Christian Distortions
Never underestimate a Christian’s ability to distort facts:
Utah Attorney General Mark Shurtleff responded strongly today against a lawsuit that aims to dismantle a new state registry that protects children on the Internet. The Attorney General’s Office filed a motion to dismiss a complaint filed November 16 in federal court by the “Free Speech Coalition”-a front for the adult entertainment industry-challenging the constitutionality of Utah’s Child Protection Registry law.
“This lawsuit shows the pornographers true colors. They claim a ’right’ to market porn to adults, but by challenging our Child Protection Registry, they have proven their real intent to force smut on our children in our homes and schools,” says Shurtleff. “The state of Utah will vigorously defend the fundamental right of parents to keep porn out of their homes. The First Amendment does not allow pornographers to send materials to kids and parents who have expressly asked not to receive them.”
Utah’s Child Protection Registry went into effect on July 15, 2005. If an e-mail address has been registered for 30 days, the law forbids sending an electronic message that “advertises a product or service that a minor is prohibited by law from purchasing; or…contains or advertises material that is harmful to minors.” (http://www.le.state.ut.us/~code/TITLE13/13_26.htm)
So apparently, as per this Christian News and Media Agency, pornographers intend to force smut onto children.
Does this mean, then, that if you block a child’s address from these adult web sites that they will still be blocked until they reach a certain age? Does the un-blocking occur on the said child’s eighteenth birthday or is this something that has to be done manually? If it does have to be done manually, is it up to the parents to un-block the content? If so, how many parents would actually do this?
Why are Christians so concerned with pornography when there is so much more to be afraid of in this world? Perhaps they should support peace as much as the current Prime Minister of Canada who wishes to ban handguns. Just as it shouldn’t be considered anyone’s “God given right” to usurp all the natural gas resources on their Hummer, it should neither be anyone’s right to bear arms… especially if it causes danger to children.
Sure, you might be thinking “what is the harm in these Christian writers saying what they please?” Well, the problem is simple; mainstream media is refusing to speak out against the distorted news stories. The absence of editorials about how the religious right is distorting reality in order to push forward their agenda is giving credibility to those who should not be renowned as a valid news agency.
Now, I can understand why the American mainstream media might refrain from writing about the treachery of the President of the United States, but why aren’t they writing about the growing problem of misleading stories from Christian-run news agencies? Are they afraid of writing bad reviews of other media sources for fear of being discredited in return?
I’m sick of seeing newspapers publish editorials that are obviously written with an agenda in mind. How can we continue to trust mainstream media when they publish such utter rubbish? I challenge someone ‘credible’ to step up to the plate and write a story on this subject… it seems the only one willing to do something these days would be John Stewart, and he admits himself to be a comedian, not a reporter.
December 9th, 2005 at 10:41 am
I believe the term is ‘fear mongering.’
It isn’t so bad that editorials are written with an agenda, because honestly that’s what an editorial is, but rather that they are so often totally inaccurate or irrelevant.
Obviously the _mainstream_ adult industry isn’t about pushing porn on kids because they cannot legally buy their wares anyway. It would be a waste of marketing dollars. Anyone who would sit down and logically think things through would come to this conclusion. There is no incentive to do this, none.
However, the underlying idea of this law is reasonable. If I had spawned a little robber_baron in training, I wouldn’t want objectionable things coming to his electronic mailbox. This would include advertisements for cigarettes, booze, Viagra and a plethora of other goods and services.
Ideally I think there should be a no-email list similar to the no-call lists that they US currently has. If I can put a no solicitors sign on my house to prevent unwanted business propositions coming to my door I should be able to do the same at my ‘digital’ door.
December 10th, 2005 at 6:43 pm
Kitka,
1. Utah is it’s own little paradox neatly tucked into a territory known as a state of the US … protectionisms that occur there really should be dealt with in a vacuum.
2. I had an interesting experience yesterday while getting a snack at McD’s … I had not watched CNN for any length of time in a loooooong time and it was on in the dining room (this is one of the really nice McD’s with plasma monitors all over the place so it was hard to ignore). And as I sat there listening to the announcer a stunning realization came to me, this guy was creating the news, not reporting it. I’m sure there was some semblance of fact in what he was saying, but it was almost all hyperbole or at a minimum very very extrapolated.
The point to come from this is that today almost (if not every) so called news gathering organization (at least in the US, you can speak for others because you seem to be much wider read) has an agenda and they are going to push it with or (in most cases) without first making their agenda/biases known or worse trying to hide it (we report the news as it is! ??!??). At least in the blog community agenda/bias is generally known before you read/hear/see the content.
At least with people like Michael Moore and Rush Limbaugh you have a very good idea of where they are coming from and you can set your filters accordingly. I may not agree with either, but I can respect each of them for pushing a clear point of view.
I think that is all my $0.02 (US) is worth today.