Sumoking's Libertarian Corner - Camoron's Pornmageddon!

Despite the heavy handed and counter productive attempts of the Tory High Command to wipe any trace of embarrassingly sane and substance touting old speeches featuring things like, a vague notion that Gov is a bit big and maybe we could do with not hectoring people (so long as they are the right sort of people, elbow patches, flag saluting, no University loan, white wine drinking, type people), from the interwebs, traces remain.
 
Traces such as this little gem persevered for posterity by the "receive press release, print without anything more than the vaguest whiff of comment" Telegraph.
 

"Today in Britain - not in some foreign dictatorship, not in a bygone age you can wake up in the morning, in your own bed, in your own home to hear a knock on the door from an official with one of over a thousand powers that now allow the state to enter your home."

"You don't have to be a terrorist or a criminal fugitive. The authorities have the right to come into your home to inspect potted plants for pests or to check the regulation of hedgerows. We are in danger of living in a control state."

 
Result, thought 2009 Sumoking, no more bullying jobsworths bought by vested interests making people miserable. Oh joy, people will soon be free and happy and act like grown ups and we'll all get on with making the world slightly better. Creativity and commerce shall flourish! Hell, at this rate we'll have landfills on Mars by 2015 and bugger this sorting cartons nonsense!
 
Alas, and perhaps unsurprisingly, not so much. Fast forward to dour present day Sumoking, skip over some worrying rhetoric, side step the worrying Snowden condemnations and we find, in the very same, receive, print, think not, Telegraph this bansturbation fuckwittery;
 

[Mr Cameron]said that the Government wanted to give parents an “opportunity to take a more positive role” in controlling what their children can look up online.

 
A more positive role? Sounds borderline encouraging, granted it sounds a bit "we know best" but almost on the right track. Steve Jobs was 56 when he died. Bill gates is 58. Tim Berners Lee is 58. For a 30-40 year old parent (or Politian) to bleat about being unable to search "Google" for "internetpornfilter solution" and then to search Google for "how to install internetpornfilter solution" is laughable. Okay, maybe our gents above are "early adopters" but the internet has been around for 20 years and I gather computers were being used back before I was even born. This nonsensical "I'm old and don't understand computers and teenagers are all super hackers" is utter bollocks.
 
Unfortunately, this is complete double speak. "take a more positive role" actually turns out to mean "do absolutely fcuk all".

Embarrassed husbands who want to opt-out of porn controls in their homes will have to “have a discussion” with their wives once tough new filters are applied by internet service providers, David Cameron has said

Setting aside the idea that only husbands watch porn or the idea that wives might not already be fully aware that leaving your hubby alone for 5 whole minutes means that old crusty, the faithful hockey sock of yore, will be dug out from behind the wardrobe, it is difficult to see how forcing ISPs to block things at source enables parents to take any role at all, never mind a positive one in controlling what their children look up online.
 
But then, okay, I suppose there will be a few Daily Mail reading people who think, 1. what about the poor little breast feeding children! what if they see some breasts! On a screen! and/or 2. yeah but you can always declare you like breasts to the benevolent government and watch what you like, at least they are being up front about it! at least they gave you a choice this time!
 
In that case, you may wish to consider what big smiley Dave hasn't been saying about his benevolent kiddy saving web filter. Fortunately Wired is not the Telegraph, they don't just print a press release after a quick rehash. Wired actually spoke to the ISPs to see what was being demanded and they found this;
 

As well as pornography, users may automatically be opted in to blocks on "violent material", "extremist related content", "anorexia and eating disorder websites" and "suicide related websites", "alcohol" and "smoking". But the list doesn't stop there. It even extends to blocking "web forums" and "esoteric material", whatever that is. "Web blocking circumvention tools" is also included, of course.

 
Esoteric Material? You are going to have to put your name on a government list in order to access what some unknown, unscrutinised body designates as "esoteric material"? Frankly I'm surprised the term "seditious" doesn't make an appearance.

As if this wasn't good enough it looks like it'll be Huawei, basically an arm of the Chinese government, that'll be operating the filter. if this sort of nonsense was going on in China or North Korea we would be pitying the poor buggers.

In closing and before the Jackboot Jackie and Haridan Harman brigade comes stampeding towards me, intent on vengeance for my seeking to selfishly feed my hardcore furry pornography habit, at the expense of others, a word on rape. 

What happens when more people view more pornography? Does the incidence of rape hoot up? Well the rise of the Internet offered a gigantic natural experiment.  Because Internet usage caught on at different times in different states in the US, it offered 50 natural experiments. 

The bottom line on these experiments is, "More Net access, less rape." A 10 percent increase in Net access yields about a 7.3 percent decrease in reported rapes. States that adopted the Internet quickly saw the biggest declines. And, according to Clemson professor Todd Kendall, the effects remain even after you control for all of the obvious confounding variables, such as alcohol consumption, police presence, poverty and unemployment rates, population density, and so forth.

(A full analysis of this research is here, at Slate.)

So, the bludgeon of government will;

1. Annoy people (well me certainly)
2. Reduce the responsibilities of parents further
3. Not reduce any serious crime
4. Censor huge tracks of the internet
5. According to the logic of bringing in the filter, not stop teenage super hackers from seeing naked breasts anyway.

This government is utterly, utterly vile to the core and I fervently hope David Cameron stands on an upturned plug with no shoes on.