Common sense has prevailed in England. Only a tiny percentage of Internet users have opted to have their Internet Service Providers block adult material from being viewed on their home computers, going against Prime Minister David Cameron's grand plan to protect the children, and stop the sweaty stench of Internet smut from permeating our sensitive nostrils.
Notice I said adult material and not pornography? It's because while the filters do block porn, they also block other material deemed hazardous to impressionable young (and old, presumably) minds, including sites dealing with drugs, addiction help, gambling, sex education , torrents, crime, social networking, and online dating. By saying no to the filters, all this hideousness can be viewed at any time of the day or night, by anyone with access to the Internet connection.
However, this doesn't mean the country is full of rampaging, drug-addicted, mastabatory file sharers. No, to me, it means the country is full of responsible adults who care about actual parenting, rather than relying on an unreliable, misinformed electronic nanny employed by the government to do it for them. Better still, those without kids are sticking two fingers up at the "man," and avoiding a new surge of harmful, politically motivated online censorship.
A misguided moral crusade
Here are the figures according to the UK's telecoms regulator. Just 5
percent of all BT subscribers, 8 percent of Sky subscribers, and 4
percent of Virgin Media subscribers activated the filters when offered
the option. TalkTalk says 36 percent of its subscribers turned on the
filter, but as it pre-selects the option, and did so even before
Cameron's directive came into force, the 64 percent who turned it off is
probably the more relevant number.
Prior to their introduction, Prime Minister David Cameron was very pleased with himself after convincing ISPs to adopt the filters. He said the Internet was waging "a silent attack on innocence," and that he was determined to fight it. Worse, he was convinced that Web filters were the answer to his prayers by a misguided, moral crusade waged by religious organizations like Safermedia.
The thing is, anyone who knows his computer's hard drive from Danni's Hard Drive will also know DNS filters aren't very good, and routinely block content which isn't harmful at all. Against the plan was the Open Rights Group, which created The Department of Dirty video to illustrate the problems and embarrassment a mandatory filter could cause for innocent Web users.
Stop the censorship
That so few people have activated the filters is excellent news,
because it could halt the march toward wider, more egregious censorship,
which worryingly had already begun. Initially branded an anti-porn –
albeit illegal porn under UK law – filter, Cameron's efforts soon turned
into an effort to save the children – and therefore covered all adult
pornographic content, illegal or otherwise – which is how the directive
was eventually pushed on to ISPs.