From caf-talk Caf Aug 13 14:24:21 1992
Newsgroups: alt.comp.acad-freedom.talk,alt.censorship
From: kadie@herodotus.cs.uiuc.edu (Carl M. Kadie)
Subject: WLU (in Canada) bans alt.sex* because its "offensive"
Message-ID: <1992Aug13.181732.3739@m.cs.uiuc.edu>
Date: Thu, 13 Aug 1992 18:17:32 GMT
[This article, by Jim Boyce, jboyce1@mamut.wlu.ca, appeared on July
14th in the Wilfrid Laurier University's student newspaper, the Cord.
Since the first article was published no action has been taken by the
administration except the electing of a new chair for the senate
committee of computing. It is posted with Jim Boyce's permission.]
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."
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,
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.
In May, the alt.sex hierarchy and several other groups were
banned at the University of Manitoba after a student sent some
prinouts from alt.sex to a reporter at The Winnipeg Free Press.
Gerry Miller, Director of Computing at the University of
Manitoba, said the Winnipeg vice squad visited the univeristy
twice asking for technical information on newsgroups. The ban is
still in effect, Miller said, although individual users may get
access, "if anybody can make a case that the material should be
brought back for scholary issues."
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
and pictures anonymously, including, "a photograph of an almost
nude woman hanging by her neck from a rope on a hook. Her mouth
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.
Other universities to recently deal with the matter include
University of Ottawa, University of Toronto and Simon Fraser.
The Cord began an investigation on newsgroups in May after
being informed by Ruby Ramji, a Laurier student, that many of
them were unavailable at Laurier. Ramji said she had found a
newslist on the Laurier system and tried to access some of the
groups that were listed on it but was unable to get most of the
"alt" groups, including the entire alt.sex hierarchy.
Ramji then talked to Bob Ellsworth, Assistant Systems
Administrator, about the problem and said she was told that no
restrictions had been placed on the groups. She decided to pursue
the matter further. "Since Bob said it was happening outside the
university, I decided to follow the link."
Because the newsgroups come to Laurier via the University of
Waterloo, Ramji used a friend's account there to see if U of W
was restricting "alt" groups and indirectly keeping them out of
Laurier. She said she checked the U of W system about eight times
during May and found that the "alt" groups were always available.
On June 17, the Cord interviewed Ellsworth and Carl
Langford, Systems Administrator. Two reasons were offered to
explain the absence of the alt.sex newgroups.
First, there was an expiry date of one day for messages in
the "alt" groups. Even with such an expiry date, however, there
should have been dozens of messages a day at Laurier just as
there were at the University of Waterloo. Instead, there were
only one or two and they arrived indirectly via other newsgroups.
Secondly, system problems may have been keeping the groups
out. Whatever the reason, Langford said that it was
unintentional: "We have done nothing here to stop if from coming
in."
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'."
Langford said that many of the people in Computing Services
had moral and legal concerns about the material and had talked
about it amongst themselves: "We're a small enough group that we
can discuss these things."
A meeting was held shortly after and attended by Baker,
Langford, WLU President John Weir, and Arthur Stephens and Julia
Easley of Institutional Relations. The printout was discussed at
the meeting and John Weir made known his decision to restrict the
six newsgroups.
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."
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."
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."
--
Carl Kadie -- kadie@cs.uiuc.edu -- University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
