{"id":19520,"date":"2023-11-17T09:13:15","date_gmt":"2023-11-17T14:13:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/?p=19520"},"modified":"2023-11-17T09:13:15","modified_gmt":"2023-11-17T14:13:15","slug":"house-speaker-mike-johnson-mocked-for-use-of-covenant-eyes-to-keep-from-porn-usage","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/2023\/11\/house-speaker-mike-johnson-mocked-for-use-of-covenant-eyes-to-keep-from-porn-usage","title":{"rendered":"House Speaker Mike Johnson Mocked For Use of Covenant Eyes to Keep From Porn Usage"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Gage Skidmore \/ Flickr<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

House Speaker Mike Johnson has already <\/span>faced scrutiny<\/span><\/a>\u00a0for what some are labeling his \u201creligious fundamentalism.\u201d Now, he faces scrutiny for the use of the program\u00a0<\/span>Covenant Eyes<\/span><\/a>\u00a0with his son, Jack. A user on X with the handle \u201cReceipt Maven\u201d\u00a0<\/span>shared a clip<\/span><\/a>\u00a0of Johnson from 2022 as he participated in a panel with his church, Cyprus Baptist Church, in Benton, LA. During the panel, which was about technology, he revealed how he and Jack, who was 17 at the time, used Covenant Eyes, a program which can be downloaded to a user\u2019s personal devices and will report to an accountability partner about questionable searches or inappropriate content. \u201cIf anything objectionable comes up, your accountability partner gets an immediate notice. I\u2019m proud to tell you my son has got a clean slate. It\u2019s really sensitive, it\u2019ll pick up almost anything, it looks for keywords, search terms, and also images, and it will send your accountability partner a blurred picture of the image,\u201d Johnson told the congregation.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

After the clip went viral, Johnson\u2019s critics piled on. Late-night host, Jimmy Kimmel, said, \u201cIt is possible to be too close with your children,\u201d as he noted that the app would give father and son information about their porn habits. <\/span>Business Insider<\/span><\/em><\/a>\u00a0<\/span><\/em>criticized the software\u2019s effectiveness, noting that Josh Duggar had used Covenant Eyes. Duggar had used the program with his wife as his accountability partner but had used the Tor browser to bypass the software. He was convicted in 2021 for possessing child pornography and sentenced to 12 years. Duggar had appeared in \u201c19 Kids and Counting,\u201d which has also been under scrutiny lately after the documentary \u201cShiny Happy People\u201d and\u00a0<\/span>revealing memoirs<\/span><\/a>\u00a0by members of the family have brought to light its \u201creligious fundamentalism.\u201d\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Vanity Fair<\/span><\/em><\/a>\u00a0<\/span><\/em>went further in its criticism, speculating whether the software might also be a security issue. \u201cIn addition to the deep weirdness of a father and son being each other\u2019s \u2018accountability partner(s)\u2019 concerning pornography, as the account that unearthed the clip noted, it\u2019s probably not a great idea for a sitting member of Congress to allow \u2018a 3rd Party tech company to scan ALL of his electronic devices daily and then uploading reports to his son about what he\u2019s watching or not watching,\u2019\u201d speculated the article, which went with the title \u201cMike Johnson Said He and His Son Monitor Each Other\u2019s Porn Usage, and Yeah, It\u2019s Exactly as Weird as It Sounds.\u201d\u00a0<\/span>Wired<\/span><\/em><\/a>\u00a0<\/span><\/em>and\u00a0<\/span>Newsweek<\/span><\/em><\/a>\u00a0did share concerns about the app\u2019s possible invasion of privacy. At the time of the\u00a0<\/span>Wired<\/span><\/em>\u00a0article, Covenant Eyes told\u00a0<\/span>The Christian Post<\/span><\/em><\/a>\u00a0<\/span><\/em>that they shared concerns about spying. \u201cOur usage policy explicitly prohibits using Covenant Eyes to monitor someone without their authorization. We do not allow spouses to use Covenant Eyes to spy on one another or employers to secretly monitor employees,\u201d a spokesman told CP.<\/span><\/p>\n

The National Catholic Register<\/span><\/em><\/a>\u00a0came to Johnson\u2019s defense. \u201cNo doubt, there is a clear and ongoing assault on all that is true, good and beautiful. To the pure, all things are pure, and to those who have no anchor, no North Star, no God \u2014 well, they do not know what to do with truth, goodness, vulnerability, humility, manliness, fatherhood and accountability,\u201d wrote Ryan and Mary-Rose Verret, noting that Johnson had previously interviewed them about their marriage ministry. They noted how mainstream media had turned accountability and openness between a father and son into something laughable and weird. A Google search of \u201cMike Johnson Covenant Eyes\u201d turns up a number of articles with headlines including words like \u201ccreepy\u201d and \u201cweird.\u201d Others frame it as a father and son enjoying each other\u2019s porn intake.\u00a0<\/span>The National Catholic Register<\/span><\/em>, however, stated that the world is too broken to understand what Johnson is doing. \u201cIt is only in a world as broken and lost as ours that such a noble testimony and witness of accountability and trust between a father and son could be so twisted and mocked.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

House Speaker Mike Johnson has already faced scrutiny\u00a0for what some are labeling his \u201creligious fundamentalism.\u201d Now, he faces scrutiny for the use of the program\u00a0Covenant Eyes\u00a0with his son, Jack. A user on X with the handle \u201cReceipt Maven\u201d\u00a0shared a clip\u00a0of Johnson from 2022 as he participated in a panel with his church, Cyprus Baptist Church,…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":664,"featured_media":19523,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fbia_status":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-19520","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"yoast_head":"\nHouse Speaker Mike Johnson Mocked For Use of Covenant Eyes to Keep From Porn Usage<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Mike Johnson faces criticism for using "Covenant Eyes" program with son.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" 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