Opinion: Extreme Right-Wing Media Fumbles Net Neutrality

As a young conservative in the tech industry I consider myself a rare breed. I don’t usually find myself surrounded by many like minded people, and often spend a lot of time defending some crazy headlines out of the more extreme right-wing news outlets and voices.

Enter net neutrality, a seemingly basic concept. Simply put it is just the idea that all internet traffic should be treated equally by the companies delivering it to you, the consumer. That’s it. It is not a set of laws or rules. It is not a conspiracy made up by Obama.

The idea itself is one supported by everyone, how to implement it and to what extreme is the topic of debate. Even Ajit Pai, the current FCC Chair and the man who recently removed the rules protecting net neutrality, supports the idea. Pai simply argues that we have not had a problem with companies violating net neutrality and that it shouldn’t be in the hands of the FCC at all.

Even Comcast, Verizon, and AT&T voice their support for net neutrality. They lobbied to remove the current rules because they don’t like being labeled as Title II and all the burden that comes with.

So when you hear someone voice opposition to net neutrality, they simply don’t know what they are talking about. Or as the case with the right-wing media; they just hear support for it from the left and immediately oppose it.

The truth is the most extreme of these outlets and voices constantly complain about companies like YouTube and Facebook censoring their voices. Which should make them big supporters of net neutrality as without it the internet providers would be the ones picking the winners and losers of the web, essentially censoring whoever they want.

What these news outlets should be saying is we support net neutrality as well but do not agree with how it should be handled. Then as a fellow conservative I could back and defend the position.

Net neutrality is a fundamental part of what the internet is, stop attacking it.