PROVIDENCE – From what I hear, legislators all around the country are initially supporting, then later withdrawing support for legislation called the Human Trafficking Prevention Act (HTPA), purportedly because of the bill’s “dubious origins.”
It seems state legislators think it’s a fine idea to install internet content filters on everything from laptops and mobile phones to routers and smart refrigerators, until they find out the guy pushing the idea is a country music star-stalking disbarred attorney who wants to marry his computer.
This is a shame, because if only Chris Sevier didn’t have such a colorful past, some of the states which have considered the HTPA in the past might have passed it by now, giving them the always enjoyable opportunity to pay lawyers to unsuccessfully defend an absurdly unconstitutional law in court.
I feel so badly for these states being deprived this opportunity to litigate that I’ve composed an alternative to the HTPA, which I’m calling Kim Mills’ Law.
Unlike the HTPA, which someone took to calling the “Elizabeth Smart Law” without first making sure Elizabeth Smart was OK with using her name in that fashion, my proposal has the advantage of being named after a fictional kidnapping victim – so she can’t very well complain, or not until EuropaCorp produces yet another sequel to Taken, at least.
Like the HTPA, my proposal would require manufacturers and distributors of internet-capable devices to pre-install content filters – but instead of limiting the blocking and filtering to sites which offer “obscene materials,” my bill would extend the blocking to include any site or platform on which obscene materials could be published and/or which could be used to facilitate human trafficking.
In other words, my legislation would make the internet extra-safe for device users, by blocking the entirety of it. Sure, not being able to browse, read, post on or interact with any websites might make an internet-connected device somewhat less useful, but you can’t plausibly argue this limited ability won’t encourage consumers to pay the fee required to unlock their devices.
Speaking of the fee to disable the content filter, if there’s one part of the HTPA which never made sense to me, it’s how low the unlock fee is. A measly twenty bucks? What self-respecting fan of human trafficking doesn’t have $20 sitting around?
Under Kim Mill’s Law, the fee to disable the content filter will be $420, with $20 going to the device vendor who disables the filter, and the rest going to a state fund which will support a former CIA operative with “particular skills,” to fund his global efforts to hunt down and murder people with foreign accents who may or may not have kidnapped his daughter, and/or other residents of the state in question.
Oh sure, the ACLU will say Kim Mill’s Law is “unconstitutional” and “unconscionable” and “unlawful state-funded assassination without due process,” but that’s all just nitpicking isn’t it?
The bottom line is, if we’re going to get serious about tackling the problem of human trafficking, it’s not enough to conflate volitional sex work undertaken by adults with sexual servitude performed by minors, or to block porn sites because they allegedly promote human trafficking and “rape culture.” We need to attack human trafficking right at its source, which is online expression of any kind, especially smartphone-carried expression communicated in broken English with a nonspecific, vaguely Eastern European accent.
When it comes to combatting human trafficking by preempting consumer access to websites which have nothing at all to do with human trafficking, Kim Mills’ Law goes further than SESTA, deeper than FOSTA and does so far more aggressively than the HTPA.
I understand and accept that as I promote Kim Mills’ Law around the country, I will be subjected to the same kind of vicious, unfairly fact-based scrutiny which the liberal media has piled upon Mr. Sevier, but I’m not at all daunted by this prospect, because I have nothing to hide.
For starters, I’ve never stalked a country music star (Norah Jones hasn’t released any country albums, right?) and while I do find my laptop very attractive, I’m not looking for a long-term relationship at the moment, so I’m content to continue merely having a casual sexual relationship with it.
I’ll soon be seeking legislative sponsors for Kim Mills’ Law across the country, and as I do, I’ll need your support. So, when you see the #KimMillsLaw trending, do me a solid and use the internet while you still can, to express your desire to forcefully lose access to the internet by retweeting, sharing, bumping and whatever else it is you kids do to make something cool “go viral.”
After all, the human trafficking you help prevent by supporting Kim Mills’ Law may just be your own!
