I think Further up Further in was Re: Black pages

Marcia Tucker tucker at IAS.EDU
Tue Feb 13 11:56:44 EST 1996


Bravo to Elisabeth Roche and others like her!

If anyone believes that this Telecommunications Bill will not 
discriminate, silence, or be used to prosecute
individuals unfairly than they are naive! 

I personally believe that this Bill has nothing to do with the
adult images, adult discussions, etc... which currently
reside on the Internet, it has to do with people who have a 
moral agenda.  In this country I thought that we had a separation
of church and state, obviously we are moving toward less
of a separation!  Scary thing is that people around me keep
on saying, "oh... they won't inforce it", and "they really 
are not moving toward censorship, just protecting our children!"
(I am a librarian and a parent)
This legislation has nothing to do with protecting children or anyone
else of a sensitive nature, if this were the case than other issues
in our society would be addressed which do threaten the mental and moral
health of our children!
 
I can not tolerate the bizarre idea that children have a "right" to
be on the Internet/World Wide Web without some direction via an adult
or teacher!  It would be similiar to having left a child alone in 
Times Square (NYC) without any direction or help!
The Internet can never be a baby sitting service or
a playground which allows children to freely roam
regardless of this bill!  There is already available
censoring software which could aid parents/teachers if they are worried,
so why the Bill?  

I guess in this election year if you can't kiss the babies you can
at least try to satisfy their parents by S.652 lip service! 


Elisabeth Roche wrote:
> 
> If our role is to be librarians, and eagerly (a given, right?) try to find
> information for the pursuing and perusing public, then we have no choice.
> 
> If by some abberation of the forces of the universe, in the United States we
> have found ourselves in a posture of civil disobedience, then at least our
> consciences are clear. (was that the correct conscience? I sure hope so:-))
> 
> We can follow through on this civil disobedience or we can work around the
> problem and we will all do what we think is the correct thing to do, being
> professional information scientists, let's not lose sight of this truth
> while others try to take this away from us.
> 
> Whatever each of us decides to do we still stand together in a fight against
> censorship and restriction of books and learning and information for all the
> people of the US who come from a tradition of our original colonial
> forebears commitments to access to information.(see Benjamin Franklin - smile)
> 
> [I wore my "I Read Banned Books button" all day and the grocery checker said
> "You read banned books?" Well, that got the attention of everyone!" )We got
> into a discussion right there in the line at the store. It was great.
> 
> Everyone around were bringing up books on the banned list (they were all
> correct, amazing what the "normal real people" we are all part of know isn't
> it:?]
> 
> It turned into quite a fun "I read Banned Books" episode at the grocery
> store...
> 
> Be ready and use it I say!:-)))  I did say, "look at my website, you could
> read banned books there",
> 
> The checker said really, "give me your url!!!!
> 
> So, talk about it and make it happen!!"
> 
> Elisabeth Roche ace at opus1.com
> http://www.opus1.com/~ace
> serendipity RULES!


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