DON'T USE CAPITALIZATION to write your emails. Don't swear at people in forums. Don't threaten anyone over instant message, and never giver your unvarnished opinion in a social network directly to someone, for if you do, you might find yourself in jail...at least in Illinois.
The Illinois state legislature passed a bill this week that bans cyber-bullying: the act of abusing and threatening others with words over the Internet or text messages.
The legislation was inspired by the October 2006 suicide of a Missouri teenager
who received "hurtful messages" on MySpace from a neighbor
pretending to be a teenage boy.
While well-intended, the new law is a clear violation of free speech and a poor attempt to regulate the unsavory behavior a few bad apples.
It's bad enough there are already grammar and etiquette "police" patrolling online forums like great whites off the coast of seal island. Now users will also be monitored by Big Brother, even when technologies exist to block emails and other messages from unwanted company.
And what happens when a boy cries wolf? Will a full-blown investigation ensue each time a teenager complains that another is being a "meanie?" Whatever happened to the intermediary intervention steps like parental oversight or filing a complaint with the company hosting the bad behavior to get the user kicked off?
Before turning MySpace into a police state reminiscent of China's oversight of Internet use, lawmakers would be wise to take a step back a look at this issue from a broader perspective. Government should not be the panacea for all our problems. It should address the issues people cannot address on their own. For in law-making, much as in physics, for every action or legislation, there is an equal and opposite reaction. In this case, a law was written to protect the innocent, but in protecting them, a freedom was lost elsewhere.
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