The anonymous forum, known as Kiwi Farms, keeps popping back online despite a relentless campaign by transgender activists and a former insider
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Fantastic article, thanks for sharing. I’m disappointed in the EFF’s stance here. I understand the reasoning but I don’t feel that such hateful, dangerous speech is a good candidate for this argument. (Hateful and dangerous as in actual deaths have occurred from this.)
Let’s say they were organizing using telephones instead. Would you want the telephone providers to proactively listen in on their conversations and cut them off based on content? No. You get the police or FBI to investigate and hunt down the people, possibly with warrants obtaining information from the telephone companies, and target the people doing the crimes.
I feel it should be exactly the same with ISPs. The ISP shouldn’t be doing the policing, the police should be doing the policing. The ISP’s job should be passing bits from MAC address A to MAC address B, nothing more.
The EFF understands that “somebody do something!” is an invitation to erode liberty, and guarding against those types of power grabs by corporations and the government is important.
In this case, EFF is arguing that ISP’s should not have the ability to choose which sites to block. They are spot-on that this precedent would be used to block access to abortion assistance programs in Red States, and would get people killed.
Last week, the Electronic Frontier Foundation published an opinion piece arguing that Tier 1 ISPs should not bow to pressure to drop Kiwi Farms, calling the move “a dangerous step” toward censorship.
It’s all fun and games for the EFF until someone on that site starts publishing their employee’s SSNs and home addresses.
Well the EFF defends internet expression and communications interests for users, even when it’s a shitty cause. Kinda like how the ACLU has defended Klansmen and similar groups. They generally believe the right to freedom of speech and expression is absolute, and if speech isthreatened for one group, it sets a precedent for other groups to be threatened too.
I noticed that people who take an absolute view on certain rights don’t seem to buy into the concept of responsibility.
I used to be close friends with one of their (founders?) back when he was younger
that sort of behavior used to run rampant on this video game forum we both frequented — he was always an interesting character to say the least. a shame what’s happening to so many young kids in need of mental help
