6 ms·

Claire Perry forces porn filter, then her page is blocked due to naughty words

111 points by appleflaxen 13y ago

DanBC 13y ago
She discusses adult topics, and rightly is blocked by the filters she has campaigned for. I hope that companies do not make any special effort to unblock her, and that they ask her to jump through the same hoops as any other blocked user. This filter system is just clearly idiotic, and clueless idiot MPs forcing it onto the public need to dogfood the results.
- a3n 13y ago
  People should write to her, letting her know that they can't access her official site, because it's blocked. On postcards. Everybody.
  - DanBC 13y ago
    I certainly think that her constituents and anyone with a relevant interest should write her very simple messages explaining just why her idea is so stupid. Some of what she says seems reasonable - "Why can't Google help with the problem of images of child sexual abuse" - but they're ignorant of what Google does to help, and what offenders do to find images of child sexual abuse. It'd be great if she could educate herself about what the problems are, what people are doing to fix those problems, and what things still need to be pushed. I'm not sure that would work though.
    - alan_cx 13y ago
      If you do that she will accuse you are being a bully and a troll, and you become her reason for censorship. This "person" is beyond reason and logic. Make no mistake, she and her ilk are not about saving the children. She wants to make adults have her values and force it on them if she thinks its necessary. Look, we all know that all that needs to happen is that all UK ISPs put an on off tick box on all their routers in people's homes. Parents could easily decide this for themselves, in private, with out humiliation and interference. But no. It has to be the hard way, it has to be the way that coerces adult to her way of thinking. What does that tell you?
      - DanBC 13y ago
        > Look, we all know that all that needs to happen is that all UK ISPs put an on off tick box on all their routers in people's homes. Wait, this is pretty much what has happened. Except it's not on the user's router, but on the user's settings page at the ISP.
        LoganCale 13y ago
        And that's the important distinction. Because it's not on the router, it's not kept as private information. And it's on by default, so if you want to see any blocked things you have to announce to your ISP, "I want to look at…"
        DanBC 13y ago
        A tiny number of people use proxies or vpns or somesuch. Other than those people: How are you keeping your internet habits secret from your internet service provider? > "I want to look at…" ...all the perfectly normal non-porn content that has been blocked by your piss-poor filters. Like that politician's website, for example.
    - skinnycow 13y ago
      Check her Twitter page. She's insufferably stupid. People have been telling her for well over a year.
  - alan_cx 13y ago
    That is probably how her supporters communicate normally. The land line phone is probably still regarded as witchcraft. Not to mention that her party has allowed the postal service to self destruct, so that they can sell it off cheap to their friends. The worry for me as a Brit is that this current government claim to be supporters for personal freedom and responsibility.... Go figure.
sheetjs 13y ago
Other cases of internet hypocrisy: After pushing for anti-piracy legislation, French President Sarkozy caught pirating music: http://torrentfreak.com/french-presidents-residence-busted-for-bittorrent-piracy-111215/ http://torrentfreak.com/french-presidents-residence-busted-f... RIAA and Homeland Security Caught Downloading Torrents: http://torrentfreak.com/riaa-and-homeland-security-caught-downloading-torrents-111217/ http://torrentfreak.com/riaa-and-homeland-security-caught-do... Fox Entertainment pirating competitors' movies: https://torrentfreak.com/busted-bittorrent-pirates-at-sony-universal-and-fox-111213/ https://torrentfreak.com/busted-bittorrent-pirates-at-sony-u...
ChristianMarks 13y ago
So much for the use-mention distinction. Filters so far seem unable to maintain it.
- SideburnsOfDoom 13y ago
  Right. making the use-mention distinction reliably is probably an AI-complete problem.
  - ChristianMarks 13y ago
    I make the assumption that censors, fanatics and some persons in positions of authority either have difficulty distinguishing use from mention, or choose not to make the distinction. For example (at the risk of offending certain sensibilities), I took the defensive attitude that the operating assumption in academia was that space-like separated, non-interacting particles at opposite ends of the universe were actively sexually harassing each other, and behaved accordingly.
- jere 13y ago
  I've never heard the use-mention distinction, but its interesting: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Use%E2%80%93mention_distinction http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Use%E2%80%93mention_distinction However, the distinction doesn't seem to be relevant here. When Claire Perry is discussing "porn" on her site, she'd be using it, unless she's referring to the word itself. Example: http://www.claireperry.org.uk/my-news/previous-stories/claire-perry-todays-announcement-on-internet/233 http://www.claireperry.org.uk/my-news/previous-stories/clair... >Given that 83 per cent of people say that the easy availability of internet porn is damaging to children, shouldn't this be rolled out more quickly? Unless there is a different meaining of use-mention not described on wikipedia.
  - ChristianMarks 13y ago
    I am using the phrase to refer to the distinction between 'discourse about X' and 'X-discourse', rather than the more limited technical sense given to it in the Wikipedia. The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy is the better reference: http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/quotation/ http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/quotation/. More inclusive uses of the phrase 'use-mention distinction' are not uncommon. See, for instance, this entry on the use-mention distinction and political correctness in the Language Log: http://itre.cis.upenn.edu/~myl/languagelog/archives/005349.html http://itre.cis.upenn.edu/~myl/languagelog/archives/005349.h... The Language Log concludes, "In sum, failure to distinguish between uses and mentions poses a danger to freedom of speech and rational enquiry as well as the danger of falsely accusing and condemning innocent people." The sense of the use-mention distinction appearing here refers not only to individually mentioned words, but phrases, sentences, paragraphs and entire bodies of discourse.
hawkharris 13y ago
Defending freedom of speech feels - and should feel - very painful. If you haven't felt like screaming, you haven't truly defended your rights to speech in a democratic nation. Why? Because defending this freedom forces us to grapple with uncomfortable contradictions. I don't want to see Neo-Nazis protesting in a public area of my city, but I allow their right to speech because I don't want courts to set a precedent for banning speech about political issues. I don't want underage children to view pictures of sexual violence, but I have to consider how blanket restrictions on sexual content will make it harder for adolescents to access information about safe sex and for adults to view legal pornography. I think too many people expect speech-related issues to be simple and easy. They take a hard position because they feel uncomfortable with the ambiguity that comes with balancing our emotions with larger legal precedents. The blanket bans on sexual content in the U.K. epitomize this: emotional concerns about "shielding" children from sexual content seem to have overshadowed more nuanced conversations about education and adults' freedom to access information.
- lisper 13y ago
  > defending this freedom forces us to grapple with uncomfortable contradictions No, it doesn't. It just means that if you choose freedom you have to put up with people making choices and doing things that you don't approve of. It's a difficult choice for some people, but it's not a contradiction.
  - hawkharris 13y ago
    I think you and I are in agreement. We're just phrasing the same sentiment differently.
    - lisper 13y ago
      Well, I vehemently disagree with this: > Defending freedom of speech feels - and should feel - very painful. It doesn't feel painful to me at all. I choose freedom, not just for myself but for my fellow man, and I accept that the price of freedom is putting up with people making choices and doing things that I would not choose to do, that annoy the hell out of me, and that do not make the world a better place. But I am completely at peace with my choice. And I understand how a not-entirely-unreasonable person might make a different choice. But the only reason that this choice should be "painful" is if you don't really want freedom. You might want some abstracted utopian notion of freedom, a freedom without cost or consequences. But this freedom only exists in your imagination, not the real world. Real freedom is messy and inconvenient and a pain in the ass, and I'll take it over oppression any day of the week with no hesitation and no regrets, and certainly no pain.
coldcode 13y ago
The greatest disease in the world is Political Stupidity.
ama729 13y ago
> The UK has decided that all ISPs must deploy opt-in pornography filters Wait, wasn't the big problem being that this filter is opt-out? Then why is everyone being so upset about it? Such filters existed for years after all.
- Brakenshire 13y ago
  I agree that is the most important distinction. The filter which is just coming into force, on BT (what was British Telecom, and one of the largest ISPs) is what's called an 'unavoidable question', where you have to make a choice when you first go online, to be filtered or not (and if so, at which level) so effectively opt-in or out. I don't really understand why people complain about that on free speech grounds. There has been government pressure to set up decent filters, but these are ultimately just private sector ISP-level parental controls. I would personally expect such features to be standard.

111 points by appleflaxen 13y ago

DanBC 13y ago

She discusses adult topics, and rightly is blocked by the filters she has campaigned for. I hope that companies do not make any special effort to unblock her, and that they ask her to jump through the same hoops as any other blocked user. This filter system is just clearly idiotic, and clueless idiot MPs forcing it onto the public need to dogfood the results.

a3n 13y ago
People should write to her, letting her know that they can't access her official site, because it's blocked. On postcards. Everybody.
- DanBC 13y ago
  I certainly think that her constituents and anyone with a relevant interest should write her very simple messages explaining just why her idea is so stupid. Some of what she says seems reasonable - "Why can't Google help with the problem of images of child sexual abuse" - but they're ignorant of what Google does to help, and what offenders do to find images of child sexual abuse. It'd be great if she could educate herself about what the problems are, what people are doing to fix those problems, and what things still need to be pushed. I'm not sure that would work though.
  - alan_cx 13y ago
    If you do that she will accuse you are being a bully and a troll, and you become her reason for censorship. This "person" is beyond reason and logic. Make no mistake, she and her ilk are not about saving the children. She wants to make adults have her values and force it on them if she thinks its necessary. Look, we all know that all that needs to happen is that all UK ISPs put an on off tick box on all their routers in people's homes. Parents could easily decide this for themselves, in private, with out humiliation and interference. But no. It has to be the hard way, it has to be the way that coerces adult to her way of thinking. What does that tell you?
    - DanBC 13y ago
      > Look, we all know that all that needs to happen is that all UK ISPs put an on off tick box on all their routers in people's homes. Wait, this is pretty much what has happened. Except it's not on the user's router, but on the user's settings page at the ISP.
      - LoganCale 13y ago
        And that's the important distinction. Because it's not on the router, it's not kept as private information. And it's on by default, so if you want to see any blocked things you have to announce to your ISP, "I want to look at…"
        DanBC 13y ago
        A tiny number of people use proxies or vpns or somesuch. Other than those people: How are you keeping your internet habits secret from your internet service provider? > "I want to look at…" ...all the perfectly normal non-porn content that has been blocked by your piss-poor filters. Like that politician's website, for example.
  - skinnycow 13y ago
    Check her Twitter page. She's insufferably stupid. People have been telling her for well over a year.
- alan_cx 13y ago
  That is probably how her supporters communicate normally. The land line phone is probably still regarded as witchcraft. Not to mention that her party has allowed the postal service to self destruct, so that they can sell it off cheap to their friends. The worry for me as a Brit is that this current government claim to be supporters for personal freedom and responsibility.... Go figure.

sheetjs 13y ago

Other cases of internet hypocrisy: After pushing for anti-piracy legislation, French President Sarkozy caught pirating music: http://torrentfreak.com/french-presidents-residence-busted-for-bittorrent-piracy-111215/ http://torrentfreak.com/french-presidents-residence-busted-f... RIAA and Homeland Security Caught Downloading Torrents: http://torrentfreak.com/riaa-and-homeland-security-caught-downloading-torrents-111217/ http://torrentfreak.com/riaa-and-homeland-security-caught-do... Fox Entertainment pirating competitors' movies: https://torrentfreak.com/busted-bittorrent-pirates-at-sony-universal-and-fox-111213/ https://torrentfreak.com/busted-bittorrent-pirates-at-sony-u...

ChristianMarks 13y ago

So much for the use-mention distinction. Filters so far seem unable to maintain it.

SideburnsOfDoom 13y ago
Right. making the use-mention distinction reliably is probably an AI-complete problem.
- ChristianMarks 13y ago
  I make the assumption that censors, fanatics and some persons in positions of authority either have difficulty distinguishing use from mention, or choose not to make the distinction. For example (at the risk of offending certain sensibilities), I took the defensive attitude that the operating assumption in academia was that space-like separated, non-interacting particles at opposite ends of the universe were actively sexually harassing each other, and behaved accordingly.
jere 13y ago
I've never heard the use-mention distinction, but its interesting: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Use%E2%80%93mention_distinction http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Use%E2%80%93mention_distinction However, the distinction doesn't seem to be relevant here. When Claire Perry is discussing "porn" on her site, she'd be using it, unless she's referring to the word itself. Example: http://www.claireperry.org.uk/my-news/previous-stories/claire-perry-todays-announcement-on-internet/233 http://www.claireperry.org.uk/my-news/previous-stories/clair... >Given that 83 per cent of people say that the easy availability of internet porn is damaging to children, shouldn't this be rolled out more quickly? Unless there is a different meaining of use-mention not described on wikipedia.
- ChristianMarks 13y ago
  I am using the phrase to refer to the distinction between 'discourse about X' and 'X-discourse', rather than the more limited technical sense given to it in the Wikipedia. The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy is the better reference: http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/quotation/ http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/quotation/. More inclusive uses of the phrase 'use-mention distinction' are not uncommon. See, for instance, this entry on the use-mention distinction and political correctness in the Language Log: http://itre.cis.upenn.edu/~myl/languagelog/archives/005349.html http://itre.cis.upenn.edu/~myl/languagelog/archives/005349.h... The Language Log concludes, "In sum, failure to distinguish between uses and mentions poses a danger to freedom of speech and rational enquiry as well as the danger of falsely accusing and condemning innocent people." The sense of the use-mention distinction appearing here refers not only to individually mentioned words, but phrases, sentences, paragraphs and entire bodies of discourse.

hawkharris 13y ago

Defending freedom of speech feels - and should feel - very painful. If you haven't felt like screaming, you haven't truly defended your rights to speech in a democratic nation. Why? Because defending this freedom forces us to grapple with uncomfortable contradictions. I don't want to see Neo-Nazis protesting in a public area of my city, but I allow their right to speech because I don't want courts to set a precedent for banning speech about political issues. I don't want underage children to view pictures of sexual violence, but I have to consider how blanket restrictions on sexual content will make it harder for adolescents to access information about safe sex and for adults to view legal pornography. I think too many people expect speech-related issues to be simple and easy. They take a hard position because they feel uncomfortable with the ambiguity that comes with balancing our emotions with larger legal precedents. The blanket bans on sexual content in the U.K. epitomize this: emotional concerns about "shielding" children from sexual content seem to have overshadowed more nuanced conversations about education and adults' freedom to access information.

lisper 13y ago
> defending this freedom forces us to grapple with uncomfortable contradictions No, it doesn't. It just means that if you choose freedom you have to put up with people making choices and doing things that you don't approve of. It's a difficult choice for some people, but it's not a contradiction.
- hawkharris 13y ago
  I think you and I are in agreement. We're just phrasing the same sentiment differently.
  - lisper 13y ago
    Well, I vehemently disagree with this: > Defending freedom of speech feels - and should feel - very painful. It doesn't feel painful to me at all. I choose freedom, not just for myself but for my fellow man, and I accept that the price of freedom is putting up with people making choices and doing things that I would not choose to do, that annoy the hell out of me, and that do not make the world a better place. But I am completely at peace with my choice. And I understand how a not-entirely-unreasonable person might make a different choice. But the only reason that this choice should be "painful" is if you don't really want freedom. You might want some abstracted utopian notion of freedom, a freedom without cost or consequences. But this freedom only exists in your imagination, not the real world. Real freedom is messy and inconvenient and a pain in the ass, and I'll take it over oppression any day of the week with no hesitation and no regrets, and certainly no pain.

coldcode 13y ago

The greatest disease in the world is Political Stupidity.

ama729 13y ago

> The UK has decided that all ISPs must deploy opt-in pornography filters Wait, wasn't the big problem being that this filter is opt-out? Then why is everyone being so upset about it? Such filters existed for years after all.

Brakenshire 13y ago
I agree that is the most important distinction. The filter which is just coming into force, on BT (what was British Telecom, and one of the largest ISPs) is what's called an 'unavoidable question', where you have to make a choice when you first go online, to be filtered or not (and if so, at which level) so effectively opt-in or out. I don't really understand why people complain about that on free speech grounds. There has been government pressure to set up decent filters, but these are ultimately just private sector ISP-level parental controls. I would personally expect such features to be standard.