Topic: Censorship of the Internet
Country: Germany
Delegate Name: Raymond Welch
School: Saginaw Arts and Sciences Academy
Topic page: background guide and all position papers All Germany position papers GLIMUN 2010 committees
In any society, it is important for the government to function well. While restrictions on the government to stop it from becoming runaway are necessary, it also cannot be restricted from doing its job. And that job is to protect its citizens. While different countries have different standards for what is legal and what is not in their countries, any country has need to keep what is illegal in its country from being spread within the country. Based on this, internet censorship is just a tool to keep illegal activity from occurring in a country. Even though the internet may not actually exist in a country, if a web page on the internet can be accessed in the country and it is illegal within that country, the government has every right to censor it.
Of course, the ability to censor the internet is not the only concern. One other concern exists, how a country censors the internet. While it is reasonable for a country to censor content like child pornography and other such illegal content, there is content that should not be censored and content that is in a grey area. Things that should clearly not be censored should not be censored, this would include items such as political sites and other sites that are not illegal or harmful to the government. However, it is the grey area that should be worried about, sites that are harmful to a government. There is no clear cut line as to when a site against a government is harmful to it, and that line should be identified. But, there is also the fact that many sites will be negative toward a government and that governments should not have the authority to censor content merely because it is against the government. Only when a threat actually becomes a matter of security can a government be allowed to take steps to censor it.
