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MIT Electrical Engineering and Computer Science
EECS Event |
Thursday, November 29, 2001
3:30 PM (refreshments 3:15)
Edgerton Hall, Room 34-101
LCS Distinguished Lecture
Abstract
On November 28, the U.S. Supreme Court will hear oral arguments in the historic case of Ashcroft v. ACLU, concerning the constitutionality of the second federal cybercensorship law. (The Court declared the first such law unconstitutional in the pathbreaking case of Reno v. ACLU in 1997.) On November 29, ACLU President Nadine Strossen will report on the Court’s argument and discuss the ACLU’s other cutting-edge work to defend freedom of cyberspeech.
Although the censored speech is often demonized as “cyberporn,” in fact it includes words and images with serious artistic, political, and scientific value. Preventing such censorship is vitally important for not only individual freedom, but also U.S. business interests, as indicated by the friend-of-the-court brief that the U.S. Chamber of Commerce filed in support of the ACLU.
Strossen will also discuss the ACLU’s intense post-9/11 work to maintain freedom and privacy online, consistent with both national security and individual liberty.