> On Dec 25, 2015, at 06:18 , Mike Hammett <na...@ics-il.net> wrote: > > To the thread, not necessarily Daniel, if blocking countries\continents is a > bad thing (not saying I disagree), how do you deal with the flood of trash? > Just take it on the chin?
Allowing hate speech is the price of having free speech. I will decry, denounce, and object to all of the statements promoting racism or banning entry of people based on religion, or other forms of discrimination, but I will not claim that any person has no right to make those statements. In fact, I will strongly defend the right of those people to make fools of themselves in public every bit as strongly as I will defend my right to make opposing statements. Unless we tolerate unpopular speech, we risk a tyranny of the majority which is both detrimental to society overall and antithetical to freedom of speech, the principles of democracy, and the entire concept of a free society. To some extent, some of the trash we take on the chin on the internet is the price of having a free and open internet. I’m not opposed to localized depeering or blockage when warranted, but it is important to keep such actions as granular as practicable. Otherwise, the collateral damage to the free and open internet becomes greater than the damage done by the miscreants we are attempting to block. Surely blocking an entire nation is well beyond “as granular as practicable”. I realize that reactionary overreach has become fashionable in the US since 9/11. Some great examples include the U.S.A.P.A.T.R.I.O.T. act, warrantless wiretapping and the associated unconstitutional laws of ex post facto granting retroactive immunity to the phone companies that lacked the will to say no. Examples abound even today in the surveillance bill that got buried in the recent budget act. > The degree of splash damage by blocking this way will vary based upon what > kind of network you are. Residential eyeballs? You could probably block most > of a lot of things and people wouldn't notice or care, as long as it wasn't > Google, Facebook, Netflix, etc. That may be true, but even if it is, it still doesn’t make broad censorship a concept we should support or accept in practice. The extent to which it is true reminds me of the story (apocryphal as it is) of the frog in a pot of water with the temperature being raised slowly. Merely because people are asleep at the switch does not give those of us in a position to understand the consequences license to abuse our position. Owen
