all ADULTS freedoms in Cyberspace to those permissble in a
     child╣s reading room, and 3) a Washington╣s Birthday celebration
     that we, too, will not allow the lie to be given to our
     Constitutionally-guaranteed Freedom of Speech. . .at least
     without a nationwide debate in which we, the citizens who voted
     these politicians into office, have had the opportunity to read,
     discuss, and openly debate these critical issues.

     Please spend a little time surfing the Net today, reading the
     best thinking of your sisters and brothers in our Cyberspace
     Community. Once you feel you╣re adequate- ly informed, then
     please communicate your feelings, in your OWN heartfelt essay--or
     just a simple email message--directly to those who lobbied
     hardest for this Bill╣s pas- sage, both in the House and Senate,
     as well as at the White House. You can find all necessary contact
     information at the VOTERS TELECOMMUNICATIONS WATCH home page ,
     clicking on the VTW Congressional Directory Ser- vice button.

     Senate Majority Leader Bob Dole, 72, is apparently not yet
     online, so call him at 202-224-652l, or fax him at 202-228-1245.
     House Speaker Newt Gingrich can be emailed at:
     [e-mail]. And the man responsible for signing this
     Net censorship legislation into law two weeks ago can be emailed
     at: [e-mail] (I╣m joking, of course; Bill╣s really
     at: [e-mail]).

     Over two centuries ago, a fellow Irishman, John Curran, wrote:
     │The condition upon which God hath given liberty to humanity is
     eternal vigilance, which condition if she/he break, servitude is
     at once the consequence of his/her crime and the punish- ment of
     her/his guilt.▓ Over a century later, Elmer Davis, in giving the
     Phi Beta Kappa Oration at Harvard in l953, concluded: │The
     Republic was not established by cowards, and cowards will not
     preserve it.▓ The following year, just to emphasize his point, he
     wrote in BUT WE WERE BORN FREE:

     │With a great price, our ancestors obtained this freedom, but we
     were born free. . . .But that freedom can be retained only by the
     eternal vigilance which has always been its price.▓

     Take courage, my Cyberspace friends, and as you reflect on how
     this new Telecom Bill was hurriedly passed behind our nation╣s
     back--without most even realizing it had hap- pened until we saw
     all those blackened home pages and blue ribbons campaigning to
     îKeep Cyberspace Free╣--take a moment, here on the anniversay of
     our first President╣s birthday, to ponder these words from his
     First Inaugural Address in l789:

     │The preservation of the sacred fire of liberty, and the destiny
     of the republican model of government, are justly considered as
     deeply, perhaps as finally staked, on the experiment en- trusted
     to the hands of the American people.

     Six years earlier, General Washington had addressed the officers
     of our Army thusly:

     │If men are to be precluded from offering their sentiments on a
     matter which may involve the most serious and alarming con-
     sequences that can invite the consideration of humankind, reason
     is of no use to us; the freedom of speech may be taken away, and
     dumb and silent we may be led, like sheep to the

     Just to be sure everyone got the message, he concluded his
     Farewell Address in l796 with this warning:

     │The basis of our political system is the right of the people to
     make, and to alter, their constitution of government.▓

     Won╣t you all please speak your own hearts and minds, to whomever
     you choose, big and small, during this historic 24 HOURS OF
     DEMOCRACY in our U.S. Cybernation?

     Respectfully, Dennis Paulson, [e-mail];
     http://www.fasting.com; Santa Barbara, CA; Freeware essay, for
     posting anywhere in Cyberspace

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                     [Twenty-Four Hours of Democracy]