Australian Internet Blacklist Prompts Concern
A whistle-blower organization claims a secret list of Web sites that Australian authorities are proposing to ban includes such innocuous destinations as a dentist's office. Australia's government denied that the list — published by renegade Web site Wikileaks.org — was the same as a blacklist run by the Australian Communications and Media Authority, or ACMA. However, a manager at the dentist's office said the ACMA had confirmed her site's inclusion on the ban list. [SiliconValley.com]
Is it the government's duty to dictate what individuals can and cannot access on the internet? The Australian government believes it is. The problem is that this censorship creates a slipper-slope. Laws should be enacted to protect people and punish those who do wrong; however, they should be constructed in a fashion that does not those in power to abuse those who are subordinated. There is no transparency to determine adding a website to the banned list. A website could be added, and I would argue some were, without careful consideration at the material at hand. Websites were banned from public access were neither carefully evaluated nor representative of public opinion.
A more appropriate method to regulate access to these troubling websites would be simply punishing those who go to them. Let the people be the arbiters of what is right and wrong, in a public forum built to bring justice. Law should be built to keep the power in the people's hand, not a group of a few individuals with access to this almighty list. A compromise to this process would to have a have a “trial” on a website and let the people determine if this website should be banned from public access or not. The trial should be public and accessible to anyone. The government made people weary by enacting this type of control behind their back.
In conclusion, it is important for this blunder to be an example to the world and countries who are consider enacting policies similar to Australia. There is a tradeoff between preventing individuals from wrongdoing and infringing on their personal freedoms. I believe Australia crossed this line.
