Docket Number: 0313

Honorable Members of the Boston City Council:

My name is Robert B. Chatelle, and I'm a Boston voter and taxpayer residing at 49 Symphony Road. I'm a freelance journalist and published fiction writer. For over 30 years, I've earned most of my living as a computer programmer and analyst.

I'm also privileged to serve the National Writers Union as Co-Chair of the Political Issues Committee. I've served as Chair or Co-Chair since March of 1992. The National Writers Union represents 4,500 freelance writers nationwide, and 800 of these belong to the Boston Local. We are journalists, book authors, poets, writers of short fiction, business and technical writers, academics, cartoonists, and workers in all genres. Out membership comprises some of the most distinguished names in American letters. We're a proud affiliate of the United Auto Workers.

We urge the Boston City Council to do all you can to prevent the use of Cyber Patrol, or other censoring software, within the Boston Public Library system for the following reasons:

• Cyber Patrol is not a good product. It purports to filter "objectionable" material, but in fact censors out much that is not only unobjectionable but valuable for both adults and children. (See attachment 7) Cyber Patrol permits selective blocking by category, but their categories are not reliable. For example, my personal web site (http://world.std.com/~kip/) is blocked for both full and partial nudity. But my site is almost entirely text and contains only two innocuous images, one of them a drawing of my cat. Z Magazine articles are blocked for sex acts -- a designation any reader of the journal would find preposterous. Moreover, Cyber Patrol blocks by abbreviating the web page address to the first three characters of it's final component. This is analogous to banning Lady Chatterly's Lover by removing from the library every book by an author whose last name begins L-a-w. As someone who has written a great deal of software for the last three decades, I find Cyber Patrol appalling. I'm considering demanding an investigation of the manufacturers of this product for consumer fraud.

• Installing Cyber Patrol at the BPL is illegal because it violates the First Amendment rights of adults. (See attachment 2.) Contrary to what you've read in the newspapers, or seen on television, information found on the World Wide Web is constitutionally protected. Constitutionally unprotected information is illegal, and anyone linking illegal material to his or her web site will either be arrested or forced to take the site down almost immediately. Put child pornography at your web site in the morning, and you'll be behind bars by nightfall.

• Installing Cyber Patrol at the BPL is illegal because it violates the First Amendment rights of minors. Minors do not have the full First Amendment rights of adults, but courts have ruled that they have extensive rights nonetheless, including the right of access to sexual material not deemed "harmful to minors." Even if the use of Cyber Patrol were confined to minors, and even if just the sex-acts filter were enabled, most of the screened materials would still be Constitutionally protected, either because of the gross inefficiency of Cyber Patrol, or because the screened material would fail the harmful-to-minors test. For example, neither mere nudity nor discussion of sexual matters are legally deemed harmful to minors.

• Installing Cyber Patrol at the BPL is illegal because censoring decisions are made secretly by a private corporation. The manufacturers of Cyber Patrol refuse to make public their blacklist of banned sites - what they call the CyberNOT list. (As a journalist, I was supplied a copy of the list by a confidential source.)

• Installing Cyber Patrol at the BPL is illegal because it violates the ALA Library Bill of Rights. (See attachments 3, 4, 5, and 6.) Massachusetts law requires that libraries have "a written policy for the selection of library materials and the use of materials and facilities in accordance with standards adopted by the American Library Association." Also, consider the ALA's interpretation of the Bill of Rights in regard to private rating systems, such as Cyber Patrol:

  A variety of private organizations promulgate rating systems and/or review materials as a means of advising either their members or the general public concerning their opinions of the contents and suitability of appropriate age for use of certain books, films, recordings or other materials. For the library to adopt of enforce any of these private ratings to library materials, to include them in bibliographic records, library catalogs, or other finding aids, or otherwise to endorse them would violate the Library Bill of Rights.

• Installing Cyber Patrol is in no way analogous to the BPL making decisions about which books to buy. Libraries can't stock every book or subscribe to every periodical because they have limited funds and limited shelf space. Thus editing decisions are forced upon them. But even in these cases, editing decision must be made fairly and without political bias. The limited-resource argument, however, is not applicable to the World Wide Web, which is of one interconnected piece. Censoring it requires more resources than not.

• There is no compelling reason requiring this reckless action. When her constituents expressed concern about what information was available to children at the BPL, Councilor Feeney reasonably requested these hearings. Mayor Menino could profit from her example. Instead, he ordered the purchase of Cyber Patrol before receiving good legal or technical advice. The citizens of Boston are in serious jeopardy if the Mayor continues to react in such a knee-jerk manner every time the Boston Herald informs us that the sky is falling. Putting the word porn in screaming headlines is a good way to sell papers. But we must remember that pornography is nothing more than a pejorative term for material with sexual content. And this is what Cyber Patrol blocks - not pornography, but material with sexual content. While some parents may be uncomfortable with their children finding out about sex, there is no evidence that exposure to sexual material does children any harm whatsoever. Parents have been trying (unsuccessfully) to shield children from knowing about sex for centuries. But sooner or later, we all find out. And it's a good thing too. As Derek Bok said, "If you think education is expensive, try ignorance."

  The World Wide Web is vast and growing. You can find just about anything there if you look for it long enough. But that's the point. You have to look for it. It doesn't come leaping out at you when you sit down at a terminal. If kids want sexual material, they can search it out on the Web. They can also search it out in the stacks of the Boston Public Library.

• Better solutions exist. Austin, Texas recently made the dreadful mistake of installing Cyber patrol within their public library system. I refer you to attachment 8, a report on what happened, and attachment 9, a letter from a volunteer who resigned because of problems caused by Cyber Patrol. I also refer you to attachment 11, which contains language from a 1995 National Writers Union resolution on free speech in cyberspace. Specifically, "Parents and children should decide among themselves what literature, art, entertainment, or information is appropriate without state or third-party intervention." Librarians (and politicians) are poor substitutes for parents. Parents who believe their children need close supervision should provide that supervision, and not abdicate their responsibility to librarians or to the government.

  This of course does not mean that librarians can't play a constructive role. I suggest we stop presuming that children have a relentless desire for sexual material, and that it is our primary duty as adults to throw as many roadblocks as possible in their path. At best we will make what is forbidden more alluring and also make the circumvention of these roadblocks a challenging game. Instead, why not acknowledge that children are curious about all sorts of things, and encourage this curiosity as best we can. Consider the approach taken by the librarians at the Sacramento Public Library. (Attachment 10)

  Their kid's web page begins with the disclaimer, "Sacramento Public Library makes no attempt to censor or control the content of information available on the Internet. Parents wishing to control the materials to which their children are exposed are expected to provide sufficient supervision of their children to accomplish this." Following this are suggested links for young kids (optical illusions, Sports Illustrated, Dr. Seuss, castles, the nine planets, etc.), for teens (NBA web site, FBI home page. CollegeNet, Drug Free Resource Net, etc.), and links for parents and teachers.

  If a child were making his or her first solo foray into Boston, a parent might mention fun and interesting places to go -- e.g., the museums, the aquarium, the waterfront, Fenway Park. Or a parent might mention none of these and instead say, "There's a terrible sinful place in Boston called the Combat Zone. Whatever you do, don't go there." The Sacramento Library chose the positive strategy; Mayor Menino; the negative. We urge the Boston City Council to do what you can to correct his error.

Robert B. Chatelle

Index of Attached Documents

1. National Writers Union letter of protest to Mayor Menino.

2. Purchase of Blocking Software by Public Libraries is Unconstitutional, by Jonathan D. Wallace, Esq.

3. The ALA Library Bill of Rights

4. ALA Statement on Free Access to Libraries for Minors

5. ALA Statement on Access to Electronic Information, Services, and Networks

6. Massachusetts State Law Regarding Selection and Use of Library Materials.

   This is the complete text of Chapter 78, Section 33 of the Annotated Laws of Massachusetts:

   The board of trustees of a free public library in any city or town or in the absence of such board, the city or town official possessing the appointive powers of such board, shall establish a written policy for the selection of library materials and the use of materials and facilities in accordance with standards adopted by the American Library Association. No employee shall be dismissed for the selection of library materials when the selection is made in good faith and in accordance with the approved policy adopted pursuant to the provisions of this section.

7. Some examples of what Cyber Patrol bans.

8. Banned in Austin: Cyber Patrol in the Austin Public Library, by David Smith.

9. Resignation Letter of an Austin Public Library Volunteer

10. A More Reasoned Approach: Kid's Place at the Sacramento Public Library

11. National Writers Union Press Release Concerning the Communications Decency Act