“Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.”
–First Amendment of the Bill of Rights, 1789
Imagine a world whose freedom of speech is suppressed. Essentially taken away by the government. By the same government that forbidden the inhibiting of free speech in 1789. That is exactly what the government today is trying to do with SOPA. SOPA is the Stop Online Piracy Act and is designed to prevent the spreading of copyrighted material on the internet. I’ll admit that seems like a good idea in theory, but if this bill passes then the government will have the ability to take down any website that has any form of copyrighted material. If you upload your favorite song to YouTube, then the government would have the option to completely shut down the site. If your five year old daughter draws a cute picture of Mickey Mouse and you share it with your friends on Facebook, the government could remove Facebook from the web for good. If we allow the government to have their way, they will be able to censor basically anything that they don’t want the public to see. Even though this bill has been delayed, we still need to voice our opinions. Massive companies, like Google and Wikipedia, are already on board by encouraging others to contact their state’s representatives. If you haven’t already, then please contact your representatives or otherwise we might be faced with a world where freedom of speech is suppressed.
No comments:
Post a Comment