No Porn From Public WiFi Hotspots In the UK Proposed 390
whoever57 writes "Prime Minister David Cameron is proposing that porn should not be available through WiFi hotspots in public areas. Exactly how this will be implemented has not been identified, even to the extent of whether the ISP or the hotspot operator should implement the blocking. From the article: '
The Prime Minister said: “We are promoting good, clean, WiFi in local cafes and elsewhere to make sure that people have confidence in public WiFi systems so that they are not going to see things they shouldn’t.”
His intervention comes after a long-running campaign from children’s charities to ensure a blanket ban on unacceptable sites on public WiFi networks.'"
Wrong question (Score:5, Insightful)
No technical solutions for social problems (Score:5, Insightful)
In general, you shouldn't try to solve social problems with technical solutions.
And in this case, it's not even possible unless you also forbid encryped sessions, which would mean people can't access their VPNs. And nobody in his right mind would surf from a public hotspot without a VPN or at least an SSL/TLS encrpyted session.
And as if that's not enough proof for you: a determined person can still use steganography to embed an encrypted stream inside a regular port 80 HTTP session. Therefore you cannot prevent people from accessing porn over public wifi. All you can do is make it more inconvenient for everyone to browse securely.
Conclusion: You can't stop it, so don't even try.
Guess he has never heard of VPN and proxies (Score:3, Insightful)
There is really no other way he could claim something as stupid as this otherwise. Just your average clueless control-freak politician. I do not even find the strength to despise him, this has gotten far, far too common.
Cue all the problems that AOL had when they tried (Score:4, Insightful)
What a great use of money (Score:5, Insightful)
His intervention comes after a long-running campaign from children’s charities to ensure a blanket ban on unacceptable sites on public WiFi networks.
Because when I donate money to a children's charity, that's exactly what I'm hoping the money will be spent on. Think of all the children saved by these campaigns.
Re:Guess he has never heard of VPN and proxies (Score:5, Insightful)
I dont think they care, about VPN or proxies. If you have these, then you're obviously old and wise enough to be able to look at whatever you want, whenever you want.
This is about minors, kids, who end up getting porn on there phones/tablets by accident, while looking for something innocent.
It's a Catholiban terrorist dictatorship (Score:2, Insightful)
That's where the whole notion of sex/porn being "dirty" and "bad" comes from. Churches and mental illness.
Imagine they'd try the same for other basic human things like... for instance.. eating.
- I bet you like the smell of a freshly cooked meal... Perv!
- Of course food sites and cooking shows should be forbidden!
- A glass of milk being shown on national television? Moogate!!! Chaos!!
- You eat by yourself? Ewww, you perv! Don't you know you will go blind?
- You had dinner in public? Off to jail with you!
- A milk-drinking toddler saw you having lunch? Die you pedo!
This is the fucked-up world religious terrorism wants to enforce. I, for one, proclaim: NOT. WITH. ME!
Sex is not a sin.
Oppression is.
Re:wtf, mate? (Score:4, Insightful)
Most Europeans only know about the US what is spoon-fed by their government-friendly media and their state-run education systems. And those governments love to tell their people how evil the US is because it allows them to advance their own extreme left and extreme right agendas. That's not a new phenomenon: monarchs and dictators have been telling Europeans how lucky they are not to be in America for nearly 200 years (just as millions of Europeans were voting with their feet).
Here's a quote from a famous German "politician":
It's scary to think that a large fraction of German politicians think and say pretty much the same thing today.
Re:Porn is bad and dirty (Score:2, Insightful)
If you think of the children that much, you are a pedo.
Re:1984?? (Score:4, Insightful)
You will only ever see what you search for on a WiFi system. Forcing ISP's and/or individual establishments that provide free internet access to monitor and block specific traffic is tantamount to authoritarian governance. I see absolutely no difference between this concept and how Egypt or Israel or Iran are manipulating and controlling the information that their citizens have access to. Honestly, please explain the difference? if any?
This is about accessing material over public wi fi. I may be unusual here, but I prefer to view porn in the comfort of my own home, and I certainly don't want to watch people jizzing into their coffee in Starbucks.
And even if the UK government banned porn entirely (which is of course not technically possible without completely abandoning internet access) it still wouldn't amount to censorship like in Iran or China.
Re:People In Glass Houses... (Score:4, Insightful)
So you're saying that Bush's quote is wrong?
You're saying that Europeans are not using negotiation and consensus to resolve their differences? That beyond Europe's borders, the world is not violent and full of totalitarian governments? Really, I'm trying to understand what part of Bush's quote you find objectionable.
(The first part of your message just demonstrates your complete ignorance. "Billions of Europeans"? Corporate-run education systems?)
Re:People In Glass Houses... (Score:5, Insightful)
As apparent from 50+ years of foreign policy fail, I'd say it is about time to abandon the meme that everything can be solved with guns and enough boots on the ground. It didn't work in Korea, It didn't work in Vietnam, it didn't work in Iraq the first time, it didn't work in Iraq the second time, it didn't work in Afghanistan (not even for the Soviets). How is that not sinking in yet? How fucking stupid do you have to be to not get that?
Re:But what sort of porn? (Score:4, Insightful)
Someone in the UK aught to add that they want religious material blocked as well. After all if you're blocking "offensive" content you better make sure you block everything people find "offensive". You should block all "offensive" content or none of it. I personally find exposing children to religion is harmful, more so than pornography.
Re:wtf, mate? (Score:4, Insightful)
I don't really agree with that in modern day Europe. The media companies don't toe the government line more than you'd expect in any country with a free press. There are often concerns about the closeness of ties between politicians and media but I think that's pretty common in Western countries. Moreover, in the UK the government itself makes a big deal of how important our relationship with the US is. Besides that, I'd argue that you're underestimating the reach of both the Internet and US culture generally. The Internet makes it easy to get access to a wide range of news sources, at least for those who are motivated to do it.
Probably more importantly, I'd guess that easily half the popular TV and most of the movies in Europe (and probably much of the world) comes from the US - there's a lot of information about US culture, self-image, even simple turns of phrase that continuously percolates into everyone's minds from this alone. People continually get (arguably idealised, since this is Hollywood) images of what the US stands for, what it's like to be American, etc. In terms of the vast entertainment industry, I'd argue that Europeans are routinely shown the same image of the US that Americans themselves receive.
Re:wtf, mate? (Score:4, Insightful)
And, as the other poster pointed out, there is a difference between a public hotspot and being in a public place.
Re:Porn is bad and dirty (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:People In Glass Houses... (Score:4, Insightful)
Third world countries are generally third world countries because they are prone to uncivilized and backwards politics and agendas.
If you don't keep an eye on them, they not only will tend to strong arm tactics towards their people, but externalize the source of the problems to first world countries leading to aggression. Like North Korea did little more than a week ago, like Libya once was fond of doing, etc.
Re:It's a Catholiban terrorist dictatorship (Score:4, Insightful)
Sex is not a sin.
Oppression is.
As a Christian, I agree with this 100%.
Many sins have been committed in the name of God, and calling sex a sin is one of them.
I mean, think about it: assuming you believe in God, then you also probably believe people were designed and created by God. In that case, sex was also designed by God, so how could it possibly be a sin?
Re:People In Glass Houses... (Score:4, Insightful)
Enough guns and boots can overthrow any regime, but that doesn't solve the problem. Answering aggression with more aggression is going to cause even more aggression (insurgents for instance). If you really want to solve the problem in a third world country, not only do you have to dispose of the ruling class/despot, you also have to educate the majority so that the country as a whole does not relapse.
You cannot expect swift application of bullets to be able to deliver the same kind of social evolution that has taken hundreds of years for the western world. This is not some kind of recipe that you can just point to and say "hey look, that's how society is supposed to work, now implement it". Education, information and negotiation is key. Once people understand why change needs to happen, you can apply guns at will. The people might even help you.
Re:Wrong question (Score:4, Insightful)
Well, I certainly think that children should not be exposed to filth like the Bible (Ezekiel 23:20 for example) or the Koran. If this law comes in I will be submitting links to every online copy of said books for blocking.
Re:Does that include Women Porn? (Score:5, Insightful)
Seriously, this belongs in the "clueless idiots want to control something they have no right to control..." basket.
Sometimes I think that the world has a chance of evolving in the right direction when insightful or intelligent laws are passed, but for each of those moments, I seem to have at least a dozen facepalm or forehead-table moments.
If a cafe owner finds that many of his/her customers are turning away to other cafes because there are too many folks holding coffee in one hand and their other hand is under the table - shouldn't it be up to them to install some sort of blocklist/filtering software? Why the fuck does it have to be a government mandated, nay regulated, nay again, state policed offence to NOT have this set up?
I am all for libertarianism, but with a touch of ethics and morals thrown in - I want people to be able to do whatever they want, and sincerly hopethat they will do the right thing - but if they choose to have effectively a red-light-district cafe, then they should be able to - hopefully ina red light district part of town. There MUST be some point where common sense kicks in with capitalism surely. You have a cafe, in the center of three primary schools, politely ask folks watching porn to move on as they are disrupting your normal business of soccer moms. Oh, you don't want a dingey establishment in the first place, okay, ask anyone watching risque content to move on if anyone notices. And if no-one does, who the fuck is it harming?
I really want to beat some common sense into idiot meddling politicians trying to force their public policies down the throats of others with a really big hard, solid, heavy stick - with nails in the end of it. There is a difference between making laws that prohibit unsafe buildings, or fire hazzards or man-eating-star-wars-type-desert-creatures and trying to ban anything that the politician doesn't want to admit to or show that he/her is doing in public from being an offence.
Re:It's a Catholiban terrorist dictatorship (Score:4, Insightful)
But a great deal of porn is about transgressive acts, and nasty attitudes. Rape fantasies are common. The notion that "no means yes" is common. The notion that all women turn into sluts when you scratch the surface. Getting pleasure from spitting, slapping and insulting someone (or I guess from being subjected to that). And of course, body parts of abnormal size.
And how do you know this?
In any case, even if that were true, I believe banning it (even just in certain places) would be morally wrong.
But children find it more difficult.
Interestingly enough, I don't see children running around raping and murdering random people very often, so I highly doubt it's a widespread problem even assuming it actually happens.
But neither am I dumb enough to say that porn is harmless.
Porn is most likely harmless to a grand majority of people. There.
Re:It's a Catholiban terrorist dictatorship (Score:5, Insightful)
It always comes up, this, in discussions about porn. Sex is normal and healthy. What could be wrong about looking at depictions of a couple engaging in this healthy, normal act.
And if that's what porn was about, I'd agree. But a great deal of porn is about transgressive acts, and nasty attitudes.
A great deal of people talking is about transgressive acts and nasty attitudes. Should we ban talking from places? Seriously how is "Pizza's here - open the box to my cock - fucking" worse than two frat boys talking about beating the shit out of someone else or wanting to? Or two girls trash talking another?
Rape fantasies are common. The notion that "no means yes" is common.
define "common". If you mean it to be more than 50% umm, then I'd like to see some citation. 30% isn't common. Even then this needs a big fat [citation needed]
The notion that all women turn into sluts when you scratch the surface.
Wait, I thought porn was about rape? Which is it?
Getting pleasure from spitting, slapping and insulting someone (or I guess from being subjected to that).
People don't need porn for this. People insult other people on a daily basis, if not more. I've seen 5,000 times more slapping on run of the mill TV shows than I have in all the porn I've seen. If you're that offended by spitting, do yourself a favor and never ever go to China. Or hang out near prepubescent boys.
And of course, body parts of abnormal size.
Fuck you and your holier-than-thou attitude on how people should look. So some people like fat porn. Oh, wait, you're talking about 18 inch cocks? So what am I not supposed to go outside anymore? Or are you talking about girls with big fake tits? If so, don't watch any sort of South American TV.
Most adults can tell the difference between fantasy and reality (although, possibly, fewer than you'd hope -- especially when there's the 'gonzo' genre that masquerades as amateur). But children find it more difficult.
You're so right. We need to get on banning Harry Potter before more children think they're wizards. Non-fiction is hereby banned because kidz iz dumbz.
So we have boys growing up with these unpleasant ideas about what it's OK to do to women, and girls growing up with these harmful ideas of what society expects of them.
From porn?! Men beat their wives because they watch PORN?! Girls have weight issues because they watched PORN?! You're dumb and so are the retards that modded you insightful.
(I'm talking about hetero porn, because that's what experience I have).
I have experience with it all and well, I can tell you 95% doesn't have any of the shit you've been spouting in it. Except for that German stuff. Freaky~!
Sure, there *is* porn in which two people are mutually attracted and have mutually enjoyable, considerate sex.
You mean like most of it?
But it's not all that common,
Inconceivable! You keep using that word, but I don't think it means what you think it means.
and consumers tend to shift up to something more interesting (i.e. more extreme and transgressive).
Umm, you're full of it. I've got over 20+ years of pron watching experience and I'm not into BDSM, skat, snuff, beast, or anything more than guy-meets-girl guy-fucks-girl. Hell, I'm not even fond of anal. People like what they like. They don't start liking shit because they're bored. Again, you are stupid.
I don't know the answer. I'm opposed to censorship. But neither am I dumb enough to say that porn is harmless.
No, you're just dumb. I'm surprised you didn't say anything in there about going blind or hairy hands. The rest of the drivel you spouted sounds just the same.