Random Access - Wednesday, May 19, 1999Senator Feinstein, what were you thinking?
When all else fails, blame the Internet
by Chris Gulker
Emotion is divinely human. A birthright, it lifts us above the humble beast even as, sometimes, it takes us much lower.This is really a column about the Internet, but give me a minute to get there. I'm steamed, pissed off, and mad-as-hell-not-going-to-take-it-anymore. I'm being really human just at the moment.
It all started with the American Revolution. We Americans got snooty about some of the business practices the Brits were fond of. In particular, we didn't like Blighty taxes - so we had a revolution, and now we tax ourselves. Progress.
We're still paying taxes, you may note. Yeah, but they're our taxes. We also decided to put some laws on the books about citizens having the right to bear arms, because the Brits had tried to keep us and guns apart as a way of enforcing their rule. I truly wish Britain had won on that issue.
Anyway we got emotional about the tax thing, and we had a revolution. So, today in the US, some other folks got emotional, and there's more trouble headed our way.
Look at Yugoslavia. We got mad at a bad guy there, so now we're bombing people and factories and refineries. One US Senator has stood up and said, no matter how bad the guy was, we shouldn't be dropping bombs, some of which land on hospitals and public busses and refugees.
But that same Senator today proposed legislation, in the wake of the Littleton, Colorado school massacre, that would ban certain types of information on the Internet. California Senator Diane Feinstein said she was shocked to learn that Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold had found the plans for their bombs on the Internet. Harris and Klebold are suspected of planting a large number of bombs and murdering 13 of their classmates before committing suicide at Littleton's Columbine High School.
It doesn't matter that none of these bombs actually went off - apparently Internet bomb info isn't very good. What matters is that virtually everyone in America is upset about this event. And politicians see opportunity in emotion - they like it when people rush blindly to an opinion without asking too many questions.
They like it because they can curry favor without resorting to hard-to-come-by graces like leadership or strong moral character. They just rush to stand at the nexus of the most popular opinion, and voila, popularity - and contributions and votes - are supposed to follow. No need for a keen intellect, careful weighing of the best and wisest course - just get about an inch in front of the stampeding herd, and pretend you're leading it.
So Senator Feinstein has pushed through a bill that, not unlike the American Revolution will likely have an effect far outside the United States. Her amendment to the Juvenile Justice Bill basically makes it illegal to make available information about bomb-making in any medium, if there is suspicion the information could be used for harmful purposes.
Well, now. What else does one do with a bomb? Plant geraniums in it? And, while the bill covers most media, including print, it's being viewed as an attempt to reign in the Internet.
For one thing, the amendment's co-sponsor is Senator Orrin Hatch, author of the Communications Decency Act. The CDA would have had the unique effect of making certain forms of speech illegal, depending on how you chose to express them.
Under the CDA, you could have discussed, say, abortion in public, on the phone, over the airwaves or by fax, but the same words in an email meant prison. One could easily see a world where each new medium became encumbered with its own peculiar laws, depending on recent events. Imagine that world: no abortion talk on email; no suggestive photos on Palm Pilots; no Lady Chatterly's lover in Windows 2000; and for chrissakes, no mention of Mickey Mouse in Netscape Navigator (but OK in Internet Explorer).
The other problem is that the good Senator is behaving like the U.S. owns the Internet. The Internet is a global phenomenon, spanning virtually every country. Where do we in the U.S. get off making practices in say, Australia, illegal?
Australians use the Internet for distance learning in sparsely populated regions. If a U.S. prosecutor stumbles across an on-line chemistry course at www.outback.ed.au, do we send in the Marines and haul the Alice Springs Board of Education off to prison? Might the Australians get a bit peeved at such behavior?
Like a lot of Americans, I grew up during the Viet Nam era, and that awful experience taught me the value of never blindly following anyone or anything. Governments are made of people and people make mistakes. Sometimes they make really big mistakes.
And, I guess, we just have to live with that proclivity. But information wants to be free, and in a world of free interchange, mistakes might not get very far before someone says "Hey, wait a darn second here..."
Restricting the Internet isn't going to prevent another Littleton. Frankly, in a country where guns are so inexpensive and easy to come by, I don't know how you prevent another Littleton. Kids, too, have a right to bear arms.
Given the awfulness of being a teenager, I marvel that there isn't more tragedy like Littleton. In my generation, acting out meant a bloody nose. Now, it means 15 dead.
So, Senator, let's blame the Internet. After all, it doesn't vote.
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