Buckley vs
Revolutions and measures undertaken for the purpose of meeting restrictions against indecent images and sites for children are common practices. Legal participations and social concerns are questioned under these conditions. The two essays; Buckley’s ‘Internet: The Lost Fight’ and Maines’ ‘The New Censorship’ deals about the conditions under which the porn sites can be prohibited from watching. There is a sense of helplessness in the declarations made by Buckley. As Buckley talks about the pornography sites and unlimited access to it, he also agrees to the fact that there cannot be an exact stoppage to it. Since internet is the strongest way to communicate and entertain, it is hard to fight back the moral issues against topics like pornography.
Buckley though personally do not support the encouragements related to these sites, and opposes the legal failures of Supreme court in offering a banned to them; he also agrees to the comments led by Mariam Bell. He accepts the fact that a 13 year old child can be restricted from picking up a porno book from the bookstore, but cannot be stopped for accessing same matters through internet. With the widespread accessibility of internet, Buckley seems to fails to raise an opposition against pornographic sites. Maines on the other hand is more argumentative. As he deals with the activities related to Censorship, he uses more sarcastic language of expression.
Failures of legal proceedings are opposed more vehemently by Maines than Buckley. He refers to the First Amendment, as a moral step towards the restrictions related to the pornographic publications. However, at the same time declares the failures of the legal supervisor in maintaining the Communication Decency act. The context of offering a moral halt to the accessibility of porno sites has been analyzed by Maines through some practical persuasions. Maines offers the examples related to V-Chip that can actually restrict the accessibility of porno sites in the computer.
However, the basic question is about the will to apply V-Chip. Maines is more clear and detailed in looking into the problems of elaborated immoral activities over intrnet. He too, like Buckley agrees about the expansion of internet, but unlike him, denies the modes of restrictions led over them. Maines offer a clear ground of unwillingness among the executive branches of administration in restricting the accessibility of pornography. He is also clear about the participation of all those parents, who in general ignore the moral side of watching these sites. In his words, ‘In households where the parental concern is low, on the other hand, the risk of violent behavior is relatively high.
But precisely because of lack of concern, it’s hard to believe that large numbers of such parents are going to attach much importance of V-chip, even to activate it.’The sense of responsibility of legal authorities and parents were never challenged by Buckley. The approach of Buckley is more liberal. In the name of ‘Utilitarianism’, Buckley considers all kinds of failures in restricting porno sites, as helpless and impractical. Whereas, when it comes to Maines, he offers innumerable sources that can actually restrict these immoral activities. Buckley considers and reconsiders all those aspects that make law incapable to fight back the immoral activities in the societies.
Accessibility to pornography has been thus accepted as a part of social evolution. On the other hand, Mianes is more strict and practical in the process of managing restriction in the society and in families in particular. Implementation of CDA, that is Communication Decency Act, has been much encouraged by Mianes. However, he also looks into the in-depth causes for the failure of this act and refers to its ‘speaker-based blocking‘. In a very convincing way, Mianes declares a combination of CDA with Children’s television Act of 1990.
He justifies the ways through which this combination can restrict children from looking into indecent channels. An extension of the same can b made applicable from prohibiting the children from having accessibility to indecent sites in the internet. On the one hand, for Buckley, ‘There are devices for the Internet similar to those beinng attempted to bar porn from television screens. One system would block twenty thousand websites, another would authorize only three thousand, and both would require weekly adjustments to compensate for the ingenuity of young porn-seekers.’ By these words the argument of Buckley seems to oppose Maines recommendation.
However, the point that Buckley misses is the ‘sense of responsibility’ in parents in reviewing the accessibility credentials in the internet. Buckley considers that nobody can keep on getting engaged in offering weekly maintenance, whereas Mianes declares that if someone really wants to fight back porn from young-seekers, then they must follow the norms of maintaining the restrictions. Maines also looks into the participation of US Constitution in this respect. He declares that the war against porn for children below 18 is not that hard to fight back. The only thing that can encourage these prohibitions is the moral awareness of the people in the process of executing laws and those who are in the family.
He also refers to the regulations led by Democrats and Republicans, in favor of welfare of the children, yet is not much bothered about the ‘political bandwagons’. Maines in particular is concerned about the awareness among people and thinks it to be possible for a healthy future of the children.Eventually it can be well established that the approach of Buckley though has been declared to be utilitarian. Yet it is rather a very weak essay in considering the steps against porn sites among children. On the contrary, the declarations made by Mianes are very inspiring.
Maines offers all kinds of solutions and the demands of social awareness against this problem. Though it seems that his approaches are tough to follow, yet are not without any hope. If we consider Buckley as a pessimistic, then Maines is definitely very optimist in his statements. Buckley’s essay seemed to be more depressing and without any solution to the problem, whereas Mianes is very encouraging and opens lots of doors against the considered problem. In my assessment the reading of Maines’ is more positive and fruitful than that of Buckley’s.
