Freedom and responsibility

I cannot understand why almost everybody is up in arms against the Cybercrimes Prevention Act that President Aquino signed into law a few weeks ago. As the name of the law suggests, it is intended to punish those who commit crimes and other offenses in cyberspace.

The law does not curtail the use of cyberspace nor seeks to stifle the right to free expression, as some oppositors are trying to mislead the public. Nowhere in the law does it say you can no longer enjoy the right to say what you want.

What the law guards against is the use of cyberspace to infringe upon the enjoyment by others of their own rights. The introduction of libel into the new law is to prevent the use of cyberspace in the malicious defamation of anyone.

This libel aspect is the same that applies to everyone else outside cyberspace, so what makes users of this new medium so unique and special that they should be provided immunity while others are not?

I have nothing against libel except what virtually all members of mainstream media want as a form of amendment — that it be decriminalized, meaning one can still be punished for libel, but only in the form of civil damages. Free speech does not have to send anyone to jail.

Libel is a form of accountability. As such it imposes responsibility. And these are things you do not resist. These are vital parts of what we have come to know and enjoy as order in a civilized and democratic system.

Sure there are possible dangers, just as there inherently are in any law. One that many love to make an example of is what happens if somebody opens a site under a name that happens to be the same as yours, which could get you in trouble.

True. But similar situations happens even outside cyberspace. What can be guaranteed is that, while anyone can get afoul with the law, in or out of cyberspace, the fact remains that as a civilized and democratic country, every person is guaranteed his day in court.

That means no law, including this controversial one, has been enacted or come into being that would curtail due process. Due process is still very much alive in our lives. The cybercrime law does not put anyone to jail at the click of a mouse.

Those who are mouthing slogans like cyber martial law are the ones who are prejudging the issue, and in the process depriving anyone the right to make a fair appreciation by themselves. They are the ones who are imposing martial law against the right to free determination.

And those who have been hacking into government and vital websites make up the best reason why such a law was created in the first place. They are committing crimes in cyberspace and need to be punished.

They need to be punished not just for the crime of hacking, but for putting into a bad light the millions upon millions of cyberspace users who act and behave responsibly even without a law having to be passed demanding such responsibility.

It is these millions upon millions of responsible cyberspace users who have made the Internet such a wonderful thing in our lives. It is just unfortunate that, as it is with real life, there will always be a few worms who will threaten the integrity of the whole fruit basket.

But it is because of these few worms that remedial measures have to be made. If somebody comes to check the basket to pick out and throw away the rotten fruit, it doesn’t mean he is going to throw away the whole basket. The rest of the fruit need not worry a bit.

There is nothing wrong with introducing a little order into our lives. Had it not been for this little order, there would have been no life, at least as we know it. Freedom is not only the ability to do or say anything. It also means the ability to know when or how to do or say it.