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IV. RECOMMENDATIONS AND CONCLUSION
15. As we
have seen, the virtue of solidarity is the measure of the Internet's service of
the common good. It is the common good that supplies the context for
considering the ethical question: “Are the media being used for good or evil?” 32
Many individuals and groups
share responsibility in this matter—for example, the transnational corporations of which we spoke above.
All users of the Internet are obliged to use it in an informed, disciplined
way, for morally good purposes; parents should guide and supervise children's
use. 33 Schools and other educational institutions and
programs for children and adults should provide training in discerning use of
the Internet as part of a comprehensive media education including not just
training in technical skills—‘computer literacy' and
the like—but a capacity for informed, discerning
evaluation of content. Those whose decisions and actions contribute to shaping
the structure and contents of the Internet have an especially serious duty to
practice solidarity in the service of the common good.
16. Prior
censorship by government should be avoided; “censorship...should only be used in the very last
extremity”. 34 But the Internet is
no more exempt than other media from reasonable laws against hate speech,
libel, fraud, child pornography and pornography in general, and other offenses.
Criminal behavior in other contexts is criminal behavior in cyberspace, and the
civil authorities have a duty and a right to enforce such laws. New regulations
also may be needed to deal with special ‘Internet'
crimes like the dissemination of computer viruses, the theft of personal data
stored on hard disks, and the like.
Regulation of the Internet
is desirable, and in principle industry self-regulation is best. “The solution to problems
arising from unregulated commercialization and privatization does not lie in
state control of media but in more regulation according to criteria of public
service and in greater public accountability”. 35
Industry codes of ethics can play a useful role, provided they are seriously
intended, involve representatives of the public in their formulation and
enforcement, and, along with giving encouragement to responsible communicators,
carry appropriate penalties for violations, including public censure. 36
Circumstances sometimes may require state intervention: for example, by setting
up media advisory boards representing the range of opinion in the community. 37
17. The
Internet's transnational, boundary-bridging character and its role in
globalization require international cooperation in setting standards and
establishing mechanisms to promote and protect the international common good. 38
In regard to media technology, as in regard to much else, “there is a pressing need for
equity at the international level”. 39
Determined action in the private and public sectors is needed to close and
eventually eliminate the digital divide.
Many difficult
Internet-related questions call for international consensus: for example, how
to guarantee the privacy of law-abiding individuals and groups without keeping
law enforcement and security officials from exercising surveillance over
criminals and terrorists; how to protect copyright and intellectual property
rights without limiting access to material in the public domain—and how to define the ‘public domain' itself; how to establish and maintain broad-based
Internet repositories of information freely available to all Internet users in
a variety of languages; how to protect women's rights in regard to Internet
access and other aspects of the new information technology. In particular, the
question of how to close the digital divide between the information rich and
the information poor requires urgent attention in its technical, educational,
and cultural aspects.
There is today a “growing sense of
international solidarity” that offers the United
Nations system in particular “a unique opportunity to
contribute to the globalization of solidarity by serving as a meeting place for
states and civil society and as a convergence of the varied interests and
needs...Cooperation between international agencies and nongovernmental
organizations will help to ensure that the interests of states—legitimate though they may be—and of the
different groups within them, will not be invoked or defended at the expense of
the interests or rights of other peoples, especially the less fortunate”. 40 In this connection we hope that the World
Summit of the Information Society scheduled to take place in 2003 will make a
positive contribution to the discussion of these matters.
18. As we
pointed out above, a companion document to this one called The Church and
Internet speaks specifically about the Church's use of the Internet and the
Internet's role in the life of the Church. Here we wish only to emphasize that
the Catholic Church, along with other religious bodies, should have a visible,
active presence on the Internet and be a partner in the public dialogue about
its development. “The Church does not presume to dictate these decisions and choices,
but it does seek to be of help by indicating ethical and moral criteria which
are relevant to the process—criteria which are to be
found in both human and Christian values”. 41
The Internet can make an
enormously valuable contribution to human life. It can foster prosperity and
peace, intellectual and aesthetic growth, mutual understanding among peoples
and nations on a global scale.
It also can help men and
women in their age-old search for self-understanding. In every age, including
our own, people ask the same fundamental questions: “Who am I? Where have I come
from and where am I going? Why is there evil? What is there after this life?”
42 The Church cannot impose answers, but
she can—and must—proclaim to
the world the answers she has received; and today, as always, she offers the
one ultimately satisfying answer to the deepest questions of life—Jesus Christ, who “fully reveals man to
himself and brings to light his most high calling”. 43
Like today's world itself, the world of media, including the Internet, has been
brought by Christ, inchoately yet truly, within the boundaries of the kingdom
of God and placed in service to the word of salvation. Yet “far from diminishing our concern to develop this earth, the
expectancy of a new earth should spur us on, for it is here that the body of a
new human family grows, foreshadowing in some way the age which is to come”.44
Vatican City, February
22, 2002, Feast of the Chair of St. Peter the Apostle.
John P. Foley
President
Pierfranco Pastore
Secretary
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