Opposing DOPA: My Letter

Technorati Tags: DOPA, Congress, Web 2.0, Social software, technology ban

Go below the fold and don't forget to stop by the DOPA wiki.

It's a combination of Will Richardson's letter and Doug Johnson's letter with some modifications.

Anna Eshoo
698 Emerson Street
Palo Alto, California 94301
Telephone:
(650) 323-2984
(408) 245-2339
(831) 335-2020
Fax:
(650) 323-3498

205 Cannon Building
Washington, D.C. 20515
Telephone:
(202) 225-8104
Fax:
(202) 225-8890

Dear Rep. Eshoo,

I am writing today to express my strong opposition to the Deleting Online Predators Act 2006 also known as DOPA. This amendment to the Communications act of 1934 (an extension to the Children’s Internet Protection Act) was introduced by Mr. Fitzpatrick of Pennsylvania on May 9, 2006. As a mother and as a board member of private schools, I believe I have some pertinent concerns about this bill.

This bill was developed as part of the "Suburban Agenda" as laid out in the Ripon Forum,  Volume 40, No. 2, April/May 2006

(http://www.riponsociety.org/forum-apr-may-06.htm)

In that issue, John McLaughlin reported on a survey Congressman Kirk commissioned in January 2006 of suburban voters in counties across the nation.  In the Ripon Forum article, McLaughlin reported that a strong concern of those surveyed is

"Making sure our kids are secure online— 87 percent favor requiring schools and libraries to install internet filters to protect children from child pornography and Internet predators.  Only 9 percent thought that this proposal violated free speech."

Accordingly, Rep. Fitzpatrick and his fellows crafted this bill as part of the "Suburban Agenda"

The intent of the amendment is one with which all responsible adults would agree: to protect minors from the predatory behaviors of adults. And indeed, a few cases have been recorded in which children have been solicited using online communication tools (social networking tools such as blogs, wikis, and chat).  However, the incidence is very, very low.

Under the current version of the bill, any “commercial Web sites that let users create public ‘Web pages or profiles’ and also offer a discussion board, chat room, or e-mail service” would be made inaccessible to underage students in schools.

In essence, this would mean that countless millions of Webpages would be restricted, the vast majority of which contain legitimate, potentially useful content for the classroom.

The amendment, as written, is too broad and overly restrictive, preventing educators from using social networking tools for educational purposes, blocking sites of legitimate educational value, removing local control from states and school districts, placing a burdensome responsibility on technology support personnel in school districts, and doing nothing to protect children using these technologies outside of school or public libraries.

I believe that:

Filter a website and you protect a student for a day.
Educate students about online safety in a real world environment and you protect your child for a lifetime.

I believe that children are best protected by:

*Providing adult supervision during all online activities for children under 14.
*Training children from 12-18 how to respond to inappropriate behavior if they are online unsupervised.
*Engaging in effective training programs for children, parents and educators that stress safe and ethical behaviors in the online environment
*Developing life-long strategies for insuring personal privacy.

Legislation that would require students be taught safe Internet behaviors would go further in achieving the goal of protecting children that requiring any particular Internet protocols or set of websites be blocked.

We all want safe environments for our children in both the physical and virtual worlds. Please consider the most effective means by which that can be achieved. It is not DOPA.

Sincerely,
Liz Ditz

dopa

Comments

[JennyD]

This is so weird. The library protect the pornography so it is available, but shuts out Xanga? I'm no big fan of MySpace, but this seems a little wrongheaded.