Now this problem brings me to my issue with a porn-free Internet zone. A really nice idea indeed: who would want to oppose it? However, the problem is: who's going to be the one who decides what is pornography? In Finland people rarely consider a glimpse of breast, as in Botticelli's "The Birth of Venus", offending; but in the U.S. Justice Department the statue "Spirit of Justice" was actually at some point of time covered with drapes. What is more, there are people for whom any portrayal of a woman without a veil or burqa is offending.So, when designing a porn-free Internet zone, who shall decide what is porn and what is not? Should we aim at creating an Internet which doesn't offend anyone? Or should we vote for a democratic, worldwide majority decision? Or what? Or should we consider particular cases? Vote about particular cases? Text-only Internet (with some words censored)? Does anyone have a really good idea?
20 comments:
A side note: even if one were able to somehow come up with universal guidelines for non-offending content, there are people who consider such restrictions to be offending.
I find your post offending, someone come and censor blogger soon!
Do you have any idea how does this censor thing work? E.g. have they list of allowed sites or list of banned sites? Or does the censorship thing just sniff the content and then decide that Karjalainen is bad for you?
I think you bring up two important issues. (1) where do you draw the line? and (2) the debate about offensive restrictions vs. free speech.
the best organization i have found that has found reasonable solutions to both those concerns is the CP80 initiative (www.cp80.com)
I'm not an expert at all in this area, but what i understand so far is this. There is usually not one "line" that determines universal guidelines, but more of a spectrum - and these standards have already been established and used for a long time in many different communication environments (e.g. movie ratings, TV ratings, video game ratings, etc). There will always be gray area over where to put lines; but currently the main problem is that there is no line in the Internet.
Second - government really should not choose for people what they do or do not look at - people just hate moral judgments like that being forced on them - but they do help set up environments where business and families that want some restrictions can safely go as well as provide penalties for people who push unwanted material at children and minors. The CP80 site talks about why "filters" as a solution is really not adequate. The solution that they suggests instead is that there is be utilized the way the Internet is built to have different ports or channels that allow different materials, and then let each person or business decide which ones they want to subscribe to. So a community portal CP80, would be free of obviously pornographic material - at the same time allowing another port(s) (Open Ports or Channels) that people can register for if they want to look at more graphic content.
The current organization that governs the Internet (ICANN) is actually a privately held company in California that is unaccountable and not transparent to anyone in the global community it serves.
So the question I think I face is wondering if it is even important enough to put so much effort into trying to solve? I have read some of the medical and social impacts (http://cp80.com/impacts), and it strikes me as a very important issue, but I am always trying to question how biased I might be - and how it comes across to others? I apologize for the long comment - but it was also an issue I was thinking about recently (as some people I know just recently got divorced over issues that began with pornography and spread to other things) and I really am interested in international perspectives on it.
The only think that I think definitely should be banned for everyone (and especially those in the Middle East) is information about the Finnish health care union salary debate! You never know what could happen if that information gets into the wrong hands.
I don't think CP80 has the solution yet. Their message is patronizing, conceptually misleading, and imposing one set of standards globally. And they don't really solve the question of who's going to decide what is appropriate content (CP80 people?)
To appreciate the different ideas of what content is okay, one just has to watch nationally aired TV content in, say, USA, UK, Scandinavia, Saudi Arabia, and South Africa. I'm pretty sure that CP80 people would find a lot of Scandinavian national TV inappropriate. For instance, I believe that most Finns share the view that porn ≠ nudity. (Otherwise our sauna tradition gets a really interesting twist.)
I think Clint misses one point of the internet: the internet is globlal, albeit dominated by an evil corporation from the USA.
Somehow this evil corporation has not yet imposed the views from its hosting country to the internets, which is surprising.
According to the CP80, cleaning the web only requires every single web publisher (I'm looking at you Matti) to register himself or herself at the CP80. The web publisher have just to follow the clear guidelines on CP80 to have their content published. (You may replace CP80 in this paragraph by the forecoming USA state-led agency).
On other news, polar bears are doing ok and reaping off the benefits of record high petrol prices.
As a positive story, I had this friend of mine who started his business career at the military service by renting porn magazines to fellow soldiers. Thanks to this prosperous business, he was able to visit his family during that time, and drink some beer :)True story?
Thanks for your thoughts about CP80 Matti and Andres. I really like hearing your perspective and opinions.
So the internet really is global? :) Huh, I was wondering where all those web sites came from that I can't read.
Seriously though, I'm a little confused and wonder where you get the idea that CP80 wants to "impose one set of standards globally"?
Maybe I am missing something (which is quite often the case, actually) but as far as I read it, they are unique because they do not want to impose one standard. All they simply want is for there to be more than one option.
The analogy I think of is when public places have smoking and non-smoking sections. You are not forcing anyone to stop smoking who would really like to - but you are at least making an option for other people (especially children) to be able to choose not to be exposed to the smoke if they don't want to be. It is actually increasing the options, not decreasing them.
IMHO, imposing anyone's beliefs (personal, local, national) on anyone else (especially on a global level) is as impossible as it is stupid.
I guess at the heart of this particular issue, the questions I ask myself are: Is hard-core pornography constructive, neutral, or destructive for individuals, families, businesses and societies? What effect and influence does it have on people (especially those who become addicted to it)? Are there any ways in which society can address the issue (especially in the areas where it becomes especially problematic) without imposing on people's freedom to choose to either be exposed or choose to not be exposed?
Are there any ideas for a better solution?
The idea of imposing one set of standards globally is the whole idea of the CP80 act. What they clearly say is: all the content in the 'net should be categorized according to its content; appropriate content should be delivered at one set of ports ('family ports') whereas inappropriate content should be delivered at another set of ports ('adult ports'). The CP80 people wish the same division between family content and adult content to apply in all countries in the world. How is this not "imposing one set of standards globally?" (But CP80 guys (intentionally?) skip the discussion about whose standards should be applied when drawing the line between appropriate vs. inappropriate content.)
If the idea is that there should be more than those two ports (say, port 666 for Norwegian adult (18+) people who don't wanna see porn but don't mind uncensored movies) we'll run out of free ports in no time. Port is a 16-bit uint, and most of those ports are already in use for different purposes. Technically speaking, there can't be very many ports for this idea.
Most of the analogies presented here and on the CP80 website fail. For example, TV broadcasting and Internet publishing cannot be paralleled either technically or conceptually. Similar, the analogy to smoking/non-smoking sections fails because "appropriate content" doesn't have the conceptual clarity and widespread consensus that "smoking vs. non-smoking" has. It's easy to tell whether someone is smoking in the room, but it's very hard to tell whether a picture is porn or something else.
So by imposing a set of standards - you mean that there is a standard for which content gets served via which port. From your comments, I mistakenly understood that you thought it meant they proposed imposing a set of standards for what was accessible or not accessible for those who really want to find it - which is clearly no the case.
I know any analogy is flawed. There is a good quote I like which says that every model for something is helpful but imperfect - concealing somethings while revealing others. There is definitely a gray line over what is considered porn or not porn. For the most part, however, I trust an international board to make some distinction, and then I wonder how big of a deal it will be to people that really want to access something in the gray area (which was determined inappropriate) if they simply need to register for an alternative port? Annoying maybe, yes, just like going to a smoking area, but perhaps a small price to pay in comparison to the overall benefit.
But whether it is CP80 or something else, I really don't mind. I am more interested in everyone's opinions on the questions at the end of my last post. I'm very curious what other people's perceptions are, and where to access the best info about those questions?
After I posted that last comment I realized that it could easily come across funny. I don't expect you to answer all the questions (or even any of them really) just because I personally am curious about them. :)
Your blog obviously doesn't need to be a forum for it, althuogh I would trust you guys a lot more than most politicians in the US (or most politicians anywhere really), but your post made me think about it more - so thanks for that. I do like hearing your thoughts too.
Sometime in the future I would like to find more research about the effect of pornography on the human brain, on a persons perception of themself and others? I'm curious why it becomes an addiction for some people? And on a larger scale what effect it has on how society treats women in particular? When I think about it though, I realize that my initial reaction to the issue is based mainly on emotion instinct, limited personal observations, and what I have heard from others. I haven't really spent much time at all looking at data or research about the issues.
I also think your original post was funny - and it is interesting the different approaches people take towards censorship. The whole concept of censorship - particularly with a global Internet is interesting. Lots of issues have existed for a long time in individual societies, but the Internet adds a new twist that is often hard for me to wrap my mind around.
what about those parents who are concerned afraid but who don't like the silly u.s. censorship joke? when i was there i saw that you can show blood, violence and killing on tv, but you can't show a nursing mother... what does that tell about people? they think killing is lesser sin than sex,,!
Matti, you initial thought about 'porn-free internet zone' seems to be a bit misleading. 1) What is it exactly (the zone)? 2) Why an adult user AU of internet need the zone? 3) Why could not the judgment be left to the AU only? 4) Is then the need real at all?
CP80 act shows its true colors here: "The CP80 Foundation supports enforcement of its initiatives through carefully crafted and constitutionally-sound legislation."
Which constitution do you think they're talking about... Finnish? :-) As a secondary concern they say that they're planning to get people from other countries to contribute. Sure!
Sure, Roman, it seems that I'm implying that "porn-free Internet zone" is the answer when we actually don't really know what is the question!
1) What is it exactly (the zone)? No idea.
2) Why an adult user AU of internet need the zone? For instance, a concerned parent (CP⊂AU) might want his/her children (CU) to surf the Internet without getting to adult stuff. Or a frustrated adult (FA⊂AU) might grow tired of pop-ups.
3) Why could not the judgment be left to the AU only? Most AU:s might not need such zone but the problem is more with the CU:s or at least CP:s. Perhaps filters are, after all, the best solution today.
4) Is then the need real at all? This discussion has strengthened my impression that CP:s around the world share a very real need for such zone.
Amusing picture though. Plus I agree with the guys in Dubai: even though the website of "Karjalainen" seldom includes any nudity, its design can be very harmful to your mental health.
Yes, I totally agree. It's bad design par excellence.
I'd like to see one of those "cultural markers" studies taking Karjalainen web page as an example of Finnish web pages, and see what they conclude out of it. ("Finns like pages with indigenous non-standard logic, peculiar navigation, varying font sizes, and many conflicting menus. Finns appreciate many ads and like them to appear at random positions on the page.")
The problem with censoring the net is that it is essentially a technical solution to a cultural problem.
In the case of the original example, this is an instance of a government imposing its assertion that it knows what its citizens want better than they do. We all agree that this is evil, and the conversation has evolved past this point.
When it comes to more benevolent dictatorships such as parenting, though, is a little censorship in order? After all, no parent wants to supervise his 10-year-old every time he sits in front of the screen to make sure he's not surfing to whitehouse.com... on purpose.
I've never completely understood why parents get so shocked when children are (accidentally) exposed to sexual content (this includes images and scenes in movies [or entire movies] but also includes jokes, stories and allusions).
Let's be honest here: it's not like sex doesn't exist until you turn 18 (or 21, or as some would have us believe, until you get married). If your child accidentally navigates to an adult website, maybe you have some explaining to do (or more likely he already knows), and then life goes on.
If the child is too young to understand, why let him navigate the internet unsupervised in the first place?
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