Posted on 04/13/2009 5:41:14 PM PDT by CounterCounterCulture
San Jose officials are preparing for a showdown later this month over online pornography in city libraries.
City officials last considered whether to electronically filter library Internet use in 1997. At the time, they overwhelmingly concluded the technology was too primitive to snag smut without also snaring information about health topics like breast cancer.
The council will revisit that decision in what is expected to be a heavily attended evening meeting April 21.
Councilman Pete Constant since October 2007 has called for reconsidering that move. He has cited improvements in technology and disturbing news reports of people openly viewing hard-core porn on library computers open to children.
"There have been multiple complaints of lewd acts and public indecency," Constant said in a memorandum to the council, that "are not discouraged or even addressed by the city's current computer use policy."
But Constant's crusade has put him on a collision course with the city's head librarian, Jane Light, and civil libertarians who have argued filtering technology remains too crude to remove porn while allowing legitimate research to continue.
(Excerpt) Read more at mercurynews.com ...
It's a phony argument. First, the filters are designed to filter images, not text. Second, there are these primative things known as... oh, you know... books. You'd think lie-brarians would have heard of these things.
This whole “library = anything goes” mindset is hogwash. How is it that a city, state, or nation can block an under-18 person from reading a porno mag in a bookstore, but then allow that very same person to go to the library, and read the very same magazine there? Or view that and far worse online? Ridiculous.
Something that's taxpayer funded is something of the people, by the people, for the people, and we have a right to set our standards. Arrogant librarians do not care about societal standards and hide behind the 1st Amendment (which only deals with Congress). If an adult wants to look at pornography, let that adult pay for it at an adult store and not tie up our taxpayer-funded resources and put children at risk of exposure.
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For some odd reason some people seem to think that pornography is covered by the first amendment. The "right" to produce, dissmeninate and view pornography was invented by the unholy alliance of Larry Flynt the ACLU and the Wonder Judges of the SCOTUS. And to really shove it in everyones' faces, the idea that our tax money should provide porn to one and all is truly sickening.
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