Maoist Internationalist Movement This is an archive of the former website of the Maoist Internationalist Movement, which was run by the now defunct Maoist Internationalist Party - Amerika. The MIM now consists of many independent cells, many of which have their own indendendent organs both online and off. MIM(Prisons) serves these documents as a service to and reference for the anti-imperialist movement worldwide.

Internet Crime Hype Fuels Government Repression

by MC12

Originally published in MIM Notes 131, February 1, 1997


The Amerikan media and U.$. government - always a great team - are working hard together to justify a repressive crackdown of "criminals" on the Internet. MIM knows that we have access to the Internet and all its benefits for organizing only at the discretion of the government at the moment. We know we can't guarantee Internet as a tool for the people without having state power to protect it.

The Washington Post's "Navigator" column recently joined the crackdown club, with an article about "Revolutionaries, counterrevolutionaries, extremist groups, radical wings, separatist movements, so- called cults, and their critics and sympathizers [who] are aswarm on the Net."(1)

Referring to a link to the Tupac Amaru Revolutionary Movement maintained by Arm the Spirit in the Toronto, and to the Committee to Support the Revolution in Peru (CSRP) - a front for the Revolutionary Communist Party-USA, a crypto- Trotskyist group that calls itself Maoist - the Post says "These are prime spots for unfiltered propaganda."

There is typical mockery of radical groups here, which is not remarkable for this article. But worse, after quoting the CSRP as saying "hook up with, support and/or join us," the article leads into an interview with an unnamed "staffer" at the U.$. Department of State and someone from the Justice Department.

The State staffer, "who was reluctant to talk about the government's monitoring of any Web pages" and spoke "only on background," was quoted as saying that "Terrorist fund-raising is illegal in this country." The Post paraphrased the staffer as saying "extremist Web sites are mostly posted by U.S. citizens and are viewed as domestic material, which is under the jurisdiction of the FBI and the Justice Department." Finally, the staffer was quoted as saying, "There is genuine international concern that this information is freely available- and that it's legal." Meaning foreign governments - such as Peru's - are also encouraging a federal crackdown.

Turning to the Justice Department, the article quoted "John Russell of the Justice Department," who said, "There are First Amendment considerations and there are legitimate law enforcement concerns." The article added, "The Justice Department, he said, would like 'to find a legal and acceptable procedure' to discover who is posting the information. He said several law enforcement agencies, including the FBI, ATF and DEA, are planning a joint meeting soon to discuss the proliferation of such rabble-rousing pages."

Law enforcement already operates freely on the Internet. What bothers them about the Internet is not that it allows people to do things they couldn't do before, but that it is so efficient a means of reaching so many people, which makes it time consuming or expensive to police compared to old-fashioned organizing.

Who's Who?

In the background of this debate, however, is the important problem of legitimacy and accuracy of information on the net. For example, the Navigator column writer also wrote: "As always with the Net, we must assume that people are who they say they are." A remarkable comment for a journalist - to be so unconcerned with the accuracy of her sources. (This sentence appeared in the on-line version of the article, but was apparently cut from the print edition.) When she adds, "Such sites are so devoid of humor that it seems likely these people really are who they say they are," we know how she can be so cavalier: the bourgeois media does not care about the accuracy of reporting on radical groups.

But, as MIM has remarked before with regard to the bogus "MPP- USA" organization, the Internet makes it easy for people to pass themselves off as representing others - especially groups such as the Communist Party of Peru (PCP) which do not have an independent Internet web site. The CSRP, which MIM does not support, does not even claim to be an "official" site for the PCP, and yet the Washington Post calls their site "the Shining Path page" and calls this "assum[ing] people are who they say they are"!

Collaboration between the bourgeois media and the state multiplies the risk here. The media can falsely identify people as criminals, and then the state can use that reporting to publicly justify cracking down on people. There was no evidence in the article or even mentioned of anyone doing anything illegal. Even the CSRP's request for support was for them, not for the Communist Party of Peru (PCP), whom the paper and government refer to as terrorists. But the Post said it was "the Shining Path page," which implies that their fundraising could be illegal.

At present, we are lucky to be able to get on the Net ourselves and give our interpretation and evidence of these various groups and claims, and let people try to judge for themselves. But with the government threatening crackdowns on Internet use, we cannot guarantee we will be able to keep this up.

An easy in for the State

The state makes inroads for its repression with patriarchy-defined sex offenders, and pedophiles in particular. A recent New York Times articles explains that, because some people use the Internet to coordinate their sex offenses, the Federal government is working on new policies for restricting Net access to parolees, including those charged with "hate crimes," a bogus category that usually includes revolutionaries.

The United $tates Parole Commission has "approved restrictions on use of computers by some federal parolees." The commission now holds the honor of being the first parole authority (no states have done this) to attempt to control the activities of convicts on the Internet.

The Times wrote: "The prohibitions address the growing national concern that criminals, particularly sex criminals, are using the Internet to gather information for criminal purposes and to hook up with other criminals. Recently, a convicted pedophile who was still behind the walls of a Minnesota state prison used the Internet to compile a data base containing the names and addresses of thousands of children who could be potential targets of sex crimes.

"The new restrictions, which parole officers can put into use as they see fit immediately, will range from prohibiting offenders from owning a computer to installing monitoring equipment on their computers that will keep tabs on where they roam on line."

Now, based on anecdotal reports of pedophiles on the Net the Parole Commission has authorized parole officers to take away the computers, or install monitoring equipment on the phone lines, of all federal parolees. MIM opposes all rape, including the rape of children, but we also oppose the bourgeoisie's pretensions that child sexual abuse is a problem of a few deranged individuals, rather than a problem of a society which eroticizes powerlessness. These restrictions will do nothing to end child sexual abuse, but they will increase the state's control over all federal parolees.

On this "slippery slope" of Internet censorship, the bourgeois media is more than willing to provide additional lubrication.

NOTES:

  1. Washington Post January 9, 1997. Page C5.
  2. New York Times January 5, 1997, sec. 4, p. 5.
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