Bill of Rights for the Digital Age
Posted by
Soulskill
on Friday March 07, @03:33PM
from the how-about-a-declaration-of-independence dept.
from the how-about-a-declaration-of-independence dept.
diewlasing writes "Since we are living in a world where the need is growing for privacy measures and rights to use emerging technology, it seems to me that state governments should adopt a bill of rights regarding internet privacy, use of technology and speech on the internet. For example: make it illegal to allow ISPs to release personal information to anyone who wants it. Now, obviously, that's not the only issue. If you were asked by your state government to come up with a bill of rights for internet privacy, technology use, and free speech regarding the internet and emerging technologies, what would you include? Many things are covered (here in the US) under the Bill of Rights in the Constitution, but it seems to me that, these days, people with enough money can disregard this. Perhaps the states might find it a good idea to enshrine rights into law."
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So? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:So? (Score:5, Insightful)
Laws only work if there's someone to enforce them. The inherent checks and balances of the three governmental branches are supposed to do that. But we've replaced the framers' three branches with just two: republicans and democrats. And they both blow smoke up our butts while doing whatever the hell they want.
Re:So? (Score:5, Insightful)
With guitar
Know your rights all three of them
Number 1
You have the right not to be killed
Murder is a CRIME!
Unless it was done by a
Policeman or aristocrat
Know your rights
And Number 2
You have the right to food money
Providing of course you
Don't mind a little
Investigation, humiliation
And if you cross your fingers
Rehabilitation
Know your rights
These are your rights
Wang
Know these rights
Number 3
You have the right to free
Speech as long as you're not
Dumb enough to actually try it.
Know your rights
These are your rights
All three of 'em
It has been suggested
In some quarters that this is not enough!
Well...
Get off the streets
Get off the streets
Run
You don't have a home to go to
Smush
Finally then I will read you your rights
You have the right to remain silent
You are warned that anything you say
Can and will be taken down
And used as evidence against you
Listen to this
Run
Re:So? (Score:4, Insightful)
Since this is the case, it logically follows that your car can be searched without a warrant. I said more about it here [kuro5hin.org] a few years ago, and again here [slashdot.org] a couple of months ago.
Not that anybody ever listens to me...
Re:So? (Score:4, Insightful)
Power corrupts. Full Stop. Creating another "Bill of Rights" would do nothing to change it.
And to the OP, seriously, you really think the government is going to GIVE us more rights? The Bill of Rights, the real one, tells us what we can expect from our Government. Every law since then has been created to restrict what we can do, not expand it. This new "Internet Bill Of Rights" would end up a) being impossible to enforce since State's laws don't cross state lines, b) Be a waste of time, and c) Be restrictive and limiting, not expanding.
How about we get around to repealing a lot of the "Think of the Children" and other nanny-state crap our legislatures have come up. THAT would be a better movement I would get behind.
Re:So? (Score:5, Informative)
Don't you mean one branch?
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:So? (Score:5, Insightful)
More to the point, how many have not, and how many people have been harmed by this?
How long has it been since the meaning of the commerce clause was inverted? How long since they began passing ex post facto laws? How long since the right to keep and carry arms has been infringed? How long have they been carrying on a war against people's personal, consensual choices? When we start talking about periods of fifty years, you've lost me on that whole "it takes time to work." Unacceptable.
My feeling is that if the system can't correct itself over a matter of decades, then the potential for harm by rogue laws (and rogue lawmakers, and rogue enforcers) is far too great. From this, I conclude that the system itself is thoroughly broken. It is not acceptable for people to be harmed by congress, the executive, and the courts exerting powers they have no authority to exert.
Also - in a system where the government is allowed to hide who is harmed by their various out of bounds, unauthorized infliction of rogue legislation, it is not acceptable to have to demonstrate harm to one's self. If that is to be the standard, then the law in question MUST be completely transparent in its application. This whole "You can't challenge phone / wire / network taps because you can't show you've been tapped because the government won't say" is a complete and utter line of nonsense.
The US legal system is being managed by criminals. Who says so? The constitution says so.
NO! (Score:5, Insightful)
Bullshit! The minute they do that, it opens the door for some scumbag politician's power play denying that people possess a right because it's not explicitly enumerated. That's why the bill of rights wasn't written that way in the first fucking place!
Re:NO! (Score:5, Insightful)
Whereas without such a document the politician would deny people *any* rights because there's no reason to think people have rights.
Consider the UN Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Most of the world blatantly ignores it, but it serves an important purpose - it gives us something to point at as a reference point for which rights are basic and universal.
Getting back to the US Bill of Rights, it's not that we would have a right to Privacy if no rights were enumerated, it's that we would have no right to Bear Arms is they weren't.
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Re:NO! (Score:4, Insightful)
The 2nd amendment states: A well regulated militia, being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms, shall not be infringed.
It's a statement that's somewhat difficult to parse in modern English, but I don't think it says precisely what you're implying. The basis for the amendment is the US was a colony of Great Britain born of an armed rebellion. The authors of the Bill of Rights recognized that a tyrannical government will do what it can to ensure it remains in power. One of those means is to ensure people cannot defend themselves by strength of arms. The second amendment was meant to prevent the government from removing that ability from the people. People might say in the US that no firearms possessed by citizens could defeat the US army, which I agree with. However, armed insurgencies with little in the way of technology or firepower have done very well destabilizing and toppling governments even in the face of the technological might of the US.
Basically, I think the amendment, even to a strict constructionist, doesn't allow the federal government to prevent people from owning firearms. I think it's a better question as to whether states may do so.
Re:NO! (Score:4, Interesting)
Not gonna happen or it'll make things worse (Score:4, Insightful)
And that's not even getting into the fact that our congress doesn't seem particularly interested in asserting it's power (and duty) to keep the executive branch in check.
The free and the brave are in short supply in the US, having been replaced by the cowardly and the cynically opportunistic.
Digital age rights (Score:5, Funny)
The Bill of Rights is Outdated (Score:5, Insightful)
This country is going down the tubes and here's why: No one cares enough. People are down right happy with their lives as they are and unless there's a large enough percentage of the population willing to openly revolt nothing is going to change.
We have hypocrisies after hypocrisies: Taxation without representation, suspension of habeas corpus, need I go on?
The people in power realize that the people won't stand for oppression so they allow a standard of living that's just good enough for 95% of the population and they are willing to throw away the other 5% because again, they realize it lets them maintain the status quo. 1984? Nah.... just a nanny, security state propped up by the same assholes who can't take responsibility for their own actions so they let the government move in and regulate everything.
So how does this tie into an "Internet Bill of Rights"? You have to make enough CARE to create a movement for anything. As for some rules.... lets start with just one for now..... Network Neutrality.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
EULA does not a contract make (Score:3, Interesting)
Rights (Score:5, Insightful)
This is one of those things that people on the left have no concept of. They think rights are things you're entitled to by government decree, which is completely contrary to the founding document of the USofA. Government ought to be extremely limited, not an all powerful monolithic demigod that it has become. And rights don't require forcing others into situations they don't want to be in (eg Universal Health Care).
While it is NICE to want Universal Health Care, it isn't a "right" because it requires something from others. It requires technology and the work of others. The biggest problem we have today is that people don't have a clear concept of what a "right" is, because they lack a foundation for describing what rights are.
From the article "state governments should adopt a bill of rights regarding internet privacy, use of technology and speech on the internet. "
Why? It is the responisibility of each of the users to protect themselves, and government shouldn't get involved except in cases for prosecution of whatever contractual breaches occurred. When you willingly give your info to others without a contract in place, and it escapes in the wild, that is the risk you take doing so.
"For example: make it illegal to allow ISPs to release personal information to anyone who wants it."
Wrong approach. Either accept that personal info is going to be released or find an ISP that offers a guaranteed level of privacy you desire. Can't find one? Tough, go without. Or find an open access point, internet cafe or whatever, that doesn't require personal info.
"If you were asked by your state government to come up with a bill of rights for internet privacy, technology use, and free speech regarding the internet and emerging technologies, what would you include?"
I don't want a Nanny state, babysitting people. I want a state that protects the LIBERTY of all men, and not pass stupid laws because someone said "there ought to be a law". How about this instead. Be Responsible for yourself, protect yourself at all times. If you took care of yourself, then you don't need the laws you're proposing. Personally, I don't want to give up Liberty for Security, because you end up with neither.
"people with enough money can disregard this."
That is the result of government power abuses. That is a result of a government that cannot even rule itself. That is a result of power grab by the government because someone said
"Perhaps the states might find it a good idea to enshrine rights into law."
Perhaps you don't know that rights exist apart from law. Laws are only there to secure rights and Liberties of men. Government doesn't grant rights, and your basic premise clearly shows that you don't understand what a right or liberty really is, or the government's purpose is.
Redefine what "is" is. (Score:3, Interesting)
The pesky thing, according to its original meaning, would have stopped many social programs such a social security. It would have allowed ordinary people to be armed. Rather than go to the trouble of amending the thing, they decided to turn it into a "living document" that could be redefined on the spot, by redefining what the meaning of "is" is.
Another great step in social progress.
So now the problem is: how do we write a new constitution that will allow "the people" to vote themselves free bread and circuses and free health care, and not take away anyone's rights.
Everyone is refusing to admit it to themselves. Government big enough to take care of everyone, will inevitably "take care" of every one's rights as well.
The power of self deception is such that the people of America are now selling the most precious thing they have, freedom, for the pot of pourage of the promise of free services. No one can tell them that that is what they are doing.
It will take rivers of blood, to get that freedom back!
The start of America (Score:4, Insightful)
Our new world is entirely different. Where they had water separating the air their governments controlled from the air the colonists breathed, we are occupying the same meat space, talking over a series of tubes controlled and taxed by those same people we disagree with. For us to live in a fringe society seems almost barbaric. Funny that, though, as I'm sure that's exactly how the colonists felt about their lives.
So here's where I suggest you start. You start by saying fuck the internet. A digital bill of rights is useless in this current incarnation of the web. It would be subverted by anyone who had any leverage at all, and often even by those who don't (the bank vs wikileaks for example). It may seem barbaric, but work on alternatives to the internet routing system as it currently is. TOR seems like a good underground metaphor, but mesh networks seem like a potential "new world" so to speak.
And even still, after you think about all of that, you have the problem of infrastructure. The colonists left the English infrastructure entirely. They just had to fight to own what was state-side, and that was that. We, however, would be running our own internet on the infrastructure (housing, power, water, govt services, etc) that is already in place, meaning once again, there is leverage.
So where do we go from here?
Re:1st Amendment (Score:4, Insightful)
As for kiddie-porn etc. I don't think that such broad labeling actually defines 'tangible harm to others' as you imply that it must?
I'm not sticking up for people that do harm to others, just saying that I'm still waiting for proof that all forms of kiddie porn cause tangible harm. As for etc. that you mentioned, I have some questions about that too. There were a number of powerful people that thought Larry Flint was doing tangible harm. Whether you like his products or not did not stop him from protecting your 1st amendment rights.
As for a new 'bill of rights' - absofuckinglutely not. The reason is simple. The current constitutional ammendments are written pretty well. What is wrong is how they are interpreted by lawmakers and courts. Any new set will be just as poorly interpreted. What we NEED is clear understanding of how they apply to new technologies. But then we have the problem of politicians being in charge of that sort of thing. That whole lobbyist thing is a large part of why the bill of rights is being abused now.
Politician's rebuttal (Score:4, Funny)
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
I'd say one's (in)ability to positively represent themself and demonstrate good judgement are very relevant to a company's hiring practices.