[1593] in Commercialization & Privatization of the Internet
Alt.sex flap at U of Iowa
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (Manavendra K. Thakur)
Mon Nov 25 15:19:58 1991
To: com-priv@uu.psi.com
Date: Mon, 25 Nov 91 15:10:32 EST
From: "Manavendra K. Thakur" <thakur@zerkalo.harvard.edu>
Here is another example of the type of nonsense stirred by
non-networking reactionaries as soon as they hear about alt.sex. This
message is forwarded from alt.comp.acad-freedom.talk (aka the caf-talk
mailing list run by eff.org).
Just goes to prove that Abernathy isn't the only one out there writing
articles like this.
------- Forwarded Message
To: comp-academic-freedom-talk@eff.org
Date: 25 Nov 91 18:27:40 GMT
>From: jones@pyrite.cs.uiowa.edu (Douglas W. Jones)
Message-Id: <9300@ns-mx.uiowa.edu>
Sender: comp-academic-freedom-talk-request@eff.org
Subject: Alt.sex flap at U of Iowa
Today's Daily Iowan, Monday Nov. 25, 1991, has joined the fray.
On the top of page 3A, on the left, is the headline "UI Computer Files
Contain Pornography", followed by the same kind of incisive reporting
of the alt.sex newsgroups that we have become used to from the print
media. The article does mention that the "pornography" is carried by
USENET, but no mention is made of other material on USENET. The
article indicates that the U of I computers contain "over 70,000
pages" of pornography, which is nonsense -- this is roughly the total
number of postings that have been delivered to Iowa's machines over
USENET, but nobody at the DI seems to have noticed that things get
deleted on a regular basis.
Appearing as it does on top of the recent flap about movie Taxi Zum
Klo, this will certainly put more pressure on the University of Iowa
to censor things on campus. In the case of the movie, the local
county attourny has decided that it is "non pornographic but one scene
contains depiction of sexual exploitation of a minor, and that scene
must be edited out in any showing of the movie."
One consequence of the Taxi Zum Klo flap is that the state legislature
will probably review the current exemptions from the "sexual
exploitation of a minor" laws that applies to educational institutions
and public libraries. As currently written, the Iowa law allows for
educational use of such material in such institutions, and the law may
be rewritten to forbid this. (So, if I wanted to teach a course on
the impact of pornography on the sexual development of children in
modern western society, I wouldn't be able to use these materials
under the proposed changes to the law.)
Doug Jones
jones@cs.uiowa.edu
------- End of Forwarded Message
I read in this past Sunday's New York Times (25 Nov. 1991) that when
the film in question (Taxi Zum Klo) was shown again at U. of Iowa, the
theater hall was jam packed full. The county attorney's edict about
the censoring the "sexual exploitation of a minor" scene was effected
by placing a piece of cardboard in front of the projector when the
scene came on -- as the audience erupted in laughter.
I've been a member of a college newspaper's staff since 1987, and so I
know whereof I speak: It is most ironic that an institution whose very
heart and soul rests on principles of press freedom is working to
undermine those bedrock freedoms in electronic media. The power of
the press in this regard is all too real. Unfortunately, so is the
overreaction of the college administrators and local politicians.
At least the students at U. of Iowa haven't lost their perspective on
things.
Manavendra K. Thakur Internet: thakur@zerkalo.harvard.edu
Systems Programmer, High Energy Division BITNET: thakur@cfa.BITNET
Harvard-Smithsonian Center for DECNET: CFA::thakur
Astrophysics UUCP: ...!uunet!mit-eddie!thakur
