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The Blue Ribbon Campaign Sunday 2006-02-26

Today I have decided to join The Blue Ribbon Campaign for free speech online and the EFF. The Electronic Frontier Foundation was founded in July of 1990 in response to emerging threats to the freedom of speech on the Internet and later became an organisation for defending freedom of speech and human rights.

I remember the strong impression The Blue Ribbon Campaign had on the “Black Thursday” in February 1996, when thousands of web pages went black for at least a day, in protest against legislation signed by the American president Clinton, aimed at limiting freedom of expression on the Internet. The campaign was supported by EEF and such leading Internet companies as Netscape.

It may be hard to understand today, the impact of black pages with this blue ribbon made at the time, if you weren’t there. Today there are many black web pages, but only as a matter of design. Back in those early days of the Internet era, most pages were grey with black text, blue links and simple GIF images - nothing fancy. When suddenly lots of pages all over the web turned black, it was a chock, and for many an eye opener for the fact, that freedom of speech could be threatened by governments, but also that efficient campaigns could be launched very fast on this new medium.

Today, more than ever in the history of the web, threats against freedom of speech are raised. In the fear of terrorism, governments are making plans for control of all kinds of electronic communication. Laws are proposed on the right to collect email traffic, tap into mobile phone calls and do all kinds of communication surveillance. Such violation of individual integrity is planned in democratic countries, in the United States and in Europe. In many less democratic countries in the world, the situation is worse, and freedom of speech is just a dream. We have to defend ourselves against crime and terror, but we cannot give in to fear but we have to stand up for human rights and the democratic freedom we have gained.

Here are the simple rules of “The Universal Declaration of Human Rights” set out by the General Assembly of the UN in 1948. They are most relevant today.

• Posted in : History
• Author : Petit

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