Hawaii Legislature Takes Up Bill To Block Porn On State Govt WiFi

Finding that “today’s internet is full of pornographic content,” a new bill in the Hawaii state legislature would require any free WiFi network operated by the state to include filters that block access to porn sites for state employees, according to a report Monday by the local news site Honolulu Civil Beat.  The bill—actually two nearly identical bills, one in the state’s House and one in the Senate—would prevent state employees from checking out porn sites on the job,  or any time that they get online through a state government-run network. Both bills are part of a package of legislation proposed by Hawaii’s Women’s Legislative Caucus. Language included in the text of the legislation claims that online porn “often involves women or children being coerced or treated brutally during sexual intercourse.” However, as AVN.com has reported, recent studies have contradicted claims that online porn is becoming increasingly violent, and that there is any link between viewing porn and increased sexual aggression.  Nonetheless, the legislation has received broad support in the Hawaii legislature from male and female lawmakers alike, as well as from both Democrats and Republicans. The House bill is supported by 23 of the state’s 51 House members, on a bipartisan basis. The Hawaii Senate has only one Republican, who does not support the bill. But 19 of Hawaii’s 25 state senators have already pledged their backing for the anti-porn bill, according to Civil Beat. A Senate hearing on the legislation is set for Thursday of this week. In February of last year, Hawaii State Senator Mike Gabbard—father of current Democratic presidential candidate Tulsi Gabbard—introduced a bill that would block porn sites for everyone in the state, unless they forked over a $20 fee to lift the filters. Kansas and Arizona have also introduced their own versions of the one-time $20 “porn tax.” In New York state, legislators last year introduced a bill that would force internet users to pay a $2 fee to the state for each individual porn download.  None of the state "porn tax" bills have yet received votes in their respective legislatures. Photo By Defenseimagery.mod.uk / Wikimedia Commons