To what extent should parents be able to limit their children's access to information? We can agree,  perhaps, that parent's should have the right to limit access to violent and pornographic material.

But what about ordinary, non-explicit pro-gay literature? I'm sure that it's disturbing to many homophobes how easily teenagers can get such information over the net these days, and (to repeat myself a bit from my last post) I'm often suspicious of the intentions of some of the people trying to control internet access.

One of the most effective and devastating tools of the propagation of homophobia has been isolation that most gay teens have had to face. Many have grown up with parents (who may or may not suspect that their kids are gay) who spout the most violent homophobic bile imaginable. Few had anyone to talk to about their sexuality, because this would mean outing themselves.

It would be hard to overestimate how important the internet has been in changing the way that gay kids grow up and come out. Many homophobic parents realize this and are terrified. Though they certainly would not put it this way, they want to maintain the ordinary, everyday homophobic child abuse that has been such an effective tool in the maintence of homophobic terror.

So what can they do to limit their children's access to the net?

Many of them, I suspect, organize around issues such as internet filters. It gives a good cover for their intentions -- who could argue against keeping kids away from porn? (Given how much spam I get these days, I'd like some help in being kept away from porn.)  

Internet Filters and Free Speech. If the law intended to keep children off adult sites in libraries proves too limiting of free expression, the libraries should go back to court. [New York Times: Opinion]

The Times notes that the justices made assumptions about the technology that are probably not true, such as the ease of disabling them for adult users who request it.

But libraries insist that will be difficult, if not impossible. They say their filtering software is generally installed at the building or system level, not on individual terminals, so there is no easy way to turn it off for individual users.

I'm also wondering how much discussion there was about the chilling effect of having to make such a request. "Could I see the adult web, please?"

Also, these filters have been notoriously bad at blocking non-sexual gay sites. Anyone have any idea if they have improved?

For many people, especially in rural areas, the internet has made the process of coming out much, much easier. I wonder, in fact, if the some of the people pushing the filter requirement in fact secretly want gay sites to be blocked. They can just blame it on the software. And for gay kids too afraid to use their home computers --where there parents may have installed all kinds of spyware -- it may mean a return to the devastating isolation so common before the rise of the internet.

I find myself wondering about what kind of sense of timing the Supreme Court has. When are they going to let us know about their decision about Sodomy? Gay pride is coming up and... I saw one news item that had said that the decision was going to come down at the beginning of this week, but no...

Could it be that they like to watch either (1) a good party or (2) a good protest and are planning to announce the decision as close to gay pride as possible?

Ack, gay pride is coming, now to my neighborhood! No idea what to do to get ready. This will be my first pride since I moved to the Castro, and, since I'm sort of right in the middle of it all, with a view of Market no less. May have some kind of sensory overload.