Ratings and the V-chip - the Communications Decency Act brings censorship to the Internet and television - includes a related article declaring the independence of cyberspace

Humanist, May-June, 1996 by Barbara Dority, John Perry Barlow

To gain the controls they want, politicians are, as usual, playing on fear: many parents today consider computers mysterious and frightening. The young always do things very differently than their parents did, and always in a very different age.

The scare tactics being used also include attempts to make obscenity the issue. It isn't. Indecency is not obscenity; existing obscenity law already applies to the Internet and to all other technologies as well. Then there's the most reliable scare tactic of all: child pornography. Alarmed assertions that the Net is awash with child pornography are as exaggerated as they are ridiculous. In any case, very tough child pornography laws already cover online communications and all other media.

Mostly due to ignorance, many people are genuinely worried that their computers will begin projecting offensive or obscene images and ideas at their children. They don't under, stand that the nature of on-line communications requires that the user seek out materials by use of descriptors and identifiers. They don't understand that users must have a computer modem, subscribe to a service provider using a credit card, call the number, type a pass, word to establish a link to the Inter, net, and then actively search and locate the information they want.

The V-chip presents almost as many problems as setting up an on, line blocking system. This "solution" allows for only one rating system: once activated, the V-chip would block all encoded programs and would be unable to discriminate between, for example, The Texas Chainsaw Massacre and Schindler's List, both of which contain violence. Obviously, such a system would have a severe chilling effect on the industry as broadcasters are forced to err on the side of caution for fear of FCC sanctions or, in the case of a "voluntary" system, for fear of government, imposed censorship.

In either case, there are many unanswered questions about ratings. Will a serial program have a rating that applies throughout a season, or will each show carry its own rating? What about old programming that airs again and again on cable or in syndication? Who will sit, watch, and rate all the old re-runs of "Dallas," "Starsky and Hutch," "Charlie's Angels," and hundreds of others? What about the news--for instance, coverage of atrocities in Bosnia or Rwanda? If this is not a depiction of sadistic and extreme violence, nothing is.

Would shows rated "violent" include programs like "ER," "Law and Order," "Chicago Hope," "NYPD Blue," and the many movies about serial killers and murders? What about war movies? What about graphic presentations on the Holocaust? What about many cartoons, some of which are notoriously violent? Surely a rating system will have to include all of these. How will "sexual content" be determined? Will shows with this rating include "Picket Fences" and "Friends" And what about those smutty talk shows? How will the concerns of special-interest groups be managed? (Already the Simon Wiesenthal Center is asking Internet providers to refuse messages that "promote racism, anti-Semitism, mayhem, and violence")