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Responsibility of Net Users
Introduction
The Internet burst into our lives in the early-1990s without much preparation or planning, and changed them forever. It has affected virtually every aspect of society. It is a macrosystem of interconnected private and public spheres: household, literary, academic, business, and government networks. The Internet has produced major leaps forward in human productivity and has changed the way people work, study, and interact with each other. The mix of open standards, diverse networks, and the growing ubiquity of digital devices makes the Internet a revolutionary force that undermines traditional media and challenges existing regulatory institutions based on national boundaries. The Internet has created new markets and is profoundly changing the way people interact, find leisure, explore the world, and think about human phenomena. In the Internet age, people often have cyber life in addition to their offline life. The two are not necessarily one and the same.
Information is organized and exchange is enabled on the Internet by the World Wide Web. Websites have addresses, based on their unique Universal Resource Locator (URL), which allows users to locate and exchange information using a web browser (White, 2006, pp. 14–15). The Internet has no central management or coordination, and the routing computers do not retain copies of the packets they handle. The Internet’s design and raison d’être are complete freedom, but soon enough people began to exploit the Net’s massive potential to enhance partisan interests, some of which are harmful and antisocial. As can be expected, given that the Internet has been a part of our lives for a relatively short time, the discussions concentrate on the social production, technological, architectural, geographical aspects of the Net (Benkler, 2006; Kellerman, 2002; Lessig, 1999, 2002, 2004; Schneider and Evans, 2007; Slevin, 2000; Zittrain, 2008 to name a few). The discussions about the costs and harms of the Internet, and how to address them, are – on the other hand – in their infancy. The transnational nature of the Internet makes it very difficult, some say virtually impossible, for national authorities to unilaterally implement laws and regulations that reflect national, rather than global, moral standards (Thornburgh and Lin, 2002; National Research Council 2001).
Generally speaking, the Internet is perceived as a free highway, and the way to combat problematic speech is said to be by more speech. In the United States, still the home of the majority of Internet sites in the world and the land of the First Amendment, emphasis is put on education (Atkinson, n.d; Boucher, n.d; Corn-Revere, 2003a, 2003b; Harris, n.d.; Head, 2005; Moreno-Riano, 2006; Nakaya, 2005; Nelson, 1998; Rutkowski, n.d.; Thierer and Crews (2003) and Shiffrin and Silberschatz, 2005, among others). Organizations and associations were set up to protect and promote freedom of expression, freedom of information, and privacy on the Internet.1 The dangers of the Internet are recognized but it is commonly argued that the Free Speech Principle shields all but the most immediately threatening expression. In the United States, among the limited boundaries to free expression on the Net are direct and specific calls for murder (“true threats”),2 child pornography, direct calls for terrorism and spreading of viruses and material protected by copyright legislation. On the other hand, threats of general nature, hatred, bigotry, racism, instructions how to kill and maim, how to seduce children, are protected forms of speech under the First Amendment. Speech is afforded protection except when a life-threatening message is directed against identified individuals.3 Blanket statements expressing hatred toward certain groups are given free sway, even if individual members of such groups are put at risk.4 For free speech advocates, the substantive danger is that of censorship. Freedom of expression is perceived as a fundamental human right and censorship should not be allowed to inhibit the Net’s free flow of information. Salimipour (2001/2002) argued that government actions “limiting the spread of harmful content should be carefully designed to ensure that measures taken do not restrict hate or offensive speech on the Internet” (Salimipour, 2001/2002, p. 395). This statement may sound strange to European ears but American courts have followed this doctrine in cyberspace, affording this form of speech broad protection. Thus, most hate speech on the Internet will not be considered threats, harassment, fighting words, or libel, since it is generally directed broadly and not at a particular person (Delgado and Stefancic, 2004, p. 127).
Most Netusers act within the law. The argument is that we cannot punish the majority of users because of the small numbers who exploit the Internet. Therefore, in the United States there are far more protections on free expression than restrictions on speech. We should not allow the abusers to dictate the rules of the game. We should of course fight against those who abuse this freedom.
In this essay I wish to address the ethical problems rooted in technology in response to potential risks on the Internet. The Internet is not the problem. The problem arises when it is utilized to undermine our wellbeing as autonomous beings living in free societies. This study focuses on articulating possible solutions to specific problems and on providing a framework within which these problems can be identified and resolved by accentuating the concepts of moral and social responsibility. It strives to suggest an approach informed by the experiences of democratic societies with different norms and legal cultures; one that harnesses the strengths and capabilities of Internet users in offering practical solutions to pressing problems. The second section introduces the underpinning concepts of this essay, moral and social responsibility. The following section discusses the responsibility of people who are using the Internet, Net agents. The final section focuses on readers’ responsibilities. Do readers of websites have any moral and social responsibility to warn against potentially harmful uses of the Net which might be translated into real, practical harms?
Moral and Social Responsibility
We need to distinguish between legal, moral, and social responsibility. Legal responsibility refers to addressing the issue by agencies of state power. In moral responsibility, the personal responsibility of the agent to conscience is at issue, with appeals to moral consideration. Social responsibility relates to the societal implications of a given conduct.
Aristotle was the first to construct a theory of moral responsibility. In discussing human virtues and their corresponding vices, Aristotle in Nicomachean Ethics III.1–5 explores their underpinnings (Aristotle, 1962). He states that it is sometimes appropriate to respond to an agent with praise or blame on the basis of her actions and/or dispositional traits of character. Of course, if one is acting out of coercion one cannot be held responsible for one’s deeds. One is responsible when one is informed, aware of what one does (1110b15–25). Only a certain kind of agent qualifies as a moral agent and is thus properly subject to ascriptions of responsibility, namely, one who possess a capacity for decision. For Aristotle, a decision is a particular kind of desire resulting from free deliberation, one that expresses the agent’s conception of what is good. Choice is important, to have desirable ends and relevant means to pursue the end (1111b15–1113b22). Aristotle spells out the conditions under which it is appropriate to hold a moral agent blameworthy or praiseworthy for some particular action or trait. He proposes that one is an apt candidate for praise or blame if and only if the action and/or disposition are voluntary. A voluntary action or trait has two distinctive features: the action or trait must have its origin in the agent. That is, it must be up to the agent whether to perform that action or possess the trait – it cannot be compelled externally. The agent must be aware of what it is she is doing or bringing about (1110a–1111b4) (Aristotle, 1962).5
Thus, by moral responsibility it is meant that autonomous agents have the understanding of the options before them, have access to evidence required for making judgments about the benefits and hazards of each option, and able to weigh the relative value of the consequences of their choice.
In a recent article, William J. FitzPatrick further explains that all cases of moral responsibility for bad actions must involve a strong form of akrasia, that is acting against one’s better judgment (FitzPatrick, 2008, p. 590). If an agent does something bad, either she does so in full knowledge that she should not be doing it, which is clear-eyed akrasia, or the agent is acting from ignorance. In the former cases the agent will be held responsible. In the latter case whether the agent is responsible or not will depend on whether or not the agent’s ignorance is culpable. The agent’s ignorance will be culpable only if the agent is responsible for some earlier failure that gave rise to that ignorance. And the agent will be responsible for that earlier failure again only if that was a case of clear-eyed akrasia. We do not establish culpability until we arrive at a relevant episode of clear-eyed akrasia (FitzPatrick, 2008, p. 593). Ignorance, whether circumstantial or normative, is culpable if the agent could reasonably have been expected to take measures that would have corrected or avoided it, given the agent’s capabilities and the opportunities provided by the social context, but failed to do so either due to akrasia or due to vices such as overconfidence, arrogance, dismissiveness, laziness, dogmatism, incuriosity, self-indulgence and contempt (FitzPatrick, 2008, p. 609).
The accompanying concept of social responsibility refers to the responsibility of individuals, groups, corporations, and governments to society. People are not islands to themselves. We live within a community and have some responsibilities to it. The responsibilities are positive and negative. That is, we have a responsibility to better the society in which we live, and a responsibility to refrain from acting in a way that knowingly might harm our community. The responsibility is ethical in nature. The assumption is that we are rewarded by the social framework in which we live, we care about society, would like to maintain it and to contribute to it. The contribution is proactive. We take active steps to do good and to avoid harm.6 We care for one another, communicate with respect and do not stand idly by while seeing that others might be in danger.
In the Internet age, an interesting phenomenon emerged that confuses the concept of moral and social responsibility. In the offline, real world, people know that they are responsible for the consequences of their conduct, speech as well as action. In the online, cyberworld, we witness responsibility shake-off. You can assume your dream identity and then anything goes. The Internet has a dis-inhibition effect. The freedom allows language one would dread to use in real life, words one need not abide by, imagination that trumps conventional norms and standards. It is about time to bring to the fore discussion about morality.
Agent’s Responsibility
An agent is morally responsible insofar as the agent has the capacity to choose ends freely and act in accordance with such choices (Fischer, 1999, p. 96). An agent would be held accountable for speech that directly led to harm. The issue is more complicated when it is impossible to prove a direct link between the Net posting and the real harm. However, please bear in mind that the subject at hand is moral, not legal responsibility. To be legally culpable it is incumbent on the prosecution to show that the speech under scrutiny directly led to the harmful action. Preaching is all right. Incitement is illegal. This is in accordance with John Stuart Mill’s theory, in which he was the first to distinguish between advocacy and incitement (Mill, 1982). However, no such temporal association is insisted upon when we speak of moral culpability. There are many cases in which it will be difficult to prove legal responsibility but the speech still might seem morally wrong and we will hold the Net speaker as accountable. An agent will be held responsible for bad conduct when the agent clearly intends to “do bad” or when the agent can be held culpable for ignorance in making bad choices. As Aristotle said, an autonomous agent is aware of her action.
Words can wound. Words can hurt. Words can move people to action. The anonymity of the Internet is most convenient for spreading unfounded allegations, for backstabbing, for malicious rumors. JuicyCampus.com (Juicy Campus, n.d.a) became a focus of attention in recent years as it had been used to ruin the name of young people. The site described itself as “the world’s most authentic college website, with content generated by college students for college students. Just remember, keep it Juicy!” The site contained a variety of information, data, messages, and other materials that users of the site created and posted, including detailing sexual activities of named individuals, their physical attributes (D.P., on the site the full name was explicit, “has the hairiest asshole in the world. You try to go down on her and you get lost in the dirty tangled bush. Seriously that shit makes me want to vom. Like wtf go get your asshole waxed and get those old stinky dingle berries out of there. Like wtf and get a tan holy shit i could use you as a fucking night light. skank.”) (Juicy Campus, n.d.b), that your named dorm mate was spreading sexual diseases, attacks on people’s integrity, accusing students of using others for social climbing, and so on. The site’s managers were well aware of what was done in their forum. They did not care.
The site’s terms and conditions unsurprisingly said the following:
Please use caution and common sense when viewing the Site. You understand and agree that any Content is the exclusive responsibility of the person who posted it, and that you will be solely responsible for any Content that you post via the Site. You acknowledge that JuicyCampus is not responsible for, does not control, does not endorse and does not verify the Content posted to the Site or available through the Site, and that it makes no guarantee regarding the reliability, accuracy, legitimacy or quality of any such Content. You agree that you will bear any and all risk of reliance on the accuracy, validity or legitimacy of such Content. You agree that JuicyCampus has no obligation to monitor the reliability, accuracy, legitimacy or quality of such Content, nor to enforce any standards … in connection with such Content. Under no circumstances will JuicyCampus be liable in any way to you for any Content, including, but not limited to, any errors or omissions in any Content or any loss or damage of any kind incurred as a result of the use or existence of or exposure to any Content posted or otherwise transmitted via the Site (Juicy Campus, n.d.c).
Most if not all the comments posted on the site were anonymous and JuicyCampus did not remove posts based on students’ objections. “The second someone’s name appears on the site, it’s a death sentence,” said one student (Holahan, 2008). This, of course, was an exaggeration, but it showed the extent people were troubled by this influential website. Behind the shield of anonymity, agents dust away all responsibility. JuicyCampus closed down on January 5, 20097 but on other forums people can say whatever they wish, notwithstanding how damaging, defamatory, or degrading their words might be, without expecting to be accountable for the consequences.
To counter JuicyCampus, Connor Diemand-Yauman, 20-year-old president of the Princeton 2010 class, created a new website, OwnWhatYouThink.com, that asks students to pledge not to visit anonymous gossip sites and to stand behind their online statements. Own What You Think seeks to unite people and bring personal accountability back into the ways in which people communicate and interact with each other. It is about encouraging individuals to voice their opinions respectfully and constructively while refusing to participate in anonymous and malicious character assassination. This refreshing initiative is also about taking a personal stand for something and encouraging others to do the same. Ultimately, “Own What You Think is about collaborating, dissenting, learning, and disagreeing in a constructive manner that allows us to grow as individuals and a society as a whole.”8 “This is about changing the way our generation and our culture look at the way we communicate with one another,” Diemand-Yauman explained. “Anonymity = Cowardice” (Holahan, 2008).
On the Web we find extensive discussions on suicide pills9 and “exit bags” (do-it-yourself suicide kit).10 In 2005, in Japan alone there were more than 17 000 Japanese websites that offered information on suicide and its methods (Hagihara, Tarumi, and Abe, 2007). One site calls on people to “save the planet, kill yourself.”11 It advises people to “do a good job” when they commit suicide, saying: “Suicide is hard work. It’s easy to do it badly, or make rookie mistakes. As with many things, the best results are achieved by thorough research and careful preparation.”12 The site goes on to discuss the pros and cons of death by shooting, hanging, crashing a car, jumping, slitting your wrists, drowning, freezing, overdosing or gassing yourself with nitrous oxide, exhaust fumes and oven gas. Another site describes using guns, overdosing, slashing one’s wrists, and hanging as the “best methods to commit suicide.” Other site titles suggested various suicide methods (Malamuth, Linz, and Yao, 2005). Yet another site illustrated various methods including lethal doses of poison, their availability, estimated time of death, and degrees of certainty methods (Malamuth, Linz, and Yao, 2005). Notwithstanding the extent of the agents’ liberalism, they should consider the prudence of such postings given the vulnerability of the people that such sites might attract. Indeed, some people report being encouraged to use suicide as a problem solving strategy by suicide web forums. Cases of cybersuicide, attempted or successful suicides influenced by the Internet, were documented (Biddle et al., 2007; Beatson, Hosty, and Smith, 2000; Cubby, 2007, Thompson 1999). The Internet facilitates group suicides, providing a forum for like-minded people to meet in order to arrange their collective death.13 Thus, such a behavior that encourages suicide constitutes a clear-eyed akrasia, behavior that is stripped of any moral and social responsibility that cannot be justified nor legitimized.
In November 2008 a federal statute designed to combat computer crimes was used for the first time to prosecute what were essentially abuses of a user agreement on a social networking site. Previously this statute was used to address hacking. Let me discuss this tragic story in some detail.
The Meier tragedy
Lori Drew, 49, her daughter Sarah, who was then 13, and Ashley Grills, 19, a family friend and employee, created on the computer mediated community, MySpace,14 a fictitious teenage boy “Josh Evans” to communicate with Sarah’s nemesis, Megan Meier, who was 13 and had a history of depression and suicidal impulses. Meier received treatment for attention deficit disorder and depression and had been in counseling since third grade (Deutsch, 2008b; Jones, 2008). “Josh’s” profile and communications were geared to the needs of an insecure and volatile teenage girl, carefully designed to exploit Megan’s vulnerabilities and to play on her emotions. After six weeks of online courtship with “Josh” who told Megan he loved her “so much,” (Deutsch, 2008a) in October 2006 “Josh” suddenly wrote to Megan “I don’t want to be friends with you anymore because you’re not nice to your friends” (McFadden and Fulginiti, 2008). The distraught Megan tried to understand why “Josh” no longer wanted to be her friend, involving her MySpace friends in a discussion. The query escalated into a barrage of insults and fierce exchanges. Megan received other emails from “Josh” in which he called her “fat” and “slut,” (Jones, 2007) and that “You’re a shitty person, and the world would be a better place without you in it” (Collins, 2008). Shortly after that last message was sent, Megan wrote back, “You’re the kind of boy a girl would kill herself over” (Steinhauer, 2008). Megan hanged herself that same afternoon in her bedroom. Drew, who masterminded the cyber affair, was convicted of computer fraud in creating a phony account to trick Megan and obtaining information in order to inflict emotional distress on the girl. The indictment charged Drew and her coconspirators for using “the information obtained over the MySpace computer system to torment, harass, humiliate, and embarrass the juvenile MySpace member” (Deutsch, 2008b).
Undoubtedly, Lori Drew and her coconspirators are blameworthy and morally culpable for her involvement in this tragedy, for playing on Megan’s emotions in a crude and cynical way without thinking which way this game might lead. They were fully aware of what they were doing. No one coerced them to take this crude path. They chose it freely, exhibiting a strong form of clear-eyed akrasia, acting against their adult better judgment. Megan’s parents discovered the Drews’ involvement six weeks after the suicide. Then the Drews sent the grieving parents a letter in the mail, “basically saying that they might feel a little bit of a responsibility but they don’t feel no guilt or remorse or anything for what they did” (Lauer and Lewis, 2007). One month after Megan’s death, Drew told sheriff’s deputies that the neighborhood had grown hostile because people had “found out her involvement in Megan’s suicide.” The report recounts Drew’s admission that she “instigated and monitored” the fake MySpace profile (Jones, 2008). Later on, when Drew realized that she might be held responsible for the vicious prank she orchestrated, she tried to shrink the magnitude of her involvement. Ashley Grills said after the tragedy that Drew suggested talking to Megan via the Internet to find out what Megan was saying about her daughter. Soon “Josh” began to flirt with Megan. Grills admitted she wrote the message to Megan about the world being a better place without her. The message was supposed to end the online relationship with “Josh” because Grills felt the joke had gone too far. Indeed it did. “I was trying to get her angry so she would leave him alone and I could get rid of the whole MySpace,” Grills explained (Sawyer and Roberts, 2008; Deutsch, 2008b). The result was the Megan left the world. The messages distressed Megan and caused her so much pain that she decided to take her life.
Megan’s weaknesses were well known to the Drews. She had accompanied the Drews on several vacations, and they knew that she was taking medication (Collins, 2008). Still they carried out the deception for weeks. They must have been aware of the rollercoaster state they had entrusted upon Megan. The initial idea of knowing what Megan thought about their daughter escalated very quickly into an online affair. After the suicide, Lori Drew denied her involvement, pointing the finger at Grills as the mastermind of the hoax. Grills insisted that Lori was deeply involved in the deception. Lori never took responsibility, saying that she did not create or direct anyone to create the fake MySpace account. Grills, on the other hand, said that was not true and was willing to take responsibility for her part. Grills said that Kurt Drew, Lori’s husband who also became involved in this tragedy, insisted after the suicide that she quickly close the MySpace account, and that Lori instructed her to keep quiet. Grills maintained that she and the Drews are blameworthy: “I’m partially to blame. They are partially to blame … I do know what I did, and I take responsibility for it every day” (Sawyer and Roberts, 2008).
What about parental responsibility? Knowing Meagan’s delicate personality, her parents were proactive in trying to protect her. They authorized Megan’s MySpace account, with some restrictions: “1. Your dad and I are the only ones who know the password. 2. It has to be set to ‘private.’ 3. We have to approve the content. 4. We have to be in the room at all times when you’re on MySpace” (Collins, 2008). Only the parents had the password to the account. Megan could not sign on without them. One of the parents was in the room watching (Lauer and Lewis, 2007). Megan had a timed amount online, usually in the presence of her mother (Lauer and Larson, 2007). The vigilant parents could log into the account at anytime. They monitored her Internet use. They were aware of Megan’s MySpace friends. They were reluctant to authorize the contact with “Josh,” as Meagan did not know him. Only after she begged and insisted to have contact with that “hot” guy did they agree to add him to Megan’s list of friends (Stossel, Vargas, and Roberts, 2007). Still, Tina Meier warned Megan of this guy, as he could be for all they knew a “40-year-old pervert” (Stossel, Vargas, and Roberts, 2007). She even called the police to see whether there was a way to confirm who owned the “Josh” account (Collins, 2008). She was told there was nothing to do unless a crime had been committed (Jones, 2008). Megan’s parents did not wish to force their daughter to delete “Josh” as they knew this would upset Megan and would cause a bitter rivalry. At least, so they thought, this way they could monitor the chats and Megan does not go behind their backs. Megan called her mother when “Josh” suddenly turned against her. Tina returned home and saw her daughter distraught. She turned the computer off (Jones, 2008), thinking that Megan needed some time to calm down. Yet despite this direct and observant involvement, more vigilant than the involvement of most parents, Megan’s parents did not prevent the tragedy.
The story of Megan Meier is tragic but unfortunately it is not unique. Cyberbullying (typically teenagers targeting, humiliating and/or intimidating other minors, typically among teens who know each other from school, neighborhood or after-school activities) charged more victims who could not cope with the malicious attacks and the vile language.15 Research shows that almost one in four children between the ages of 11 and 19 have been the victim of cyberbullying. The same research shows that approximately 65% of kids know of someone who has been cyberbullied.16 According to a national phone survey of 935 teenagers conducted by Pew Internet and American Life in November 2006, one in three online teens have experienced online harassment. Teens who share their identities and thoughts on social networking sites, such as MySpace and Facebook, are more likely to be targets than are those who do not use social networking sites. Nearly 4 in 10 social network users (39%) have been cyberbullied in some way, compared with 22% of online teens who do not use social networks (Reich, 2008). Internet agents should be made aware of the consequences of their free expression.17 Stories like that of Megan Meier should be brought to classes and discussed openly and fervently. People, especially young people, should be made aware of the power of the word and settle the confusion between online and offline responsibility. Sites like www.netsmartz.org and http://kids.getnetwise.org/tools/ are instrumental in providing information and promoting awareness regarding the possible harms of social networking forums on the Internet. We need to teach our children that silence, when others are being hurt, is not acceptable. Safety should be maintained online and offline and studies should be carried out about the connections between the two. As stopcyberbullying.org holds, the task is to create a generation of good cybercitizens, controlling the technology instead of being controlled by it.18 Agents are morally and socially responsible for all their conduct, whether in the cyber or physical environment.
Internet users, when acting collectively, have power – they are able to change companies’ policies and conduct. Yahoo!, a US-based Internet service provider, had adult items on its shopping pages since 1999. Then, in 2001 it quietly expanded its offering of hard-core videos and DVDs in search of new revenue. When the Los Angeles Times reported this, the company was swamped with angry calls and emails. Under pressure, Yahoo! announced that it would stop selling X-rated videos and other pornographic material on its webpages. It would also stop entering into new contracts for banner advertisements for adult merchandise. Yahoo! has also come under fire for serving as a host to online chats by hate groups (Bergstein, 2001). It began donating ad space in the chat rooms to Tolerance.org, set up by the Southern Poverty Law Center. The ads also appear when users enter words such as “Nazi” or “hate” on Yahoo! search engine (Bergstein, 2001). Agents’ collective action, driven by moral and social responsibility considerations, may affect business to better their Internet conduct in fear of revenue losses.
Readers’ Responsibility
John is walking on the beach listening to his IPod. He sees a little child drowning in the water nearby. John is a good swimmer and could easily save the child, but he decides to keep on walking, enjoying the music he loves so much. John leaves the little child to his own fate, and the child drowns. Following Aristotle, we would hold John morally culpable for his decision to walk away and for the tragic consequences of his failure to act. He voluntarily chose to enjoy his music over saving the little child’s life. It is a case of clear-eyed akrasia. There was no ignorance, only self-indulgence and contempt for human life.
Now consider a person who posts on the Internet a desire to blow up the world and to exit the world stage in a hail of fire, leaving corpses behind him. Suppose James reads this posting on the Net. Is he morally culpable to try and stop that person? If he does not, can we hold him morally responsible for failure to act?
As the Internet continues to grow, the responsibility of the reader is especially important in the identification of new websites that serve as a vehicle for the expression of murderous thought that potentially leads to murderous action.
Kimveer Gill was a 25 year-old man from Montreal who decided to depart the world, leaving corpses behind him. He voiced his aim explicitly on an Internet site called VampireFreaks.com. Gill was not reprimanded for his postings on vampire-Freaks.com. Quite the contrary; he received moral support from his website friends. On Tuesday, September 12, 2006, just a day before he went on rampage shooting at Dowson College in Montreal, “Caranya,” a 19-year-old member from Indiana, wrote to Kimveer, “Can I go play with you?? I wanna go hunt down the preppies with you!” (Hanes, Silcoff, and Hamilton, 2006). Subsequent postings from visitors to Caranya’s webpage were not kind: “Congratulations on inspiring a psycho to go on a murderous rampage killing innocent kids,” wrote one. Another posted: “One has to wonder where he was able to get his moral support from” (Lithwick, 2006) Gill’s blog was immediately removed after the killing, but not before a stream of online comments were posted, most of them denouncing Gill. However, one read: “I’ve been to Dawson College. The people there are so superficial I actually thought about shooting the school up myself. Thank you, unknown guy with a Mohawk. I salute you” (Robertson, 2006). A 16-year-old VampireFreaks member named Melissa from Sherbrooke, Quebec expressed her surprise that Gill was responsible for the Montreal tragedy. “I found him super cool,” she said, “There was nothing strange about his blog” (Agrell, 2006). There was nothing strange in the fact that his screen name was Fatality666. Apparently there was nothing strange that his favorite video game was Super Columbine Massacre. Nothing strange in the way Gill described himself: “His name is Trench. You will come to know him as the Angel of Death … He is not a people person. He has met a handful of people in his life who are decent. But he finds the vast majority to be worthless, no good, conniving, betraying, lying, deceptive” (Couvrette, 2006b). Indeed, apparently there was nothing strange in the pictures that Gill chose to upload, more than 50 pictures depicting him dressed like his heroes from Columbine, long black trench coat and boots to match while carrying various weapons. In one of the pictures, titled “You’re next,” he was seen pointing a handgun at the camera (Pona, 2006). In another picture he held a sign in order to deliver a message – “My Gothic Princess Leaves a Trail of Tears. God Has Forsaken Her. God Will Pay” (Toronto Sun, 2006) In his last photo on the VampireFreaks blog, he was wearing his signature trench coat and holding up an automatic weapon with a text message “ready for action” (National Post, 2006). The readers found nothing strange in the fact that Gill decided to post a virtual tombstone on which he wrote “Kimveer – Lived fast. Died young. Left a mangled corpse” (Couvrette, 2006a). Apparently there was also nothing strange in the list of a vast array of people, places, and things that he hated, among them were comedies, governments, sunlight, and country music.19 The readers of VampireFreaks.com who saw all this information and said nothing should have had better judgment.
In spite of the very violent messages included in Kimveer Gill’s profile and postings, nobody reported him to the police. The readers’ failure to report this disturbed state of mind involves a strong form of akrasia. Readers of websites should be alert of problematic postings, and speak out when they read warnings of troubled individuals who seem to be on verge of explosion. Teachers, administrators, parents and peers, often are the first-hand recipients of the expressions of rage. They can help prevent violence by seeking treatment for people showing the type of behavior that might erupt into violence (Swanson and Nguyen, 2007). Web readers should contact police if they see information that looks like a threat to public safety.
Jed Kahane, who covered the Gill murder story from the very beginning for CTV, reported that one of the questions everyone raised in Montreal after the rampage was “how could Kimveer Gill post such violent pictures on his own website and talk about it for so long and no one bothered to report him or raise an alarm bell” (Oliver and Taber, 2006).
In the aftermath of the Megan Meier’s suicide new websites popped up to commemorate Megan, but also another startling site named Meganhaditcoming.com. The anonymous blogger claimed to be a former classmate of Megan’s. She described Megan in vicious terms as an aggressive, vulgar and unpopular girl who victimized the Drew girl. More than 5000 comments were posted within three days – many of them denouncing the blog as “sick” and suggesting it was the work of the Drews (Jones, 2008).
Internet hotlines
An important initiative is the voluntary establishment of Internet hotlines, by Internet Services Providers from different countries. The term “hotline” characterizes organizations ensuring communication from users about Internet content they find of significant concern. Such communication can take place by phone, fax or email. The connection is usually qualified by easy accessibility, high availability, and an assured response. Some hotlines in the private sector where enterprises offer direct access to “help desks” or related services dealing with consumer and client requests (Waltermann and Mahill, 2000, p. 46).
Hotlines have to be transparent. Users should be aware – at the point of entry – of the persons/organizations responsible for running the hotline system and those persons and organizations on whose behalf hotlines are operated. Transparency also means that the rules and procedures according to which concerns are being processed and explained at the point of entry: for example, which concerns will not be processed; which concerns will be handled over, when, under what criteria and to which public authorities. The system should be explained in sufficient detail and additional help should be available (Waltermann and Machill, 2000, p. 48).
Users should have the ability to track their concern throughout the process and they should be informed of the final outcome of the process. To this end, hotline operators should be informed accordingly by public authorities so that they can provide this information. Organizations running hotline systems should, at regular intervals, make publicly available reports on the basic statistics and experiences with their systems (Waltermann and Machill, 2000, p. 49). Parents and teachers can become involved in children’s Internet activities and establish healthy Internet-use guidelines and principles (Weimann, 2006, p. 235).
In Britain, the IWF Hotline provides internet users with a means of reporting potentially illegal content that are located on websites, newsgroups and online groups.20 Police officials have set up an online network that young people can use to report crimes anonymously without having to tell their parents. The tactic has worked well in catching pedophiles.21 Through hotlines, anyone can make a report of something they suspect to be illegal on the Internet. The hotline investigates these reports to determine if they are illegal, and if so, trace the origin of the content. If the content is illegal, the hotline refers this onwards to local law enforcement agencies as well as the Internet Service Provider for removal.
In the United States, since 1998 the Department of Justice is funding the CyberTipline®, at www.cybertipline.com. The cyber tip line is operated by the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children to act as a national clearinghouse for reports of Internet-related child pornography and other Internet-related sex crimes committed against children.22 The majority of concerns are with child pornography, child prostitution, and child sex tourism (Wolak, Finkelhor, and Mitchell, 2005).23 A 24-hour, toll-free telephone line, 1-800-THE-LOST® (1-800-843-5678), is available in Canada, Mexico, and the United States for those who have information regarding missing and exploited children. Similar hotlines are suggested for alerts about violent messages that threat committing of murders. Readers who might not wish to alert the police directly should be able to contact a similar cyber tip line and evoke attention to violent threats and signals.
Some of the existing hotlines are associated in a global organization named INHOPE (The International Association of Internet Hotlines),24 which enjoys the support of law enforcement agencies, local governments, and child welfare organizations. As sites can be accessed by anyone anywhere, illegal content may be reported by a person in one country, while the site can be hosted somewhere else. Once the source is traced, hotlines pass reports over to the relevant country. INHOPE has set processes for exchanging reports, to ensure a rapid response is taken. These hotlines deal mainly with three sorts of illegal contents: child pornography, illegal activity in chat rooms, and hate speech25 as well as with online grooming (mostly pedophiles preying on children).26 The 2007 Global Internet Trend Report27 reveals that most reports refer to child pornography (50%), adult pornography (28%) and other child related-content (19%). Only 0.7% of the reports (an average of 130 reports per month) refer to other illegal contents, a category which is comprised of promoting violence against an individual, terrorism and drugs.28
The use of hotlines can establish new routes of communication between users, in particular, parents, media-industry initiatives, and law enforcement authorities. A hotline enables users to respond to illegal Internet content by drawing attention to where it is to be found. The hotline receives the report and, if necessary, sets in motion a process of response. The response includes processing the report, providing the user with feedback and a decision about whether to forward the report to law enforcement or a self-regulatory authority (Waltermann and Machill, 2000).
Conclusion
The Internet is a vast ocean of knowledge, data, ideologies, and propaganda. It is ubiquitous, interactive, fast, and decentralized. The ease of access to the Internet, its low cost and speed, its chaotic structure (or lack of structure), the anonymity which individuals and groups may enjoy, and the international character of the world wide web furnish all kinds of individuals and organizations an easy and effective arena for their partisan interests. It contains some of the best products of humanity, and some of the worst ones. It serves the positive and negative elements in society.
The Internet does not have any borders but it does have limits. Its short history provides us with a crash course in understanding why order is preferable to anarchy, and why a balanced approach is needed to address and resolve conflicting freedoms. People have the freedom to express themselves, within reason. Two underpinning principles, in the heart of liberal democracy, are respect for others, and not harming others. We should strive to uphold them also on the Internet.
In this essay I stressed the concepts of moral responsibility and of social responsibility. We can reasonably expect people to know and to take certain steps to know the difference between good and bad, between that which is of benefit and that which is evil, and then to act accordingly. Given the agents’ social context, basic capabilities and the level of knowledge people are expected to cooperate in the struggle against antisocial activities on the Internet. Readers may encounter problematic material during their surf of the Internet. They should contact the authorities via a tip line and alert about the problematic content.
Acknowledgments
I thank Janet Spikes for her excellent research assistance, and to Sam Lehman-Wilzig for his constructive comments.
Notes
All websites, unless otherwise stated, were last accessed between February 5 and February 8, 2009.
1 Among them are The Center for Democracy and Technology (CDT), http://cdt.org/; The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF), www.eff.org/ ; The Electronic Privacy Information Center (EPIC), http://epic.org/ ; The Global Internet Liberty Campaign (GILC), http://gilc.org/; The Internet Society, www.isoc.org/; The Association for Progressive Communication, www.apc.org; Save the Internet, http://savetheinternet.com/
2 A statement is a “true threat” when a reasonable person making the statement would foresee that the statement would be interpreted by those to whom it is communicated as a serious expression of an intent to bodily harm or assault. See Planned Parenthood of Columbia/Willamette, Inc. v. Am. Coalition of Life Activists, 290 F.3d 1058, 1080 (9th Cir. 2002). See also Watts v. United States, 394 U.S. 705 (1969); United States v. Kelner, 534 F.2d 1020 (2d Cir. 1976); Rothman (2001); Andrews (1999); Karst (2006).
3 In Planned Parenthood of the Columbia/Willamette, Inc. v. American Coalition of Life Activists, 23 F. Supp. 2d 1182 (D. OR 1999), an Internet site listed the names and home addresses of doctors who performed abortions. The site called for the doctors to be brought to justice for crimes against humanity. The names of doctors who had been wounded were listed in gray. Doctors who had been killed by antiabortionists had been crossed out. The court found this speech to be threatening and not protected under the First Amendment. See Delgado and Stefancic, (2004): 127. Another pertinent case is The Secretary, United States Department of Housing and Urban Development, on behalf of Bonnie Jouhari and Pilar Horton v. Ryan Wilson and ALPHA HQ, before Alan W. Heifetz, Chief Administrative Law Judge (decided July 19, 2000), available at www.hud.gov/utilities/intercept.cfm?/offices/oalj/cases/fha/pdf/wilson.pdf
4 See Anti-Defamation League (2000); Delgado and Stefancic (2004, p. 127).
5 For further discussion, see Meyer (1993); “Moral Responsibility,” Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (2004).
6 See Kaliski (2001); Marshall (1994); Christians and Nordenstreng (2004); Bunton (1998); Rivers, Schramm, and Christians (1980).
7 Juicy Campus published the following: “Unfortunately, even with great traffic and strong user loyalty, a business can’t survive and grow without a steady stream of revenue to support it. In these historically difficult economic times, online ad revenue has plummeted and venture capital funding has dissolved. JuicyCampus’ exponential growth outpaced our ability to muster the resources needed to survive this economic downturn, and as a result, we are closing down the site as of Feb. 5, 2009.” http://juicycampus.blogspot.com/ (last accessed February 4, 2009).
9 www.saves.asn.au/resources/newsletter/jul1998/item4.php; http://kittyradio.com/soapbox/mental-health/25048-suicide-sleeping-pills.html
10 www.beliefnet.com/News/2002/07/Exit-Bags-Stir-Up-Death-Debate.aspx; www.ncbi. nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/12043438; http://www.finalexitnetwork.org/newsletter/newsletter 1204.htm
11 www.churchofeuthanasia.org/index.html"
12 www.churchofeuthanasia.org/index.html
13 http://news.walla.co.il/?w=/402/639665 (Hebrew).
14 MySpace is a social networking service that allows members to create unique personal profiles online in order to find and communicate with old and new friends. The services offered by MySpace include any MySpace branded URL (the “MySpace Website”), the MySpace instant messaging service, the MySpace application developer service and other features (for example, music and video embedded players), MySpace mobile services, and any other features, content, or applications offered from time to time by MySpace in connection with MySpace’s business (collectively, the “MySpace Services”). The MySpace Services are hosted in the United States. See www.myspace.com/index. cfm?fuseaction=misc.terms. It is estimated that every month over 10 million American teens log on to MySpace.
15 Several suicides in the United States were recorded as the result of cyberbullying. Ryan Halligan was bullied relentlessly. He received emails and instant messages from classmates ridiculing him and calling him a loser. When a pretty girl at school pretended to like him online but later revealed she was only joking, the taunting emails and instant messages increased, only with even more venom. A few weeks later, in October 2003, Ryan hanged himself in his family’s bathroom. Like Megan, he was 13 years old. See Long (2008); Fink (2008). In the UK, Sam Leeson, a 13 year-old student from Tredworth, Gloucestershire, hanged himself in his bedroom apparently after suffering months of bullying online. See http://mashable.com/2008/06/14/bebo-suicide/
16 www.cyberbullying.info/whatis/whatis.php
17 For discussion on suicide and ethics, see Cohen-Almagor (2005).
18 www.stopcyberbullying.org/take_action/take_a_stand_against_cyberbullying.html
19 Killer likened life to a video game, Globe and Mail (September 15 2006): A9. For further discussion, see Cohen-Almagor and Haleva-Amir (2008).
20 www.iwf.org.uk/public/page.31.htm
21 Police virtually powerless to find killers online: experts (2006) Cornwall Standard Freeholder (Ontario), September 15, 8.
22 Also see www.missingkids.com/en_US/publications/NC144.pdf (accessed June 17, 2010).
23 See www.missingkids.com/cybertip/ (accessed June 17, 2010). See also www.stopitnow.org/ (accessed June 17, 2010).
24 www.inhope.org/ (accessed June 17, 2010).
25 See “Anti-Semitism on the Internet, an overview,” (April 28–29, 2004), www.inach.net/content/INACH%20-%20Antisemitism%20on%20the%20Internet.pdf (accessed June 17, 2010).
26 www.inhope.org/en/problem/overview.html
27 www.inhope.org/en/system/files/inhope_global_internet_trend_report_v1.0.pdf
28 www.inhope.org/en/system/files/inhope_global_internet_trend_report_v1.0.pdf, pp. 49, 61.
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