Conservatives Call for 'I watch porn' Armbands - November 24th 2010
Conservative MP Claire Perry has demanded that people who want to access pornography on the Internet should have to register with their Internet Service Provider to prevent children from accessing the material. Upon opting in, the request to be able to access porn would be noted on the customer's account, they would be sent an 'I watch porn' armband and would have to erect an 'PORNOGRAPHY AVAILABLE HERE' banner on the front of their house in order that parents know which home wifi networks not to let their kids use.
“As a mother of three, it is perfectly reasonable that I suspend all logical thinking.” Ms Perry explained, “The fact is, preventing my children from being able to access pornographic material at all will enable me to put off uncomfortable conversations for at least 5 years until their imaginations have come up with a complete distorted concept of what sexual relations involve.”
Several websites have expressed concern at Ms Perry's suggestion, saying that having a line in the sand in which one side content is porn and the other content is not porn does not fairly reflect the diverse nature of adult content.
Conservative spokesperson Keith Wilson declared that any law would take this into consideration:
“Indeed, it seems unfair to subject an artistic nude to the same constraints as some weird BDSM fantasy porn. I would suggest that the ISPs provide a whole list of different types of pornographic material they want enabled on their Internet Connection so we know exactly what each person likes to watch.
“That will enable us to round up the sexual deviants and humiliate them by ridiculing their differences to us 'norms.'”
Under Conservative plans, people would have to give up their anonymity on the Internet regarding their sexual desires.However, many technical experts expressed scepticism at the feasibility of such a plan, as Internet specialist Chuck Hankman explained:
“Exactly how are the ISPs supposed to determine what is porn and what isn't porn? With Web 2.0, and the ability to freely upload files to and from social networking servers it would be impossible for an ISP to impose a 100% block on pornographic imagery.
“And even if certain domains were blocked, if a child did want to access porn there would be proxy servers from other countries that can reroute the material, and if we blocked those then they would just download illegal software to enable them to bypass the firewalls, which would lead to a huge increase in viruses and an epidemic of infected machines.
“Instead of a parent closing their eyes, sticking their fingers in their ears and shouting 'LALALALALALA' with regards to their child's maturity, perhaps if they sat down and talked to them about growing up then none of this would be necessary, they would get a balanced upbringing and we wouldn't end up with acomputers full of diseases and a distorted perception of the realities of the outside world.
“And I am sure that is a metaphor for something else.”
UPDATE: Editorial: Why it is impossible to block porn on the Internet, and why Miranda Suit is an idiot.
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