Everything Charedim say is wrong with the internet is true. The internet, as I’m sure anyone reading this blog is aware of is the absolute worst source of pornography in the world. It can be had at an instant, in the privacy of one’s own home with complete ease. There is no censorship on the internet and therefore there is no limit to what people will put on their websites and no limit to anyone accessing it at their pleasure. Pornography in other media always carried a greater risk and has a bit more difficulty in being accessed. Magazines can be discovered, Movies are public and to some degree regulated. Broadcast TV is censored and Cable can be controlled by not buying into pornographic sites or by locking out certain channels. But internet porn can be accessed in an instant and just as quickly deleted from the screen. The dangers about internet porn have been discussed by many publications and it is not my intention to do so here. I just wanted to add my agreement with the Charedi world about the real dangers.
The problem with the Charedi solution is the same problem that affects their solution to everything. If there is even the slightest danger of bringing a taint into the home, it is to be banned... eliminated from their world completely. The argument goes... that no matter what the benefit, it is not worth the risk.
The problem with this philosophy is that the baby must be destroyed right along with the bathwater. The internet is not ...ALL... evil. The benefits are so enormous that only a complete fool would say otherwise. The benefits of the internet are as good as the evil on it... is bad. To eliminate this valuable resource by banning it is to eliminate all that potential benefit as well. And this is precisely the point of departure between Charedim and Centrists. Centrists do not ban anything that has potential good in it. We rather find ways to control it so that the benefits are maximized and the evil minimized. Is it foolproof? No. But it is better than advancing ignorance, in my view.
But, as one commentator on Rabbi Gil Student's blog Hirhurim indicated today, the Charedi concern is more about ideas than it is about porn. They fear ideas. Porn can get filtered out and combined with a good parenting policy will do a good job of retaining the benefits while minimizing the detriments. But ideas, which are contained in Blogs such as this one cannot be filtered out.
Charedim are isolationists B'Shitah and as much as they are concerned with the real dangers of porn, they are more concerned with “wrong” ideas being picked up by their Charedi constituency. They will not take a chance on the real world because God, forbid a stray non-Charedi viewpoint might be accepted by a Charedi. They therefore prefer to live B'Chadrei Chadorim so as to minimize if not completely eliminate any potential contact with a Hashkafa that is not in lock-step with theirs.
We who are in the "Center" believe we should hear all Hashkafos and then use our God given minds to decide what makes the most sense to us. Nor do we fear encountering possible Apikursus because we are firmly grounded in our Hashkafos.
For those who beliefs are weak, we have to ask our selves why that is the case. What did they lack in their Torah education that raised such doubts? They perhaps should not be exposed to streams of thought that may push them over the edge. But that should not prevent the rest of us from reading views that are different from our own. Besides, there are always going to be doubters that are easily influenced away from a Torah Hashkafa. They don't need the internet. They will find their way to Apikursus just fine, as they have long before the internet was invented. But none of this means that those of us who are strong in our Hashkafos should be denied learning about other Hashkafic views... even Charedi ones.
