OUR VIEW: Libraries on guard

Beware whenever “the children” are used to justify some action, inaction or cause. You can bet that “the children” won’t benefit one bit either way. You can be equally sure that all attempts at logical conversation and debate have gone out the window. At that point there can be no pros or cons, only “the children.”
At issue is a new state law that requires libraries to have Internet filters on any computers available for patron use. Those who support the law will tell you it’s for the children, it’s to keep them safe from predators and pornography while using public machines. Those who oppose it will say it erodes the First Amendment and does more harm than good, lulling parents into a false sense of security while the computer experts in the family find ways around filters to find the very things they ought not be looking for.
But forget about the realities, forget about high-minded things like the First Amendment, forget about the fact that filters too often filter out legitimate things like sites devoted to breast or testicular cancer. The Family Foundation of Virginia, the group pushing the new state law that denies funding to any library that doesn’t filter its Internet, says it’s all for the children. Thus ends the debate.
“Parents do their job while in the home,” said Victoria Cobb, president of the Family Foundation. “The least the state can do is make sure those protections are then on taxpayer-funded computers.”
If there ever was a meet the new boss, same as the old boss, parting on the left is now a parting on the right sort of moment, this is it.
Those on the right argue often that those on the left are intent on building a nanny state, sometimes for the children, taking away liberties in exchange for safety. The left can and should argue the same thing.
Conservatives are fond of pointing out that what is and isn’t the government’s job when it comes to social projects embraced by liberals. They will tell you that it isn’t the government’s job to provide universal health care or to fund a universal preschool program. Now they tell us it’s the government’s job to ensure that computers in a public space must have filters, or else.
It is the responsibility of parents and guardians to guide and protect their children. That’s what’s best for the children. Thus ends the debate. To trust the government to do that job for us is to abdicate our foremost responsibilities. It also opens up the door for other, perhaps even worse, intrusions into our family lives. 
Libraries are funded primarily through state and local money. If at the local level libraries have become online Sodoms and Gommorahs, parents can petition the local governments to cut funding, replace personnel and tighten the reins.
But in the end, maybe the best piece of advice the Family Foundation and others should remember, one that can take the place of any Internet filter, is to “Raise up a child in the way he should go …”