Net Neutrality, while staged as a civil rights issue, is actually an issue of government overreach. Think of it as the next form of SOPA. SOPA was a very anti-democratic form of censorship and control of the internet. When that failed to pass, they re-branded it as PIPA. When PIPA failed to pass, they tried to pass of some of the same ideals with Net Neutrality (also the Trans Pacific Partnership). Net Neutrality as as neutral as the Affordable Care Act is affordable, or the Patriot Act was written for patriots... or the Democratic People's Republic of North Korea is democratic, a republic, or belonging to the people. It's hogwash and buzz words.
Net neutrality was a power grab by the government in an attempt to deplatform the views they disliked. And they do that through the FCC and provisions of fighting against foreign propaganda. They can accuse news media they don't like of being Russian agents, and use the regulatory powers of the FCC to censor the content they deem as a threat to their power. They would do this without oversight by establishing an independent agency called the "Global Engagement Center". Then actions would be taken against such content through the FCC. Since all these organizations are set up as independent from government, they don't answer to congress. Not to mention they would do this without due process since no charges would ever have to be filed; just threaten the ISPs with the risk of losing their licenses. It's McCarthyism to a T.
And all this could only happen by turning ISPs from independent businesses, into government sanctioned and licensed common carriers. Which is what we know as "net neutrality", or "title 2 of the federal communications act". Remember, they use the easily provable lie about "Russia Russia Russia" to censor ideas they disagree with.
Here is the NDAA 2017, signed by Obama... Flip to page 1438.
http://docs.house.gov/billsthisweek/20161128/CRPT-114HRPT-S2943.pdf
The idea that Net Neutrality is for protecting against packet shaping is patently ridiculous. Firstly, because packet-shaping and zero-rating has not been stopped since 2015; ISPs still do it. So what was the point of Net Neutrality? Secondly, because ANYONE can get around packet-shaping by installing readily available and FREE VPNs on their computers and/or routers. Thirdly, the fear that ISPs will hold edge-providers for ransom with fast lanes and slow lanes would fall apart pretty quickly. There are hundreds of ISPs in the US... and no edge-provider would pay up such ransom to an ISP, because then they would end up having to pay the ransom to hundreds of ISPs.
Every instance of edge-providers being held for ransom has been stopped by EXISTING laws, protected by the Federal Trade Commission (not the FCC), which oversees anti-competitive and monopolistic practices. Specifically article 1 and 2 of the Sherman Act. Net Neutrality was sold to the public as an effort to stop anti-monopolistic practices of the ISPs... by moving regulation of the internet from the FTC (the organization that handles anti-monopolistic practices) to the FCC (an organization that does NOT handle anti-monopolistic practices)? It doesn't make any sense on a logical level. The truth of the matter is the FCC does not stop monopolies, it actually enforces them; through the practice of licensing (common carriers)... think about how the FCC has created government sanctioned monopolies in the cable industry.
Ajit Pai's move to destroy Net Neutrality, actually returns regulatory power of the internet to the FTC. The truth of the matter is Net Neutrality was passed in 2015, but had not actually yet been implemented. This vote was a last minute attempt to repeal Net Neutrality before it officially began enforcement at the end of THIS year. So the FCC voted to keep the internet as it is now, and not change it based on a power grab from the Obama administration.
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