@Buzz Lightyear I think the measure you're looking for is a porn blocker put into all new modems, with a code that can disable the blocker anytime a person wants to access pornographic material. That way adults can easily watch as much porn as they want, but the children/teens will have to ask their parent for permission to view porn. That should also meet the requirements of most Libertarians, since it preserves the right of adults to do what they want, and it gives the parent, not the state, control over the child.
Personally, I'd like to see a blanket ban of all pornography, as the people who are involved in producing it are abused so horribly that the industry is beyond fixing. Moreover, the people are often put in the position of taking these jobs through coercion and deception, so they are not freely entering into a contract, which is a violation of Libertarian principles. Such a ban isn't going to happen, at least not anytime soon, though, so I'd just be happy to get the porn blocker built into modems.
@Buzz Lightyear I think the measure you're looking for is a porn blocker put into all new modems, with a code that can disable the blocker anytime a person wants to access pornographic material. That way adults can easily watch as much porn as they want, but the children/teens will have to ask their parent for permission to view porn. That should also meet the requirements of most Libertarians, since it preserves the right of adults to do what they want, and it gives the parent, not the state, control over the child.
He's referencing Classical Liberalism, which is essentially the old name for Libertarianism. Classical liberals believe that you should be allowed to do whatever you want, as long as you aren't taking another person's God (or ambiguous force) given rights away from them.
@Buzz Lightyear I think the measure you're looking for is a porn blocker put into all new modems, with a code that can disable the blocker anytime a person wants to access pornographic material. That way adults can easily watch as much porn as they want, but the children/teens will have to ask their parent for permission to view porn. That should also meet the requirements of most Libertarians, since it preserves the right of adults to do what they want, and it gives the parent, not the state, control over the child.
Personally, I'd like to see a blanket ban of all pornography, as the people who are involved in producing it are abused so horribly that the industry is beyond fixing. Moreover, the people are often put in the position of taking these jobs through coercion and deception, so they are not freely entering into a contract, which is a violation of Libertarian principles. Such a ban isn't going to happen, at least not anytime soon, though, so I'd just be happy to get the porn blocker built into modems.
Yes, in politics we have to be practical. And I agree with your thoughts. If that was introduced, it would wall up a huge amount of porn currently being consumed by minors. And you would have to think the measure you mention has a very good chance of appealing to near all parties across the political divide.... being directed towards minors.
My question is why is some MP or senator or representative not taking up this cause??
My next question is what it would take? Lobbying? A petition? I come from a small country, and I am seriously considering taking up this cause when I get back there. Get some publicity out there, get a petition going, and then get an MP to pass a bill through Parliament.
But given the nature of globalism today, the law would have to be changed in the States and Europe.. the more liberal countries. Or am I wrong here... for more conservative countries have no problem blocking porn sites right?? It would be great to think the technical fix could just be the mandatory use of a porn blocker in all modems. It is then just an issue of political will which I think is feasible to gain with some action taken.
Yes, this could be the compromise needed to get a ground swell of wide support behind it. Give the parents the ability to lock out porn [the power of veto] ... at the ground level... in the modem... opps... I see a problem. There is one modem in the house, and the parent is using porn....
There would need to be two modems in the house... or a two-storied modem - an adult one and one for minors. This will make it much easier for parents [even for the mass of middle-class parents using porn 'recreationally'] to keep their dependents from it.
@Buzz LightyearI think the measure you're looking for is a porn blocker put into all new modems, with a code that can disable the blocker anytime a person [the adult] wants to access pornographic material. That way adults can easily watch as much porn as they want, but the children/teens will have to ask their parent for permission to view porn. That should also meet the requirements of most Libertarians, since it preserves the right of adults to do what they want, and it gives the parent, not the state, control over the child.
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I think this looks to be the best solution touted so far. Governments must standardize modems to require a code in order for adult material to be viewed... all in the interests of minors who have yet not acquired the self-interested rational decision-making processes of adulthood.
I doubt parents could be prosecuted [or there would even be the political will to do so] if they gave their children the code... but the point is that the vast majority of parents would not.
I don't think it's fair for families to have to pay for porn blocking filters, subscriptions, and software. The cost for some of this shit is ridiculous. The internet is a public tool, and as such there should be regulations in place which protect the younger members society. I think internet service providers should get their asses in gear and provide different options that will suite their customers needs.
ISP: Have a family? Enjoy our family friendly browsing experience with our safe browser package which by default blocks all pornography from being accessed either directly or indirectly through search engines.
Boom! It's that simple! The government isn't involved, customers have the power of choice, and everyone lives happily ever after without having to shell out money for filters and shit they shouldn't have to pay for.
The problem here is we only see the tip of the addiction problem. The reality may be that porn has already become so 'normalized' that every second parent in the country is watching a little bit now and then for 'recreational' purposes, or the spicing up of his or her sex life. And so they are not wanting that kind of blanket screening on porn. What they want is some kind of hardware/ browser/ modem option which can separate adult viewing from minor viewing.
In the interest of minors, governments can make mandatory the building of this option into the technology [tweak the technology], and then leave it to the parents to use it/ enable it. The vast majority of parents will use it. Both porn users and non-porn users alike... because they want what is best for their children.
I think this kind of minimal regulation is both desirable [by most voters] and doable [politically].
It's a people choice, yes it feels good when you're into it but things should go into moderation and too much will cause danger. This applies to all Porn, Drugs, Cigarette, Alchohol. Banning isn't the real solution here for these people who are addicted will keep looking for it, Producers of porn Films and Manufacturer of Silent killer product should be shut down.
Just as this site is governed by some moderation, in order to enjoy a civil space... so too does society. It is called regulation. This is not about banning everything... simply about moderating certain things lest have a pernicious influence on society.
So tobacco is regulated, alcohol is regulated, why not porn?
Classical liberalism was represented by the Whigs.
Classical conservativism was represented by the Torys.
The Torys were the 'King's men', they were more interested in preserving the established culture and a continuity with the past.
The classical liberals were the progressives of the day. They were more interesting in the new ideas of freedom, equality and fraternity. For them, history is progress. Post-revolutionary America is founded on classical liberalism [this classical liberalism undergirds a modern liberalism at one end of the political spectrum, and a modern conservatism at the other].
The word conservativism generally applies to the idea that less government is better. In the past there were other institutions at play beside Parliament such as Church and Monarchy. With the power of those other institutions having pretty much been swept away, conservativism has shifted its ground to now looks solely to laissez faire business [which was only a part of the old liberalism].... anything but the legislature, which is understood to be an inefficient restraint on Capitalism. Conservativism has always tended to be morally/ culturally conservative [I suspect something of all this was involved in the Civil War... interestingly, William F. Buckley, the main architect of modern conservativism was a Southern gentlemen type supporting segregation in the South]. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_F._Buckley_Jr.
Liberalism has always been for reform, extending the franchise, justice and equality, and morally progressive. And laissez faire... a free market. A liberal government is concerned to juggle a few more issues than simply getting out of the way for business to run its course.
Modern conservatives and liberals are today united on classical liberalism; we are all free and equal individuals to pursue our own self-interest in the market place. Where they differ is to what extent of regulatory government is required, and of course on issues of morality.
Both modern conservatives and liberals should in principle agree on the regulation of pornography related to minors because the minor is NOT yet a free and independent agent in the market place.
I agree with the idea of having better ways to really block porn, as most porn blockers don't work very well, but I don't agree that it should be the government's job to put them in all computers or modems or whatever. I think that should be a personal choice a parent can make for their children, if they feel it's needed. I don't understand why we need the government to do everything for us.
Portugal decriminalized all of the drugs there is, and have invested more of rising its crushing awareness than going for a war on drugs.
Result ? The drug usage is significantly dropping so are the drug induced deaths.
I agree with the idea of having better ways to really block porn, as most porn blockers don't work very well, but I don't agree that it should be the government's job to put them in all computers or modems or whatever. I think that should be a personal choice a parent can make for their children, if they feel it's needed. I don't understand why we need the government to do everything for us.
Maybe it should be the parents job, but governments have let everyone down badly, because before the internet they really did protect people from P.
It's not right for a person or organisation to be responsible for something for such a long time, and then one day to just relinquish all responsibility without any warning.
Parents are more wary now, but in the earlier years, many let their kids freely surf the internet, because they believed the government was safeguarding it, when they weren't.
Maybe it should be the parents job, but governments have let everyone down badly, because before the internet they really did protect people from P.
It's not right for a person or organisation to be responsible for something for such a long time, and then one day to just relinquish all responsibility without any warning.
Parents are more wary now, but in the earlier years, many let their kids freely surf the internet, because they believed the government was safeguarding it, when they weren't.
Well, in my opinion, that's the parents fault. It's lazy parenting to expect the government to keep your kids away from porn or off of bad sites on the internet. Don't let your kids use the internet without supervision if you're worried about what they're doing and don't trust your kids. It's your job, and your job alone, to raise your children. That's my opinion.
I agree with the idea of having better ways to really block porn, as most porn blockers don't work very well, but I don't agree that it should be the government's job to put them in all computers or modems or whatever. I think that should be a personal choice a parent can make for their children, if they feel it's needed. I don't understand why we need the government to do everything for us.
That's a good point. If people want these sort of routers, they can buy them, but most people choose not to, either because they don't think their kids will get into porn, or because they don't think it's such a big deal. Issues like these are tricky, because you want to protect the child from harmful neglect by the parents, but you have to weigh that against people's rights to not buy what they don't want to buy, and of businesses to not produce what they don't want to produce. I don't have an opinion on this issue yet, because I've got a lot of strong feelings on both sides of it and I can't separate those from what I believe is actually right.
I think this issue falls under the same difficult category as stuff like seat belt laws for minors, gun safe laws, and laws about secondhand smoke. They all limit the freedoms of the adult, but they are usually passed with the intent to protect minors.
I don't have an opinion on this issue yet, because I've got a lot of strong feelings on both sides of it and I can't separate those from what I believe is actually right.
I think this issue falls under the same difficult category as stuff like seat belt laws for minors, gun safe laws, and laws about secondhand smoke. They all limit the freedoms of the adult, but they are usually passed with the intent to protect minors.
To me the biggest difference is the internet. In order to really enforce any sort of law in this area, I can't see a way it would be possible without being incredibly invasive. I just can't see how this could be enforced well, and it seems like a waste of time and money to me, honestly. While I agree that porn is harmful, there are more serious things for police to be focusing their attention on than parenting people's children for them.
To me the biggest difference is the internet. In order to really enforce any sort of law in this area, I can't see a way it would be possible without being incredibly invasive. I just can't see how this could be enforced well, and it seems like a waste of time and money to me, honestly. While I agree that porn is harmful, there are more serious things for police to be focusing their attention on than parenting people's children for them.
It is very interesting how private morality and public politics are to interface today in the law. There is a near complete split... but not quite.
Even though you would never find anyone more intellectually conservative than me in all spheres... that is, in ideal terms, I am also a pragmatist in reality. What interests me is finding a workable solution that could both incorporate a moral/ cultural concern for the effects of pornography and the realities of contemporary political life. And the interface is already there... in so far as the current political climate is all for the protection of minors. It is there, on that front, that the issue has to pushed through more coherently. As it stands, the current system, arguably by its own logic, is failing minors.
One of the realities is that many people would object to the enforcement of a law that would be considered invasive of individual rights and privacy.
The way to meet this is simply to have a law regulate the delivery system*, where now there is a solid option for the adult user to enable their modem for adult content... and then have that enabling process linked to particular devices [owned by the adults]. Classic liberalism [on which all parties are founded] is all for choice, options and empowerment.
It's essentially a technical fix that would empower the mass of parents with scruples about this matter to effectively protect their children. It is also a way of allowing a modicum of morality to interface with a system that as it stands at the moment, is flooding kids with porn.
I suspect the real problem here is that many have a knee-jerk reaction to the mention of morality in the public spere. Which is why this 'moral concern' needs to be identified with the current law that protects minors.
*All delivery systems should be regulated with minors in mind. For example, shops are regulated against the free flow of cigarettes and alcohol to minors. This is the argument in a nutshell.
See the difference though is that the government isn't stopping minors from buying alcohol and cigarettes because they are morally wrong. They're incredibly physically damaging, not to mention that irresponsible drinking at a young age can literally kill you or get someone else killed. I don't see the regulation of alcohol and cigarettes to minors as being the same as regulating minors watching porn. Porn, in my opinion, though it has some negative physical effects, is mostly a moral issue. And I don't believe the government should be in the business of regulating people's personal, moral decisions.
And the thing is, you're still talking about this is if the law is the only way. As if there must be a change on a governmental level if anything is ever going to get better. But parents already have all of these options at their fingertips. They have access to porn blockers, parental controls, and just the ability to not allow their kids to go on the internet without supervision. These are decisions the parents can make on their own, and the government doesn't need to be involved in any of that.
The fundamental difference in our views is that you seem to think it's the government's job to protect children from making poor moral choices. I believe that's the job of the parents.
And there are still so many other logistic issues regarding your suggestions. One was mentioned by someone else here, and that is, what constitutes porn? What will be blocked with these modems?
Nudity? Sex? Lingerie ads? Swimsuit ads? Men with their shirts off? Pictures of breast feeding women? Written erotic fiction? Girls with low cut shirts?
Someone has to decide these things, and everyone has different opinions on these matters.
See the difference though is that the government isn't stopping minors from buying alcohol and cigarettes because they are morally wrong. They're incredibly physically damaging, not to mention that irresponsible drinking at a young age can literally kill you or get someone else killed. I don't see the regulation of alcohol and cigarettes to minors as being the same as regulating minors watching porn. Porn, in my opinion, though it has some negative physical effects, is mostly a moral issue. And I don't believe the government should be in the business of regulating people's personal, moral decisions.
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OK, good point. There are two possible responses to this:
1] That pornography IS physically damaging to the brain. For this to gain traction, organizations such as Nofap would have to continue educating the public. There is a possibility of this going mainstream [the toxic combination of minors and porn] as people are starting to talk about porn more openly in mainstream culture. I notice there are a few documentaries on Netflix [oh, the irony that I can not watch them. I have a problem, being in a foreign country, with enabling my status to mature audience].
2] That though tobacco and alcohol are indeed physically damaging there is also a moral/ cultural element to there restriction from minors. In theory, children have equal opportunity in a meritocracy via universal education. Dabbling in intoxicants and stimulants would only hinder their chances to improve their station in life.
Of the half of the population that are more libertarian-minded [where the issue of freedom trumps morality], perhaps a fair few would be persuaded by one or the other, or both of the arguments above.... which is only what would be required given that the other half of the population, already morally adverse to pornography, wouldn't even need the above reasons. Here is a good chance for a solid majority.
[Actually, I think this issue of pornography might the one moral issue to win out even with a lot of libertarians... as many libertarians are also morally conservative. A morally conservative libertarian would also have to be very doctrinaire to reject this smallest of regulation on the porn industry]
And the thing is, you're still talking about this is if the law is the only way. As if there must be a change on a governmental level if anything is ever going to get better. But parents already have all of these options at their fingertips. They have access to porn blockers, parental controls, and just the ability to not allow their kids to go on the internet without supervision. These are decisions the parents can make on their own, and the government doesn't need to be involved in any of that.
The fundamental difference in our views is that you seem to think it's the government's job to protect children from making poor moral choices. I believe that's the job of the parents.
And there are still so many other logistic issues regarding your suggestions. One was mentioned by someone else here, and that is, what constitutes porn? What will be blocked with these modems?
Nudity? Sex? Lingerie ads? Swimsuit ads? Men with their shirts off? Pictures of breast feeding women? Written erotic fiction? Girls with low cut shirts?
Someone has to decide these things, and everyone has different opinions on these matters
Yes, in theory it should be the parents responsibility to supervise their children. And yet they need to be empowered to do that. The government is not required to enforce this law. All government would do is pass a law requiring companies/ service providers to tweak the technology. This would not involve a blanket ban, or even a censoring of content, but just the provision of a solid optionwhereby parents can simply choose whether to enable or disable pornographic content. Think of it as governments equipping parents with a set of tools, not telling them what to do or how to use them.
I'd be interested in hearing from parents who are against their children watching porn, and yet feel frustrated in their ability to 'police' it.
What constitutes porn? Explicit sexual content... not p-subs.
I think this issue has the potential to completely split the libertarian position. Most libertarians are morally conservative. To reject the smallest regulation on the porn industry, a libertarian would have to be very doctrinaire indeed.
This shouldn't surprise us. If you look at the history of the libertarian movement, it began with a coalescence of very disparate parts.
Examining postwar conservative intellectual history, Kim Phillips-Fein writes:
The most influential synthesis of the subject remains George H. Nash's The Conservative Intellectual Tradition since 1945.... He argued that postwar conservatism brought together three powerful and partially contradictory intellectual currents that previously had largely been independent of each other: libertarianism, traditionalism, and anticommunism. Each particular strain of thought had predecessors earlier in the twentieth (and even nineteenth) centuries, but they were joined in their distinctive postwar formulation through the leadership of William F. Buckley Jr. and National Review. The fusion of these different, competing, and not easily reconciled schools of thought led to the creation, Nash argued, of a coherent modern Right.[42][43]
