FCC Chair Defends Net Neutrality Repeal After Fed Court Questions

LOS ANGELES—A federal court last year upheld the Federal Communication Commission’s 2018 repeal of Obama-era net neutrality rules — but not without three key questions. In a post on the blogging site Medium on Monday, FCC Chair Ajit Pai finally responded to those questions, almost exactly one year after the ruling by the District of Columbia Court of Appeals.  Perhaps not surprisingly, Pai stood by the 2018 repeal, which came in the FCC’s “Restoring Internet Freedom Order,” blaming “numerous Washington politicians, far-left special-interest groups, Hollywood stars, and Silicon Valley tech giants, as well as many in the media,” for, he claimed “trying to scare the American people” about the fallout from net neutrality repeal. For the online adult industry, net neutrality repeal still represents a potential disaster. Without net neutrality protections, internet service providers are free to block or slow down porn sites if they choose to do so, or to bundle porn sites into packages and resell them to subscribers at premium prices.  Even without outright censorship, the 2018 net neutrality repeal could ultimately result in a watering down of sexually oriented content online. “The quickening of the internet has meant that many more people have access, and can reach our content, and thus stop feeling loneliness and shame,” Free Speech Coalition spokesperson Mike Stabile said in 2018. “When you slow sections of the internet, you're telling people that some ideas and sexualities and identities are second-class, and you bring that shame back. The internet becomes The Big Vanilla." The federal court required that the FCC address whether net neutrality repeal posed a threat to public safety; whether it would impair low-income access to broadband; and how it would affect “pole attachments,” which according to the FCC are “fees that are generally paid by cable systems and telecommunications carriers who lease space from utility companies on poles or in ducts, conduits, or rights-of-way.” But in his Monday post, Pai simply dismissed the court’s concerns. “Having reviewed the input received, the law, and the facts, I am confident that the regulatory framework we set forth in the Restoring Internet Freedom Order appropriately and adequately addresses each issue,” the FCC Chair wrote. In addition to his online statement, Pai also issued a new order, reaffirming the 2018 repeal of net neutrality rules.  One of the FCC’s two Democratic members, Jessica Rosenworcel — a net neutrality supporter and frequent Pai critic  — called Pai’s new order “insane,” saying that especially during the coronavirus pandemic, Americans have come to rely on the internet for even the routine details of everyday life. “It’s also cruel that this is our priority when the crisis has exposed just how vast our digital divide is and how much more work we have to do for broadband to reach 100% of us — no matter who we are or where we live,” Rosenworcel said in a statement. Photo by U.S. Department of Agriculture / Wikimedia Commons