FREE ESSAY ON TRASH ON THE INTERNET

TRASH ON THE INTERNET

With the increase of on-line crimes and fraud, stricter laws must be placed on the sale of
such problematic items as guns, prescription drugs, and human blood and organs over the
Internet. The selling of these and other items has created many problems in recent
months. Most of these items are auctioned online through popular sites such as e-bay.
This is a somewhat complicated issue due to the fact that they are many conflicting
opinions. In addition, the laws for and against the marketing of these products online
are very uncertain. There are many activists and liberals in favor of selling organs and
blood online in order to save lives. Many gun advocates such as the NRA are greatly in
favor of the retailing of guns over the Internet. The sale of guns online will be a
rather tricky issue when dealing with the revision of current gun laws. Online
prescription sales have already proven themselves dangerous and in several cases,
lethal.
The online firearm market has taken of within the last couple of years. There are already
many websites offing guns, ammunition, and supplies for purchase. Unless legal action is
taken against this, obtaining a firearm will become easier than ever. Right now, it's
mostly just hunting advocates' websites that sell guns, but sooner or later, corruption
will begin, as always it does. These websites proclaim legitimacy- most are legitimate,
though some are not. Most offer guns only to people who have gun permits or licenses and
ship through NRA approved companies. Be this all true, the laws surrounding the on-line
gun market are not clearly defined but rather hardly existent. Despite the NRA's views,
many people of various activist groups are straightforward in saying that strict laws
need to be made to stop this marketing of firearms. As it is, guns are easy enough to
acquire at gun shows. Selling guns online only simplifies this. It will be interesting to
see what comes of this as stricter laws are placed on guns.
Selling prescription drugs online has also become extremely popular within a short period
of time. It is so popular in fact; the National Association of Boards of Pharmacy has
just set up a new board that certifies online pharmacies and calls them Verified Internet
Pharmacy Practice Sites. To date, there are only four such sites. They are: CVS.com,
Drugstore.com, MerckMedco.com, and PlanetRx.com. This is not to say that no other
websites are safe, just that the Food and Drug Administration does not accept them.
People are advised to buy only from the four acceptable websites. One problem with online
pharmacies is that there are only four approved ones. Any others may be potentially
dangerous. These other websites, though they may be completely legal, and they may be
only selling prescription drugs, might not be safe. They don't carry your medical
information- only your physician does. Most prescription drugs have precautions and drug
interactions making them unsafe for some people. A simple trip to the doctor's office may
take the risk out of these websites. This view is easily argued by people with little
time on their hands to go to the pharmacist or the doctor's office. They allow people to
just fill out a simple form online to order all their prescriptions. For the time being,
making the short trip to your pharmacist may be the safest way to go.
Another item that goes along with prescription drugs is the sale of blood and human
organs online. Recently, there have been several sales and auctions of organs online. One
sale in particular, was recently terminated by Yahoo! through which the sale was being
made. A man attempted to auction of one of his kidneys. The bidding reached $500,000 when
it was called off. Selling organs is, and has been illegal since 1984. Many people are
against the federal law that bans the sale of human organs. One argument is "blood can be
sold, so why can't kidneys (lungs, eyes…)?" Though this argument may not seem truly
relavant, it does raise the issue of organ sales on-line or otherwise. Why shouldn't this
be legalized when it could possibly save lives? The government offers a simple answer-
fraud. There are clearly many criminals in the online world. If these organ sales were
legally established, there would be many people who would attempt to deceive and swindle
potential buyers.
Another thing being sold, or rather rented, online are prostitutes and call girls. This
is obviously illegal, but the market is growing. Again, there are very few clear laws
defining prostitution and the net. Laws against pornography have been strictly enforced
over the last couple years; however, the laws regarding prostitutes- male and female,
many minors- have not. The Internet simplifies the life of a call girl, or boy, by
eliminating the middleman, so to speak. These young people are able to make as much money
as they want, and keep every cent. This is a difficult issue to tackle because the
Internet is such a vast place, especially the Internet underground. These prostitutes are
hard to track, thus making law enforcement much harder than finding them on the streets.
As in all the other cases mentioned, stricter laws must be created and enforced. Online
prostitution must be stopped.
In all cases of online sales: guns, drugs, organs, blood, and prostitutes; laws must be
set. By creating laws, many people will be protected from the crime and trash that lurks
on the Internet. Though easily debated issues, they are all issues, which need foundation
and grounding. People can fall victim to online crime easily in any of these situations,
be it mentally, physically, or emotionally. Online crime has to stop. Maybe increased
government participation and laws won't bring it to a screeching halt, but they will slow
its progress.