Access and citizen power
By Rina Jimenez-David, Philippine Daily Inquirer
February 9, 2012

Anyone who posts anything on the Internet should be aware that he or she is releasing it to the whole world—or at least the “wired” world. Which is why when I heard that mothers of young Filipinas who were engaging in cyber-sex over the Internet justified their daughters’ activities by saying that “at least our daughters are not touched,” I was appalled and amused. Sure, the clients couldn’t put their hands on their daughters’ nubile bodies, but were they aware that their daughters’ faces and identities could be accessed by anyone with a computer or similar device, and that their “naughty” activities would be recorded for all eternity? (Or at least for as long as the Internet is in existence.)

Like with most anything in this world, the Internet has both an upside and a downside. Cyber-sex and all other forms of nefarious activities flourishing on the web (along with the death of privacy) may be a downside. But an upside is that persons who previously, because of their humble circumstances, were voiceless and faceless could, through accessing the Internet, gain a worldwide audience.

I recently attended a round-table discussion on “IT, Gender and Citizenship” where the results of a project involving urban poor community leaders were shared. Under the project, the leaders, many of them women, underwent training on writing news and features, and afterwards were fielded to “report” on events in their neighborhoods or on the views of their neighbors. Their stories were uploaded on an e-magazine titled “Boses ng Komunidad (Voices of the Community)” contained in the website of Likhaan, an NGO engaged in both service provision and advocacy on reproductive health issues.

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