"Lord, what a world!" department:
In response to complaints about San Francisco Public Library visitors openly viewing explicit content, including pornography, the network has installed plastic screens to block monitors from people nearby, according to a recent New York Times report.
According to The Times, the library plans to post warnings on all computers to remind people to be sensitive to what others might see while they are web surfing.
The watching of such materials in public has increasingly been the focus of debate and legislation as broadband technology becomes more widespread, pitting people who want internet access to be unrestrained against those who feel that controls must be placed on the public viewing of mature materials.
Well, at least they're doing it to protect the privacy of those who don't want to see porn. The porn watchers will probably start feeling deprived now. What is it about wanting to do something in public that should be left behind doors? Yes, I'm talking about you, Fred Willard.
I find this whole controversy somewhat baffling. Justices have disagreed over what constitutes obscenity (and that is the legal concept, not "pronography"), but no Supreme Court in the history of thise country has ever ruled that obscenity is protected by the First Amendment. But even if you wanted to make the case that it should be, that doesn't mean a public institution should feel required to provide it. Let the perverts stay home.
So, you want to argue that poor people who can't afford to watch porn anywhere but at the library should not be treated unfairly? Really, that's where you want to go with this?
Comments
Fred Willard (and Pee Wee Herman) weren't exactly in public. They were in porn theatres, where the whole idea is to make the customer want to jerk off. I was shocked that porn theatres still exist, and by local government so overfunded that cops can do this.
They just had an incident here in Lancaster PA when cops arriving at a reported heart attack find a guy dead from stab wounds. Show of hands, please: shouldn't they send EMTs in an ambulance to heart attacks? Cops exist to inflict health problems, not treat them.
If Fred was there to find a kid to abuse, he oughta be arrested, but so should the ticket-taker who let the kid in.