If there is God somewhere around us, he’s permitted pornography as a way of celebrating his creations! Right? Not according to the UK’s Christian “Mothers’ Union”, which is exactly as fun as it sounds: they’ve negotiated a porn blockade.
Under the new system, the Guardian reports, porn-seekers will have to manually opt-in to receive titillating websites — that’s right, they’ll be blocked by default. The initiative’s meant to keep little kids away from porn. Which, sure, probably isn’t a bad idea. But it’s a parent’s job, not a centralised opt-in server’s job.
This also means that adult customers of the four (large) ISPs affected — BT, Sky, TalkTalk and Virgin — will have their names associated with the HELLO, YES, I’D LIKE TO MASTURBATE WITH MY COMPUTER list. The privacy risks here are huge. What if that list were to leak? It’s nothing to be ashamed of, but not something you want floating around, either. And in England, maybe now it is something to be ashamed of. [Guardian]
Photo by John Stillwell/WPA Pool/Getty Images: Queen Elizabeth II Launches The New Look Royal Website (www.royal.gov.uk)
Ian
Wednesday, October 12, 2011 at 8:40 AMIs this not a good thing! “Average age of first Internet exposure to pornography 11 years old” Protecting the developing minds of children should be every adults goal. As an adult I find a lot of web ad’s rude and unsolicited. I use apps like Adblock to control what is displayed on my screens as I really don’t like or want sexualised images push on me. To me this looks like it’s just an effort by parents to protect their children, I say good on them.
Sam, if “It’s nothing to be ashamed of, but not something you want floating around, either.” Why would you care?
Lee Bledsoe
Wednesday, October 12, 2011 at 9:19 AMThe problem is that it is on by default, it should be an extra service parents can request.
Mike
Wednesday, October 12, 2011 at 12:47 PMTHIS. Seriously. Want it blocked? Then opt-in and get it blocked. Fucking christians…
wsDK_II
Wednesday, October 12, 2011 at 1:52 PMyay, great way to blame 2 billion people.
idiot
Mike
Wednesday, October 12, 2011 at 3:33 PMYes I am blaming all christians, because like it or not Christianity has become institutionalised. Leaders have no power without any followers, this only got pushed through because enough people were behind this group. So I’ll repeat just for you: fucking christians. Don’t push your morals on me.
Go back to trolling Apple threads.
Garygum
Wednesday, October 12, 2011 at 7:06 PMYou’re missing his point that the majority of Christians have no contact with you and have no connection to your situation at all. The world is bigger than your neighbourhood, mate.
Sicarius123
Wednesday, October 12, 2011 at 10:32 PMThe only reason this can be pushed through is because the government stats show there are enough Christians to be behind this movement.
Whether they are or not, by identifying as Christian it pushes their morals on the masses.
light487
Wednesday, October 12, 2011 at 3:02 PMI agree with wholeheartily Mike. This is not about morals, it’s about civil liberty. Someone else’s morals should not dictate the law for other people’s morals.
They either need to make porn illegal or get the f*ck out of the way and let people make their own choices.
Dalz
Thursday, October 13, 2011 at 3:44 PMI believe it is morally okay to eat another human being. But unfortunately, the “morals” of other human beings have forced me to abandon that idea forever, unless I am happy with life in prison… So I agree with you on that one, everyone else can keep their damn morals and stop preventing me from living my dream of eating your children!
Dalz
Thursday, October 13, 2011 at 3:46 PMDamn goodie goodies taking away my freakin free agency to do as I will… we are living in tyrrany! If only people didnt have their own morals and values forced onto the rest of us!
Matt
Wednesday, October 12, 2011 at 9:22 AMAs the article states, it’s the parents job not that of the ISP to block these types of things.
gameon
Wednesday, October 12, 2011 at 12:39 PMSpoken like a person with no children.
Heard of iPhone? iPad? Tablets? Internet connectivity is everywhere and easily accessible for children.
Most parents use these in some form to entertain/placate their children, just like tv was not so long ago.
Ozoneocean
Wednesday, October 12, 2011 at 1:15 PMSpoken like a tech ludite, the mentions of the i-devices were a good clue.
For a start most decent porn these days uses Flash, so buying Apple stuff cuts the field down quite a bit already.
Secondly, if the block was opt IN rather than opt OUT that’d still protect your kids exactly the same on ALL your devices that you provided your kids and pay the accounts for.
Devices can’t just access the net willy nilly, you have to set up accounts for that. And porn over free wifi hotspots is generally blocked too. :)
lolwut
Wednesday, October 12, 2011 at 4:19 PMspoken like a tech newb and non iphone user
you do realized many websites now have a mobile version of their website?
including the porn sites?
flawed argument is flawed
James Ray Cox
Wednesday, October 12, 2011 at 1:24 PMI have 2 kids and there is no way I am restricting my access to porn on their behalf.
Sicarius123
Wednesday, October 12, 2011 at 10:33 PMLearn to be a good parent, and not either sit your kids in front of the TV to shut them up, or give them an iPad?
Dalz
Thursday, October 13, 2011 at 3:51 PMYou dont seem to get it! Parents ARE doing their job by pushing this through! If they werent doing their job by getting this pushed through then we wouldnt be having this conversation right now. You might as well come out and admit that you are perfectly comfortable with children under the age of 12 being able to watch hardcore porn, beastiality, and porn stars acting out rape scenes… yeah sure thats just fine isnt it. It doesnt matter if they do, they are too young to understand it anyways! Technology is so intrusive its virtually impossible for a parent to adequately police their childs internet use without either forcing their child to become a social outcast because he isnt allowed to use the internet without mummy and daddy there. OR you would label his/her parents as control freaks that wont allow their child the freedom to choose!
James
Wednesday, October 12, 2011 at 12:48 PMThe “why do you care” argument is a very dangerous road to go down. Internet filtering – if you aren’t doing anything illegal, why do you care? Who’s to say that once this is passed, it won’t become mandatory to sign up to view political activism sites? Or you have to go on a list to be able to access euthanasia information?
It’s a slippery slope, and one that i sure as hell would never trust the government on.
gameon
Wednesday, October 12, 2011 at 10:58 PMThe Amish sent a letter welcoming you back to 1693.
Did you never sit in front of the tv while your mum made your dinner?
gameon
Wednesday, October 12, 2011 at 11:00 PMCrap that was meant for Sicarius123. Back to my cave to learn to internet.
Ozoneocean
Wednesday, October 12, 2011 at 1:09 PMChildren are a minority in our community. Safety padding all of creation just for the sake of a small amount of people is insane and people that support it are insane.
If any parent is THIS worried that they cannot keep their kids safe from things that they don’t want them to access that they have to change all of society to do it FOR them then they’re not fit to have those kids in the first place.
Blindwilly
Wednesday, October 12, 2011 at 1:27 PMI’m not a big fan of filters either but according to ABS stats for June 30 2010 children under age 14 made up 18.9% of the population. Add in ‘children’ up to age 18 and the number is over 20%. Many would regard 1 in 5 as not being a minority (eg: the Chinese popn 1.3 billion out of global popn 6.7 billion = 19% of world popn or roughly 1 in 5) – unless you were being witty referring to their legal status!
Ozoneocean
Wednesday, October 12, 2011 at 2:01 PM1 in 5 is literally a minority though, isn’t it? The majority are NOT kids. :)
light487
Wednesday, October 12, 2011 at 3:05 PMThey may not be a minority.. but they are certainly minors..
StevoTheDevo
Wednesday, October 12, 2011 at 1:13 PMBy 11 years old, you’re well and truly starting to seek out porn.
I certainly remember school friends bringing their older brother’s/Dad’s porno mags to Primary School when I was a kid.
I don’t mind the concept, but I agree it should be Opt-in if only to make doubly sure that parents are aware it’s not a 100% reliable solution (a blacklist will always be out of date). The biggest worry of the mandatory filter concept is that it can easily be thought of as a “problem solved” solution, when in fact it’s merely a “problem reduced” solution.
light487
Wednesday, October 12, 2011 at 3:06 PMActually.. even saying “by 11 you’re seeking out porn” to suggest this is normal is a bit of a generalisation. In Australia, this may (or may not) be the case on average.. but not in all cultures. And there lies the crux of the matter, it is a cultural thing.. not a technological thing.
Salmonpie
Wednesday, October 12, 2011 at 1:50 PMAge of my first encounter with porn was 10! The internet didn’t exist and it was on top of my dads wardrobe!
EckyThump
Wednesday, October 12, 2011 at 9:23 AMThis is the beginning of the end for net freedom, The Aussi net filter got shoved aside, and would hopefully have died there! Now that the Poms have caved in to the right wing, Australia will surely want to do the same thing! being part of the Commonwealth and all! I really hope this stays in the land of rain and snow!
Blindwilly
Wednesday, October 12, 2011 at 1:11 PMBeing part of the Commonwealth – really! The only thing we get from that is an out of date royal family and a games every 4 years where we beat the crap out of most other nations.
We will get a net filter because Conroy and co want one and will justify it on whatever grounds they can conceive of, ie: think of the children!
The net filter is not dead yet, its just resting at present and the Govt is unlikely to stir the pot given its popularity rating at present.
EckyThump
Wednesday, October 12, 2011 at 2:54 PMI actually agree that we get nothing from the Commonwealth, but I still think that our Govt may try to use it as an excuse to trot it out again! I do hope the damn thing doesn’t show it’s ugly face again though! #]
Blindwilly
Wednesday, October 12, 2011 at 9:51 PMTrue, with some sort of weird twisted logic whats good for the Mother Country will be good for us (which is the type of talk you expect from the Libs and not a Labour Govt)
glennc
Wednesday, October 12, 2011 at 12:22 PMmy god
JTJ
Wednesday, October 12, 2011 at 12:45 PMBlock should be off by default and people opt-in to it.
RobbyM
Wednesday, October 12, 2011 at 2:04 PMCan’t wait for the almighty Australian Christian Lobby to push this – of course the opt-in function will be broken and attempts to view porn will simply send you to websites with Jim Wallace’s latest twitter comments which are always good for anti-muslim and homophobic rants.
sparhawk0
Wednesday, October 12, 2011 at 3:15 PMJust so we’re clear, I’d be my last dollar there’s at least one 10-11 year old in the UK that can figure out on their own how to bypass any proposed filter. There’d be a lot more with 15-16 year old brothers who’d do the figuring out for them.
And if I remember my pre-(public)Internet 11 year old self correctly, they operate as a hive mind: what one knows, they all pretty much know.
Still, you go for it, UK. Pi$$ your money down the drain for no appreicably benefit other than appease to Christian fringe groups, who conveniently blame the Internet for their children’s promiscuity while failing to take any responsibility themselves. You’ve got heaps of money to waste on this kind of thing, right? I mean, there’s no major financial crisis in your part of the world that you should be paying serious attention to instead of this pandering to Tory soccer mums or anything, is there?
Gordy
Wednesday, October 12, 2011 at 3:23 PMI think we should push for an Opt-In approach to the indoctrination of children into crazy belief systems. Let the children decide. Punish their parents if they go against the childrens wishes.
Whiteanvil
Wednesday, October 12, 2011 at 4:45 PMDont think for a second that this wont be worked around.
I remember years ago ‘some friends’ pushing a certain ‘state governments’ internet filter to the limit.
What we found was:
– There are still news groups
– there is russian, asian websites
– there are VPN’s and proxies
What this will breed is two kinds of internet users:
– passive luddites who accept what is given to them
– a new internet user who can swim around these files
This will push parents to do one thing:
‘blame the internet’
Erik Hallander
Wednesday, October 12, 2011 at 4:54 PMYay.
Another lazy parenting trick. Take some responsibility for your children instead of trying to make the government fix your problems.
Useless people.
Franz
Wednesday, October 12, 2011 at 6:03 PMWho would have thought invisible friends could cause so much trouble.
When I read crap like this, I fully approve of World War 3.
Adam
Wednesday, October 12, 2011 at 6:45 PMI read nothing above but all i have to say is this-
This is the start of censoring the entire internet. Once you have set the framework down for blocking one thing, it is dead easy to just add more things. It’s like the South Park episode when Eric goes to cancel Family Guy. You people are completely missing the point. This is especially bad in the UK where you already need a license to watch TV and listen to Radio. Worst case is that everything becomes censored and you will effectively need a license to go on the internet. It is the wet dream of every police state to be able to completely control the access to information of their people and this mother’s association handed them just that in a silver platter.
lolwut
Wednesday, October 12, 2011 at 8:03 PMat least the license give the world TopGear and Graham Norton Show !!
Craig W.
Thursday, October 13, 2011 at 4:03 AMMany Years Ago… when i was a kid and had no way to “verify” i was an adult to get into the good websites, I used free isp newsgroups… But that was the 90′s… Gnutella, G2, e-Donkey, Kazzaa, BTorrent… all viable ways to get your fix in the following years, all not blocked and easy to use…