-Caveat Lector- from: http://www.wired.com/news/news/politics/story/18070.html?wnpg=2 <A HREF="http://www.wired.com/news/news/politics/story/18070.html">Political News from Wired News</A> ----- First-Hand Lesson in Censorship by Declan McCullagh 9:00 a.m. 23.Feb.99.PST Michaun Jensen's troubles began innocently enough in a computer lab at Southern Utah University. She was researching a sociology paper on censorship of offensive words and images. Her first offense was viewing an erotic Web site. A student complained. The lab monitor walked over to Jensen's computer and warned her. "He said, 'You need to stop,'" said Jensen, a 19-year-old junior. Then she followed links to a Hitler Was A Pagan site, which features a photo of Adolf Hitler alongside Italian dictator Benito Mussolini with arm extended in a Fascist salute. That was enough to prompt Gary Stewart, the student overseeing the computer lab, to kick her out for violating the university's rules on computer use. It also fueled a campus debate -- including a front-page article last week in the school newspaper -- that began simmering last year over the breadth, scope, and constitutionality of the policy, which bars students from downloading or viewing "objectionable material." Of course, Southern Utah University, nestled in conservative Cedar City, Utah, is not alone in drawing up such rules. Many administrators have grown nervous about Internet use, and in their recent book, The Shadow University Alan Kors and Harvey Silverglate list dozens of fear-reaching examples. Southern Utah University draws an unusually clear line, however, barring computer users from reading controversial newspapers or books online, even if the same publication appears in the school library. The university says neither faculty members nor students may use computers to "acquire, store, or display" material that is "racially offensive" or "objectionable." Jensen's professor argues that the school's library offers plenty of books about Hitler, as well as microfiche copies of Playboy going as far back as 1953. ===== First-Hand Lesson in Censorship Page 2 9:00 a.m. 23.Feb.99.PST continued "What they're really after is to keep students from looking at pornography," said Dan Pence, an associate professor of sociology and Jensen's instructor. "This seems to be a pretty clear example of taking as much control as you can get away with." Pence and other social science faculty members voiced their views loudly, and repeatedly, last fall when they returned to campus to find the administration had quietly adopted the new rule over the summer. Administration officials downplayed the rule at a December meeting, and said it wouldn't be used to stifle "legitimate" research. A committee voted to reevaluate the regulation, but not to dispense with it. According to the campus newspaper, university attorney Michael Carter said at the time: "If someone has a legitimate educational purpose [for viewing a Web site], that should be all right." Carter did not return phone calls from Wired News, but a spokesman did. "The student who asked Ms. Jensen to leave the lab did what he was obligated to do under the current policy," said Neal Cox, director of public relations. "The bottom-line desire we would have is that students coming from diverse backgrounds feel comfortable in the presence of one another." Valuing comfort over freedom might be constitutional at a private university -- where the First Amendment does not apply -- but not at a public school where free-speech rights are protected, critics say. "It's not constitutional. The First Amendment constrains what government agencies can do," said Carl Kadie, a research programmer in Redmond, Washington, and Electronic Frontier Foundation volunteer who founded the group's Computers and Academic Freedom project. "These policies infuriate me, but not just because they are unjust and unconstitutional. They infuriate me because the policy makers implicitly deny that justice and the Constitution even apply to computers," Kadie said. Federal district courts have ruled that similar speech codes -- that apply only offline -- violate First Amendment guarantees of free speech. Jensen has not been disciplined further, though school policy allows her account to be suspended. The school's spokesman said he did not know of any plans to do so. "The school is saying we're just children and we don't know what we're talking about," Jensen said. Related Wired Links: Censoring Censorware 12.Feb.99 Court Limits Online Speech 11.Feb.99 Library Filters Must Go 23.Nov.98 Virginia: Professors Don't Really Need Net ----- Aloha, He'Ping, Om, Shalom, Salaam. Em Hotep, Peace Be, Omnia Bona Bonis, All My Relations. Adieu, Adios, Aloha. Amen. Roads End Kris DECLARATION & DISCLAIMER ========== CTRL is a discussion and informational exchange list. Proselyzting propagandic screeds are not allowed. Substance—not soapboxing! These are sordid matters and 'conspiracy theory', with its many half-truths, misdirections and outright frauds is used politically by different groups with major and minor effects spread throughout the spectrum of time and thought. That being said, CTRL gives no endorsement to the validity of posts, and always suggests to readers; be wary of what you read. CTRL gives no credeence to Holocaust denial and nazi's need not apply. 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