District's uneven blocking of Web sites draws criticism

[BR_Parkway]

http://www.palmbeachpost.com/localnews/content/local_news/epaper/2006/05/09/s1b_skWEB_0509.html

Millions of Web sites are off limits to Palm Beach County students because they promote violence, racism and pornography, but some are criticizing the district for taking censoring too far.

The district has blocked access to gay and lesbian advocacy Web sites, including one belonging to a local group that serves gay youth, while allowing students to surf sites for the National Association for Research and Therapy of Homosexuality, Traditional Values Coalition, the American Family Association and Focus on the Family — organizations that oppose gay rights.

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"If their blocking software prevents kids, particularly middle and high school kids, from having access to information about gay rights and public health issues, but on the other hand allow access to religious group Web sites that are hostile to gay and lesbian legal rights and public health, that constitutes censorship," Green said.

"That's a lot of power, to decide what information is given," said Rand Hock, founder of the Human Rights Council. "There has to be a better way the school district can strike a balance than blocking all access to all students."

[Craig3410]

1. I site I recall tested this theory...

http://www.peacefire.org/BaitAndSwitch/

We collected some of the anti-gay statements from the home pages of four well-known conservative sites: the Family Research Council, the Focus on the Family, the Official Dr. Laura web page and Concerned Women for America (none of these sites are currently blocked by any of the programs that we tested). We then created one different "bait" Web page for each of these organizations, with the "bait" page consisting of quotes taken from the organization's Web site, without telling the viewer where the quotes came from. The "bait" pages were submitted for review to each of the blocking companies (through anonymous HotMail accounts so that the companies wouldn't know the submissions were coming from Peacefire).

In all cases, the blocking companies agreed to block the pages we submitted in their "hate speech" categories. We then contacted the blocking companies to ask if they would block the organizations whose Web pages were the sources of our anti-gay quotes.