Freedom of Cyber-Speech

2093 Words5 Pages
bulb-icon

Recommended: Significance of the freedom of speech

Freedom of Cyber-Speech

Freedom of speech has always been an important issue in American society. With the advent of the Internet as a high-speed communication device, this issue has become even more prominent in recent years. This paper will explore the issue of whether the Internet should be censored. Additionally, it will investigate possible methods for undertaking this censorship.

Since 1787, the Constitution has been integral part of American society. The First Amendment to the Constitution, passed in 1791, reads:

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances. [1]

For two hundred years, this amendment has been tested in many different ways. Over the years, the government passed many laws that did, in fact, "abridge the freedom of speech" for a variety of reasons. Now, new technology appears to be giving the government another issue in which it must decide if it should go against the literal interpretation of the Constitution. This paper will show how content on the Internet can be seen as dangerous, and if it should be censored. It will then investigate what strategies are being used to censor it.

The Internet has provided a new and very powerful communication tool for Americans over the past several years. With the Internet, ideas can be transferred faster than ever before. Countless benefits have arisen with the development of the Internet, including powerful research resources, on-line shopping, and more. However, with ...

... middle of paper ...

...ier Foundation. 10/17/99. http://www.eff.org/EFFdocs/about_eff.html#mission - An introduction to the EFF

[6] First Amendment and Free Expression. Center for Democratic Technology. 10/17/99. http://www.cdt.org/speech/ An introduction to the CDT

[7] The Freedom Forum Online. The Freedom Forum. 10/19/99. http://www.freedomforum.org - An introduction to the Freedom Forum

[8] The Free Expression Network The Free Expression Network. .http://www.freeexpression.org - An introduction to the Free Expression Network

[9] United States Supreme Court. Schenck v. United States. 1919.

[10]United States Congress. Title V - Broadcast Obscenity and Violence. 1995.

[11] Baase, Sarah. Gift of Fire. New Jersey: Prentice-Hall, Inc. 1997.

[12] GetNetWise. GetNetWise. 10/17/99. www.getnetwise.com - A tool for obtaining web-filtering software.

Show More
Related

  • The Bodies Are Talking: Will Society Listen?

    3892 Words  | 8 Pages

    On Thanksgiving evening, November 27, 1992, Sergeant Kenneth Mathison and his wife Yvonne drive their 1988 tan Ford van along Route 131 in Hilo, Hawaii. The rain is pouring down and before he knows it, Kenneth Mathison is awaiting police assistance as he cradles his wife’s dead body in the back of their van. Mathison, a sergeant of 25 years with the Hilo Police Department was allegedly informing his wife, a maternity nursing professional at the Hilo Medical Center, that he was being investigated in his second paternity suit. According to Mathison, when Yvonne heard the news, she jumped from the passenger side of the van. While he was looking for her in the blinding rain, Mathison purportedly ran over his wife. He then carried the body into the van and secured it with yellow rope in the back before attempting to find help. Will the forensic evidence support Mathison’s account of that fateful evening?

    Read More

  • American Civil Liberties: Do Americans Have Enough Protections for Civil Liberties, or Not?

    1449 Words  | 3 Pages

    Friedman, L. S. (2010). What Is the State of Civil Liberties in the United States?. Civil liberties (pp. 11-49). Farmington Hills, MI: Greenhaven Press.

    Read More

  • Significance of The Free Exercise Clause

    598 Words  | 2 Pages

    The Free Exercise Clause of the First Amendment states “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof”. Meaning, Congress cannot forbid or ban the exercises or beliefs of any religion. However, the government can in fact interfere with religions practices. This means that the government cannot prohibit the beliefs of any religion, but can intervene in certain practices.

    Read More

  • Planned Parenthood of PA v. Casey

    1705 Words  | 4 Pages

    Schultz, David, and John R. Vile. The Encyclopedia of Civil Liberties in America. 710-712. Gale Virtual Reference Library. Gale Virtual Reference Library, n.d. Web. 18 Mar. 2010. .

    Read More

  • Insurance for White Masculinity: Methods of Control to Ensure a Dominant Race

    3572 Words  | 8 Pages

    The nineteenth-century saw great changes within America and from these changes an ideology was created in an effort of understanding and unification among white men. Changes were occurring so rapidly that they could not be digested and readily accepted, therefore opposition to these rose very significantly. The nineteenth century saw for a great number of political changes as the black race began to collect rights, the arrival of immigrants on an unprecedented scale, the colonization of the remaining world, and the change of women’s roles. White women started to become more educated and moved out of the house and into workplace disrupting the domestic order that was essential to keeping men’s lives stable as Tocqueville claims that the “regularity of [women’s] affection was the safeguard of American men’s lives” and without this regularity a hysteria and insanity developed. (Barker-Benfield 47) White women were immediately labeled as threat to the lineage of white men because the civilized woman began to be considered a “Race of Hysteria.” (Briggs 1) Women were considered hysterical as it was believed that as a civilization became more civilized it became a “breeding place for insanity” and these ideals were pushed upon women because their roles in society were significantly changing and men were not apt to accept these changes readily. (Barker 52) White Masculinity was developed out of the idea of making sure that white women would not become a “racial threat” to white men’s lineage; white women were supposedly becoming civilized and hysterical at the same time and then began to significantly lose in population because of these problems to the other...

    Read More

  • Hedda Gabler

    1073 Words  | 3 Pages

    Henrik Isben’s “Hedda Gabler” is a problem play that deals with several social conflicts that a newlywed woman experiences when we arrives back to her home town from her honeymoon. As the daughter of General Gabler, Hedda Gabler has been born into and grown accustom to being at the top of her town’s social hierarchy. Because of Hedda’s social status and undeniable beauty she has the ability to control and manipulate those around her – but to a certain extent. The time the play was set in, women did not have a lot of freedom to do anything outside of getting married, having children and attending to the house. Hedda did not fit this mould that was created for women of that time. She was not very maternal individual and reactive negatively whenever the subject of a possible pregnancy was mentioned. Hedda also had intimacy issues and avoided forming a close and personal bond with another human being. When she and Eilert Løvborg were beginning to develop a friendship the moment they started getting intimate she pulled her pistol out on him and told him to leave or she would shoot him. Eilert Løvborg fed her hunger for life she lived vicariously through his stories about his less than honourable, drunken nights. Soon Eilert started meant more to Hedda than she was willing to admit and she pushed him away. Hedda is unhappy with the way her life has unfolded because she is forced to form intimate relationships, her marriage to George Tesman, a possible baby, and being forced to spend time with Judge Brack. Henrik Isben’s “Hedda Gabler” resolves the thematic issue of social constraints through Hedda’s beautiful illusion that acts of freedom and courage do exist.

    Read More

  • What Is The Sympatheticism In Hedda Gabler

    1086 Words  | 3 Pages

    Hedda’s symbolic age--twenty-nine--forced her to get married because society’s age limit for marriage was catching up to her; she needed a stable and secure arrangement to avoid any scandals. However, by marrying George, Hedda was trying to get what she wanted the most: control. Attempting to maintain material wealth and status was her way of doing so; both become obvious in Hedda’s complaints. She wants another piano because the old one “doesn’t really fit in with all these other things,” and asks for a butler and horse, knowing she cannot have these things (232;247). More importantly, Hedda is trying to recover the previous status she had when she talks to George about how “It was part of our bargain that we’d live in society--that we’d keep a great house--” (247). This becomes the ultimate proof that Hedda’s love for George is fake. The marriage was a bargain; therefore, it seems that Hedda is only preoccupied with the betterment of herself. She does not care for others, not even for George. Hedda is consumed in her materialistic world, and cannot realize that this world will never actually materialize. It is apparent that what is important in life has somehow omitted her and she is lost in her own

    Read More

  • Hedda Gabler Essay

    815 Words  | 2 Pages

    Hedda says, “Good morning, dear Miss Tesman! So early a call! That is kind of you.” This first encounter presents Hedda’s struggle to keep her aristocratic background an ongoing part of her present life. Hedda’s sarcasm here shows her societal class difference from Aunt Julia and her annoyance with being woken up too early. This encounter portrays Hedda’s struggle between her shadow and her persona. Hedda’s shadow is her yearning for power and the struggle of her marriage to someone in a lower class, while her persona exhibits a kind, friendly

    Read More

  • Hedda Gabler Gender Roles

    1170 Words  | 3 Pages

    The characters in the play are consistent with the stereotypical ones of the Victorian era. Women were expected to get married and stay at home, being seen as unintelligent and fragile. Hedda Gabler is neither of things, thus emphasizing Henrik Ibsen’s point of female oppression in the Victorian era. Hedda’s character does not present the typical affectionate trait a woman would have towards her husband; The idea that women were supposed to get marriage and have children early during the Victorian era. The male role was expected to be extreme dominance over the woman, and to be the bread winner. Henrik Ibsen’s reflection of the Victorian era in the story, Hedda Gabler emphasizes on the social standards imposed upon women and men. The play questions the power dynamics distributed between the two genders, the concept that a woman’s proper role in her marriage is to tend her husband, while the man’s role is to provide for the family and uphold its reputation. Henrik Ibsen presents two characters who are victims of this drastic social code and the measures of both characters have to take in order to structure their ideals around a strict society. When both characters ideals conflict with the social mores of society, the result is often unsatisfying or tragic. For example, Hedda’s lust for power in the story is a trait not often found in women during the Victorian period. The role of power is reserved for only the men in Victorian society. In order to behold power, Hedda sacrifices her stereotypical image as a woman. Hedda does not display the typical loving wife role, but rather adopts a vicious and manipulating female character trait. George Tesman breaks this stereotype as well, by depending on Hedda to get his professorsh...

    Read More

  • Oppression in Ibsen's Hedda Gabler

    832 Words  | 2 Pages

    One of the social issues dealt with in Ibsen's problem plays is the oppression of women by conventions limiting them to a domestic life. In Hedda Gabler the heroine struggles to satisfy her ambitious and independent intellect within the narrow role society allows her. Unable to be creative in the way she desires, Hedda's passions become destructive both to others and herself.

    Read More

  • The History of Freedom

    1666 Words  | 4 Pages

    Foner, Eric. Give Me Liberty. 3rd ed. Vol. Two. New York: Norton &, 2011. Print.

    Read More

  • Hedda Gabler Research Paper

    1270 Words  | 3 Pages

    Hedda Gabler was raised by her father, General Gabler, and that is how people know her. She is not someone’s girlfriend, wife, mother, or friend. She has always been and always will be General Gabler’s daughter. Being raised without a mother, Hedda was left with only her military father to look to as an example, so she learned to shoot, ride horses, be prideful, and coldhearted. She learned to set her sights on something and not stop till she got it. Like her father, Hedda takes an aristocratic view on life. She attended all the social gatherings and had many suitors, but they never interested her. She wanted something different than what they had to offer; she wanted freedom and control over her own life.

    Read More

  • Social Issues in Hedda Gabler

    1613 Words  | 4 Pages

    In considering the many implications of the social issues as explained above, it can not be denied that the very theme of Hedda Gabler centers on social issues. "Hedda Gabler is ...indirectly a social parable" (Setterquist 166).

    Read More

  • Persuasive Essay On Internet Censorship

    1557 Words  | 4 Pages

    Internet is a powerful tool that allows users to collaborate and interact with others all over the world conveniently and relatively safely. It has allowed education and trade to be accessed easily and quickly, but all these benefits do not come without very taxing costs. This is especially true when dealing with the likes of the Internet. Countries in the European Union and Asia have realized this and have taken action against the threat of net neutrality to protect their citizens, even at the cost of online privacy. Internet censorship is required to protect us from our opinions and vices. Every country should adopt Internet censorship and regulation since it improves society by reducing pornography, racism/prejudice, and online identity theft.

    Read More

  • Naturalism In Hedda Gabler

    2105 Words  | 5 Pages

    Later she insults “Aunt Juliana 's new hat, pretending to mistake it for the servant’s” (Act II, 184-85). Hedda seems to despise everything about George Tesman and his middle class existence. She demands much more class than he has been able to provide her, for she was the beautiful, charming daughter of General Gabler and deserved nothing but the finest. As the character of Hedda Gabler develops, the reader learns that she has only married George Tesman because her father 's passing away left her no significant financial resources, nothing but a respectable heritage. She tells Brack of her decision to marry Tesman: "I really had danced myself out. My day was done. ... And George Tesman – the very model of rectitude. ... There 's a good possibility he might make something of himself, after all. ...It was more than my other admirers were prepared to do for me, my dear Judge." (Act II, 88-105). Hedda needed someone to support her financially, and George Tesman was the only decent man to propose to her. She was forced to cross beneath her social class and marry this commoner in the hopes that he would make a name

    Read More

More about Freedom of Cyber-Speech

Open Document