I havenāt done an update on Net Neutrality in a while as I was trying to find a reasonableĀ ānext stepā, especially since itās been out of theĀ ānews cycleā for a bit. Well, I have some good news.Ā
According to the senator (minority leader Chuck Schumer) from New York, they now have a total of 50 votes for a Senate resolution of disapproval that would restore the Open Internet Order of 2015 and deliver a stiff rebuke to Ajit Pai and other Republican members of the FCC. It would also prevent the agency from passing a similar measure in the future, all but guaranteeing Net Neutrality is permanently preserved
Whatās stopping them now? They need just ONE more Republican and they have less than 30 days to do it.
So goes the next actionable step. You have to contact your senators and get them to suppose the Congressional Review ofĀ āthe Open Internet Order of 2015ā³.Ā
2) Via https://resist.bot/Ā – you can write to Congress using this site orĀ Text RESIST to Resistbot on Telegram, Messenger, or to 50409 on SMS. By providing basic information, you can write your Senator to move forward.
Now, if you got a Democratic Senator, push them on to find that one Republican Senator. If you got a Republican Senator, encourage them to reconsider their stance on Net Neutrality.Ā
We just need ONE RepublicanĀ Senator and we have less than 30 days to do so.Ā
But guess what? Thereās something you didnāt know about the vote.
Get this: the vote was basically illegal.
You heard me right. Eric Schneiderman, American lawyer, said in Twitter: āI will sue to stop the FCCās illegal rollback of #netneutrality. New Yorkers and all Americans deserve a free and open internet.ā
Not only do we have another ally, but now we know that the vote wasnāt supposed to happen.
THE SECOND WE āCALM DOWNā AND THINK WEāVE WON IS WHEN THEYāLL YANK THE RUG OUT FROM UNDER US. SO NO-DO NOT CALM DOWN. IT IS NOT THE TIME FOR CALM BUT FOR OUR FULL FURY.
Thereās been reports about how, and I quote,Ā ā21.7 million public comments supporting the rule change were likely faked. The amount of fraudulent comments is staggering, but also necessarily surprising. To recap:
THEY ARE USING BOTS TO SUPPORT THE DEATH OF NET NEUTRALITY!
The Attorney General is looking to, and I quote,Ā ācorrupt the FCCās notice and comment process.ā In other words:
WE MIGHT JUST HAVE A CHANCE TO FIGHT BACK!
Everybody, read this article carefully, and reblog this post like there is no tomorrow! The whole world must know about this!
You gotta do shit. You gotta fight harder than ever now. Fact is, no one who was paying attention had much doubt about this outcome. These are feckless, amoral monsters who do not give a shit about you. That was already true, we already knew it, and it doesnāt make any difference. You cannot give up now.
Basically: Do what youāve hopefully been doing. Make noise. Get others involved. Educate people. Spread the word. CALL YOUR REPS. Please please look at the thread linked above, but taken from it, here are some people to contact, ways to contact them, and scripts to use.
THIS IS NOT JUST ABOUT GETTING CHARGED MORE FOR A TIERED INTERNET. THIS IS ABOUT CREEPING FASCISM.
ACA repeal getting scrubbed? The fact that this tax bill, while it will probably go through (CALL. YOUR. REPS.), is having a hell of a lot more trouble than it should have? Itās because of the stuff they want to restrict access to. Weāve shown them how powerful we can be, theyāre terrified of us, and they want to shut us down. This is about money, but even more, itās about the restriction of information.
They want to make it harder for you to fight them. DO. NOT. LET. THEM.
Guys I donāt know how many younger followers I have so I wanted to say something really quick:
No matter what happens on the 14th of December, you will not immediately lose the internet.Ā Itās not like that.Ā Thatās not how these things work.
Thereās already been a bill introduced to fight it.
Thereās going to be a court battle.
So yes, keep voicing yourselves, keep fighting
But donāt let the anxiety of some doomsday get to you.
And for the LOVE OF PETE, they WANT us to be exhausted. They WANT us to believe thereās nothing we can do. But thatās a BIG FAT LIE. They have not won over us yet.Ā
So, Net Neutrality has officially been repealed. It was split 3-2.
Now you guys need to absolutely pummelĀ your local congressional representatives with calls, letters, and protests until Congress steps its game up and fixes this so that the FCC can never do this again.
We watched as three men callously laughed about how silly they thought some of the calls were for not being eloquent enough for their taste. We watched as they lied about the internet, even when the truth was uttered minutes before.
Donāt let them have this win.
Make your representatives miserableĀ until they fix this. The news will be worthlessĀ to you in the upcoming months, as every major news network is either owned by an ISP or has tangential business with ISPs. They all serve to profit on this. Fact check with extreme prejudice. Donāt stop until your internet is back to where it needs to be.
Neutral.
I donāt care if youāre far-left, far-right, or dead down the center. Do you want it to be where an ISP can choose to throttle access to Fox News or Breitbart on a whim? What about Vox? What if some bad reviews come out for a movie and Comcast throttles it to hide that? What if Netflix is throttled into oblivion so that Hulu becomes the only possible option for viewing? What if you go to start-up a new business and youāre told that you have to pay for the $500/moĀ ābusiness packageā in order to get higher the 0.3 Mbps traffic speeds to your site?
NothingĀ about this decision is going to benefit how you use the internet.You use it for paying bills, for doctors and hospitals, for school, for work, and for entertainment.
Donāt give up, guys!
Make your representatives miserable.
DOesnt it need to go through court still? WHere it would be pummeled off?
Thatās when advocates take it to court! Agency actions donāt need to be rubberstamped by the courts (in fact, courts prefer not to interfere with agency action).
And depending on which district takes this court case, it could end up favoring the FCC on this.
You want CongressĀ to make the decision because then it is written in law, and isnāt likely to be easily overturned.
š„ There is beauty in destructionš„ 