Senator J. James Exon is one of the legislators at the forefront of the battle to protect citizens from obscenity peddlers and pedophiles. In "Keep Internet Safe for Families," he proposes an amendment to the Telecommunications Reform Bill that would greatly stiffen penalties for people who actively transmit pornography and other offensive materials. He is quoted as saying, "We need this added deterrent so that those that would pervert the network will think twice" (144). He uses a clever analogy to compare the Internet superhighway to a regular highway. He comments, "Just as we have laws against dumping garbage on the interstate, we ought to have similar laws for the information superhighway" (144).

Exon believes children will remain targets of the pornography industry as long as they are curious about pornography and parents are too busy to monitor them. Children can access obscene pornographic materials from television, magazines, books, and films. The Internet isn't any different. Distributing pornography to children is a revolting crime, and those caught doing it should be punished accordingly. But this problem does not call for the enormous and unconstitutional task of censoring the Internet. The problem calls for family intervention and prevention. Pornography is legal in the United States. This industry has dropped anchor in America and is not planning on leaving. We have more pornography between our coasts than any other nation in the world. Until we deal with the pornographers, we can't tackle the problems associated with their texts.

The Electronic Frontier Foundation proposes a different course of action. This group believes it is the job of parents to safeguard their children and instill proper morals. Parents can't always watch their children, but filters can be purchased that selectively hunt out pornographic sites and restrict the computer from access. The parental lockout unit is another device used to monitor the web. It only allows children to access sites their parents have already accessed.

Whose standards do we use when we decide what should be censored and what should not--church, school, government, me, you, who? I don't know the answer, because I don't believe the Internet should be censored. I am not a pornography fan. I am, however, a fan of art. Some art incorporates nude or lewd imagery and statements. Should I be restricted from these beautiful images of culture because someone else doesn't like them? I don't believe so. Censorship opens a cultural vaccuum. When we begin to censor certain texts, we put a stranglehold on all the rest.

Coats, Daniel and James Exon. "Amendment No. 1362." <http://www.eff.org>.

Exon, J. James. "Keep Internet Safe for Families." CyberReader. 2nd ed. Victor J. Vitanza. Needham Heights, MA: Allyn & Bacon, 1999. 144-145.

Meeks, Brock. "The Obscenity of Decency. " 21 Nov. 1999. <http://www.hotwired.com/lib/privacy/exon.privacy.html>.