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NET NEUTRALITY OUTRAGE IS A LESSON IN HOW EASY IT IS TO POLITICALLY MANIPULATE PEOPLE
Editorial by Kevin Ryan
During World War II, Japanese leaders told residents of the island of Okinawa that American soldiers would eat them and their babies if America captured the island. As a result, thousands of Okinawans fought to the death or took their own life rather than face capture.
Of course the claim was untrue, but such is the power of propaganda to manipulate the masses into doing your bidding, whether it’s defending an island to the death...
...or giving control of the internet to politicians and bureaucrats.
Watching people lose their minds on social media today after the FCC voted to repeal the so-called net neutrality regulations was a sad reminder that government propaganda remains the best way to control the populace. Like the bogus cannibal American soldiers, the net neutrality repeal is a fake boogeyman so wrapped up in hyperbole that its detractors honestly believe it will lead to the collapse of the internet if not society itself.
Yet one need only look back to 2014 to realize it’s a total falsehood. Before net neutrality took effect in 2015, the internet was in no way broken. It was a bastion of free information. ISPs weren’t engaging in the behavior that the new regulations were written to protect us from, prices were dropping, new applications and services were emerging daily.
And President Obama’s own FCC commisioners recommended against applying Title II regulation to ISPs, believing the regulations written in 1934 would be detrimental to the modern and rapidly evolving technology of the internet. But, in a saavy political move, the president publicly announced that he wanted the Title II regulations “in order to protect Americans from big internet bandwidth providers controlling internet content” via throttling or blocking. The notion that hated ISPs like Comcast might somehow censor or slow our internet experience so terrified many voters that they virtually begged the government to take over the internet.
And they are still so obsessed with that fear over a non-existent problem that the public has reacted to word of net neutrality’s repeal with truly unbelievable claims of the disasters it will cause.
Feminist Sandra Fluke: Killing Net Neutrality would kill access to abortion information... There is no reproductive freedom without Net Neutrality.
The New York Times: The Internet Is Dying. Repealing Net Neutrality Hastens That Death
Mike Caufield, director, Washington State University Vancouver: Killing net neutrality will throw us back to the Dark Ages
GLAAD: The repeal of Net Neutrality is an attack on the LGBTQ community
Wired: Expect Fewer Great Startups if the FCC Kills Net Neutrality
Rolling Stone: Repeal Could Kill the Careers of Indie Musicians
The Verge: Ending net neutrality would contribute to inequality of education and opportunity and could threaten the basic foundation of American democracy.
And that’s just the media and other organizations. Read through your Facebook news feed today if you want more insane hyperbole from friends and family. And coming next week: Many of the same people begging the government to regulate the internet will be pleading with the government not to let them keep more of their own pay check, and saying tax cuts will threaten the basic foundation of American democracy.
BREAKING NEWS: THE FCC HAS VOTED TO ELIMINATE THE 2015 OPEN INTERNET ORDER, BETTER KNOWN AS NET NEUTRALITY
by Kevin Ryan
The FCC has voted 3 to 2 to eliminate the Obama Administration’s 2015 regulation forcing ISPs to charge the same for all internet traffic, no matter how heavy the bandwidth usage.
...
“For those of you out there who are fearful about what tomorrow will bring, take a deep breath, this decision will not break the internet,” FCC Commissioner Michael O'Reilly said. “While repealing net neutrality rules grabs headlines... net neutrality started as a consumer issue but soon became a stepping stone to impose vastly more common carrier regulation on broadband companies.”
Prior to net neutrality, ISPs were regulated under Title I, which classified them as information services. In 2015 the FCC voted to instead regulate ISPs under Title II of the Communications Act of 1934, the same regulation that had in the past been applied to companies like ground line phone networks.
Opponents of net neutrality argued that the same regulation that for decades stifled telecommunications innovation would do the same to internet innovation. Indeed since the regulation was imposed in 2015, investment has declined, broadband deployments have been put on hold, and planned innovations were shelved.
Net neutrality proponents argue that without it, ISPs might charge more for bandwidth heavy users like Netflix, and less for reading text-based sites, which uses much less bandwidth. However, mobile broadband was not regulated under net neutrality, and that industry has been able to lower prices and offer many different options based on a user’s needs that ISPs cannot.
And the fear that ISPs could offer à la carte access to individual services may actually be misguided. It could actually be a boon for consumers, who are now saddled with having to buy the full package, even if there are services they may not need. Net neutrality is comparable to how cable television providers force subscribers to purchase large packages of channels, including ones they’ll never watch, rather than allowing viewers to choose individual channels they actually want. Indeed some ISPs want to keep net neutrality in place, because it forces their broadband customers to purchase services they don’t need.
I honestly don't know whether the people who are chanting about "net neutrality" even realize that, prior to the Fed seizing regulatory control in 2015, this was just the natural state of things.
And now I'm wondering if people actually believe that "powerful brands can pay to block information" on the internet...
Remember when America was great and a few free market railroad tycoons free from the burden of government regulations enabled and controlled the large scale movement of goods and people about the country. In their quest for ever increasing profit they made railroads great. They could pick industry partners and choose economic winners all while avoiding stepping on toes of other railroads even controlling 100% of the goods that could be transported to certain markets was a power they exercised. Then big government came along and built interstate and state highway systems and had the audacity to make it free and with equal access to everybody. Yea that screwed everybody. lets go backwards.
Remember when America was great and a few free market railroad tycoons free from the burden of government regulations enabled and controlled the large scale movement of goods and people about the country. In their quest for ever increasing profit they made railroads great. They could pick industry partners and choose economic winners all while avoiding stepping on toes of other railroads even controlling 100% of the goods that could be transported to certain markets was a power they exercised. Then big government came along and built interstate and state highway systems and had the audacity to make it free and with equal access to everybody. Yea that screwed everybody. lets go backwards.
You do realize rail road companies were only able to do that because of government mandate right?.....
This thread used to be fun... and now its devolved into more bs political vomit... Keep your pants on and keep it to yourself.
Hey look a real random picture! Not just some stupid meme generated by your moronic extreme left/right political dumbtank of choice.
You do realize rail road companies were only able to do that because of government mandate right?.....
Which came first, The railroads or the political donations to ensure a regulatory environment enabling railroads to dictate things on their own terms ensuring a monopoly? I reject your argument that the government created railroad monopolies, the railroads did it themselves.
Munn v. Illinois [1877, SC] indirectly lead to the Interstate Commerce Commission [1887]
This body of five individuals was created to hear complaints of individuals or individual businesses, and to ensure that the railroads maintained "just and reasonable" rates
Which came first, The railroads or the political donations to ensure a regulatory environment enabling railroads to dictate things on their own terms ensuring a monopoly? I reject your argument that the government created railroad monopolies, the railroads did it themselves.
Every stop for a second and think maybe big business wouldn't be able to influence and have such a drastic impact if there wasn't big government? Regulations couldn't be created to give a company that kind of power unless the government had that kind of regulatory power in the first place. So first you give the government the power to regulate, then you write the regulations. Why do you think it is the head of the fda used to work at the top levels in Pharmaceuticals industry? Why do you think the head the Federal Reserve used to work in the top levels Goldman Sachs? Why is the FTC run by people that used to make a killing on Wall Street?...Wolf's watch the hen house much? The list goes on and on.
Do you honestly think these top-level executives in their Industries gave up top pay to go into government for altruistic reasons?
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