Fortiani» (Dbserbrr January I, 2014 Page 15 Opinion articles do not necessarily represent the views o f the Portland Observer. We welcome reader essays, photos and story ideas. Submit to news@portlandobserver.com. Standing Up for Our Online Rights FCC should protect net neutrality most popular content available only on cer tain tiers or with certain p ro v id e rs. (Im ag in e AT&T as the exclusive home of Netflix and C om cast as the sole source of YouTube.) In 2010, the Federal Communica tions Commission tried to establish concrete rules to protect net neu trality. But the agency ended up caving to pressure from the biggest phone and cable companies and left huge loopholes standing in the way of a truly open Internet. And now Verizon is in court chal lenging those rules— and the FCC’s authority to draft and enforce them to protect consumers and promote competition. That’s because under the Bush administration, the FCC decided to give away much of its by J enn T opper T he In tern e t is the world’s largest shopping mall, li brary, video store, post office and town square. When you turn on your computer, you’re in the driver’s seat, choosing what you want to read, watch, and hear. We owe everything we love about the Web to net neutrality, the prin ciple that the Internet is an open platform and service providers like AT&T, Comcast, and Time Warner can ’ t dictate where you go and what you do online. Without net neutrality, the Web would look a lot like cable, with the authority to oversee our broadband Intemet. already was, believe me, things could networks. The current FCC could fix Indeed, the second it looks like get worse.) The ISPs will try to read the problem by reclaiming this au the FCC is going to be defeated, you all of your content so they can sell thority, but it hasn’t yet. can expect all the telecoms and ISPs you to advertisers. New “troll tolls” If the FCC loses the case and fails to join hands and declare they’ve will force content creators and oth to take the necessary action to re- reached an agreement to self-regu- ers to pay discriminatory fees j ust to reach people online — and will re quire the rest of us to pony up for “premium” content. Does that sound O rw ellian? That’s because it is. But this is no far-fetched scenario. It’s time for us to stand up and fight for our online rights. We need to tell the FCC to stop messing around. It’s time for the agency to fix its past mistakes — and establish strong net neutrality protections that are 100 percent loophole-free. verse course, the agency will be late. Jenn Topper is the media man toothless as the biggest Internet If this happens, they’ll win and ager at Free Press, an organiza providers run amok and destroy we ll lose. Online privacy will be a tion fighting fo r your rights to con every th in g we love about the thing of the past. (If you thought it nect and communicate. In 2010, the Federal Communications Commission tried to establish concrete rules to protect net neutrality. But the agency ended up caving to pressure from the biggest phone and cable companies and left huge loopholes standing in the way o f a truly open Internet. ■ h m m Communities Different from Our Own Embracing diversity in our citizenship tems of oppression and its continu ing im pact on the Indigenous peoples which theological rationale has been based on the doctrine of discovery. The doctrine originates from various church docu ments in mid- 1400s Europe to justify the right to claim the indigenous lands, territories, and resources on behalf of Christendom, and to subjugate indigenous peoples around the world. It is a concept of public inter national law expounded by the United States Supreme Court in a series of decisions, and continually to be cited even today. For those that descend from the westward-bound American, some see that they have no responsibility to the current plight of Native Ameri can communities, because they are not the original oppressors. Still, some descendants acknowl edge that they do benefit from the social systems that were built on the foundation of land theft from and subjugation of indigenous peoples by E lizabeth L eung 123 years ago this week, on Dec. 29,1890, up to 300 Lakota men, women and children died in what has become known as the Wounded Knee Mas sacre. It was the “unforgettable story of the last major military operation by the U.S. in its long battle to subdue the native population of North A m erica,” the w ebsite o f the Wounded Knee Museum says. This last significant engagement between Indians and soldiers on the N orth Am erican C ontinent ended “nearly four centuries of warfare between westward-bound A m ericans and the indigenous peoples.” The above quotes refer to the centuries of domination and pat- ^Jortlauò Ö)bseruer P u blisher : E d ito r : Established 1970 Mark Washington, Sr. M ich a el L eig h to n E xecutive D irector : Rakeem Washington C reative D irector : P aul N e u fe ld t O ffice M anager /C iassifieds : A dvertising M anager : Lucinda Baldwin Leonard Latin R eporter /P hotographer Donovan M. Smith by their ancestor-settlers. fit for citizenship. Nowadays, more According to Citizenship: A Very I have always wondered how all than 600,000 immigrants become Short Introduction by R ichard these views would be made relevant naturalized as U.S. citizen every year. Bellamy (2008), there are two views to the 21 st century immigrant/citi- One of the requirements for natural of citizenship developed in western zen, who as minority settlers can ization is to pass a civics test on U.S. democracies: political and legal. both benefit from and be marginalized history and government. O f course, In voting, for exam ple, one ex by the same established structures. citizenship isn’t about passing a ercises his or her political citizen ship. And in the possession of the right to the rights, one lays claim to his or her legal citizen ship. I would suggest, perhaps, in daily lives we can have an inter- cultural view of citizenship. It is not about civic education in the abstract, but a practice o f engaging our co-citizens outside of the election cycle and the im mediate present. It involves a life long practice o f learning about our neighbor-citizen, o f histories and concerns of the com m unities differen t from our own: race/ The U.S. have always prided civics test, as a similarly titled CNN ethnicities, econom ics, abilities, ourselves as being a nation of immi op-ed by Peter Levine pointed out; sexualities, and legal status. grants, though at the beginning our “[fjor immigrants and native-born Elizabeth Leung is minister for immigration policy only preferred Americans alike, civic education racial justice for Justice and Wit those from western Europe, and only should be a b o u t... promoting high ness M inistries in the United free white males were considered as and diverse civic achievement.” Church o f Christ. / have always wondered how all these views would he made relevant to the 21st century immigrant/citizen, who as minority settlers can both benefit from and be marginalized by the same established structures. 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