{"id":5695,"date":"2013-02-21T18:11:07","date_gmt":"2013-02-21T23:11:07","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/journals.law.harvard.edu\/crcl\/?p=5695"},"modified":"2013-02-21T23:51:21","modified_gmt":"2013-02-22T04:51:21","slug":"could-big-tech-be-the-solution-to-passing-sensible-gun-laws","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/journals.law.harvard.edu\/crcl\/could-big-tech-be-the-solution-to-passing-sensible-gun-laws\/","title":{"rendered":"Could Big Tech be the solution to passing sensible gun laws?"},"content":{"rendered":"

Guest post by Theresa Borden HLS ’14<\/p>\n

On February 19, Professor Lawrence Lessig presented a lecture titled” Aaron’s Laws: Law and Justice in a Digital Age”<\/a> in honor of his appointment as Roy L. Furman Professor of Law and Leadership at Harvard Law School. <\/p>\n

Those in attendance would agree that Professor Lessig\u2019s presentation was thought provoking on many levels.\u00a0 To my mind, his discussion of Aaron Swartz\u2019s Guerilla Open Access Manifesto<\/em> was particularly resonant. \u00a0The notion of a movement aimed at liberating information so that netizens could more freely engage with it flitted through my brain, triggering a thought I\u2019d had while at a panel discussion hosted by the Dean the previous Friday: \u201cGun violence after the Newtown tragedy: What can legal, public health and other efforts do?\u201d<\/a> \u00a0Specifically, I remembered one question posed by a student identified as a joint-degree candidate at HBS and HKS.\u00a0 She observed that the discussion over gun regulation oftentimes devolves into a partisan debate, divided along a line with Government on one side and Industry on the other (the latter wearing the hat of the NRA). But this dichotomy seems false and particularly overly reductionist with regard to Industry, which is much broader in scope than gun manufacturers and distributors.\u00a0 In light of this, isn\u2019t there something more that Industry can do?<\/p>\n

The panelists gestured at Health Care, an industry well placed to address problems like gun owners who lack gun safety information and the mentally ill who lack access to continuing care. \u00a0The answer sat nicely with the discussion of public health initiatives; however, I propose that a more compelling response may be found within the purview of \u201cother efforts,\u201d particularly, efforts that can be made by Big Tech.<\/p>\n

The online migration of social interaction through user-generated content sites (UGS) is almost complete (e.g. my mom has a Facebook).\u00a0 Social norms are created and reinforced through the default settings of websites like Facebook and YouTube (for a more thorough discussion of this phenomenon, look at the recent conference sponsored by Harvard Law School’s new Program on Behavioral Economics and Public Policy, called \u201cSocial Media and Behavioral Economics\u201d<\/a>).\u00a0 We \u201cshare,\u201d we \u201clike\u201d and we \u201cunfriend.\u201d\u00a0 In addition to socializing online, we also learn online.\u00a0 We \u201cWikipedia\u201d and we \u201cGoogle.\u201d Then, we share our \u201cresearch,\u201d and other people \u201ccomment,\u201d \u201clike\u201d or \u201crepost.\u201d\u00a0 At its best, the Internet is the School of Athens.\u00a0 At its worst, the Internet is a cesspool of misinformation that rewards conclusory statements punctuated by an implicit eyebrow raise.\u00a0 But whatever is the Internet, it is the place where the debate over sensible gun reform is happening – right now.\u00a0 People are tweeting and posting (and retweeting and reposting) a hodgepodge of \u201ctruths,\u201d collected from various \u201csources.\u201d It is to those sources that I would like to turn your attention.<\/p>\n

In the online fora, many \u201csources\u201d cited in support of or against reforming gun laws are suspect.\u00a0 They are tertiary at best and provide little to no critical analysis of issues raised.\u00a0 Almost all of them are one-sided.\u00a0 Posts of YouTube videos abound.\u00a0 Very few references are made to academic scholarship, because although the Internet is an infinite archive, many resources are still off-limits to those unable to pay access fees (or those not affiliated with a university).\u00a0 If the measurement of a resource\u2019s worth is its price-tag, then one should not be shocked by the subpar quality of online discourse – excluded from it are many of the \u201cbest\u201d sources out there!\u00a0 Your typical netizen has to sift through weeds of freebie sources – some of which are fine, but many of which lack the benefit of having been written by individuals who are interested in informing rather than inflaming.\u00a0 So, what can Big Tech do?<\/p>\n

The answer, I think, is partially found in the spirit of Aaron Swartz\u2019s Guerilla Open Access Manifesto<\/em>.\u00a0 Although Big Tech can\u2019t unlock the coffers of knowledge (Big Publishing and Big Ed have to do that, see, e.g. the \u201cCost of Knowledge\u201d campaign, which came into full force last year), Big Tech can help cultivate an environment that values critical thinking and scholarship. \u00a0Trying to \u201cclean up\u201d the internet could seem futile for many reasons, but I will focus on two: the first is a normative observation and the second an architectural observation. First, people (e.g. journalists) have long combatted the mislabeling of \u201copinion\u201d as \u201cfact,\u201d and yet such practice is still epidemic in media – indeed, history is rife with the propagation of misinformation (gossip and rumor mills are credited with having started many a revolution).\u00a0 Second, even if misinformation doesn\u2019t inevitably prevail in the \u201cmarketplace of ideas,\u201d the infrastructure of online fora, like the default word limits of twitter, facilitate the rapid spreading of conclusory assertions. \u00a0As I find a discussion of what is \u201chuman nature\u201d far beyond the scope of this post (as should it be), I will turn to the second potential shortcoming of looking to Big Tech to help elevate online conversation, that is: its architecture.\u00a0 Perhaps restructuring social UGS to provide a community policing system similar to Wikipedia\u2019s (one that would permit flagging suspect assertions as biased or in need of a citation) would be a step in the right direction.\u00a0 Currently, such sites provide for the removal of content that violates the sites terms or policies, so-called voluntary censoring, however, they target the substance, rather than the form of online discourse.<\/p>\n

The debate surrounding differing opinions on gun laws is an important one and should be robust.\u00a0 However, it should also be informed.\u00a0 Citizens who purchase and possess firearms consider that there is a \u201cright to keep and bear arms,\u201d when it is in fact their right to \u201cself-defense\u201d that is protected by the Second Amendment.\u00a0 This right is symmetrical and there are those for whom this same right is infringed by the possession of assault weapons by certain people and by the proliferation of firearms in certain high-density urban centers.\u00a0 Indeed, the Constitutional fount for the right to possess a firearm is the same one that compels sensible gun law reform.\u00a0 But such reform will only happen if citizens have access to reliable information that they process critically.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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