Imagine you are studying in a Rhode Island public school and have the assignment to complete. While working on it, you come across a difficult topic and decide to watch a YouTube channel where the topic is explained simply and beautifully. And that’s where your pursuit of knowledge comes to a halt as your school has internet censorship. Though designed to block some specific categories of websites to primarily prevent access to pornography, or sites where incidents of cyber-bullying, cyber-racism, cyber-sexism, and cyber-homophobia often occur, the flawed software often ends up blocking useful sites too. Thus, while students may access a random entertainment website, access to BBC may be blocked.

A science teacher even expressed his frustration saying how one of his lesson plans was ruined as the students needed to browse the internet to get information on “polyvinyl alcohol” but couldn’t as the search included “alcohol”- one of the blocked words. Though students may use VPN to unblock the sites they desire, not all schools may allow such usage and even many parents might not be willing to give such a potent tool in the hands of their kids.

Internet Censorship worldwide

Even in workplaces, internet censorship is highly debated. However, the situation it is slightly different from schools as the primary focus is on reducing cyberslacking. Several studies have shown how employees use internet at work for personal use, which may include sending and receiving personal emails, checking the sports headlines, stock market or news, comparison shopping, gaming etc. with such personal usage, employees on the clock end up effectively stealing company time and money, which adversely affects the company’s productivity.

Apart from the loss of productivity, such reckless access of various sites by employees may even make the company’s confidential data and files prone to cyber attacks. In addition, when the company’s administration or the managers become suspicious of employees’ work habits and ethics, it could trigger tensions between the parties, which in turn is likely to affect productivity adversely and even badly harm the morale of the workplace as well as the overall work atmosphere.

Though internet access is required (and even necessary) for several modern jobs, internet censorship at the workplace has become almost a norm these days to restrict wastage of productive hours. However, several companies have taken a balanced approach by designating specific times (say, lunch hours) to allow their workforce free access to otherwise blocked sites.

Cons of internet censorship at schools

Supporters of internet censorship say it restricts the student’s exposure to sexual, violent, and other harmful topics, thus making the move advantageous. However, the opponents put forward several arguments to show how internet censorship brings along several disadvantages and undermines learning at school. Let’s check some key points in this regard.

Adversely impacts the learning process by limiting teachers’ creativity and freedom: Imagine the plight of a political science teacher (in high school) who has to keep aside a wide range of timely topics – from gun control, and terrorism in the Middle East, to medical marijuana and at times, even local politics, as he can’t have class discussions on them because students can’t do online research because the search terms contain blocked phrases.

Students would grow up being ignorant of the world: By stopping the flow of information, schools are limiting the students’ exposure to an opinion on real-world issues. For example, not letting students know about violence, discrimination, abuse, reproduction etc. may leave them overwhelmed, shocked, or ill-informed when they venture out of this seemingly protective shell out into the real world. In a way, it can be said that internet censorship in schools leads to lack of truth, which in turns causes ignorance, which may be unsettling and costly for students once they are ready to step into the real world for further studies or jobs.

No one to oversee what’s blocked and what’s not: Deciding what’s acceptable and what’s not is often left solely at the school’s discretion. As a result, some schools take the censorship to absurd extremes where they use their filtering software to block sites marked as “news,” “political,” and even “dictionary.” When there’s hardly anyone to check or debate the school’s censorship decisions, it may end up influencing the young minds and even the society by blocking and allowing sites that it deems fit and safe.

What’s the solution?

Perhaps schools (and even workplaces) may be made to run for 4-5 hours (instead of the usual 8 hours) to give students and employees enough time to browse the internet without any censorship. In case that’s not possible or feasible, the next best solution is to use a robust VPN to override the restrictions and access the desired sites or geoblocked content – either for school projects or your personal use.