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MONTEVIDEO (APC) - The proliferation of sexual
content on the internet
and the considerable size of the pornography market online is a concern
to lots of different groups. However while the online adult sex
industry accounts for 12% of web pages, the internet
has also been used to express and explore a range of sexual
experiences, relationships and content that cannot be considered
“harmful”. This kind content is very important to people’s right to freedom
of expression and right to information.
Especially for people who have little access to resources, rights and
spaces in the “off-line” world. Learn more about these issues and the
research that APC is
doing to understand them better.
More
>>
MUMBAI
(Manjima Bhattacharjya and Maya Ganesh for GenderIT) – “And I can chat
with you baby / Flirt a little, maybe / But does your mother know that
you’re out ?” Twenty-something middle-class women in Mumbai, the city
with the highest internet
use in India, talk about how they explore their sexuality online, how
they present themselves however they want and how they deal with risky
situations. More
>>
BEIRUT
(Nadine Moawad for GenderIT) – “The gay rights movement in Lebanon would not be
anywhere near where it is today if it weren’t for the internet”. In the
midst of strongly censored neighbours, Lebanon enjoys online freedom
that is hampered only by very slow and very expensive internet
connections – but is that freedom there to stay? In a country where
homosexuality is punishable by upto two years in prison, Nadine Moawad
assesses the role of the internet
in the rise of sexual rights activism in Lebanon and asks if Lebanon’s
strict social controls are about to encompass the internet. More
>>
GRAHAMSTOWN
(Jeanne Prinsloo for GenderIT) – Two out of three gay South African respondents to
an online survey said that going online had helped them accept their
sexual orientation and many admitted to coming out online before they
did so offline. But the voices of transgender people rarely appear in
studies and surveys. To address the gap, APC
EroTICs researcher Jeanne Prinsloo of the University of Grahamstown
looks at the use of a transgender site which provides a critical space
for trans people to lurk and listen to ideas and debates that are not
present in mainstream sites, to rehearse their new identity and to
assess the risks they might take. More
>>
NEW YORK (Sex Work Awareness) –
Freedom of speech and its flipside, access
to information, is guaranteed by the First
Amendment of the US Constitution. However federally-funded libraries
are required to prevent people under eighteen accessing “harmful”
content. Kevicha Echols and Melissa Ditmore investigate the use of internet
filters on public library computers and find that measures adopted by
libraries range from installation of filtering software on all
computers for child and adult use to no filters at all! The law is
being implemented differently varying across city, county and state.
Sectors of the society most likely to be affected by this ad hoc
censorship are young people and the economically-disadvantaged who rely
particularly on library computers to access online
information. More
>>
RIO de JANEIRO (CLAM
and Sex Politics Watch) – Proposals to fight cybercrime have been
floating around in Brazil for more than a decade but the backers –
primarily banks and music companies worried about internet
fraud and unauthorised music sharing — couldn’t find public or
parliamentary support until they switched their focus to child
pornography. Lula has refused to sanction online censorship and the government
has opened a public consultation on what a civil law to regulate the internet
should look like. EroTICs researchers Corrêa, Maria and Queiroz explore
the history of the Brazilian regulation debate and conclude that the
time is ripe to talk about rights – and for feminists and sexual rights
activists to get involved. More
>>
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