I belong to a site called Big Muscle Bears, who have asked me to sign a petition from the Gay and Lesbian Task force to STOP the Federal government from thinly veiled homophobic attacks.
The Federal Record Keeping and Labeling Act (2257) has huge impacts on social networking sites, it could shut down the entire industry through burdensome regulation. Why should you care?
Because "the regulations would allow the Attorney General to conduct warrantless searches at will on the sites’ records, including your personal information."
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From G&L Task force:
The Department of Justice is proposing regulations to implement a federal law designed to combat child pornography, known as Section 2257. The law was first enacted in 1998 and was amended in 2006 and significantly expanded to include regulation of the Internet.
While many of the regulations pertain to companies that produce adult entertainment magazines and videos (and are extremely burdensome), they would also affect anyone who uses an adult social-networking site.
I am all for jailing child molesters, period. IF this was about that, fine, let's get 'em.
It's not.
This is about homophobia, plain and simple. Those closeted gays and lesbians who find themselves looking for sex in public venues would have a lot more company if there weren't these social networking sites to introduce them to each other. It's good public policy to encourage internet socializing, especially in rural areas. I am a public health worker in San Francisco, I know.
Isn't that enough reason to be for it?
Still not convinced?
How about this-
Your personal information may be subjected to these searches and businesses are forced to comply to complicated recordkeeping standards. It is unclear how your information may be used by the government.
What you can do: http://www.thetaskforce.org/...
Go to this website and send an email to the DOJ, we have until September 10th to voice our concerns.
I want to restate that I am ALL for stopping child molestation, but I have to say that the site I belong to won't allow anyone under 21 to join. So how do we play into predatory behavior for minors?
We don't.
Here's a linky to a pdf if you want have a quick read. 2257 Fact sheet