In a time when people are increasingly surrendering their civil liberties with hardly a whimper, I have to wonder what we are teaching our children about the ability and value of forming your own opinions and speaking your mind.

News has broken in Sydney regarding a high school forcing students to remove personal blogs from the internet, or risk suspension. Of course, the threat of "cyberpredators" is the purported reason. Surely, as Kurt Opsahl from EFF comments in the story, it makes more sense to teach our children how to exist in the online community in a safe and effective manner, rather than banning blogging outright.

Almost more disturbing in this article is the acknowledgement that, as this is a private school, "parents of students who enrolled in the schools signed contracts governing student behaviour, including responsible internet use". While I can accept the controlling of internet use whilst on school grounds, how can a school control internet use of students when they are at home. Do these students have no rights of their own - or do they have to completely defer to their parents/schools will?

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