God Knows??

The parent filter of the Internet service provider Claranet seems to be built upon the advice of religious groups. Local media confirm that the broadband provider wanted to develop a filter which would keep kids safe, so instead of simply using common sense to determine what should be in a filter, the ISP turned to religious groups to decide.
Besides, it also allows schools and kids safety experts to help. The only problem is that it is for some reason consulting people who fight for a worldviews claiming “the world was created 6,000 years ago” and “women should be dressed like Satan’s pillar box”.

Worse still, the ISP is going to use volunteer guardians in order to decide the filters, which means that it won’t even be recognizing people from churches or religious groups – only those who want to have a go at filtering.

Meanwhile, in religious groups, the kind of people who volunteer for such things are usually a special breed that largely believe that their own religious leaders have got it wrong. In other words, they think that Jesus tells them to filter all references to ankles, and that other religions are run by demons.

The ISP announced that it was recruiting volunteer guardians from various outfits, although it won’t identify them. Claranet issued a statement saying that it had an “Islamic advisor”, and kids safety campaigner Sara Payne was among them. The ISP’s guardians will be asked whether they believe 140 categories of online content are appropriate for the modern children. The volunteers will be able to add or remove certain online services from the blacklists created by a 3rd-party company whose name is currently kept in secret.

In other words, any guardian may decide that Bebo has been blessed by God, or Jeff, or Xenu in the category of social networking, but at the same time decide to block Facebook as its users are the spawn of Satan and will burn in hell, Hades or Slough for all eternity.

Hopefully, the subscribers will be allowed to choose to set up and customize their own filters, or accept a pre-selected list from one of the volunteers and edit it themselves if they want.

Apparently, most people who opt for a religious filter are those who want to be told about sex or relationships by someone who has sworn not to have done either.