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Originally Posted by sirius Its that time again for what may be a 'heated debate' , lol. Again, Its only a mild one, hahaha.
This sundays supplement is regarding Freedoms, and the freedom of the internet, whats happening and what you think about it (hopefully).
With our heritage and hard faught for freedoms being eroded away every week by stealth, whether it be via small 'insignificant' bills in parliament we never get to know about, sweeping reactions to 'media' outcrys that bring about restrictions, the government and police 'indirectly' censoring what we can and cant see and hear or the EU powers and laws which we now HAVE to follow as being a part of the EU, the pace of the loss of freedom we are 'supposedly' famous and jubilant about is certainly stepping up at an alarming rate.
This may be due to pathetic attempts to restore public confidence about 'terrorist' attacks, but nethertheless, with freedoms of speech no longer being allowed due to the 'politically correct' establishment and reactionalist minority groups, changes in the law to be arrested for 'thought' crimes and crimes you 'may commit in the future', the right of trial by Jury (as apposed to trials by biased 'appointed bodies') being abolished and the assumption of 'innocent until proven guilty' soon going to be gone, we are sleepwalking into a police and establishment driven state where we have no rights anymore.
The government is also further and further snooping into private matters which are not of thier concern, allowing information to be collected upon us, email content to be analysed (yes that means you too, lol) deatils of bank accounts and thier contents and logging and prying into a whole other stash of 'private' affairs is helping to create a 'controlled' country that is beyond 'big brother' in concept.
This is happening aside from 'terrorism' too. In my opinion our liberty and freedom is a defining feature thats been faught hard for and something which sets us apart from the terrorists and must be maintained - if we unnecessarily take away our civil liberties and human rights, then the terrorists will have won.
The last bastion of 'freedom' which we have enabled - "The Internet" - is renouned for being an uncontrollable and uncensored media utility that is 'problematic' to say the least to government and authorities who strive to stifle content, debates, expressions of opinions and documents which we are not supposedly to know about - even by introducing things 'in our best interest' to gain public acceptance. However, is the internet unregulated? Thats always the presumtion, however the reality is a different story.
In a study of 10 ISP's in the UK, ALL 10 stated that they did block access to content which 'may' be deemed 'illegal' or inflamatory and publications which may cause 'distress', 'anxiety' and 'offence' to some 'subscribers'.
(the following is an extract from 'netfreedom' news)
ISPs regulate their customers with Terms and Conditions policies which do not require any of the formal checks and balances of conventional legal processes. These internal policies are commercial agreements between individuals and private organisations and there is little customers can do but comply. Peter o'Tool explained: "The government and police don't want to censor. They'd have to adhere to regulations, protocols and court orders. This way they don't have to do it." He added: "The view of the police is that they want ISPs to do the dirty work for them."
As Internet Freedom founder Chris Ellison explained, Scotland Yard has managed to force ISPs to achieve what the Police alone could not: "the censorship of Internet material without what they see as the inconvenience of courts, the unreliability of juries, or the complication of constructing a case."
There is no formal accountability in the process. Ellison added: "For too long the government-backed organisations like the IWF (Internet Watch Foundation) have operated behind closed doors and without constitutional balances on restrictions of freedom of speech." It certainly seems that censorship in Britain operates silently with material being blocked or removed by ISPs without Net users ever being informed. For those who are censored there is no right of appeal. Once seen as censorship-proof, as far as UK users are concerned the Net is becoming one of the most censored media of all.
What are your opinions on these facts/claims?
Cheerio
Sirius.
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