Friday, January 20, 2012

Abstract on SOPA

I'm going to wax philosophical on SOPA today.

Unless you live in a cave, you heard that Google, Wikipedia, and others went "black" earlier this week in protest of the SOPA bill. The bill, presented by Congress as an attempt to curb piracy, had dangerous language in it that would have allowed the government to restrict online content.

Lesson 1:
Government is not a nanny, nor should it be. This is true with guns, internet, and many other things - some of which the government already plays nanny to, sadly.


Lesson 2:
Another lesson we should take from it is this: we the people need to know what is in every bill that Congress puts up for vote. Too many times, a bill is passed that has "unintended consequences" (as SOPA would have had) that leave us with less freedom.

Lesson 3:
Folks in government fear most losing their power (i.e. - not getting reelected). Make them think they will for any topic, and they will vote the way you want them to.

Lesson 4:
Had SOPA passed, it would have resulted in fewer freedoms at the expense of "more security." That's how it always works - they try to get you to sacrifice freedom for security. That's never a good trade.

Lesson 5:
Follow the money. ALWAYS follow the money. This bill would never have made it to committee, much less out of committee, if there had not been money behind it.

1 comment:

  1. My dad taught me Lesson 5 very early on, and he uses that for a lot of 'tests' when dealing with what government (and businesses) do.

    -Mark

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