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Forget MTV, I Want My Internet!
shystershep writes "Teenagers in China are apparently pretty serious about getting internet access. This article on the English version of the online newspaper Xinhuanet details gang-type activity to get around China's ban on persons under 18 entering internet cafes. I may get a little cranky if I don't get my daily net fix, but I've never beat anyone with a fire extinguisher because of it (not that I remember, anyway)."
China has a very checkered history of human rights abuses. While some may argue that this isn't exactly a human rights issue, it certainly is cause for concern. Every country which has attempted to control its citizens access to information has failed or is failing. Look at what's happened in the middle east. It's the same as what's about to happen in China. There will be an information revolution eventually because the Chinese people are hungry for information. The government can't hold out forever.
I don't think this will lead to an Internet version of Tiannamen Square, but as more and more people find ways around the restrictions imposed upon them, the aging government will eventually relax its restrictions. This process is inevitable anyway. The current rulers are getting old and will die. Today's youth is poised to take over, and I can just imagine what a nation of over a billion people is capable of once they taste freedom!
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Read my journal and s
I mod you -1 Unclear Thinking, not -1 Troll.
First of all, pick a thought and stick with it. I don't know if you're whining about internal affairs, foreign policy, dictatorships, the President, or outsourcing.
Second, I don't see how you're going to tie stupid foriegn policy to losses of internal freedoms on an ongoing basis ("Do not attribute to malice what can easily be explained by ignorance"). While there are close ties between the two within the last 3 years, part of what made the world hate us so much is that for the decade prior to fall 2001, the American people shoved their heads right up their bums and didn't WANT to know anything about foreign policy. Most of the egregious abuses of internal freedom during the Clinton era were in the form of consumers getting the shaft for the benefit of companies.
Third, while many people within Bush's sad sack administration may have played roles in Saddam and/or the Taliban, etc., Bush wasn't among that group of people fifteen years ago. While I'm certainly all for voting him out, it's his administration that is really doing almost all the damage around the world, not him personally, and you can't vote for them. In fact, the people poised to do the most harm to our freedom are, coincidentally, the people who DON'T get voted in. That's the point of figureheads. They make people think that they have representation while the real players pull strings behind the curtains. You never noticed?
Alito: A vote for Alito is a punch in the eye to put that bitch back in her place!
Can you separate logic from emotion? If not you'll probably want to skip this...
From an emotional point of view, you're right, it sucks. That was a fucked up thing, executing him and distributing the video. It's bad enough when it happens to a stranger, I can't imagine seeing it happen to someone I cared about. On an emotional level, hell yes I object.
From a logical standpoint, it was brilliant, though still a distant second to flying fuel laden planes into buildings: Shock and Awe baby, pure shock and awe... The goal of any competive endeavor is to win and one way is to completly demoralize your opponent. Isn't war the ultimate competition? How better to demoralize your opponent than executing his people and feeding it to his populace. All the easier if they'll search it out for themselves.
I don't think it's a better tactic, it's certainly a valid one. It is prone to backfiring, enraging the people you're trying to frighten off. Back to China, a massive decapitation would require way more organazation, arms, and manpower than taking out all the pawns.
At the bottom of the endless pile of paper work which characterizes all regulation lies a gun.
Alan Greenspan