On Protecting Children From Speech

Citation: Etzioni, Amitai. “On Protecting Children from Speech.” Chicago-Kent Law Review. 2004: 3-53. Google Scholar. 5 April 2009. http://lawreview.kentlaw.edu/articles/79-1/Etzioni.pdf

This article discusses and analyses the issues concerning children’s rights to free speech. According to the author, past court cases care more about how restricting access for children would inadvertently affect adults than they do about how there is a compelling state interest to protect children from harmful speech. To remedy this, Etzoini thinks Internet access for children and adults should become separate. Where it is not possible to make a separation, government regulation is needed, because voluntary measures, such as parents choosing to purchase filtering softwares, are generally ineffective. A review of research studies concludes children can be harmed by viewing objectionable media content, although this has been more definitely proven for violent content than for pornography. Etzoini also says that as children get older, they should have greater free speech rights, and should have their content restricted less.

The article provides a counterargument to some of the other documents published concerning how children can be protected from harmful content on the Internet. The Supreme Court cases concerning section 223 of the CDA and COPA were struck down in part because it was believed that there was truly no way for to restrict content for children without also inadvertently restricting it for adults. Etzioni, however, believes there may be ways to separate Internet access based on age. Additionally, this article differs from the arguments made by Thierer, because it favors governmental regulation of content over self-regulation. Etizoni’s reason for the ineffectiveness of voluntary regulation does however relate to a concept Thierer discusses – that of self efficacy. If people’s motivation to filter the Internet content of minors, self-regulation could potentially work. The problem right now is that efficacy is too low for people to want to take an initiative and regulate content.

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On Protecting Children From Speech