CNN anchors Kyra Phillps and John Roberts recently discussed what apparently is a pressing issue in America today, Internet restrictions. In the course of interviewing Andrew Keen, who authors a book about the evils of blogging and the Internet’s vast openness, they chewed over restrictions on anonymous blogging and a need for “gatekeepers”. All three seemed to be in agreement that in the wake of the Shirley Sherrod controversy, we must do something about Internet freedom.
Phillps going so far as to think that something must be done “legally” to “crack down” on the false or defamatory language from the blogosphere. There’s just a small stumbling block on the road to Internet utopia, the first Amendment. Broadly, all Americans have the right to speak their mind anywhere they go and through all mediums. While the Internet is the most recent and successful disseminator of speech, it is covered by freedom of speech and press as well.
I tend to see a pattern of language about “crack downs” and “gatekeepers” a lot lately, mainly from the left. They focus on Sherrod as the poor victim of the Internet’s “wild west atmosphere” but forget that it was the same medium that vindicated her within 24 hours. In the same way President John Adams attempted to censor self-titled “seditious” speech from local papers and penny presses, folks like these CNN anchors feel the need to regulate something that is fallible.
America is unique in the world. The bedrock of our freedom is that to speak freely. Even if we get the story wrong, we can use our speech to correct it. We should not regulate out of a fear of failure, we simply need to learn to avoid it naturally.
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