Date: Wed, 14 Jun 95 19:33:10 0000
From: Monica Worline <monica@surfwatch.com>

My name is Monica and I am a bisexual member of the staff at SurfWatch
Software.  The company makes a product that filters the Internet for
sexually explicit material; many of you have heard of SurfWatch today
because we have been portrayed as censoring gay, lesbian, and bisexual
sites on the Internet.

I am writing as myself, not as an official representative of SurfWatch 
--
because I have felt heartbroken all day as I have read your messages
accusing me of denying educational information to young gay people.  I
wanted you all to know that the people at SurfWatch are my friends and
companions. They have been supportive of me through all kinds of
situations, and they are really responsive to this issue.

I was skeptical when I first heard about the idea of SurfWatch, because 
it
sounds like at right-wing product.  But the people at SurfWatch are 
being
very thoughtful about the way they implement filtering.  ONE OF THE 
BIGGEST
MISCONCEPTIONS IN EVERYONE'S MESSAGES IS THAT SURFWATCH BLOCKS OUT ALL
LESBIAN/GAY/BI SITES ON THE NET!! SURFWATCH DOES NOT BLOCK BASED ON 
SEXUAL
PREFERENCE!!  We have included gay and lesbian people in our product
testing, and we are in the process of forming an advisory board which 
will
include people in the community (like Christopher Kyrzan) to look at all 
of
our sites. I only agreed to come to work for this company because they 
were
committed to allowing access to sex ed, safe sex, and other sexual
educational materials on the Internet.  I only agreed to come to work 
for
this company because I think that a company who can provide broad vision
and fair-minded leadership will be a much better alternative than Jesse
Helms and his band.  I believe in the people of the company to respond 
in a
way that is just and right.

It is so hard for me as a member of the community to read all of the 
mail
accusing me of being a fascist trying to take away the speech rights of 
gay
people; but at the same time, I love the idea that the community 
responds
so fast and with such passion about the issues that matter.  I'm not a
fascist.  I'm not trying to limit anyone's rights to say anything--In 
fact,
I'm trying to do just the opposite-protect the free speech rights of all 
of
us before they are legislated away through bills like the Exxon 
amendment
and the Dole proposal.

It feels very ironic and sad that SurfWatch has been misunderstood and
barraged with "censorship" accusations on the very same day that the 
Exxon
amendment passed overwhelmingly in the Senate.  That law would make any
"indecent" speech on the Internet a criminal act -- and that is they 
type
of censorship I think the community really needs to fight.

My wish is that everyone who sent us such passionate messages about 
keeping
information available on the Internet will hear that we want to and plan 
to
do just that.  We will make mistakes, and we are willing to fix them. (I
didn't know the square dance page was blocked--but once we blocked the
library of congress and once we blocked IBM)  We want input from the
community about our product and our site list.  In his original message,
Christopher Kryzan says that he searched 40-50 sites and found a few 
that
were blocked (BTW, all but 1 have been unblocked by SurfWatch already).
What people took from that was censorship of LGBT sites--instead of
focusing on the fact that the MAJORITY of the sites he looked at were 
NOT
blocked.

In this case, I think we're firing on the wrong enemy.  I care about
Internet free speech and the availability of information for the gay
community. SurfWatch gets the message.  Please, instead of spending 
energy
trying to convince SurfWatch of what it already believes, write your
Congressperson, call the House of Representatives to urge them to kill 
the
Exxon amendment, or do something today to fight against *real* 
censorship.

Thanks for listening,
Monica

monica@surfwatch.com