Net Neutrality and the Politics Pendulum

Net Neutrality and the Politics Pendulum

I joined Facebook and Twitter in July 2009. While a great deal has changed in my life since then, I have admittedly not noticed too many great changes in my access to either Facebook or Twitter. I cannot recall when I first used You Tube or first subscribed to Netflix, but I have experienced a few price increases with Netflix. I imagine this is what it will be like with the repeal of Net Neutrality. Since Internet Service Providers (ISPs) are no longer required to treat all content providers (Facebook, Twitter, You Tube, Netflix, etc.) equally and can logistically charge some content providers more due to volume or bandwidth demand, there is a possibility that the price of Internet access will increase as well as the cost of certain services such as Netflix. We have enjoyed Net Neutrality for a mere two years now and I can assure you that Netflix has already gone up in price in that time and will likely do so again. The underlying problem is greed. Internet Service Providers and content providers alike wish to make more money and charge higher premiums. The latest decision to repeal Net Neutrality makes this easier for them to do and pads the pockets of the already wealthy. This, unfortunately, is the political climate that we are in until we hopefully do something to reverse this direction in future elections. At the moment, what used to be indirectly a theocracy has become an oligarchy, with big money and big corporations at the top of the leaderboard. Ajit Pai, the villain of Net Neutrality, is a former Verizon executive whose primary role in this game is to repeal Net Neutrality, which he has done. Ahead of this victory, he ended subsidies and programs which made Internet affordable and accessible to low-income individuals. That said, the price of Internet service, as well as the price of content such as Netflix and Hulu are going to go up in price anyway, regardless of whether or not we have Net Neutrality. If we learned anything in Economics class, it is that supply and demand, as well as inflation, drives up costs. The added element of greed drives the cost up even further. The larger issue is whether this repeal will affect access to information.

If the repeal of Net Neutrality results in the increase of price for Internet service or specific services, then the access to these services will be limited to those persons who can afford them, leaving the less affluent in the dark. While it may be true that this could potentially limit access to the less affluent because Internet could become less affordable, it is not necessarily true that information will be more censored (it already is censored) or that speeds will be slowed for any reason. Content providers like Twitter, Facebook, Netflix, etc. can already afford to continue the speed of the service they provide. It will be up to the consumer to afford the more premium packages (note: these ‘packages’ will not include separate costs for each content item as believed by some) that will deliver the same level of Internet access they presently receive. It is worth noting that the potential increase in cost for Internet access, as well as the potential for different Internet packages, is still hypothetical and would likely be gradual. Also hypothetical is the fear that actual access to information will be censored, even for those persons who can afford the premium packages. I am sure that the oligarchy would love nothing more than to censor the information that we have access to, or censor our ability to coordinate online, but the reality is, they already do.

Recently, my daughter used her school computer to research depression and suicide. Exactly one day later, I find myself in the counselor’s office. Not too long after this debacle, my son has a history project to do, but is unable to use his school computer to research the Battle of Yorktown because it contains the word “battle”. Just as school districts are able to spy on our students’ search histories and prevent them from looking up certain things or accessing certain websites, our government can and does do the same already. They have been doing this for years, hence the need for whistleblowers like Edward Snowden, who ousted the government for this practice back in 2013, two years before Net Neutrality. Net Neutrality came to be for a number of reasons, including this leak of information by Snowden. The average consumer is upset about the repeal of something that made no difference to them prior to 2015, and amongst these consumers are people who are either divided about or in favor of indicting Snowden. Second, Net Neutrality did not significantly increase our access to information, but it may have made our access to that information more secure. Third, believe it or not, there was a time when the Internet itself did not exist. Yet, despite the lack of the Internet, we were still able to access information, in much the same way that my son was still able to research the Battle of Yorktown for his history project. The oligarchy is not large enough or strong enough to overpower the will of the majority, which we still are. They may have repealed Net Neutrality without the vote of the majority, but they cannot continue to control the future. They cannot keep us from reading books or from educating ourselves. They cannot keep us from organizing. They cannot prohibit us from gaining access to Internet through a variety of methods, including some of those methods that have been shared on Twitter since the repeal of Net Neutrality. They have failed to censor Edward Snowden or the recommendations he has made for safer usage (such as The Tor Project). They can make it difficult for us to vote, but ultimately, they cannot stop us, just as we saw in Alabama.

The politics pendulum has been swinging back and forth since George Washington resigned and will continue to swing back and forth. Right now we are in the midst of a giant upswing on the Republican side with the lowest approval rate and the highest percentage of greedy deplorables of any administration in history. What happens when the pendulum swings high on one side? What are we doing with our time to prepare for the next upswing? Merely complaining about the present upswing does not adequately prepare us for what happens next. There is work to do.

The repeal of Net Neutrality is not the end of the world, but it is not good news either. Net Neutrality equalized fairness to individual content providers, increased access to consumers, and improved security and access to information. The repeal, like Trump’s election, was not secured by a popular vote, but by a much more sinister movement in politics, government, education and media. Some people are merely accepting and succumbing to voter suppression, government lies, party loyalty and deliberate attempts by Trump and his administration to delegitimize the media and jeopardize the freedom of press.  They are just accepting that this is the way it is. They are tired of hearing the comparisons to George Orwell’s 1984. The oligarchy wants you to be tired. They are succeeding with these people. We still have access to information and should be spending our time educating ourselves and protecting our democracy. The Constitution and the Bill of Rights were written in order to ensure and protect our democracy, yet it seems like not too many people are even familiar with what either of those documents say or why they were written the way they were. Our displeasure at the separation of church and state, which was put in place for a reason, gave way to a theocracy, which gave way to party loyalty, which ushered in our present oligarchy. Our own apathy is at fault.

If there were no Internet, or if Internet were somehow severely impacted by the repeal of Net Neutrality (which I do not see being the case since we had very few complaints about our access prior to 2015), I would have a great deal more time to read, write, and create, and when elections came, I would vote.