From: evansmp@uhura.aston.ac.uk (Mark Evans)
Newsgroups: alt.comp.acad-freedom.talk
Subject: Re: six newsgroups banned at wilfrid laurier university
Date: 27 Jul 92 11:19:30 GMT
Organization: Aston University

jboyce1@mamut.wlu.ca (jim boyce u) writes:
: 
: The following article appeared in Laurier's student newspaper, The Cord, on
: June 14, 1992.
: 
: 
:      Access to six newsgroups on Laurier's computing system has
: been restricted until the Senate Committee on Computing Ethics
: can meet and discuss their controversial content. All six were
: from the alt.sex hierarchy, a collection of groups that deals
: with topics ranging from bondage and bestiality to recovery from
: sexual abuse and a general discussion on sex. WLU President John
: Weir said he made the decision because, "in my opinion, and in
: the opinions of others, the material was offensive."
If that is the reason why restrict it to 6?
If this was applied across the board then only the purely technical
groups would still exist.
Though some of these might be threatend 
hyperthetical argument: "I don't like apple, IMHO anything to do with apple
products is promoting apple and is thus offensive" (goodbye comp.sys.apple.*
comp.sys.mac.*)
:      Newsgroups first began arriving at Laurier two months ago
: when the university started to switch from the "unix" computer
: system to the faster, "sequent" system. They enter through a
: computer network called ONET via the University of Waterloo, and
: include messages and information from computer users all over the
: world.
:      While there are more than a thousand newsgroups available,
(nearer 2000)
: it is a handful which are raising moral and legal questions at
: several Canadian universities. Most of these are in the alt.sex
: hierarchy which are among the most popular newsgroups.
Maybe because alternative sources of obtaining information on these
subjects are difficult to obtain, incomplete or out of date
:      In May, the alt.sex hierarchy and several other groups were
What were these other groups??
: banned at the University of Manitoba after a student sent some
: prinouts from alt.sex to a reporter at The Winnipeg Free Press.
He did (of course) comply with any copyright notices on the articles 
in question.
:       On July 2, The Kitchener-Waterloo Record ran a front page
: story about computer pornography at the University of Waterloo.
: It was reported that the newspaper had received newsgroup stories
It did, of course, check that these stories did come from netnews
and were not simply manufactured by the (anonymous) individual.
: and pictures anonymously, including, "a photograph of an almost
: nude woman hanging by her neck from a rope on a hook. Her mouth
(translation: woman wearing sufficent clothing to concel a flying harness)
: is open as if screaming." The Waterloo Regional Police Department 
: was quoted as saying no investigation would be undertaken unless
: campus police requested help. The University of Waterloo, which
: banned the alt.sex hierarchy for several months in 1990, plans no
: investigation either unless a complaint about the material is
: received.
Odd that they have taken action without investigation...

:      A week later, the Cord interviewed Langford, Ellsworth and
: Hart Bezner, Director of Computing Services. Bezner said he was
: "stunned by even the suggestion that people would be keeping it
: [alt.sex] out", and attributed the unavailablility of alt.sex to
: problems within the system.
:      Bezner typified the content of alt.sex as "puerile" and said
: that he could not understand why students would be interested in
: reading "bondage" groups. He added that the situation would have
: to be considered in regards to the university switching over to
: the new computer system: "It's a matter of priorities, putting
: sex groups on is not as important as compilers... it's just like
: walking up to a half-finished apartment and asking why the
: bathroom isn't finished... we just haven't got around to it yet."
:      Later, Bezner said the Cord interview "turned on our
: interest" and he decided to do something about the material in
: the alt.sex groups. He took one hundred pages of output from one
: of the groups to Don Baker, Vice-President Academic: "it was my
: personal decision... I looked at it and said to myself, `I don't
: want to be held legally responsible for that, let those guys [the
: administration] investigate the legalities of it'."
Hold on, here he took 100 pages of a newsgroup which wasn't getting through..
This sounds somewhat odd.
Where did HE get it from.
:      On June 26, one of the newsgroups was restricted, and on
: July 2, another five met a similar fate. All six were from the
: alt.sex hierarchy, according to Ramji (Bezner referred us to her
: because he was not sure which of the groups were restricted).
: They included: alt.sex.bondage, bestiality, motss (members of the
: same sex), movies, pictures.d (a subgroup that discusses
: pictures), pictures.misc, and wizards (a less tame version of the
: generic alt.sex group).
:      Don Baker said that the solution was "short term". He said
: that there were policies on language use at Laurier and laws on
: such issues as hate literature, and that while the university
: should try to be as liberal as possible, "we're mindful of the
: fact that language has consequences, and to the extent that they
: can be discriminatory or demeaning, we should have some concern."
I don't understand the connection to the 'hate literature'...
that argument would appear to be more in tune with a newsgroup 
representing a political viewpoint or party.
:      John Weir said that the decision was based on how offensive
: the material was and not any legal implications. He did not think
: the decision compromised the university in any way and said, "I
: think one has to always make judgement about the need to judge
: things as being offensive versus the right people claim to have
: to read anything they want to read... we could have, I suppose,
: allowed the thing to run and gave it to the committee as a
: problem such as that. We chose not to do that. We felt that we
: would prefer to have it off-line during the interim rather than
: on-line."
Sounds like the 'I don't like it...' argument.
Of course keeping the material off-line would make it more difficult to
mount a defence.
:      Ruby Ramji disagrees with the judgement and, until the
: Senate Committee makes a decision, will have to access alt.sex at
: the University of Waterloo. She said that the newsgroups have
: educational content and discuss issues such as sexual hangups and
: relationships, and provide information on AIDS and other sexual
: diseases. They also have an academic purpose: "I was doing a
: study on alt.sex and I couldn't get access to it and I needed it
: as a primary source... I feel they [the administration] are
: hindering the flow of information into an academic institution
: that's supposed to uphold the freedom of information."
This raises the interesting question...
Do censors actually read what they wish to censor?
-- 
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
Mark Evans                                   |evansmp@uhura.aston.ac.uk
+(44) 21 565 1979 (Home)                     |evansmp@cs.aston.ac.uk
+(44) 21 359 6531 x4039 (Office)             |
Newsgroups: alt.comp.acad-freedom.talk