Surf The Internet and Burn in Hell
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There's no denying that the internet has changed all of our lives. Of all of man's modern inventions, no other has impacted the way we live like the internet has. It has affected everything from how we obtain our news and entertainment to how we shop. It's an unlimited source of information and education. It has even changed the way people socialize and interact with each other, from chat rooms to newsgroups to bulletin boards. It has taken down the world's borders, uniting people from every race, creed and color to form one global community. All this sounds great, but for all the good that it does, the internet is also leading to the downfall of mankind! The internet has become a haven for sickos, perverts and criminals, loosening people's morals and sense of decency. What's worse, all of us are guilty of contributing to it. There's no denying that everyone at some point or another has done something immoral or improper, that under normal circumstances we never would have done. With the aid of the internet though, we're more than eager to explore this new online world of sin and debauchery. I'll start with the criminal aspect first. Scam artists have found a new place to set up shop and rip people off. Whether it's get-rich-quick schemes or selling bogus products that promise impossible results, these charlatans are making a fortune from gullible people. Sure, they exist outside of the online world as well, but the internet has given them new methods to do it and a seemingly unlimted number of potential victims via spam. Then there are those that think they are entitled to all the information available on the internet - your information! We're not just talking about people getting your credit card info. There are people who are also after your social security number, your bank accounts, your date of birth, where you work, as well as your address and phone number. These people will stop at nothing to obtain what they want and there is very little you can do to protect yourself. Then we have the "practical jokers", whose idea of fun is to cause total chaos and mass destruction. They do this two ways - by hacking and by spreading viruses. How safe do you really feel knowing that terrorists are accessing our goverment's databases, obtaining top secrets? Should we feel any safer if some teenager from Idaho does it instead? Anytime someone hacks into a computer system they have no right going into, be it a government, corporate or private system, they are committing a felony. It is no different than someone breaking into your house, yet many of the people doing this feel there is nothing wrong with it. Then there are those who create and spread a virus because they were "bored" and had nothing better to do. Viruses at best, cause people inconveniences. At worst, they cause systems to crash, hard drives to be wiped out, and force businesses, institutions, and government departments to temporarily shut down, often at the cost of millions of dollars. The damage and destruction is akin to blowing up a building. Well, you may say, "Certainly I'm not committing any of these crimes." Maybe not, but how many of you are downloading copyrighted material illegal? For more on this subject, see "Download From Napster and Burn in Hell". And then there are average people like you and me, who have discovered auction sites like Ebay where they can sell all their old junk at inflated prices, making a huge profit. Of course there are people stupid enough to pay those prices. Even worse is how the internet and Ebay has allowed the average person to become a ticket scalper. Thanks to Ticketmaster Online, anyone can buy tickets for concerts anywhere in the country and sell them on auction sites for hundreds of times the original price. Believe me, most of the people doing this would not or could not if it wasn't for the internet. In short, the internet has provided the resources for average people to take advantage of other average people. While many of these things are done by professional criminals and scam artists, and for the most part people are inherently good, the problem is that a lot of people don't see anything wrong with doing some of these things, just as some people think it is okay to cheat on their income taxes. Many of these things are wrong from a moral standpoint, if not from a criminal standpoint. The fact that people are losing the ability to distinguish from wrong and right, or not care what is wrong and right, is very troubling. Another side of the internet that can be very entertaining at times is the humorous side. There are thousands of sites devoted to humorous topics that are indeed very funny. The problem is that the humor contained on many sites is nasty, offensive and downright cruel. Granted, there have always been off color jokes, jokes taking advantage of other people's misfortunes, and jokes told at the expense of others' feelings. Just tune in to David Letterman's or Jay Leno's monologue on any given night and you'll see what I mean. This type of humor has crossed over to the internet. The no holds barred environment it provides has given jokesters unlimited freedom to say what they want and feel regardless of how cruel and offensive, even if it is humorous. I will be the first to admit I am guilty of this as well. Some of the things I have said on my site, as well as many of the sites I have linked on my Links Pages are exactly the kind of thing I am talking about. Again, this kind of stuff has always been around but the internet has given the world a wider forum to distribute it, making it more available to people, with email being the biggest distributor of all. It doesn't matter how mean-spirited or offensive a joke is, as long as it is funny. People would rather have a good laugh at the expense of others than not have a good laugh at all, and the internet is contributing to this lack of decency and humanity on our part. Then there are the real sick and disturbing sites on the web. These are the ones that feature disgusting and gruesome images of corpses, accidents, mutilations, animal maulings, suicides, deformities, autopsies, executions and other gross stuff. I'll have to admit, one of the very first sites I visited when I gained access to the internet in 1994 was a site called the Gallery of the Grotesque. As repulsive as these sites can be, people are still fascinated with them. No matter how horrible, curiosity gets the best of you and you just have to look. It's like when you're driving down the highway and you just have to slow down past an accident, hoping you'll catch a glimpse of a dismembered limb lying among the wreckage. To some extent I think this is okay, even healthy. As mortals we all have a natural curiousity as well as fear of death. What better way to conquer or at least ease that fear than confronting it head on. Viewing photos of death takes some of the mystery out of it, making us more comfortable with our own mortality. Coming to terms with our own death is a natural and important part of our lives. The complaint I have is that some of these sites take this stuff too far. Dead bodies and accident victims are one thing, but some of the things I've seen are downright apalling. I really don't think we need to see people being tortured and murdered by execution squads in faraway countries. The after photos are one thing, but do we actually need to see the actual act taking place? One site I visited featured photos of a man eating a roasted human baby! To be honest, these could have been fake but they certainly looked real. Even if they were fake, do people really need to see this kind of stuff. It's the really sick stuff like this I take exception to. The other thing that bothers me are the celebrity death sites, showcasing autopsy and accident photos of famous people. I suppose these shouldn't be treated any differently from other death photos, but celebrity photos tend to get widely circulated and distributed as if people have a God given right to review the remains of their favorite stars. Even worse are the people who charge money for such photos. I'll never forget when someone posted on alt.music.prince that they were selling autopsy photos of Prince's dead infant son. Again, I don't necessarily think it's wrong for people to be curious about death. The problem is that the internet has made these types of photos available to anyone with a computer, and people, especially kids, are looking at them for the wrong reason. To be curious is one thing. To use death photos for entertainment is another. People get a kick out of the "amusing" way people died, or just try to gross their friends out. What we seem to forget is that the people in these photos we're looking at were once living, breathing humans who had families and friends and lives just like ours, and at the very least deserve the dignity and respect we all should receive upon our own deaths. Death is a serious subject, and when people meet misfortunate ends they shouldn't become objects for all the world to gawk at. This is just another example of how the internet has taken away some of the decency and humanity in the world today. I'd also like to mention some of the racist, anti-gay, anti-religous and bigoted sites on the internet. While I believe the people who own these sites certainly have the right to express their views, the internet has given them a forum to express those views and reach people they never would have been able to before. Unfortunately there are other people out there who are susceptible to these hate mongers' way of thinking, and the internet provides an easy way for them to band together and spread further hate. The last topic I'd like to discuss is the big one - SEX. Sex is certainly an important part of our lives. It is natural and healthy, something that can give us great pleasure as well as ensure the continuation of our race. I am not here to judge anyone on what they believe or how they live their life. I certainly won't condemn anyone for any kind of lifestyle they choose, or what it is they choose to turn them on. We are all human and all of us have different things that excite us and pleasure us. However, as useful a tool as the internet can be, even for sex, once again things can get a little out of hand. The most obvious are the perverts, child molesters and stalkers. Sure, they exist in regular society, but again, the internet has provided new feeding ground for these creeps. My own opinion is that the internet actually makes things easier for these twisted souls to scout out and contact potential victims. No more hanging around the schoolyard or following women home late at night. Now all they have to do is just log on and join a chat room. And of course, explicit photos and videos are more readily available to these people as well. As for the average person, the internet has exposed them to some things of a sexual nature that they probably never even dreamed of. This isn't necessarily bad, as it can promote diversity, acceptance and tolerance. The problem is, should people, especially kids, be exposed to it in this fashion? As with my complaint about death photos, sex on the internet is used more for entertainment purposes, and I'm not talking about the masturbatory kind. People seem to get a kick out of seeing beastiality, naked women smeared with feces, extreme bondage and doctored photos of celebrities performing oral sex. If you're into or curious to explore things like that, then that's fine. To check them out just for kicks is wrong. I guarantee the majority of people who look at this stuff would not go out of their way to find it if it were not available on the internet. Once again, the internet has exposed people to something that they wouldn't normally see. People aren't looking at sexual images to explore or fulfill their own sexuality. Instead, sex on the internet has become just another excuse for people to gawk at something outrageous or shocking. As a result, the actual physical act of sex loses some of its meaning, sensuality, intimacy and importance. As for the pay sex sites on the internet, I defer to the prior paragraph about getting ripped off. My intention here was not to get too preachy. Overall I'm just trying to make a point about how something as useful and innovative as the internet can get misused. One of the main purposes of the internet if you believe the commercials, is to unite the entire world into one online global community. To some extent that has happened, but in the process I feel we have also become less human which sort of defeats the purpose of the whole thing. Morals and decency have been forgotten in exchange for a new online world where anything goes. People are using the internet with misguided intentions and whether they realize it or not, they are becoming less sensitive to the real world around them. Please feel free to post your own comments and views to the message board!
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