The government is overly intrusive in Internet regulation

When Ezekiel Mutua indicated a while back that he is interested in regulating content on Internet platforms like YouTube and Netflix, some Kenyans thought that it was a joke. The man is given to theatrics perhaps in pursuit of the notoriety that is a requirement for running for political office in this country. He has indicated his intentions to regulate everything, including presumably what Kenyans are allowed to think.

This past week, the Communications Authority confirmed that regulation of Internet offerings is also on their menu. This must now be taken with the seriousness it deserves, because it betrays the mindset of the people in government. It demonstrates the huge disconnect between the generation in leadership and the majority of the governed. They confirm the veracity of the claim that there is a generation of leaders who can correctly be labelled BBC, meaning “Born Before Computers”. Today it is necessary to educate this generation on what exactly the Internet is.

Traditionally, people met at the marketplace to exchange ideas and learn about developments elsewhere. While most social interactions were closely regulated, meetings at the marketplace were freer and more spontaneous. Even the chiefs of old acknowledged that it is not possible to control much of what happened at the marketplace. Regulations were made on the structure of the marketplace and transactions that could be conducted, but nobody attempted to control what people could tell each other or what stories they could tell at the marketplace.

MARVELOUS TALES

Every marketplace had showmen who displayed their weird talents, and storytellers with marvelous tales from distant lands. Nobody attempted to stop them from doing their thing, and some even made money from their ventures. The marketplace was the place people went to for entertainment, for solace, and for reaffirming their place in the human collective.

Today, we are gradually replacing that physical marketplace with a virtual one. We are doing shopping, getting our entertainment, and being educated through online media. The need to congregate at a physical location to gain these benefits of human interaction is no longer strictly necessary.

Regulating material downloaded off the Internet is equal to attempting to control what one hears at the marketplace. Or requiring everyone to don earplugs whenever they hear certain things at the marketplace in order to protect them from vulgar or obscene material. More evocatively, it is equivalent to asking a Kenyan to overcome the old Swahili saying “macho hayana pazia (eyes have no curtains)” by requiring them to conveniently look aside or block their eyes whenever they came across “unacceptable material”.

A regulator seeking to control Internet content would be the equivalent of an African chief seeking to control what stories people can tell at the marketplace and how they may walk or interact at a marketplace visited by people from all over the world. While it may appear desirable to protect the people from perceived unpalatable influences, it is not always possible to do this. Further, people have diverse tastes that may not be in sync with those of the people sitting as regulators. An overly puritanical approach to the control of what people may see or encounter runs the risk of going down the slippery slope of creating morality police without an agreed standard of morality.

Google, YouTube, Netflix and other Internet-based entertainment platforms are simply vehicles for content producers to showcase their products. The consumers’ varied tastes are catered for, running the full gamut from the holier-than-thou religious offerings to the presumably less wholesome packages preferred by the less restrained members of our society. It is impossible to control content production, because creative people are impossible to contain.

Lukoye Atwoli is associate professor of psychiatry and dean, School of Medicine, Moi University; [email protected].