Reply #25: Your implication is that people who oppose censorship are pro-pornography.

[Neurotica]

I am a mother of two young children and I very much care about what they see on the Internet. At the same time, I would not want to limit someone's ability to perform research in the library. That's why our library system has an excellent solution -- filters are available and adults decide for themselves and parents decide for their minor children when they sign up for a library card whether or not the filters are automatically turned on (it's connected to your library card number).

Please note that filters block a lot of perfectly legitimate information while at the same time letting some of the bad stuff through.

And you can't use the presence of minors to justify imposing content-based restrictions on access to Internet speech. Judge Leonie Brinkema in Mainstream Loudoun v. Loudoun County Library Board of Trustees said that "...defendants may not, in the interest of protecting children, limit the speech available to adults to what is fit for juveniles.”

What's more, the use of filtering software means that private firms are controlling citizens' access to information. The firms that develop filtering software will not reveal what they block (claiming proprietary information). And many of these firms have religious or political biases and/or connections to organizations whose goal is to censor information with which they disagree.

Here are some excerpts from various articles and studies:

The June 2005 edition of Consumer Reports stated that "...our evaluation of 11 products, including the filters built into online services AOL and MSN, found that…the best blockers today tended to block many sites they shouldn’t…"

The March 2001 edition of Consumer Reports also addressed censorship: “In some cases, filters block harmless sites merely because their software does not consider the context in which a word or phrase is used. Far more troubling is when a filter appears to block legitimate sites based on moral or political value judgments…Our results cast doubt on the appropriateness of some companies’ judgments…”

Ellen Edwards of the Washington Post reported on December 11, 2002, that “software meant to protect young people from the seamier side of the Internet may also be blocking important health information on issues ranging from diabetes and sexually transmitted diseases to depression and suicide, according to a Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation study released yesterday…"

The National Coalition Against Censorship (NCAC) has excellent resources and links as well.