Are we losing control?

The debacle of the BBC’s Newsnight story this week over false allegations of child abuse has once again raised frequently made calls for more control of the internet. Lord MacAlpine was not named in the Newsnight report but his name spread like wild fire across the internet leading some commentators and politicians to call for stricter measures of censorship and editing on the internet. This is a sentiment shared by many in education who fear the loss of control that inevitably comes with social media sites.

You can understand where these views come from. It is appalling that an innocent man has had his name attached to such serious crimes without any kind of evidence or formal investigation. The internet opens up all sorts of dangers for everybody and schools are right to be cautious of the potential damage that can be caused to reputations and the exposure of children to inappropriate content and the risk of cyberbullying. But to call for more control of the internet strikes me as missing the point, by quite a long way.

Firstly, how would this control come about? The internet and the World Wide Web were created with openness and freedom at their very soul. Governments may wish to have more control over content, but this would not be practical or desirable; regimes that attempt to do this are looked on with disdain in the free world and their extraordinary efforts are likely to be in vain. This is one of the features of the internet, and in particular of social media, that is so revolutionary. Everybody has a voice. This means one has to filter through quite a lot of rubbish to find anything of value, but search engines do this job to an extent and there are many examples of priceless videos, pictures and thoughts that would never have gone public before the emergence of the internet.

We are also in danger of blaming the technology rather than the humans that create these situations. The Newsnight fiasco was caused by some shoddy journalism. The fact that no name was actually said on the programme does not mean that people did not know who was being spoken about. This is a similar issue that affects schools who are encouraged to ban mobile phones or to block websites. This will not stop bullying, pornography or whatever else it is that we are trying to protect our children from but it will certainly restrict the availability of exciting resources and cutting edge technology that young people invariably carry around in their blazer pockets.

By all means lambast the BBC in their clumsy handling of sensitive issues. By all means address bullying as a serious issue in schools. But let us not fall into the misapprehension that the technology that is now very much part of our lives is at fault or to blame for human frailities.