The full text of the dreaded and mysterious TPP trade deal involving 12 countries and encompassing 40% of the world’s economy has officially been released. While little by little, part by part has trickled out like a slow leaky faucet, this is the first time the public has had the opportunity to read it in its entirety. Now the treaty is waiting ratification for the the interested countries. It covers the world’s labor, what has been said to be affordable medications, the environment, the safety of food and product safety, and much more corporate interest.
Ever since the leaky faucet has been dripping at a trickle pace, one of the questions many has had was how it would effect the internet among other issues. Many have said that the regulations are so strenuous that it would lead to internet censorship through heavy and broad copyright regulations. We defeated SOPA and CISPA and now we are facing much the same threat with the TPP treaty. To quote an article that I was reading earlier from truth out news it put it this way. “….. essentially what it does is it forces the United States’ broken copyright system on the rest of the world without expanding protections for freedom of speech and so-called ‘fair use,’ which are basically provisions that prevent copyright from being used to censor or take down legitimate content or criticism or political dissidence from the internet.”
Fair use is a statement that anyone with a social media account, YouTube account, and really anyone interested in sharing information is well aware of. Is this a way to suppress information the government, corporations, and those not “playing by the rules” are going to be using? That is a very real question and could lead to the ongoing attack on the first amendment and another way to calm fears of the corruption we are seeing today.
One of the fears, as far as the internet goes, it is will be used to prosecute and go after whistle blowers instead of protecting the acts of those that “see something, say something.” This is a multi fold problem that could even criminalize journalist using information they obtained from whistle blowers such as Ed Snowden and Bradley Manning. In these cases the information will be hidden and the truth can not be brought to light. That is against the grain of a Constitutional Republic which could be the very reason for this to be included in the TPP treaty. By including multiple countries it would extend the tyranny of the elite and bring prosecution to journalist seeking to expose the corruption.
Couple this aspect of the TPP with net neutrality and you could very easily take the internet out of the free people and have a genuine propaganda machine. Joesph Goebbels would of loved to of had this in his propaganda tool box. Complete and total control of not only the mainstream media but a deafening blow to alternative media as well. One swift blow, one swift silence to millions of voices.
This is really just one of the sickening parts of the TPP and I plan on talking about many other concerns once I have had time to digest and analyze the documents more. Just based on my initial research, some of my fears are now confirmed. Free speech is very important to a free society and we can not just turn that over to our elected politicians or more detrimental, a global agenda involving many nations.
Look for future articles about the TPP in the near future. If my research and the documents presented to us so far are this bad, then we really need to pick up our fight and make our voices not only known, but louder. Let your Senator and Representatives know how you feel. Something tells me they aren’t going to care, but this needs to be our first step.
Written by: Michael Howell
Fighting The Tyranny 