Save The Internet Essay, Research Paper

Did you know that 83.5%

of the images available on the Internet were pornographic (Kershaw)? Did you

know that pornography on the Internet is readily available to curious little

children who happen to bump into them?

Today, the Internet which has only

become popular several years ago, is unequivocally one of the most revolutionary

innovations in the computer world. The information superhighway has changed

peoples’ lives dramatically and have created many new exciting opportunities

as well as markets to be exploited. But, unfortunately, the Internet also has

created a haven for the depravity of pornography and hate literature. Therefore,

this has called for immediate action and the only solution up to today is censorship.

The Internet must be censored to the utmost.

Many people complain that censorship

is the violation of the first amendment and the suppression of freedom of speech

but there is a point where freedom of speech becomes corrupt; freedom of speech

only creates an excuse for the vile pornographers to poison our nation let

alone our children.

Pornography is regarded as immoral and downright filthy

by the people. It denies human dignity and often stimulates the user to violent

acts (Beahm 295). Therefore, pornography and violence are correlated. It trivializes

the human beauty and converts it into commercialized slime (Beahm 295). Moreover,

the consumption of pornography can lead to a detrimental addiction and the

consumer can become a slave to it (Beahm 297). In short, pornography is a very

addictive drug; which has an equal or more potency to hard-core drugs like

heroin and cocaine. Can you imagine a ten year-old innocently surfing the Internet

and suddenly bumps into a pornographic site depicting explicit images of naked

women and becoming addicted to it? The damage is long-term and when the time

comes, we will have a nation of perverts. Galbraith says, "The U.S. constitution

does not forbid the protection of children from a pornographer’s freedom of

speech. That must be inferred through the First Amendment." These are our children

and we have

the right to protect them. The fact that pornography is damaging

mentally is further aggravated as the availability of pornography to all Internet

users is a major problem as well.

The ridiculously easy accessibility to

all types pornography; by anyone who logs into the Internet has raised a major

concern from both the government and the public. The Internet, being the biggest

interactive library ever existed, has no owner, President, chief operating

officer or pope (Montoya). "Inevitably, being an uncontrolled system, means

that the Internet will be subjected to subversive applications of some unscrupulous

users." (Kershaw) Internet users can publish pornography and hate literature

that information is literally made available to millions of Internet users

worldwide (Kershaw).

A five year-old can easily obtain pornography on the

Internet by just typing the word "sex" in the search engine and literally hundreds

of thousands of listing will appear on-screen, each leading to a smut page.

This type of easy accessibility have people calling for censorship (Kershaw).

"Most popular images available were of hardcore scenes featuring such acts

as paedophilia, defection, bestiality and bondage." (Kershaw) According to

Chidley, "In 1994, more than 450,000 pornographic images and text files were

available to the Internet users around the world; that information had been

accessed more than 6 million times." (58) This shocking figure is further agitated

by the fact that pornography would be very harmful to the young unsuspecting

child who happens to stumble on it while roaming about cyberspace (Kershaw).

Remember, our children is our most important resource in the future; we have

to refrain them from negative influences so that they could be good citizens

of tomorrow.

"Regulating the Internet might be the only way to protect Internet

users including our children from accessing obscene pages." (Montoya) Singapore

has taken an encouraging step to establish a "neighborhood police post" on

the Internet to monitor and receive complaints of criminal activity-including

the distribution of pornography (Chidley 58). They have also implemented proxy

servers to partially filter our pornographic sites such as "Playboy" and "Penthouse"

from access. An anonymous author quotes, "When such material is discovered,

access providers could be alerted, and required to deny entry to the sites

concerned." (Only) This is an ideal approach to censorship and should be exercised

in every country. Parents at home can also be more responsible over what information

is retrieved by their young ones by installing programs like SurfWatch that

will block pornography from access (Quitter 45). In addition to this problem,

child pornography also prevails over the Internet.

Another distressing issue

about the Internet is the presence of child pornography; "Digitally scanned

images of ? naked boys and girls-populate cyberspace." (Chidley 58) Innocent-looking

little boys and girls were forced to undress and they pictures are published

on the Internet. How degrading of us as human beings! Furthermore, possession

of child pornography is an offense and the "police are concerned that a shadowy

pedophiles’ ring, offering child pornography and information on where and how

to indulge in their fetish, is operating on an international scale." (Chidley

58) By censoring the Internet, not only you’ll keep the public save from the

wickedness of pornography, but you’ll also help enforcing the law. Pornography

is not the only problem on the Internet; as there are many others; some of

which I will describe next.

Another issue that concerns me is that publications

such as bomb making manuals are easily available online (Kershaw 2). According

to Kershaw, "?the wrong people can now get their hands on this information

without having to leave the secrecy of their home." (2) This easy availability

of such material promotes terrorism-the information obtained to make the bomb

found in Centennial park in Atlanta during the Olympics is available on the

Internet. The bomb had created a big chaos but fortunately, there were no fatal

casualties. However, not all terrorists’ attempts were unsuccessful, thousands

of innocent people and children have been killed in the Oklahoma bombing and

the subway massacre in Tokyo. Moreover, many curious children have lost their

fingers and even their lives by experimenting with bomb making. This must stop

immediately! Another non-pornographic problem about the Internet is the availability

of hate literature.

The Internet has also been a place where people express

their hatred and anger toward other people. Kershaw says, "?newsgroups on the

Internet contain messages which could incite violence against members of various

racial, ethnic or religious groups or messages which deny the Holocaust." This

sort of information advocates racism and other types of sensitive discrimination.

In many countries, the problem of racism is almost unheard of today, but the

problem will surface up if we let the racists minorities influence public.

Racism will then tear our nation apart and trigger many wars from trivial matters.

Kershaw also says that groups such as the neo-Nazi of America are not uncommon

and have many people worry that the Net gives these types of groups a meeting

place and a source of empowerment (2). Kershaw also stresses, "One particularly

disturbing message found on the Net one week after the Oklahoma bombing that

read, ‘I want to make bombs and kill evil Zionist people in the government.

Teach me. Give me text

files.’" The Internet is meant to be a medium that

promotes healthy qualities; not a place of hate and evil. "There is a difference

between free speech and teaching others how to kill." (Kershaw)

Overall, the

Internet has many useful applications which are educational and a fresh source

of entertainment when television gets too boring. However, we shall not feel

too complacent and ignore the deleterious face of the Internet. We will not

rest on our laurels until the Internet is completely free from pornography

and other unhealthy elements. Otherwise, the Internet will slowly but surely

end up to be sleazy slums operated and dominated by notorious gangs and secret

societies. While now it seems difficult to censor the Internet; however, we

shall attempt our very best to do so to keep our children away from the dark

side of the Internet; our children remains our highest priority. Let’s attack

this problem at its source by censoring the Internet as that is to only rational

solution up to today. We do not want our world to be ravaged by the present

situation of Internet!

b31

Beahm, George. War of Words-The Censorship

Debate. Kansas City : Andrew and McMeel, 1993.

Chidley, Joe. "Red-Light

District." Maclean’s 22 May 1995.

Galbraith, John Kenneth. "The Page That

Formerly Occupied This Site Has Been Taken Down in Disgust!" http://user.holli.com/~kathh/anti.htm

Kershaw,

Dave. "Censorship and the Internet."

http://cmns-web.comm.sfu.ca/cmns353/96-1/dkershaw

2 Apr. 1996

Montoya, Drake. "The Internet and Censorship."http://esoptron.umd.edu/FUSFOLDER/dmontoya.html

1995

"Only disconnect." The Economist 1 July 1995.

Quittner, Joshua.

"How Parents Can Filter Out the Naughty Bits." Time 13 July 1995.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Beahm,

George. War of Words-The Censorship Debate. Kansas City : Andrew and McMeel,

1993.

Chidley, Joe. "Red-Light District." Maclean’s 22 May 1995.

Galbraith,

John Kenneth. "The Page That Formerly Occupied This Site Has Been Taken Down

in Disgust!" http://user.holli.com/~kathh/anti.htm

Jensen, Carl. Censored:

The News That Didn’t Make the News-AND WHY. New York : Four Walls Eight Windows,

1994.

Kershaw, Dave. "Censorship and the Internet."

http://cmns-web.comm.sfu.ca/cmns353/96-1/dkershaw

2 Apr. 1996

Montoya, Drake. "The Internet and Censorship."http://esoptron.umd.edu/FUSFOLDER/dmontoya.html

1995

"Only disconnect." The Economist 1 July 1995.

"Pulling the Plug

on Porn." Time 8 January 1996.

Quittner, Joshua. "How Parents Can Filter

Out the Naughty Bits." Time 13 July 1995.