Adopt a [Chinese] Blog

malorkus writes "Here's a great way for bloggers and others with decent web hosting to help fight internet censorship in China and other restrictive countries. Adopt a Chinese Blog aims to match up censored bloggers with volunteer hosts."

Comments

What is their major malfunction?

[Raistlin77]

Leave China alone for Christ's sake. You're not going to change things, especially if you are NOT IN CHINA!

Re:What is their major malfunction?

[Curtman]

"Leave China alone for Christ's sake. You're not going to change things, especially if you are NOT IN CHINA!"

No way. This has gone way too far.

If there is truth to these accusations that the Chinese government is intimidating citizens of my country in any way for something such as practicing Falun Gong, then we have a serious problem that need s addressing.

I'm in no way in favour of military action, but this is clearly and act of war on their part if it is true.

Re:What is their major malfunction?

[Anonymous Coward]

"If there is truth to these accusations that the Chinese government is intimidating citizens of my country in any way for something such as practicing Falun Gong, then we have a serious problem that need s addressing.

I'm in no way in favour of military action, but this is clearly and act of war on their part if it is true."

yet Saddam Hussein can kill 2 million people and almost all here on /. would say we should not have gone to war with Iraq.

I don't think you are going to get much support for military action on this forum.

Re:What is their major malfunction?

[Curtman]

"yet Saddam Hussein can kill 2 million people and almost all here on /. would say we should not have gone to war with Iraq"

Excellent point. This is why I am also not in favour of military action against China. On this account, at least you cannot call me a hypocrite.

I'm talking about diplomacy, and possibly outlawing trade with them.

Re:What is their major malfunction?

[Rakishi]

Sorry to tell you this but its only an "act of war" if the US goverment doesn't like the country, just look at Israel and what they do.

Re:What is their major malfunction?

[Raistlin77]

A trade embargo is not going to make China change it's policy on internet content filtering.

Re:What is their major malfunction?

[Anonymous Coward]

Considering the large amount of goods the United States buys from China and the small amount they buy from us, we could probably do a lot of damage to their economy if we restricted trade. We could do without cheap linen goods and plastic toys; can they do without their money?

Re:What is their major malfunction?

[tomhudson]

A trade embargo is not going to make China change it's policy on internet content filtering.

Exactly. Besides, the rest of the world couldn't even afford a trade embargo with China at this point ...

And its not like other countries aren't doing the same ... (hello, France wrt louis vuitton auctions, Germany wrtnazi memorabilia, Microsoft wrt Mike Rowe Soft) ... oops, forgot, Microsoft isn't a country - they outsource that function by renting their politicians.

Re:What is their major malfunction?

[Rakishi]

Yes, they're people will just suffer a lot more and lose whatever chance they may have had at goverment reform in the future (from everything I've read the Chinese goverment isn't stupid enough to believe they can keep their current system going once China become rich/capitalistic enough). Look at Iraq and North Korea, or Cuba.

Re:What is their major malfunction?

[Stonehand]

Quite. Other nations are looking to *increase* trade with China, not to decrease it. Forget about embargos in terms of leverage against Beijing.

Re:What is their major malfunction?

[Curtman]

"just look at Israel and what they do"

This is true too. I am much less familiar with that situation than this one. I am however aware that the Jew -vs- Muslim war has tyrants on both sides. Buddhism is concerned primarily with having compassion for others. I do not believe you will find an example of Buddhists retaliating against oppression. I have no idea the depths of what happens in Israel, or to Muslims when they travel there, but this quote is what I am concerned about:

Montreal resident Ying Zhu says when she went back to China to visit her mother recently, she was arrested by agents of China's Public Security Bureau and held for 33 days.

She says in addition to trying to recruit her to spy on Falun Gong members in Canada they demanded she give them detailed information on friends listed in her phone book.

"When I refused they told me they knew everything about every Falun Gong practitioner in Montreal," she said.

Montreal accountant Wey Dun Gwang says he's received threats from people he believes to be agents working out of the Chinese Consulate. "They said, 'You'd better not practise Falun Gong or your life will be in danger.'"

Re:What is their major malfunction?

[Anonymous Coward]

...and possibly outlawing trade with them. Yeah! Put Wal Mart out of business!!!

Re:What is their major malfunction?

[TummyX]

just look at Israel and what they do


What exactly? Protect their citizens (15% of which is Arab by the way)?

No, governments should do nothing while palestinians blow up kids in nightclubs and school buses.

Re:What is their major malfunction?

[Anonymous Coward]

The argument by sane people has never been that we should not have ever gone to war with Iraq. It was always that Bush's war with Iraq was shady and would not have a positive impact on terrorism. Stop arguing with idiots, it's making you dumber.

Re:What is their major malfunction?

[Fiver-]

We went to war with Iraq because Hussein was killing his people?? Ohhhh, I forgot to turn my code wheel to Tuesday to see what today's justification was.

Re:What is their major malfunction?

[Curtman]

"Yes, they're people will just suffer a lot more and lose whatever chance they may have had at goverment reform in the future"

At this point I'm pretty sure the Chinese people feel hopeless about any chances for reform. Iraq, North Korea, and Cuba aren't involved in spying on and arresting citizens of foreign countries, that we know of. What a government does to its citizens is one thing, but foreigners are different. The citizens have a responsibility to keep their governments in line. I fear the same issues have arisen closer to home as well though, there's plenty of this stuff going on right now in the US.

Re:What is their major malfunction?

[Rakishi]

You mean like spying on my goverment and stealing information from it?

Re:What is their major malfunction?

[Curtman]

"No, governments should do nothing while palestinians blow up kids in nightclubs and school buses."

They should consider themselves lucky that the US gives them billions of dollars of weapons to fight enemies that are equiped with rocks and primitive explosives. Enemies that they imposed upon, and enemies that they threaten and steal from when they attempt to expand their borders.

Israel lost its sympathy card a long time ago.

Re:What is their major malfunction?

[m50d]

I think we're more against lies. If you say it's clearly because of the people's rights and that's why you're invading we might support you. If you make up something about weapons of mass destruction (ok china actually has them, so you wouldn't be making that up, but something along those lines) we won't.

Re:What is their major malfunction?

[TummyX]

They should consider themselves lucky that the US gives them billions of dollars of weapons to fight enemies that are equiped with rocks and primitive explosives.


WTF? Do you think they use all of those weapons on the Palestinians? The best thing that can happen for Israel is for he world to acknowledge that it *IS* a war. The fact is, if they used those weapons in an all out war, the Palestinians wouldn't have a fucking change.

And to describe palestinian as poor enemies with only rocks and primitive explosives is nothing short of fuckign ignorant. A suicide bomber who can disguise himself, walk into a nightclub and blow himself up is far more dangerous than the restricted actions of the IDF. Especially since it creates a situtation where liberties (including those of Palestinians) have to be exchanged for security.

Enemies that they imposed upon, and enemies that they threaten and steal from when they attempt to expand their borders.


I invite you to read some history and get damn a clue.

A country like Israel, despite being attacked repeatedly by its neighbours, being built up of people who have had their lands stolen off them (in both Europe and Arabia) has managed to develop into the only multi-cultural, multi-ethnic democracy in the middle east. Israel is responsible for inventions ranging from the MRI to ICQ to the Pentium-M.

When was the last time you saw a Jew blowing himself up in Saudi Arabia or Germany demanding their land back? Nope, they just get on with their fucking lives and contribute to humanity instead of becoming career refugees like a certain group of people.

Re:What is their major malfunction?

[TummyX]

Oh, like no Governments except for the Israeli government spys on other nations.

Get some fucking perspective.

Re:What is their major malfunction?

[Curtman]

"I think we're more against lies. If you say it's clearly because of the people's rights and that's why you're invading we might support you."

The reality is, if we go to war with China nuclear weapons are going to be used. They will likely also ally with the "Axis of Evil" that Bush invented. We have to send a strong message that our citizens are free, and that isn't up for negotiation though. It doesn't take a war to do that.

Re:What is their major malfunction?

[CmdrGravy]

Doesn't China consider Falun Gong practioners to be terrorists ?

In which case they seem to be going about things in much the same way the US/UK are with their terrorists.

Re:What is their major malfunction?

[Curtman]

"The fact is, if they used those weapons in an all out war, the Palestinians wouldn't have a fucking change."

The fact is, they should not have those weapons at all. I find the idea of giving someone weapons and calling it humanitarian aid offensive.

Isreal has been attacked by its neighbours, but Isreal has also attacked them. Neither one is right

Suicide bombers are attempting to show how hopeless they feel about their situation in the very loudest way possible. There is a fair solution, and it doesn't involve more death. Unfortunately the suicide bombers have done such a good job, that they have also lost their sympathy card. And further, Isreal doesn't feel it can offer them anything without being seen as giving in to terrorism. The situation is very very sad, and it just feeds on itself through fear.

The best thing the world can do at this point is look on with sorrow I'm afraid. The best thing that Isreal, and the Palestinians can do at this point is wake up from the terrible nightmare they are having. Nothing is worth all this.

Re:What is their major malfunction?

[Curtman]

Yes, and yes. Pretty much exactly the same way. Except that China isn't engaging in as many illegal trade practices. And they didn't deport the lady from Montreal to Syria.

Re:What is their major malfunction?

[TummyX]

The fact is, they should not have those weapons at all. I find the idea of giving someone weapons and calling it humanitarian aid offensive


What? Israel has been attacked by its neighbours who have sworn to "push israel into the sea" and the US shouldn't help Israel defend itself? it is in the best interests of the US and the world that Israel -- a stable multicultural democracy in the middle east -- survives.


Suicide bombers are attempting to show how hopeless they feel about their situation in the very loudest way possible


No, they do it cause they believe they are stupid and think they will get rewarded (sex etc) in heaven. They are idiots and it's no suprise that they generally are very young.


The best thing the world can do at this point is look on with sorrow I'm afraid


You know, there is *much* worse happening in the world. The Israeli/Middle-east conflict is so popular because it's the only place of conflict where the reporters can sit down and have sushi whilst they wirte about how horrible Israel is.

Re:What is their major malfunction?

[Curtman]

"Israel has been attacked by its neighbours who have sworn to "push israel into the sea" and the US shouldn't help Israel defend itself?"

Yes, exactly. They bulldoze homes of Palastinian people, and build settlements on their land. This is outrageous. It makes no more sense for you to defend the US' relationship with Israel, than it does for Syria or Lebanon to aid the Palestinians. Less so, because it's really none of the US' business until one side or the other decides to play fair at least.

"The Israeli/Middle-east conflict is so popular because it's the only place of conflict where the reporters can sit down and have sushi whilst they wirte about how horrible Israel is."

No, the Israeli/Middle-east conflict is so popular because it is the source of all this craziness with terrorism this, and terrorism that. This is exactly what I mean when I say "The situation is very very sad, and it just feeds on itself through fear."

Re:What is their major malfunction?

[Anonymous Coward]

Nothing is worth all this.

Unfortunately some don't see things the same way and you then get the suicide bombers and other actions to gain control of areas. The religious importance of the region is enough to keep people interested in the fighting (well that and past losses).

Re:What is their major malfunction?

[TummyX]

Yes, exactly. They bulldoze homes of Palastinian people, and build settlements on their land


Homes used by terrorists or to smuggle weapons (hidden tunnels).


It makes no more sense for you to defend the US' relationship with Israel, than it does for Syria or Lebanon to aid the Palestinians.


No, it does and I've already explained why.

Without US weapons defending Israel (deterrence works great), Israel would now be North Egypt, West Jordon and Southern Lebanon. The concept of a Palestinian state would be a footnote in history. Because of Israel and this whole conflict, Palestinians for the first time in history will get their own country.


Less so, because it's really none of the US' business until one side or the other decides to play fair at least.


How can you reason that it will suddenly become the US's business when one side decides to "play fair"? I've never heard of anything more ridiculous. And by your own standards, isn't it possible that the US has decided that Israel is playing it "fairer"?

Re:What is their major malfunction?

[Curtman]

"Homes used by terrorists or to smuggle weapons (hidden tunnels)"

Yes, well we all know what a threat to humanity hidden tunnels are.

"Without US weapons defending Israel (deterrence works great), Israel would now be North Egypt, West Jordon and Southern Lebanon. The concept of a Palestinian state would be a footnote in history."

So would Israel. I'm not sure Israel is justified in existing in the first place. What went on in Germany was attrocious, but I don't think it gives anyone the right to behave this way. Stop advancing, and give them their damn land route. What is so hard about that?

"How can you reason that it will suddenly become the US's business when one side decides to "play fair"?"

Because hypocrisy is a logical fallacy. It doesn't matter which one is "fairer", fair is fair, and anything else is unfair.

Re:What is their major malfunction?

[Anonymous Coward]

Falun Gong is not Buddhism. Buddhism is not at all illegal in China, and there are many Buddhist temples.

What people in the West don't realise is that the Falun Gong is a fucking crazy cult. They're like the Scientologists, but more dedicated, and they were banned because they made a grab for political power. I don't think they should be banned (I'm in favour of freedom of religion), but the Falun Gong practitioners are not the innocent victims they make themselves out to be.

Re:What is their major malfunction?

[Curtman]

None of that matters in the face of the allegations that China is doing these things on foreign soil. Whether or not Falun Gong is a 'fucking crazy cult' or not is only your opinion. The Scientologists have a right to believe what they do too, it's their methods of dealing with non believers that I have a problem with. I've seen enough of that to know what it's about I think. I'm not about to call them names though, or tell them they are wrong.

Re:What is their major malfunction?

[Curtman]

"Falun Gong is not Buddhism. Buddhism is not at all illegal in China, and there are many Buddhist temples."

Sorry, I meant to respond to this as well. China's history with Tibet is enough to make me fear their persecution. Especially based on their lack of respect for international borders. The practice of Buddhism was banned there, as Falun Gong is now in China. To me this fear of political instability is almost as frightening as fear of opposing religions.

Re:What is their major malfunction?

[Foz]

Suicide bombers are attempting to show how hopeless they feel about their situation in the very loudest way possible. There is a fair solution, and it doesn't involve more death.

Are you completely nuts? You DO realize that suicide bombers seek out crowded areas and then blow themselves up along with as many innocent civilians as possible? I fail to see how that doesn't "involve more death" nor do I see how it is a fair solution. It's a fucking stupid non-solution that does nothing but terrorize innocents (thus the whole "terrorism" thing).

A suicide bomber is a far far cry from the protesting monk who douses himself in kerosene and sets himself on fire or something. One kills himself only, as a form of social outcry. The other kills himself along with as many innocent people as possible with the sole intention of scattering body parts, blood and fear over as wide an area as possible.

-- Gary F.

Re:What is their major malfunction?

[Anonymous Coward]

but Isreal has also attacked them.

Isreal doesn't feel it can offer them anything without being seen as giving in to terrorism.

Curtman, if you really think the above are true, you should do some reading about the '48, '67, and '73 wars. They are wars of aggression and conquest launched by Israel's Arab neighbors.

You should also look at Barak's peace offer. It's a great deal. Arafat's response was to launch another Intifada.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Camp_David_2000_Summi t

Re:What is their major malfunction?

[benjamindees]

Because of Israel and this whole conflict, Palestinians for the first time in history will get their own country.

Hmm... this is so wrong, I'm not sure where to begin. You need a history lesson.

And by your own standards, isn't it possible that the US has decided that Israel is playing it "fairer"?

The US has decided that Israel is a productive weapons purchaser and a sufficient regional hegemon to keep the oil flowing from its neighbors. Nothing more, nothing less, and even the second part is questionable.

The fact that Israelis get so uppity about it, like they're God's chosen fucking people or something, makes us question whether giving them the ability to defend themselves was such a great idea. Israel obviously can't handle the responsibility of owning Apache helicopters and Patriot missiles and not using them.

Israel's handling of the Palestinians has been embarrassing. They can't even build a fence without trying to cheat the Palestinians out of more land and drawing more ire. The concept of "defense" is completely foreign to their "defense" force. IDF can't take incoming pebbles without returning fire on civilians, can't manage to keep explosive-laced terrorists from penetrating their "border", and can't restrain themselves from invading Palestinian homes for the sole purpose of seeing what's on the tele.

That having been said, things generally seem to be moving in the right direction. Lets hope the eyes of the world and 140,000 American "helpers" can convince all sides to develop clear borders and stay within them.

Re:What is their major malfunction?

[Curtman]

"Are you completely nuts?"

No, I don't think so. Maybe a little prone to hysteria sometimes, but no more so than your average Joe.

"You DO realize that suicide bombers seek out crowded areas and then blow themselves up along with as many innocent civilians as possible? I fail to see how that doesn't "involve more death" nor do I see how it is a fair solution."

Just to be clear about this, I did not say the suicide bombers are justified. What they do is just as bad as when Israel attacks them. What needs to happen is both sides need to stop, and until at least one side does this thing will escalate as more and more other nations are brought in to the conflict.

The question of who is innocent in this I do not understand. If one side or the other would refrain from terrorism, only then could they claim innocence. What we have now is two guilty parties arguing politics while real people suffer on both sides.

I agree with your sentiments against terrorism completely.

Re:What is their major malfunction?

[Curtman]

"you should do some reading about the '48, '67, and '73 wars. They are wars of aggression and conquest launched by Israel's Arab neighbors."

1946 until now, looks to me like someone has an unfair advantage. They've got friends, you've got friends. It's a damn shame they have to be mutually exclusive. The crusades were a great plague on the region, and so is war from Arab allies.

"You should also look at Barak's peace offer. It's a great deal."

Errrmmm.. Yeah, generous. Wow.

Re:What is their major malfunction?

[TummyX]

Hmm... this is so wrong, I'm not sure where to begin. You need a history lesson.


You can begin by telling me when there was ever a palestinian nation.


Israel's handling of the Palestinians has been embarrassing. They can't even build a fence without trying to cheat the Palestinians out of more land and drawing more ire. The concept of "defense" is completely foreign to their "defense" force. IDF can't take incoming pebbles without returning fire on civilians, can't manage to keep explosive-laced terrorists from penetrating their "border", and can't restrain themselves from invading Palestinian homes for the sole purpose of seeing what's on the tele


You are so full of it. The IDF are one of the best anti-terrorist forces in the world. Nothing I say will convince you of that but you're just fucking ignorant. It's not easy to defend against terrorists when you're trying to guarantee everyone's liberties.

Re:What is their major malfunction?

[Curtman]

I'm not sure what exactly it is about this comment that offended you so much CowBoyNeal, but I'm sorry to hear that you feel so strongly about it as to make me your foe.

It's unfortunate that you have to hide behind your semi-anonymous troll account rather than enter into discussion about what exactly the disagreement is.

I wish you all the best.

Re:What is their major malfunction?

[Curtman]

"It's not easy to defend against terrorists when you're trying to guarantee everyone's liberties."

Doesn't it seem a bit unfair to expect those liberties, if you aren't prepared to grant them to everyone?

I'm sorry if I gave you the impression that I am against Israel, because I'm not. I'm against the conflict.

Re:What is their major malfunction?

[Curtman]

"A trade embargo is not going to make China change it's policy on internet content filtering."

If China wants to try and filter the Internet, they are free to do so. It's the detainment and intimidation of citizens of foreign countries that I have a really big problem with.

Re:What is their major malfunction?

[benjamindees]

[Our intention is to] finally establish such a society in Palestine that Palestine shall be as Jewish as England is English, or America is American.

-Chaim Weizmann, first president of israel

Start reading.

Re:What is their major malfunction?

[Rakishi]

Compared to the utter crap that happened during the Cultural Revolution, I'm sure the Chinese people are quite happy about the current government. The thing is that it is changing (compared to a few decades ago for example), and government figures have indicated a desire for democracy in the future. However, if they change too quickly they risk rebellion and instability which really won't help the people in the long term (look at Russia or most of the regime changes the US helped).

For now the current government is bringing economic prosperity and all its side-effects (which is what most people really care about, freedom is secondary to a full stomach), such as education which probably will cause changes on its own. That's probably why the government is so open to change, they understand that if they maintain the current policies and growth there will be change whether they like it or not. They may as well make the change as pain free as possible, which in the end is also good for them (messy change generally involves the death/exile of numerous leaders).

Re:What is their major malfunction?

[Curtman]

What's this got to do with China not respecting the borders of sovereign nations?

Re:What is their major malfunction?

[l3v1]

but this is clearly and act of war on their part if it is true

Looking at how the recent US-conducted wars have been going, you'd better think a bit more than twice before saying such things. War is not the answer to a lot of things. Find another way to test your weapons.

Re:What is their major malfunction?

[Curtman]

"you'd better think a bit more than twice before saying such things. War is not the answer to a lot of things.

You should have quoted the beginning of that..

I'm in no way in favour of military action

Block

[turtled]

Wouldn't their government then just block access to certain servers / sites / blogs?

Re:Block

[Crimson Dragon]

Yes, but the point of this seems to lie in the fact that enough people doing this will hassle the powers that be and bring attention on a larger scale to the rights violations going on there.

Re:Block

[Anonymous Coward]

They wouldn't need to once they found out who it was and did away with the subversion personally.

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[Anonymous Coward]

Get people to register with an email address. If it stops working, someone notifies you. Inform all the people on the mailing list of the revised address.

If the Chinese government works at the same speed as most governments, they'll never keep up.

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[Raistlin77]

Of course they will.

I don't understand why these idiots must insist on forcing American values on China. From their main page:

"It is based on the belief of free speech that we started the Adopt a Chinese blog project."

When will they realize that there is no free speech in China, and by doing things such as this, they are actually making it WORSE for the Chinese!

Re:Block

[tomhudson]

that, plus if they post in chinese and you can't understand it, you may very well be hosting a government "agent provocateur".

... or, if they post in english (or ingrish) then they aren't really communicating very effectively with their own countrymen, so it becomes just another political statement w/o much impact.

IOW, a cute idea, but not very practical or logical. Perhaps we're being trolled?

Re:Block

[Raistlin77]

There are no rights violations. It is Chinese law that is, in our opinions, flawed, but what gives you or I the right to say so?

Re:Block

[Anonymous Coward]

And neither was there in the West for a long time, and then people decided to try and change things. No one is forcing Western values onto China in this program, they're simply helping those Chinese who wish to promote such values in their own country.

Re:Block

[Anonymous Coward]

Like creating a national firewall, working with search engines, blog hosts, etc, isn't a hassle enough?

Rights violations? I wasn't aware that Chinese citizens had any rights as we know it. Freedom of speech isn't a violation when the current generation never had it in the first place.

It's not like the rest of the world is going, "oh, it's so nice and free over there!"

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[wrf3]

And therein lies the tale of moral relativism. Freedom isn't better than tyranny; life isn't better than death; bravery isn't better than cowardice; and truth isn't better than lies. So let's stand for nothing, since we have nothing on which to stand.

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[dkf]

They wouldn't need to once they found out who it was and did away with the subversion personally.

I thought it was Visual SourceSafe that we wanted to do away with...

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[AKAImBatman]

There are no rights violations. It is Chinese law that is, in our opinions, flawed, but what gives you or I the right to say so?

I thought the same thing, but several very intelligent posters pointed out that there *are* rights being violated. Article 35 of the Chinese Constitution states:

Citizens of the People's Republic of China enjoy freedom of speech, of the press, of assembly, of association, of procession and of demonstration.

Now I realize that the Chinese Constitution may not be worth the paper its printed on (I know of many violations of the constitution, including friends who fled China due to religious persecution - read: arrest/jail - directly in contradiction to article 36), but that shouldn't stop the Chinese from fighting for rights they've been explicitly granted.

A good writeup on the situation from a Chinese Law Professor is here, with a well reasoned rebuttal here.

Let's hope the Chinese people are able to fight for their constitution. If only it was as easy as taking the case before the Chinese Supreme Court. :-/

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[Rutger Swarts]

I fail to see ho anyone is forcing any "american" values on the Chinese. Giving people the opertunity to host a blog is just that, making things possible.

And, how would this make things worse in China? Again, all it does is make it possible for people in china to use the web in a manner that does not force them to expose their personal details to the governement.

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[Rakishi]

Depends what school of morality you subscribe to, some preach that such rights are in essence unviersal. We have every right to say whatever we want about those laws, it's called freedom of speech. As for changing them; we again have every right to, given China's involvement with the world, try to influence Chinese politics by aiding certain factions.

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[Crimson Dragon]

What is morally relative about a government denying its citizens rights they purport to give their citizens in their very constitution, as was insightfully stated?

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[Anonymous Coward]

I don't understand why those idiots must insist on forcing Communist Party values on the Chinese people.

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[wrf3]

You missed the point. The parent asked the question, "What gives you or I the right...".

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[tomhudson]

What is morally relative about a government denying its citizens rights they purport to give their citizens in their very constitution, as was insightfully stated?

... in which case there isn't a single government that isn't guilty. So we're back to moral relativism. You have to make a judgment call at *some* point. Some things are more evil than others, from a human perspective.

Besides, these chinese bloggers ... an hour after you've eaten one, you're hungry again ... (there. someone had to say it. satisfied?)

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[uniqueUser]

Rights violations? The right to free speech? They don't have it. There for it is not violated. Don't get me worng. I think they should have it. And I think thiw will draw attention to the fact that they don't have it.

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[CosmeticLobotamy]

There's no rights violation. It says so right in your thing:
Citizens of the People's Republic of China enjoy freedom of speech, of the press, of assembly, of association, of procession and of demonstration.

The constitution doesn't say they get that stuff, just that they enjoy it. That was a pretty safe bet on the part of the constitution writers. Much better than Article 51, which says the people of China "want someone who likes to just stay in and cuddle."

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[Rakishi]

I'd like to point out what the above statement says about the parent. It seems that he believes we have no rights to do anything unless specifically given to us, it seems that some other entity (government?) must give said rights to us. This, of course, goes against the Western point of view which gives me all rights unless I decide to give them up (say because my government says so, China is NOT my government may I add). See it's funny however if you say that using the Western view of things to justify some actions is bad, what is there to define said actions as bad? I mean why should I accept another person's view of things?

By refusing the existence of universal rights, the parent gives me the right to mess with China because there is nothing that forces me to adhere to the Chinese government's view of things. If they wish to they can try to change our view of things, we can resist of course but nothing keeps them from trying.

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[Crimson Dragon]

Which is precisely why we don't lay down and die here, and why drawing a line in the sand is the only sensible thing to do. The recession of rights across the globe is something we need not give up on.... we need to take a stand when it comes to the denial of rights.

We need to stand for the rights of developers to engage in reverse engineering proof-of-concept without being prosecuted.

We need to stand for so many things that our apathy has allowed undue recession into darker times. We wonder why our rights fall by the wayside as we sit here and doom-and-gloom over our "moral relativism"

Bloggers can't blog. Coders can't code. Children get flattened with tanks. What else do you need to act on your loss of rights, a gun to your head?

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[AKAImBatman]

The constitution doesn't say they get that stuff, just that they enjoy it.

Keep in mind that it's just a translation. I seriously hope that the original (Mandarin?) is not quite so loosely worded. And even translated, it can be interpreted as granting a right.

Also keep in mind that Article 51 doesn't apply in this case because no law exists to prevent the discussion of democracy. (See the law professor's blog I linked to.) If this were America, one would simply file a court case and take it as far as the Supreme Court if necessary. Why someone over there hasn't done that yet is beyond me, but it may have something to do with article 128: The courts report to congress. Not good. :-/

Re:Block

[Intron]

Nobody gives you rights. You have rights. There are only people trying to take them away.

If all people exercise their right of free speech, free press and free association then those rights will persevere. If you back down, then you will cede your rights. Its easy to promote a popular cause. Its the unpopular ones that define your character.

Anyway, I'd like to help, but my ISP won't let me host a blog on my server. And I have to wash my cat this weekend.

Re:Block

[Anonymous Coward]

The concept of human rights (aka natural rights, univeral rights, etc.) only seems to be controversial on Slashdot. Nobody here should take seriously the argument that free speech isn't a right in China because the Communist Party says so. If we accept that argument, then how can we reconcile our condemnation of government sponsored genocide?

Re:Block

[Khuffie]

And the US constitution isn't being violated by the Patriot Act?

Re:Block

[Ryosen]

So what you're saying is like "I enjoy chocolate, I'm just not entitled to it". Being a bit literal, aren't we?

From dictionary.com:

Enjoy:
v. tr.

1. To receive pleasure or satisfaction from.
2. To have the use or benefit of: enjoys good health.

I believe that the intent of the Chinese Constitution is under definition #2.

Re:Block

[yintercept]

No one is forcing Western values onto China in this program

Just for the record, the Communist system currently in place in China was developed in the west. It was forced on China in an extremely oppressive fashion (the Cultural Revolution). The Cultural Revolution was not simply about bringing in new ideas, it was a very violent Marxist program designed to completely wipe out China's past.

The post that labels free speech as forcing western values on China is quite amusing. Quite frankly the most likely outcome of supporting free speech is that people are very likely to discuss the cultural values that western style communism tried to drive from their country in the Cultural Revolution. In other words...freedom would allow the Chinese people to be ... Chinese.

Re:Block

[CosmeticLobotamy]

I got an off-topic and a serious reply. Was it not clear that I wasn't entirely serious? I thought it was pretty clear.

Although, on a serious note, "it can be interpretted as granting a right" is never good enough. Generally when things are written so that they can be interpretted as granting a right, they're written that way so that they can sound good without having to actually grant that right. But yeah, maybe the untranslated version is crystal clear.

Re:Block

[CosmeticLobotamy]

Seriously, the part about cuddling? Not a tip-off that I was a li'l bit kidding?

Re:Block

[Wieland]

That's a valid point on a philosophical level. When there's no universally recognized moral authority (such as a supernatural being of some kind), there's no way to tell right from wrong that is beyond contestation.

From a more down-to-earth political viewpoint however, there are such things as universal human rights, which include, amongst others, freedom of thought and freedom of expression. Chinese law is in violation of those human rights, just like law in nazi-Germany and Japan during WWII, or laws in the former GDR that allowed people to be shot on the spot if they tried to flee the country.

Since WWII, the international community has developed an international legal framework to protect basic human rights independent of national law. There's, for example, the Universal Declaration of Human Rights or the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights.

Although it remains a controversial issue, human rights related international law is increasingly considered jus cogens, meaning it applies universally, regardless of a countries national laws or whether it has actually signed a human rights treaty or not. This is especially true for issues like slavery or torture, that are illegal in all cases. Regretfully, censorship law is probably in a somewhat greyer area, though.

Apart from all that legal mumbo jumbo, the question what gives the Chinese government the right to decide what's to be published and what's not, is just as valid as yours.

Re:Block

[kfg]

I submit an article to a magazine. The magazine decides to publish it.

How does this constitute the magazine forcing its values on me?

KFG

Re:Block

[e-gold]

I never have mod-points when I REALLY want them.

+1 insightful (albeit obvious to many of us) it needs to be said when Laura Bush can fearlessly make a "milking the MALE horse" joke but Howard Stern is scared to say the word "oral" these days. The first amendment is in even more danger from Bush than the second was in from Slick Willie's goons post-Waco/OKcity (and for the powers that censor, that's going some).
JMR

Yes, I'm a partisan-libertarian, and no I'm not speaking for anyone but myself, as always, and if this rant annoys you think about me smirking at that little fact...

Re:Block

[Dr. Evil]

From what I've been told, the spirit of the law often comes into play too. To state in a legal document that the citizens of China derive pleasure from something would be a senseless thing to include. It's clear that that's not what it means, so the statement wouldn't be ambiguous.

Yeah, of course it is just an example. I agree completely that this ambiguity is just an artifact of the translation.

Re:Block

[Anonymous Coward]

Now I realize that the Chinese Constitution may not be worth the paper its printed on (I know of many violations of the constitution, including friends who fled China due to religious persecution - read: arrest/jail - directly in contradiction to article 36), but that shouldn't stop the Chinese from fighting for rights they've been explicitly granted.

Let's worry about our own civil rights violations that are occuring right here in the USA before we worry about China.

Oh wait, the Americans WANT to have their rights taken away, sorry, I forgot.

Who cares about freedoms terrorists are everywhere!

Re:Block

[LWATCDR]

The problem is that no freedom of speech is absolute so their several legal ways to get around it.
1. Libel. Just as their are laws in the US about lying about someone I am sure that their are laws in China about lying about the government. An example might be someone claiming that Red Army attacked people protesting for democratic reform. While the "truth" is they where trying to over throw the government since China is already a democratic society really they are the People's Republic of China.
2.Another way to legally block bloggers is that the Government controls all Internet access in the country. The probably own it. If I want to start an ISP and I want to block every URL that has an s in it that is my right. If you do not like do not use me. The same can be said of the Chinese Government except they are the only ISP but it is still legal.

You see it is all shades of gray. There is no absolute truth, no black or white....
Bullcrap!

Re:Block

[Anonymous Coward]

When you signed up for society you handed your rights over to society, which then decides how and when to give them back to you.

You only had absolute rights in nature.

Re:Block

[ntijerino]

I'm thinking of hosting one of these blogs just to make my host less vulnerable to attack. If all traffic from China to my host is blocked, I'm probably more secure. Hell, maybe the US government ought to start doing adopting blogs as a security measure.

Re:Block

[crashcodesdotcom]

When you signed up for society you handed your rights over to society

I would tend to agree with that except for one problem. I didn't sign-up, but here I am nonetheless.

Re:Block

[Alcilbiades]

You don't have rights or at least very many unless you are willing to fight to keep them. Also I think that freedom of the press is a little to free when it allows paparzi and crap to chase people around simply because they are famous. A governments job is to protect the citizen body as a whole in a way that gives those in power more power without causing a revolution. Only countries with a history of freedom does the government have any check due to social mindset. And even then governments try to promote fear and hate between members of their own society so that it can grab more and more of the citizens rights. Look at hate crimes in the US....should it really matter who was attacked, beaten, raped or killed...not imo instead justice should be blind, but how would the government be able to grab more police power w/o fear, fear of terrorist, your neighbors, people of different cultures, sex and race. Anyways, don't believe you have any innate rights because humans not born into the wealthy and powerful are born as servants and only by determination and fighting have we secured a counter balance of power held by the few.

Re:Block

[Frit Mock]

"I thought the same thing, but several very intelligent posters pointed out that there *are* rights being violated. Article 35 of the Chinese Constitution states:

Citizens of the People's Republic of China enjoy freedom of speech, of the press, of assembly, of association, of procession and of demonstration."

Well, that's probably a tricky article ...

Over here in Germany, we have basicaly the same article in our constitution.
However, we have exceptions to that right ... and they are there for good (and historical) reasons. One exception to the above freedoms is that they can't be used to spread nazi-propaganda. I might lack a proper english skill to express some more restrictions to these freedems accuratly, but I'll try ... the above freedoms are not granted for anti-constitutional thoughts/speeches or contempt for human beeings.

Personally I am convinced that the above freedoms shall not be granted to those, that try to abuse these freedoms with the intention to destroy our constitution or to restrict human rights. After all, freedom wants to defend itself and freedom can't grant itself to those those that seek to destroy it!

Here in Germany one or the other site is shut down from time to time due to the mentioned exceptions after some month of lawsuits. (Whenever I made my own opinion about such sites, I would say, yes, they deserve beeing shut down.)

That beeing said, the tricky thing is to have an objective and fair judge over what endangers freedom or human rights.

I am fine with the fact, that there are not unlimited freedoms granted and I think it would be ok, if the Chines don't grant unlimited freedoms either in order to protect their constitution ... ... however the Chinese government abuses their right to restrict freedoms to protect the constitution and misuses it to protect the government itself!

Re:Block

[Belial6]

"plus if they post in chinese and you can't understand it, you may very well be hosting a government "agent provocateur"."

That should be just fine with the adopters. Free speech is free speech. If you start deciding that only certain kinds of speech should be allowed, then your no better than the government censors.

Re:Block

[Anonymous Coward]

Your parents signed you up. Their parents signed them up. Etc. You could have chosen to join a different society when you left your parents' home.

Re:Block

[telecsan]

I don't understand why these idiots must insist on forcing American values on China.

Yeah, just like we stinky Allies forced our values on Germany during WWII. Support World Domination!

End point to this, that is mostly lost on this post-modern world. Not everything is shades of gray. Black and White do exist, as do Good and Evil.

Re:Block

[tomhudson]

There's a difference between free speech and abusing someone's trust to post lies and set them up to take the blame.

BTW, free speech isn't an absolute - you do not have the freedom to shout fire in a crowded theatre if there's no fire, for example.

I would be pissed as all hell if they were tell me that they were reporting on a civil rights protest, but it was really recipes for "how to wok your dog" in chinese and that I am one of the prime "dog ranchers" with really choice cuts from a wide selection of breeds.

Or maybe you'd have no problem with them saying to the whole world how much you like to perform certain sex acts that are illegal in your jurisdiction? After all, "agents provocateur" have been known to do that sort of thing.

Re:Block

[NamShubCMX]

And I have to wash my cat this weekend.

Seems like a very good idea for a blog!

Re:Block

[rsynnott]

Then China can try to enforce its laws. But there's no reason outsiders have to cooperate with it...

Re:Block

[rsynnott]

No, it's quite a good idea. It makes it easier for people living under a somewhat repressive regime to voice their views, and harder for said regime to censor them. Sounds like A Good Thing to me...

Re:Block

[yiantsbro]

Great---I wonder how many Chinese deaths I can be responsible for by doing this? With me nice and safe over here.

Re:Block

[Raistlin77]

You are quoting rights that are in America. Nobody ever said these rights apply anywhere outside of America. You are assuming some sort of global constitution which simply does not exist.

"All people" do not have rights of free speech, free press, and free association. If they did, we would not have so many different nationalities in the US. My point is that you, and 9 out of 10 people here on slashdot, are condemning Chinese government for not upholding the rights of the United States of America in China, and are trying to interfere with the inner workings of China. You do not have the right to do so.

Re:Block

[Anonymous Coward]

whoooosh.

Re:Block

[rednip]

And therein lies the tale of moral relativism.

Freedom isn't better than tyranny;

Anyone care to put up a ticket for a permanant visit to N. Korea and the bottom of Maslow's hierarchy of needs? (btwjftaf [BTW, just for the anticiated flamewar) I do not like Bush and I am working within the electoral processs to free us from his relatively mild form of tyranny)

life isn't better than death;

Dead men can't type, surely you have choosen a one point to live rather than death.

bravery isn't better than cowardice;

Damn good thing at least some people don't think that way

truth isn't better than lies

So someone could stand up in court and say that you are a serial killer, and you'll put up no defense?

So let's stand for nothing, since we have nothing on which to stand

You should replace "let's" and "we" with the far more appropiate "I" and we'll finally agree.

Re:Block

[tomhudson]

I'm from the side that believes that increased trade and business relationships, emmigration, as well as improved communications in general, are the only way to effect real change.

Samizdat didn't bring down the Soviet empire - the rest of the world continuing to advance economically and politically, along with trade sanctions, did them in. Same with South Africa. Eventually the "grass is grener" becomes irresistable, because, with increased trade, too many people are exposed to knowledge that there are other ways.

The worker in China making toys for WalMart must wondeer what wonderful place all those millions of colourful fun things are going to, all those toys, gadgets, electronics. Its not just the people who interface with the RotW (Rest of the World) who are exposed - its the whole supply chain.

This is one thing people tend to overlook, because its "just some worker on an assembly line." but when its millions of workers on thousands of assembly lines, shipping companies, truckers, boxers, sub-contractors, etc., they all become "contaminated" with knowledge that there's a whole other world out there.

You're underestimating the mental acuity of the "little people" and overestimating the impact of blogs.

Re:Block

[Anonymous Coward]

Actually, you are given rights by the government of your given country. As much as we all love the Constitution, it's still a document that is enforced by the same government that grants the rights.

China, as a sovereign government, doesn't have to give anyone rights. That's the whole idea behind sovereignty.

I'd like to see you try and "exercise your right to free speech" in China and get beat down by thugs and then exported to a labor camp in northwest China...

The only cats you'd see up there would be the ones on your dinner plate. (and breakfast plate, I hear cat dumplings are popular in the mornings).

Re:Block

[Rakishi]

Why not, answer me. You claim that because they're value system is different we cannot interfere. However, by saying that you're forcing YOUR value system onto me since there is no universal right or law preventing me from interfering with someone else's value system. Why can't I condemn them? Why can't I interfere? What are you basing my actions as being "bad" on? They have no inherent universal right to anything as you claim, which also includes the right to keep me from interfering.

You're a hypocrite, attempting to use a line of reasoning without following it through to completion.

You also ignore the fact that the very existence of such dissidents means not everyone subscribes to the Chinese governments moral system, so you cannot use the government to claim I am interfering. You talk of moral systems, and as such you must compare the Western one to the Chinese one not to the Chinese government's one. If some people do not agree with the government then they are no longer covered under its moral system. If you're going to use the governments actions as a basis for morality than at least use it for both sides, and don't compare apples to oranges.

Re:Block

[tverbeek]

Let the pointless semantic bickering, hopelessly esoteric metaphysical sky-gazing, and ideological sermonizing commence.

Re:Block

[rsynnott]

I'm not saying that blogs are a solution to China's problems. But China and its people (or at least those in the cities) ARE getting richer. It'll be the world's biggest economy soon enough. And yet the regime shows no signs of crumbling. Don't expect it to do so just because of knowledge that the outside world is different; there has to also be the knowledge that the outside world is BETTER. I'm sure lots of Americans now, consumed in paranoia, would prefer to live under a safe, prosperous, totalitarian regime (that is after all the way America has been headed for the last few years, with huge public support). No, I don't think blogs will make an improvement. But they won't hurt. And they'll help the rest of the world find out what's gonig on in there.

Re:Block

[Belial6]

It's a blog. Thus, there is not necessarily, and unlikely, a specific theme. If they are writting in chinese, they are unlikely to give you a translation of every post. While it would be nice if everyone always told the truth, the reality is that many people don't. It is unfortunate, but the "good guys" tend to be just as likely to lie about their foe as the "bad guys". The "bad guys" might still be bad guys, but lies are still lies.

You pretty much have two options. Speak within the law, along with all of it's restrictions, or speak outside the law, and live with the fact that some people lie.

As for the fire/building example...All that shows is that free speech is a farce. Free speech is either absolute, or it does not exist. We definitly do not have free speech in the U.S.. We just have very liberal speech laws.

Re:Block

[wrf3]

Nobody gives you rights. You have rights.
What are they? Where are they enumerated? Why do some not recognize those rights?

There are only people trying to take them away.
So what about those who cannot defend themselves? Under your system, are rights only for the strong?

Re:Block

[greenrd]

Ouch. You totally missed the sarcasm.

Re:Block

[RevRigel]

If you're a product of the US education system, go ask for your money back, because you didn't get what you paid for. Rights are not granted by a constitution. Rights are inherent (at the 'certain inalienable' ones). Freedom of speech is merely acknowledged by the US Constitution, not granted.

Re:Block

[wrf3]

As much as we all love the Constitution, it's still a document that is enforced by the same government that grants the rights.
The U. S. government does not grant rights to its citizens. It enforces rights granted to them by their Creator.

Re:Block

[AKAImBatman]

If you're a product of the US education system, go ask for your money back, because you didn't get what you paid for. Rights are not granted by a constitution. Rights are inherent (at the 'certain inalienable' ones).

Man, I'm glad I didn't go to your education system. You have a pretty warped view of history.

Our declaration of independence says the following:

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. -- That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed,

1. You'll note the suspicious lack of "Freedom of Speech".
2. Our founding fathers recognized that while rights are not granted by a government, it is the governments job to ensure the rights under which the people will live.

Something else to note is that the US Constitution went into effect in 1789. Yet the First Ammendment (the right to free speech) was not added until 1791! The exact origins of the ammendment are complex, but they stem from the desire by the early American government and populace to provide a method for the general public to keep tabs on what their government was doing. Thus protection was set up to provide for freedom of speech and press. NO OTHER COUNTRY RECOGNIZED THIS FREEDOM. In fact, many governments went as far as to explicitly censor the newspapers of time.

So the origins of the freedom of speech are nowhere near as simple or "inalienable" as you make them out to be. If I were you, I'd ask for my VAT back.

Re:Block

[hunterx11]

You are assuming some sort of global constitution which simply does not exist.

Like this? Even if you think the UN is stupid, human rights are not an "American" thing, they are a human thing. America doesn't define my rights, China doesn't define my rights, and you don't define my rights. People have the right, and the obligation, to speak out in favor of liberty everywhere.

Re:Block

[jacksonj04]

No no no no NO. You do *not* have the obligation to speak out in favour of liberty, because that would be hyprocritical. You are at liberty whether or not to speak out, if you were obligated to then you are no longer at liberty to make that decision.

Re:Block

[hunterx11]

I mean that you are morally obligated, not that you should be forced to. Freedom lets people make good choices or bad choices, including condemning it. Speaking out in favor of liberty is an ought in the same sense as helping others--you shouldn't be forced to do it, but you should do it of your own free will anyway.

Re:Block

[bnenning]

You'll note the suspicious lack of "Freedom of Speech".

Gosh, and it doesn't say anything about the freedom to eat chocolate either. It does however say "Liberty".

Something else to note is that the US Constitution went into effect in 1789. Yet the First Ammendment (the right to free speech) was not added until 1791!

Statist fallacy #43. Neither the Constitution nor the Bill of Rights grants rights to citizens. They grant powers to *government*, and in theory government can act only in accordance with those powers. Sadly, the delineation of certain specific rights had led many people to believe that they have *only* those rights, and government can do anything as long as it doesn't infringe them. Alexander Hamilton warned of this:

I go further, and affirm that bills of rights, in the sense and in the extent in which they are contended for, are not only unnecessary in the proposed constitution, but would even be dangerous. They would contain various exceptions to powers which are not granted; and on this very account, would afford a colourable pretext to claim more than were granted. For why declare that things shall not be done which there is no power to do? Why for instance, should it be said, that the liberty of the press shall not be restrained, when no power is given by which restrictions may be imposed? I will not contend that such a provision would confer a regulating power; but it is evident that it would furnish, to men disposed to usurp, a plausible pretence for claiming that power. (Alexander Hamilton, Federalist, no. 84, 575-581, 28 May 1788)

Sadly, he was correct.

Re:Block

[marianne1017]

I can't say I've read EVERY comment but I've read a lot, and I'm surprised no one yet has quoted John Gilmore: The Internet treats censorship as damage, and routes around it. To me, the Internet isn't owned or controlled by any government or corporation (allowing that the mysterious forces that control ICANN are, well, mysterious; does anyone else remember the NSA conspiracy theories re: DNS control?) - it's possibly the best instance of distributed anarchism that works for good (most of the time) and for ill (some of the time, bearing in mind human nature). I like to hope that if anything can combat totalitarianism, it's the Internet.

Re:Block

[crashcodesdotcom]

You could have chosen to join a different society when you left your parents' home.
It would have been nice if someone would have told me that.

Where's the nearest libertarian society? And how can I sign-up?

Why is it illegal to sell what can be freely given?
Why are there seat belt laws? I mean who does it hurt if I don't buckle up? If someone is dumb enough not to buckle up and they get killed in a car accident I say "Oh well."

Dang it. Now I'm just getting all flustered. Darn you!

Re:Block

[Anonymous Coward]

Good idea?!? What dya need that for? It's a b.l.o.g.

Re:Block

[Saint Aardvark]

Dude, if I had mod points right now I wouldn't be taking the time to compliment you. Excellent points, all of them.

Re:Block

[tomhudson]

Thanks. I work with computers all day and sometimes it just seems that the whole world thinks computers/the internet are the solution to every problem, when the real problem, 10 times out of 10, is a people problem.

Its almost like the thinking goes something like this:

A: Here's the problem ... make a computer program to fix it.
B: Isn't that a people problem, not a tech problem?
A: Yeah, but we can't reprogram people.
B: But a computer program won't fix the problem
A: Well, we've got to do *something*. Write a program.

... so we try to guide peoples' behaviours with programs (fill in this form, click on this button, etc), which then leads us to RTFM wars, etc.

Its funny how scared management is to dealing with people problems, when that is what they're there for in the first place.

This is just a special case of the more generalized one - people have a hard time dealing with each other. Guess that's why we're the most dangerous predators on the planet.

Fighter Censorship at Home!!

[Anonymous Coward]

Funny how slashdot hates censorship, but the moderation system here is akin to the worst censorship you'll find anywhere. Modbombs, ip bans, ip checking, and other "anti-troll" measure have made slashdot one of the biggest censors around.

More hypocrisy from CmdrTaco. He hates censorship, but has no problem censoring and banning people from this site.

Re:Fighter Censorship at Home!!

[archmagusrm]

Methinks the distinction here is censorship of information and legitimate opinion rather than censorship of trolls. We like to censor trolls, nobody wants to wake up to one in the morning...

Re:Fighter Censorship at Home!!

[JavaLord]

Methinks the distinction here is censorship of information and legitimate opinion rather than censorship of trolls. We like to censor trolls, nobody wants to wake up to one in the morning...

Yeah right.

Until you make a joke about Mac's and get banned for a month. Of course, making jokes about Windows in every other article is ok, but don't touch the blessing children of Slashdot, the mac, or anything running linux.

The people who run slashdot abuse their power to enforce their views. It's not really that bad though, Slashdot isn't professional journalism, it's just a crappy website that became more successful than it ever should have.

Re:Fighter Censorship at Home!!

[advocate_one]

sadly, I've blown my mod points for today... otherwise, I'd have modded you up

World of Warcraft.

[JavaLord]

Fine, but what do I get in return? Will they farm my World of Warcraft gold for me? Make me a snow-globe or something?

In soviet Russia

[farker haiku]

Hrm... so,
In Soviet Russia, Bloggers host you!

Re:In soviet Russia

[ImaLamer]

In Communist China, You Host Bloggers!

*I love this meme, can't help it*

Re:In soviet Russia

[Glog]

This is like SO not funny anymore. Go back to fark please.

Re:In soviet Russia

[Anonymous Coward]

Like, OMG!

Adopt...

[British]

*Sally Struthers walks on*

For just 5 megs a month you can adopt a Chinese blog. You will recieve letters, a digital camera picture and more from your sponsored blog. Your blog will recieve bandwidth, FTP access and encryption...

Just 5 megs a month. Isn't that worth it?

Re:Adopt...

[Anonymous Coward]

Does it come with sexual favors? :D

Re:Adopt...

[agent4256]

If its only 5 megs a month, then i guess with my hosting i could easily host some 10k blogs. Wooo the possibilities. Is there a central site somewhere to "sign up" to be available to be a blog host?

Why not?

[ch0p]

What's to stop the government from arresting people who are trying to get around their censorship?

Re:Why not?

[Blacken00100]

You make it sound like that's your problem.

Re:Why not?

[kfg]

What's to stop the government from arresting people who are trying to get around their censorship?

Absolutely nothing. These people are risking their lives to speak, because where they are speaking is a revolutionary act. That's rather the point.

KFG

Punishment?

[OverkillTASF]

Is there some law in China against circumventing the censorship laws? Like.... What is the potential punishment that you are probably incurring upon whatever China-person you "help out"?

Re:Punishment?

[Neurotoxic666]

Both persons should agree on something like this:

1. The blogger (in China) pretends he just sent the content of the blog in a personal email and that

2. the host published the content of said email without permission.

IANAL and IANC (Chinese), but this seems to make some sense. This or something similar...

Re:Punishment?

[Nos.]

Because of course a government that won't respect personal freedoms will certainly respect a technicality.

I rive in China...

[Anonymous Coward]

...you insensitive crod!

This sounds like a good idea, BUT...

[Rude Turnip]

I'd be scared shitless to visit China if I let some dissident bloggers use some of my hosting space. The Chinese govt. is probably paranoid enough to start putting together a list of individuals who have helped these "dangerous" individuals.

Another concern I'd have is that a blogger might have lots of harsh words about some local official, but how do I know it isn't simply slander? And what would my liabilities be in such a case?

Re:This sounds like a good idea, BUT...

[anoiniminious cowher]

Oh Come on! The worst thing that would happen to you is that you'd get denied a Visa.

Re:This sounds like a good idea, BUT...

[Anonymous Coward]

Chinese Individual .. thats a good one...

Re:This sounds like a good idea, BUT...

[Stonehand]

Eh, it might be rather more interesting from their point of view to let you in, but under constant surveillance so they can later investigate everybody you had contact with in case any of them happen to be dissidents -- or if it would be convenient to frame any of them as dissidents. Then, they can trumpet your involvement with this shindig as "evidence", and go drive up some good ol' fashioned anti-foreigner, nationalistic fervor.

Re:This sounds like a good idea, BUT...

[northcat]

Yeah, China - which hosts millions of tourists every year - will make a list of a few people and try to filter them out. After all, China is just a small village and doing such things will be as easy as putting a dog in the main entrance to the village. And we all know that they're more concerned with filtering out bloggers than national security or something similar.

Re:This sounds like a good idea, BUT...

[Manchot]

Trust me, you won't be held liable for any slander that a Chinese blogger might say against a local official. Most countries aren't too keen on extraditing their citizens to China in order to face libel charges.

Re:This sounds like a good idea, BUT...

[internic]

Right, because getting a computer to match up names from visa applications to a list of "offenders" would be way too difficult.

Re:This sounds like a good idea, BUT...

[Threni]

> Eh, it might be rather more interesting from their point of view to let you in,
> but under constant surveillance

This happens to you in China regardless of it you're on some watch list. If you DO end up on a list you'll probably just be denied entry, as the OP suggests.

Re:This sounds like a good idea, BUT...

[Klaus Obermeyer]

Yes, sadly China is paranoid enough to "make a list of a few people and try to filter them out" out of the millions of visiting tourists every year. This is especially apparant in the case of Falun Gong where foreign citizens are currently being held without trial for speaking out against the wrongful treatment of their fellow practitioners.

American citizens such as human rights activist Dr. Charles Li have been arrested and dissapeared into the black hole which is the chinese justice system never to be seen again.

Re:This sounds like a good idea, BUT...

[shplorb]

I take it you're not familiar with the Chinese diplomat who's currently trying to defect to Australia - he claims that the Chinese government has an extensive spy network in Australia that is monitoring people and even abducting them and taking them back to China.

Quite the alarming allegation. It's on the level of North Korea sending submarines to Japan to abduct civilians during the night.

Out

[Capt James McCarthy]

I think I'll outsource my blog to India.

Outsourced

[CorporateWhoremone]

You can't outsource to the US. That just dosn't mesh with the United States' plan for global domination.

Re:Outsourced

[SComps]

it does if you outsource for free.

Risk

[Anonymous Coward]

It's just a matter of time before Chinese agents sign up for this and starts giving the samaritan nice presents in form of viruses, trojan horses etc.

Re:Risk

[Uptown Joe]

It looks like they have the same problems with viruses and spyware that we have here, infected computers and users with no clue of how to keep them clean.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/3210086.stm

Re:Risk

[lb746]

If your hosting it as say a moveable type style blog or some sort of controlled blog, you can still keep the admin account to it and censor it yourself. While this may defeat the purpose some, it would let you be able to remove something like an offensive image if suddenly your blogger went goatse crazy You only need to allow them to login to blog.

Now if you were dumb enough to give them your login and password to your FTP persay, then you probably should have handed in your geek card long before reading this article.

Re:Risk

[scupper]

I would think the risk of this "Save the China Bloggers" deal would be from Chinese spammers and hackers taking advantage of folks through this "program" that might not know how to securely configure their hosting accounts or servers. It almost seems like an ingenious scheme to get people to give up server access, however limited, bandwidth and disk space for mischief.

Could this be turned into a gigantic social engineering blitzkrieg?

Re:Risk

[Anonymous Coward]

And, uh, how do you propose they do that?

If someone you host for has the ability to install trojans and viruses on your server, you shouldn't be hosting anything at all.

Not to rain on your parade but..

[matvei]

what's stopping the Chinese secret service (or whatever) to register with this service as hosts, collect all the information needed to snatch the blogger and make an example out of him and his family?

Re:Not to rain on your parade but..

[Uruk]

Nothing really stops them except the filtering that the adoption agency does. Since they're probably not trained in intelligence procedures, I'd guess they can't stop this from happening.

But if you're Chinese intelligence, the better method is to prevent people from getting to the adoption service in the first place. They don't want to throw people in lonely prisons after they publish damaging things, they want to prevent damaging things from being published. The best way to do that is to use the Great Chinese Internet Filter (AYB) to block the adoption service, and to block known sites that choose to adopt Chinese blogs. It's easier to make the blogger irrelevant or unheard than it is to throw them in prison.

Things like freenet have been developed to really help the Chinese out in this situation. And this is really sad to say, but true: sometimes you need someone to be made an example of, because it's the recognition of the injustice towards them that spurs others to really consider the issue critically and do something about it, since the same could happen to them.

Re:Not to rain on your parade but..

[matvei]

"They don't want to throw people in lonely prisons after they publish damaging things, they want to prevent damaging things from being published."

And the most effective way to do that is to make an example of those pioneering this new way of free speech and their loved ones - there are many people who are willing to give their own life for their cause but no one wants to get their family enslaved, tortured or killed. It's not nice but to me it seems like the most efficient way to keep people from doing Inaproppriate Things (tm) and that's why I believe that this is what the Chinese government uses.

" And this is really sad to say, but true: sometimes you need someone to be made an example of, because it's the recognition of the injustice towards them that spurs others to really consider the issue critically and do something about it, since the same could happen to them."

That would be correct if they'd only stopped at hurting only the misbehaving citizen. As I said, the thought of dying for The Cause sounds glorious while getting your loved ones killed for is horrific.

Re:Not to rain on your parade but..

[duggy_92127]

...collect all the information needed to snatch the blogger and make an example out of him and his family?

What country/world do you live in?? You're really contemplating the possibility that the Chinese government is going to hunt you down, "snatch" you away, and do horrible things to you?

Listen, America has a number of problems, but keeping its citizens safe from foreign aggression while on their own soil is not one of them. And I'm including "terrorism", even though that's not remotely the point here.

Furthermore, "...the United States (US) lacks extradition treaties with over fifty nations, including the People's Republic of China and North Korea." So even if they asked the US politely to hand you over, our government would just laugh at them.

How paranoid do you have to be to think that not only is the government of China going to notice you, but send somebody over to get you? Wow.

Doug

Re:Not to rain on your parade but..

[theyre watching you]

You completely missed the grandparent's point. In his situation a Chinese citizen would sign up for the service, but instead of sending their data to a nice American/European/whatever, the Chinese government would recieve the information and then make an example out of the Chinese citizen. There is no American in the scenario.

Re:Not to rain on your parade but..

[matvei]

The servers are in free countries. The bloggers are Chinese people in china.

Great idea...

[Anonymous Coward]

Would any chinese adopt my european CVS?

That would be great! If I could move my project to a free country. Reading trivial patents is so boring you know...

Re:Great idea...

[minus_273]

" Would any chinese adopt my european CVS?

That would be great! If I could move my project to a free country"

only on slashdot. Only here would someone call china free in a thread about having to move blogs outside the country and fear of the repercussions if you are caught.. Amazing.

Re:Great idea...

[Anonymous Coward]

WHOOSH! That was like mach 3 over your head, dude. poster made a funny and appropriate observation, and plus it's funny cuz' it's true. shit's like an american stem cell researcher moving to china to do research in a free country. get it now?

Re:Great idea...

[Anonymous Coward]

This gets modded funny! Funny thing is thats exatly what I'm thinking right here today, for REAL, as an important business decision.

I would like to hear from organisations in foreign countries, India, China, Russia and Brazil who deal in setting up satelite business arrangements or partnerships so that those of us who have genuine ideas can offshore our interests and work unencumbered by unreasonable constraints.

I am right at this moment considering how to move my 2 year old startup
venture out of the 'Developed World', not because I want cheap labor but because the laws of my own country inhibit business development. Or are about to.

Sadly, then I can sit here in my own country exporting my work, talent
and economic value that aproximately 100,000 pounds of my countrymans
taxes have paid for ( I had a state granted education all the way to PhD)
to some other place and peoples.

I used to be proud of my country. My business instinct has always been driven by a geekish need to give something back as much as to make money,
but I presently live in an environment that is hostile to my endeavours.
It makes me wish Maggie Thatcher was back, I'm sure she would have stood behind the small British software producer and told these software patent bozos to go fsck themselves.

I'd gladly swap server space to those who need freedom of speech and are able to offer freedom of practice. Im my country I can say what I like but I cant DO anything. In China at least I would find great enthusiasm behind my enterprises, provided they didn't attack or impinge on the communist state, instead of blocked corridoors, red tape, and legal threats at every juncture.

Re:Great idea...

[Anonymous Coward]

Oh thanks for explaining there. You muppet! Of course I 'get' it. The humour is laden with irony
because what the poster decribes is actually happening. Yes it's funny, in a noir way, that at the same time free speech is being driven from China, freedom of practice is being driven from our countries. Perhaps thats the really funny bit YOU dont get?

Re:Great idea...

[minus_273]

right becasue bush "banned" stem cell research (as oppossed to stop federal spending on SOME embryonic stem cells) . I would actually like to see evidence of that.

No way!

[Quiet_Desperation]

After what the Chinese did to Jack Bauer in this season's "24"? Forget it.

Other countries?

[5plicer]

This is great idea! What about hosting blogs of citizens of other countries where internet censorship run rampant? I guess the campaign does cover a lot of territory, given China's immense population.

Does anyone here appreciate the irony?

[tigre]

China is a safe haven for all sorts of internet activity which is illegal and reprehensible here, I guess it's only fair that we return the favor.

Re:Does anyone here appreciate the irony?

[Anonymous Coward]

Just what is on the Chinese governments mind in allowing the country to be used as a spam/phising haven? Yes, I feel a little guilty about blocking Chinese IP space.

It's also a shame other countries who have IP addresses assigned to APNIC that they should suffer collateral damage by being firewalled along with Chinese addresses.

Re:Does anyone here appreciate the irony?

[UrgleHoth]

China is a safe haven for all sorts of internet activity which is illegal and reprehensible here

Two questions:
1. Like what?
2. Where is here?

Re:Does anyone here appreciate the irony?

[Anonymous Coward]

China is a safe haven for all sorts of internet activity which is illegal and reprehensible here

1. Like what?

Post your unobfuscated e-mail address somewhere and you will learn soon enough, my young apprentice.

Their Choice

[snoopyjd]

This is their choice. I am sure they are all too aware of the punishment they may receive if they are discovered. However, this will allow them to operate a blog without having to give the Chinese government their name and address.

Of course they will still have to cover their tracks whenever they post or read their blog (or just about anything else on the Internet), but it will give them one additional layer of protection.

If people are willing to risk their lives in an effort to change their circumstances giving a little bit of storage and bandwidth seems to be the least we can do.

Not more blogs!

[Noogie Brown]

Isn't the internet flooded with millions of pointless worthless blogs already? The last thing we want is more.

Free Blog Hosting?

[p0]

But don't they use services like free blogger.com?

Re:Free Blog Hosting?

[lb746]

It's already blocked to them. Here's a short list of some sites blocked by China already
http://cyber.law.harvard.edu/filtering/china/China -highlights.html

This whole idea seems a bit pointless. It just means they will block more sites. Think of it this way, you may be helping them post a blog, but as soon as your site gets blocked, now no one can visit your site from China. Currently most smaller sites are ignored. If you have any current chinese readers or visitors you'll possibily end up ruining it for them.

Adware hosting?

[Donny Smith]

The linked site does not exactly show how they plan to limit (ab)use to actual opressed bloggers and keep the spam and ads out.

BTW, what is wrong with opening a (Chinese) blog account on one of Western sites and emailing blog posts via some foreign Webmail site that provides HTTPS encryption of Web sessions?

Re:Adware hosting?

[Heisenbug]

BTW, what is wrong with opening a (Chinese) blog account on one of Western sites and emailing blog posts via some foreign Webmail site that provides HTTPS encryption of Web sessions?

Popular blog hosting sites are trivially easy to censor and track. Hosting on thousands of unrelated volunteer sites is meant to be harder to block.

Re:Adware hosting?

[Itanshi]

yeah, and i'd like to know what came of Cult of Dead Cow's Ghost internet protocol (yes i made up the name, correct me on the real one, ok?) the project that would completely anonymise your presence on the net bet a chinese version would be beneficial to this campaign and others

In other news...

[subtropolis]

a secluded NOC was the target of what appears to have been a small nuclear strike. The only other traffic in the area was a Chinese cargo blimp twenty klicks south- southwest which also seems to have been destroyed in the incident.

"We like to censor trolls"

[Anonymous Coward]

anti-war = friendly elf, mod up
question anti-war = troll, mod down
question Bush's past = friendly elf, mod up
question democrat's past = troll, mod down
anti-gun = friendly elf
pro-gun = troll
. /. China

pro Chinese Gov. troll FE
Chinese dissadent. FE troll

fucking idiots

Stop trading with them

[Anonymous Coward]

It may seem drastic I know, but why do we trade with countries that have a bad human rights record ? It seems a little odd to me

Re:Stop trading with them

[Rollie Hawk]

But they are a communist nation. That makes up for it.

But in all seriousness, that is one good reason to. People have lots of theories about what brought down the Soviet Union. In my opinion, most evidence points towards capitalism doing it.

Re:Stop trading with them

[z0idberg]

No-one will stop trading with them because they are the fastest growing economy in the world. If one country stops trading with them then all that will happen is that country misses out on the economic opportunities there.

If there is a lot of money at stake people/governments are very happy to turn a blind eye. Exhibit A: you dont hear anyone screaming about ceasing trade with the US over the blatant human rights abuses at guantanamo bay.

Re:Stop trading with them

[Austerity Empowers]

Their people will work happily for peanuts so we can have manufactured goods for less than the price of air. Their government contrasts our own governments slow but deliberate transition to facism, making us think we're still "free".

In other words, why wouldn't we trade with them!

Re:Stop trading with them

[rsynnott]

Don't be silly; they're nothing like communist. They wave red flags and have a few vague labour laws; that's about it. They're totalitarianist-capitalist.

Re:Stop trading with them

[HomerJayS]

There are two ways in which people typically are motivated to change the government over them.

One is when the people are so oppressed and/or starving that they have nothing to lose by starting a revolution (peaceful or otherwise). You can't take away something from someone who has nothing.

The other way is to raise the standard of living for the average person. When the overall standard of living raises to some level above "where is my next meal coming from?", the people have more time/energy to expend on ousting the oppressive government.

By trading with China, the latter is the goal.

Note: there is the 3rd option of "find an excuse for the worlds only superpower to liberate you", but that does not apply to nations that control nuclear weapons.

Re:Stop trading with them

[Rollie Hawk]

So you're saying they are communists?

Re:Stop trading with them

[bogjobber]

We can't stop trading with them because we are both members of the World Trade Organization. The WTO is, for those who don't know, a worldwide organization for liberalizing trade. It is a forum for international discussion. Before China was admitted to the WTO, we were able to use trade restrictions as leverage in human rights negotiations, but now it isn't so easy. Since both countries (assuming you're talking about the U.S.) are members of the WTO, any dispute must be brought before the WTO to be discussed. This limits one country's ability to halt trade with another.

Yes...

[Anonymous Coward]

If it's for spreading political propaganda, you're guaranteed a place in the sun at a Lao Gai prison.

Would this be considered an act of?

[agent]

A). Treason
B). Terrorism
C). Separation of Church and State
D). Insanity

At the risk of being off-topic...

[bradbury]

This isn't about blogging. Its a somewhat rhetorical, outside-of-the-box question -- "What if the Chinese government is using the right approach?"

Their economic growth has been much better than ours over the last decade. Their top-down economy can decide to build new nuclear plants when they need them without having to deal with environmentalists interfering for a decade or more. [One of the best prospects for eliminating dependence on foreign oil is relatively cheap electricity combined with hybrid and eventually full electric cars.] They don't have to worry about the "networks" trying to slip "broadcast flag" ammendments onto appropriations bills. Their politicians don't have to worry about catering to the money. Etc.

In short, is a top-down command controlled political system (and economy) better than a system run by a bunch of special interests elected into place by people who vote based in large part on how someone looks [according to results of a recent scientific study]?

Re:At the risk of being off-topic...

[Anonymous Coward]

If you think the Chinese government's way is the right way, you've got two choices:
1) Move to China
2) Don't host a Chinese blog
That's the great thing about the freedom you've got.

Re:At the risk of being off-topic...

[hsmith]

This is insightful?

I would rather be purvey to freedom and liberty than have a totalitarian government limiting what choices i can make in my life. You see, as china moves more towards a capitalistic society, where people are free to choose and expore, they are becoming quite successful. It isn't "communism" that is making them well to do, it is captialism and the free market.

Government controlled economies NEVER work, it was the end to the socialist USSR empire, it will be ours as we move closer to it.

These things such as "broadcast flags" are what happens when you have "big government." the "big business" buys their favors from the "big governmnet" because big government becomes corrupt. don't think for a single hot minute that there are not special interest groups in China, the politicans are a totally differnet class over there, even local ones.

if we moved to free markets, we wouldn't have the issue of broadcast flags, because the movie and entertainemnt insdustries would be FORCED to adapt, or they would die out. true free markets are self cleansing, the one we have now is NOT.

because they can buy these special favors, they can continue to be inefficent at the cost of a lobbyist.

Re:At the risk of being off-topic...

[Daniel_Staal]

The democratic or republican forms of government are not designed to be the best form of government: a benevolent, wise, dictator/king is a far better system. What they are designed for is to limit the downside. While a good dictator/king is the probably the best form of government, a bad dictator/king is probably the worst.

The point of a democratic or representative system is that the worst case is limited, because no one person has the power to totally screw everything up. Presumably, therefore, at least some people will be decent, keeping the system from total failure.

So, yes, a planned economy can outperform a non planned one, if the planners are very good. A controlled political system can out perform a non planned one, if the planners are good.

But you have to have good planners. And they have to stay good, and operate in the interest of the system, not themselves.

An uplanned system, where everyone operates in their own best intrest, works fairly well, and does not depend on finding exeptional people to run it.

(My personal feeling, by the way, is that their economic growth has been more the result of technology upgrades than anything else. The US/Europe leads the world in productivity-enhancing tech, and a country that can jump a few grades closer to us will grow a lot faster than we will because we have to develop the next steps.)

Re:At the risk of being off-topic...

[Eslyjah]

IAAE. Ignoring the other tyrannies of the Chinese government (as you do)...

Your reasoning is based on numerous fallacies. The biggest is that you are calling the Chinese economy "top-down". The top-down approach impoverished the Soviet Union, and would do the same to China. China professes to being a Communist, top-down economy, but it's not true. There is quite a bit of free enterprise carried on in addition to the state-owned version. This is where the growth is coming from.

The Chinese economy is a hybrid. It's a "both directions" economy. The top-down part slows it down, and the bottom-up part generates the growth.

It's true that they have had much better growth in China than in the USA, but consider that they remain at a MUCH lower standard of living. If you travel to rural China today, you will see that poverty is widespread. In fact, measured by American standards, the median Chinese is well below the poverty line. GDP per capita in China is about 1/8 of that in the USA.

And then of course there is voting, to which you allude. It's true that in China, people do not vote based on how the candidates look; they vote for whom they are told to vote. I would not consider that an improvement.

Re:At the risk of being off-topic...

[Guppy06]

"What if the Chinese government is using the right approach?"

So what? The ends do not justify the means.

Re:At the risk of being off-topic...

[NinjaFarmer]

That is why you have a computer run the government.

Re:At the risk of being off-topic...

[ediron2]

In short, no.

Economic growth: growing from zero (china) has a better percentage gain than growth from peak (US). No news here. On the other hand, things that grow quickly have a higher risk. Put another way, a startup grows faster than GE or Microsoft. But they can also overheat/crash/fail for a lot of reasons that won't kill a stable diversified giant corporation.

Your posting also interchanges economic and political concepts. They're not the same thing, and untangling them is necessary to talk effectively.

Bottom line: In theory, maximum political efficiency comes from despotic or dictatorial control. In practice, no economically optimized dictatorship has ever existed. To paraphrase Gilmore's law, that's why regulation inevitably creates a black market: capitalism treats control as damage and routes around it.

Re:At the risk of being off-topic...

[Anonymous Coward]

Actually there is a third option.

3) Try to convince others that our system should be changed to be more like theirs.

Personally I don't think it should but I disagree with people who say 'If you dont like America then move!'

If another country has found a better way to do something then I want to see if that would work here. Telling people to move just because they want change is foolish.

Again I don't want the Chinese system, I just think it's odd when people assume that our way is the only way and it shouldn't ever change because it's our way and it's the best way.

This is TRULY the best thing about the freedom we have. The freedom to change our system if we think it can be improved.

Never forget this.

Re:At the risk of being off-topic...

[earthbound kid]

Which is great until a blue screen of death results in the execution of your grandparents and a murderer getting early Social Security.

Re:At the risk of being off-topic...

[tyler083]

reminds me of someone i knew claiming Cuba could be great because almost everyone new how to read. my response: does it matter if you can only read what you are told to read? in my opinion, no.

Re:At the risk of being off-topic...

[Anonymous Coward]

Huh? the chinese top down system is "using the right approach" That was a troll, right? Have you ever heard of the China's "Great leap forward", 1959-1961, when the Party decided that the time was right for everyone in china to immediately industrialize?

from wikipedia: Various sources put the death toll at about 30 million people, with majority of the deaths owed to starvation. The three years between 1959-1961 were known as the "Three Bitter Years" as the Chinese people suffered from extreme shortages of food.

Basically, this top-down system that you laude caused the world's most massive famine, ever.

I mean, when a authoritarian system gets out of control, there are no checks and balances or accountablility to moderate the destruction.
I don't think any democratic system has managed to do anything so rapidly catastrophic to their economy, nor do I think they have the propensity to do so; if a policy is disastrous, it can be changed, or the policymakers supporting it can be changed. Not so in a country where dissent is perceived to = treason.
Re: your suggestion that china is better off without those pesky environmentalists.... 7 of the 10 most polluted cities in the world are now in china, and breathing in the Beijing smog is a nightmare; respiratory diseases and phlegmn hawking are everywhere.

You are correct that in american democracy special interests are often able to manipulate polititians in ways counter to the public's interest. What makes you think that china's system is less prone to this type of manipulation and corruption?

Re:At the risk of being off-topic...

[paymoretaxes]

Interesting. Allowing capitalistic activity while retaining ultimate control over the people. As China moves to become more capitalistic, it will surpass even the United States easily. The only thing holding it back was trying to control industry. Just look at where Japan is now, and that's only a relatively small Asian country. As the greatest economy and country in the world we must strive to infect China with that greatest threat to progress: Free Speech.

Re:At the risk of being off-topic...

[eamonman]

Well now I know which leader you were in Civ

Re:At the risk of being off-topic...

[TheSync]

In practice, no economically optimized dictatorship has ever existed

Some people in South Korea and Taiwan may say that this concept is not quite correct. Recent work titled "The Political Economy of Growth: Democracy and Human Capital" (PDF) shows that democracy has no statistically significant direct effect on economic growth.

There are plenty of examples of dictatorships which were highly effective in achieving economic growth, and plenty of examples of democracies which are not effective in achieving economic growth. Of course, the converse of both is true as well.

Economic growth has much more to do with regulation per se, as opposed to the political source of the regulation.

Re:At the risk of being off-topic...

[gronofer]

The democratic system is based on the typical reality that a majority of the population can overthrow the government through one means or another if it's sufficently unpopular, as seen in various contries recently. An election provides an institutionalised method to the same end, without giving any guarantee about the quality of the government that the people want.

A non-democratic government must have either popularity and support, or a docile population, or a willingness to use extreme violence.

A marginal case is sham democracy, where the degree of sham varies, where people get to vote but it's restricted in some way. E.g., one candidate for president in Egypt, or the first-past-the-post countries where only two or three parties can hold power. Here, the government must resort to the dictatorial techniques to some degree, since it's not likely to have the support of a majority of the population.

Re:At the risk of being off-topic...

[ediron2]

To be honest, I let the literary device get ahead of me here... I figured that, if I was mistaken, someone would point out corrections.

I'd agree that the political and economic mechanisms are decoupled. That was partly why I said 'in *practice*'. With that in mind, it'd be interesting to see how many decades your examples survive without getting mired by favoritism, self-indulgence, nepotism, or the likes.

That separation of market and politics is pretty profound: if the politicians don't meddle, there's no linkage. If they *do* meddle, any politically-forced flaws either cause the country to shift businesses to profitable ones or causes a black market (or both).

That said, it takes profound self-restraint for governing agencies to not bend economic rules to their own selfish interests. That would be a longterm risk for any single-controller governmental system. I'd argue that the risk is higher than for democracies and republics, since the latter allows an occasional nondestructive purging of the insiders.

Then again, we seem to have plenty of those flaws in our Republic (the US). Gilmore's law version 3: Rich and powerful people treat laws as damage, and route around them via whatever means they find. And the more money/power you have, the better your workaround will be.

A last thought: It's ironic that I believe politics and economics are decoupled, but that power and money are interchangable.

great idea

[fr1kk]

I think this is a great idea. Sure, there may be some legalities involved but who cares? Thats what disclaimers are for, I suppose. I think its worth the risk, if there is even any at all. I never would have been involved in websites to this day if a few generous souls donated some webspace for me to play around with. Besides, I dont know anyone in China, its a nice way to meet some new people and get another perspective on life on the other side of the globe.

Re:great idea

[marianne1017]

I agree wholeheartedly (re: Who cares?) At what point DO we stand up for freedom? This is something practical and tangible. Yes, it can be abused, therefore, it will be abused. But if a gazillion blogs are hosted on a gazillion servers, and those blogs additionally keep moving around, I think it will be hard to track and filter. I despise the Patriot Act, but you cannot compare that to the abuse of freedom in China. It was touching to hear C. Rice exhort the Mideast to uphold freedom of expression, assembly, religious worship. All those noble sentiments the US government and US corporations have checked at the door when it comes to China. As for the person who opined perhaps the Chinese government has the right idea - after all, their economy is so spiffy now - A) this person has no idea what economic life is really like in China for most people, and B) running the trains on time is something totalitarian governments are demonstrably good at, but I still don't want one. Democracy is the worst system there is, except for all the rest ...

Chinese gov't can adopt DMCA victim websites

[Anonymous Coward]

It's great to see efforts being made to give the people of China free speech, but the increasing level of madness and greed emanating from (corporate)America the situation is no longer as one-sided as it once was.

The Chinese government should return fire with fire by encouraging "legal" Chinese web site operators to "Adopt a patent-free website" or Adopt a DMCA victim".

They could start with the author of DVD Decrypter.

The American Government is no longer the squeaky-clean defender of the oppressed that it never was, and now that Canada and Europe have fallen,
it looks like the time has come for a kind of copyright anti-here.

China fits the bill like no other country in the world...

Re:Chinese gov't can adopt DMCA victim websites

[Anonymous Coward]

... now that Canada and Europe have fallen ...

Canada, you say?

If you are referring to the latest bill ammendments to Canada's Copyright act, you will find that they only render activities that are done for the _purpose_ of infringing as actually being criminal, and purpose can only be inferred when copyright infringement actually occurs (that is, one makes copies without permission that are not otherwise exempt from infringement). Read it carefully... it's nowhere even _close_ to being as draconian as the DMCA has turned out to be.

Webspace

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm looking for a free, fully-managed, load-balanced hosting environment with unlimited bandwidth and space, free domain registration, SQL Server and the dotNet framework.

In exchange, I promise to be scathingly critical about nation you choose.

Going about this assbackwards.

[Anonymous Coward]

The internet is no longer safe for many of the activities that we once liked. Slapping a band-aid on one little piece of it won't fix the problem, and it can only serve to provoke a crackdown. Does no one remember Tiannamen Square?

We need a new network. An anonymous one, one where no one can figure out if you are even connected to i, let alone the one that wrote a blog that appears on it. It isn't Freenet. It needs to be IPv4/IPv6 capable... we got rid of all the old layer 3 protocols because nothing less would suffice. It can't be Tor, we got rid of host files, because we want real, human-readable domain names, rye932hj2h3.onion doesn't count. Sadly, everyone seems to have missed out that anonymity isn't some phd-level cryptography puzzle. We have all the software tools we need, off the shelf.

Take your favorite vpn software, freeswan, openvpn, hell, even pptp. Once you use it to connect to a friend, you have your own (2 host) IP network. It can't be eavesdropped on. But you're not anonymous to that person, you have to know his internet IP, right? So make sure that person is always in another nation than your own. If they wiretap your internet connection, they'll see ipsec packets going to that IP, make sure he is beyond the reach of your law enforcement authorities (and you will also be beyond the reach of his!). Now, if you connect to a second person outside your own country, that person can communicate with your other partner, and they are anonymous for all intents and purposes. They can ping each other, lob UDP packets at each other, any number of things, that we take for granted, each and every day on the internet.

Still, it's a lame network, with just 3 people. But it can grow. Every person that connects that is willing to set up a router (even a crappy little 486 will do) can invite yet more people. It could scale to thousands of people, tens of thousands. IRC, webpages, email, everything that works here. And at best, you only know the identities of a few people on it, all of whom are safe on the other side of an international border even if you are forced to reveal who they are.

What keeps you people from doing this? Does it sound to simple to work? Is the end result too polished, you want to spend the next 2 weeks trying to insert a file on freenet? Does openvpn and bgp intimidate you?

Go on, ignore me. Spend the next 5 years whining about this strategic withdrawal, and that EFF holding action, slashdot.

Anyone that is interested, reply to this post with a method of contact. Tell a friend (who resides in nation other than your own) about it, get him interested. Everyone who brings in another person gets to connect, no other requirements.

Re:Going about this assbackwards.

[sheppos]

OK, so there's ~200 countries on the planet. Everyone has to be connect to another country? So maybe there's 100 people allowed on your network? The maths are more complicated than this obviously but I can't be bothered to work it out. Duh!

Re:Going about this assbackwards.

[Anonymous Coward]

No, there can be more than 1 canadian, more than 1 american, more than 1 russian. Just that two russians can't connect to each other, or two americans to each other. So it's more of a map coloring problem, which is supposedly possible with 4+ colors. There are other problems that could keep it from scaling, but those won't be an issue until the low thousands. Maybe not even then, we're learning alot as we go.

Yin and Yang

[davmoo]

On the surface, I think this is a wonderful idea. I just happen to own a server, and very well may participate in this.

But I have one concern.

If I get caught by the Chinese government, all they can do is block my server. If the person I'm hosting gets caught, they get tossed in to jail or stood up against a wall and shot.

I must contemplate this on the tree of woe...

Re:Yin and Yang

[Anonymous Coward]

Chinese people who speak out against their government know the risk to themselves and their families. If they feel that speaking the truth is worth the risk, then the best thing we can do is to help them accomplish that goal. I am sure the people running the underground railroad felt terrible about the escaping slaves that were caught and killed, but it didn't stop them from helping the next batch of people who would rather die pursuing freedom than to live as slaves.

Re:Yin and Yang

[TheKidWho]

But see that is their choice! They know that could possibly happen, but to them its worth fighting for.

Re:Yin and Yang

[davmoo]

You do make a valid point. And I will agree that there are times when one must risk something massive for "the greater good".

But since I (hypothetically, at this point) aided them, even if it was by their own free choice, it would also weigh heavily on me for the rest of my natural life.

But most likely I will participate...I'm looking at blogging software choices now.

Peaceful? Buddhists?

[Anonymous Coward]

Yeah, like what goes on in the south of Thailand proves that.

MOD Training example

[Anonymous Coward]

MODS: Here's a training example for you. The parent post has shunned the topic at hand in favor of grinding a personal axe. If the discussion were a comparison of the Chinese freedoms vs. American freedoms, then it might be on topic. But this is not a discussion of that comparison, making the parent a pointless flame. It is thus offtopic and should be modded as such. The result of *proper* modding vs. modding who you agree with/don't agree with is an improvement to the overall quality of the discussion. So consider the situation and please mod as you see appropriate. Thank you.

Re:MOD Training example

[Khuffie]

Why did you post this as AC? Scared? Oh well. I'm not grinding a personal axe but stating something most people either ignore, or don't see. People always talk about China/Saudi Arabia/*insert country US doesnt like* lack of human rights/free speech and so on, and are totally oblivious to the fact that they are being completely hypocritical. What about Guantanamo Bay, where people have been held for years without trial? What about the Patriot Act, that gives the government the right to arrest and spy on people without being questioned? People should be considering this before blasting countries like China. And note I'm not saying China is good and the US is bad.

Re:MOD Training example

[Anonymous Coward]

Well, you seem to say, since we have the Patriot Act, we have no standing to observe any other country's wrong?

Can't both items be wrong and be corrected? Why can't we complain about the treatment of people by foreign governments when we have a restrictive act of our own?

You imply that we cannot and should not comment of any thing any other nation does that hurts their own citizens. I think you are wrong in that point.

Re:MOD Training example

[dslbrian]

People always talk about China/Saudi Arabia/*insert country US doesnt like* lack of human rights/free speech and so on, and are totally oblivious to the fact that they are being completely hypocritical. What about Guantanamo Bay, where people have been held for years without trial? What about the Patriot Act, that gives the government the right to arrest and spy on people without being questioned?

I think you'll find that many of the same people who criticise lack of freedom elsewhere are the same ones who think the Patriot Act is unconstitutional. In either case it is irrelevant. One does not need to live in a utopia in order to comment on the situation in other countries.

The fact is that the Chinese government is totalitarian and very motivated in the preservation of its regime. It will use any means necessary to maintain that position. It doesn't matter if it violates the rights of its citizens in doing that, as the "party" obviously considers itself above its own laws.

Here in the US the various agencies are held accountable (at some level at least) for their actions, and they can be taken to court (FBI, Waco, anyone?). We could certainly use more accountability in the office of the president and Congress however.

Talking about the US is simply a diversion on your part though. I've lived in Saudi Arabia. I've been to Taiwan and lived in South Korea. Seeing how Taiwan and South Korea regard their counterparts (China and North Korea), and having been in Saudi I can tell you the people of those countries do not enjoy the kinds of freedoms we take for granted in the US. In all those places having access to information deemed unacceptable (regardless of whether you actually DO - ie. perhaps simply owning a satellite dish), could be viewed as a major crime. Any society that needs to censor the topic of freedom cannot be free (you simply cannot give me a valid enough answer as to why China's massive censoring of the internet is a "ok" thing - its not, no matter what argument one might provide).

Re:MOD Training example

[Khuffie]

No i'm not. Both items are wrong and *should* be corrected. What im saying is that the US (especially the US government) is quick to point fingers at other countries when they violate human rights and freedom, and then turn around and do the same thing themselves. I guess I wasn't clear, but the US (government) shouldn't be telling other countries what to do when they have problems of their own to fix.

Re:MOD Training example

[Khuffie]

The fact is that the Chinese government is totalitarian and very motivated in the preservation of its regime. It will use any means necessary to maintain that position.

The US is the most powerful nation in the world right now, and is very motivated in preserving that fact. Even so far as to wage war against countries that haven't attacked it. Isn't that totalitarian?

Here in the US the various agencies are held accountable (at some level at least) for their actions, and they can be taken to court (FBI, Waco, anyone?). We could certainly use more accountability in the office of the president and Congress however.

Definitely, especially since the CIA and the president fabricated lies to justify going to war, and has continued to lie against mounting evidence (ie, not knowing about immenent attacks, etc).

I can't comment on other countries, but I've lived int he Middle East (i'm from Kuwait). Yes, internet in Saudi Arabia/Kuwait and similar countries IS "censored", but the censoring is done merely against pornographic content, as its against the law there, and I can respect that. However, owning a satellite dish is certainly not viewed as a major crime, and virtually everyone nowadays has satellite TV, as Cable TV isn't widespread. But no, I can't respect or justify China attempting to censor the topic of freedom, and I never said I did.

Re:MOD Training example

[bnenning]

I guess I wasn't clear, but the US (government) shouldn't be telling other countries what to do when they have problems of their own to fix.

This is the enlightened multicultural version of "let he who is without sin cast the first stone". No government is or will ever be perfect, so your view amounts to forbidding criticism of any other government ever, and that's just silly. Yes, the US government sometimes violates the rights of its citizens, and yes, it's gotten worse after 9/11, but it is *nowhere near* as bad as tyrannies like China, Saudi Arabia, and North Korea.

Re:MOD Training example

[Khuffie]

And the problem is people remain lax and keep on saying the same thing: "Well, we're still better off than China/North Korea, so that's fine I guess", as more and more rights keep on being swept from under their feet. They do nothing to counteract it, and before they know it, the country they're in will end up being as bad, if not worse, than the tyrannies that they were criticizing all this time.

Irresposible

[Space_Soldier]

This would be irresponsible, especially if you are of Chinese decent. It is highly probable that out of 1 billion people, your name collides with someone else's. You won't get in trouble, but they might receive the torture chamber due to mistake identity.

The next level of a Pen Pal

[EmperorKagato]

This is an excellent idea! Teaming up with people from across the globe, thus changing their view about a country or person etc.

This is definately the opportunity of a lifetime.

Ah, the irony...

[The Woodworker]

I've read hundreds of posts on slashdot that were wrongly modded down (censored) as trolls because people didn't like what they had to say, and others modded up as 'insightful' with content like 'MS SUCKS' and nothing else to say. Now this community is bitching about China?!! The looking glass is a mirror.

BTW, -1 as a troll. To hell with my karma.

Re:Ah, the irony...

[grumpyman]

I have to ditto, hard. In this community, I have to agree upon the several values:

• Anything MS is evil
• Anything RIAA, MPAA is evil
• All software must be open-sourced, or else it's evil
• Google's great, other search engines are evil
• Communist countries are evil
• All governments are evil
• Anything Starwar's interesting

The list goes on and on... Without abiding to these values, you're sure to be modded down and your message will be never seen again. Better yet with your karma -1 you'll start with 0 the next time! Now this is censorship.

Re:Ah, the irony...

[not-real-sure]

I agree with you. It seems that in this forum the comments that should be counted as flames are modded insighful and the ones that should be trolled are modded as funny. I guess the community base for slashdot would rather flame Microsoft then help out someone else.

Re:Ah, the irony...

[Anonymous Coward]

I can still read -1, Troll posts by changing a few settings. If I do, no one will even think ill of me. I certainly won't have government thugs come after me.

That's not true of dissidents in China trying to publish their ideas.

Re:Ah, the irony...

[B1ackDragon]

I think the interesting thing about the slashdot mod system is that it is very democratic, and hence also shows symptoms of "tyranny of the majority." (Though I may be misusing this term.)

It's not quite right though, as we see. I think the reason the problem is so bad is that people with certain views express opinions, which get modded up. When one gets modded up often, they have good karma, which means more mod points. Then, these people mod up other comments with views similar to their own, and the cycle continues... possibly a fairer system of distributing mod points would cure the problem, but who knows?

Pot,, Meet Kettle

[Anonymous Coward]

It was okay for the US to invade Columbia, because people in Columbia encouraged acts that were illegal in the USA, such as illegal drug trading. Or so the US has maintained for decades.

So is it equally okay for China to invade the USA, since people in the USA encourage illegal acts in China, such as illegal web logging?

Or is it just the case that set of morals and values espoused by the USA is always right, and the rest of the world is always wrong?

Just wondering...
--
AC

Re:Pot,, Meet Kettle

[EmperorKagato]

Words don't kill people, people's actions or choices do.

Re:Pot,, Meet Kettle

[Anonymous Coward]

Words don't kill people, people's actions or choices do.

If sedition is so harmless, why is it illegal? If you speak the wrong words, the FBI will come and lock you up, for reasons of "national security". Heck, if you teach the wrong group of foreigners about modern cryptography, you're breaking the law.

Just yesterday, a article that was delibarately censored by the military finally was published: sixty years later. In the USA, the wrong words clearly are considered harmful.
--
AC

SPAM it out

[dark-br]

China's gov. does nothing to stop de floods of SPAM sent everyday from there but want to fsck up bloggers? Simple! Just start sending out all your political considerations by spamming the world with it.

If you can sell vI@gr@ and enlarge my penis maybe you can make me read all the things you have to say about living in a represive country (not that by living in Brazil we don't already know).

If you cannot blog it, SPAM it!

Re:SPAM it out

[Anonymous Coward]

good point. but one problem is that most of the true spamming senders live in the west. they only care the profit they get from selling vI@gr@, not the human rights in china.

Good question though

[engwar]

I guess it depends on how much you trust an authoritarian government with very few checks and balances.

A government like that is certainly more efficient but what happens when the people in charge aren't benevolent and decide that their first priority is something other than keeping the trains running on time. For example say you get some folks in power that are like the Taliban and want to impose their morality and views on the populace because they're serving what they consider a higher cause.

Give me the checks and balances and flaws of a democracy any day. There are more important things than efficiency.

Communitycolo.net is the answer

[Tairan]

Community Colocation Project is part of the Online Policy Group which provides Free (as in speech AND beer) hosting to any individual or non profit entity. They're the peoeple who fought Diebold, refuse to work with unacceptable takedown notices, and in general, are here to host these kinds of sites.

How About Imeem.com?

[Anonymous Coward]

There's already quite a lot of chinese users, and the application supports free blogging (and international character sets) - seems like a good fit?

A minor point RE environmentalism and nukes

[engwar]

I consider myself to be fairly moderate politically but I think nuclear power is short-sighted.

I also question how the parent poster (and people in general) seem to assume that anyone who is interested in protecting the environment is some kind of wacko.

Businesses are successful when they're profitable. Many times it's more profitable to say, dump your companies waste in the river than to dispose of it safely.

Now certainly there are environmentalists that would rather save one little fish than build a sub-division. Those people are extremists.

But it's a fact that power and money are corrupting influences. And we absolutely need people and organizations to work to make sure that our paint isn't filled with lead, our water isn't contaminated by waste from hog farms and our beaches don't have medical trash washing up on them.

The media likes to paint anyone interested in the environment as a wacko as that gets viewers to tune in.

The US has become a country where people think you have to be THIS or THAT. You're either conservative or liberal. You're either an environmental nutcase or you're pro-business.

There are many shades of grey. I want a positive business environment so I and my children have stable jobs AND I want it with clean air. You can have both.

One question...

[Anonymous Coward]

Do I get a picture before, or after their fingers are broken by the authorities?

Surprised nobody has mentioned this

[Shadow of Eternity]

http://www.peacefire.org/ has a couple ways to get around chinese blocking too.

NOT FUNNY: China vs. Vietnam

[Anonymous Coward]

In Seattle, the majority of the protestors that materialized were Americans of Vietnamese ancestry. When Hu Jintao, the president of China and butcher of Tibet, visits the USA, virtually none of the protestors are Americans of Chinese ancestry .

As well, Americans of Vietnamese ancestry are, at representation, in organizations like Amnesty International (AI). In fact, one such person ran to be a board member of AI. By contrast, AI is almost devoid of Americans of Chinese ancestry. In short, Vietnam will, more quickly, become a liberal Western democracy than China.

Re:Adopt a blog...

[telecsan]

For about the price of a cup of *java* a day...

*ducks*

What about LJ

[Leroy_Brown242]

What about Live Journal or something?

Maybe Bittorent style blogging?

I like...

[Sierpinski]

I like Chinese...

There's 900 million of them in the world today, so you better get to like them, thats what I say...

I like Chinese....

I like Chinese Food... The waiters never are rude...

Re:I like...

[tverbeek]

I like Chinese... There's 900 million of them in the world today

This is only true for very old values of "today" (e.g. 1973). It's currently estimated at over 1.3 billion.

Re:I like...

[Sierpinski]

If you didn't get the Monty Python reference, I pity you. Its from a song, surprisingly titled 'I like Chinese'.

While we're at it...

[Anonymous Coward]

...can we buy the bullet they'll use to save their family the expense?

do you really THINK

[Anonymous Coward]

you have the power to change your system if you think it can be imporved? Or are you just fantasizing you have the freedom to do so?

Damn...

[Anonymous Coward]

I think my head just exploded. That is the dumbest thing I've ever read.

Re:Damn...

[Anonymous Coward]

Dumb how?

this is great.

[thanew]

its like adopting a starving child in djibouti, but without having to send them a postcard

What's the Point?

[KrisCowboy]

What's the point if this Slashdot article is filtered in China? Apparently no Chinese blog would know about it.

Re:What's the Point?

[ddewey]

Slashdot is not blocked in China. I live in China and read it every day.

Smart little trick

[Morgor]

When I first read about the blog censorship on msn in china, I tried it myself, and discovered that you were infact allowed to write the words "freedom" and "democracy" if you only registered yourself as not living in China. So with my fake identity of a Chinese student living in Beijing, I couldn't write the characters for democracy, but with my real identity of a Danish student living in Copenhagen, I could easily write those words, and it had no impact that I was infact using the Chinese msn site.

Re:

[Torqued]

"that, plus if they post in chinese and you can't understand it, you may very well be hosting a government "agent provocateur""

Actually, I've found that the Google Toolbar translation tool does a decent job w/ translating web pages in Chinese into English. Enough so that you should be able to get the gist of what they are posting.

People living in glass houses...

[Tungbo]

Sure, let's stop trading with governments who imprison civilians (including minors) for years without any charges; and also those who abuse, torture, and humiliate their prisoners; and also those with secret search and seizure laws including libraries; and those who send agents oversea to assasinate foreign leaders and overthrow democraticly elected governments.

Hmmm. Who's left on the list? Canada?
Does any one have a totally clean hand ?

Obligatory...

[Anonymous Coward]

I want my monkey-man!

Duh...

[benjamindees]

Perhaps because it's in their economic self-interests? I mean, seriously, why do you think governments do *anything*?

Why did we go to war in Iraq? Why did France oppose it? Why do we push for strict IP laws around the world? Why do we shun the Kyoto treaty?

Money makes de vorld go round...

From a certain point of view

[PCM2]

Nobody gives you rights. You have rights. There are only people trying to take them away.

That's one way of looking at it. Somebody else might say your opinion is total nonsense. Society grants you rights. What rights you have are completely determined by the prevailing culture around you. American culture might say women have the right to wear whatever they want, bare their midriffs in public etc. Fundamentalist Muslim culture might say men have a right not to be tempted to immoral action by the flagrant sexual advances of women who are not their wives. I think we can all agree that certain rights are inalienable and universal -- the right not to be murdered, for example. But after that there's a lot of gray area. The original rights the founding fathers of the United States thought were inalienable were not life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness; they were life, liberty, and property. Clearly there was debate as to what was considered a "right" even back then.

Re:

[tomhudson]

Ah, but it's all in the nuances.

For example, I could say "He's not fit to sleep with a pig", then, when he complains, say, "Okay, he is fit to sleep with a pig. My bad.", or words to that effect.

Acts of War

[Anonymous Coward]

If there is truth to these accusations that the Chinese government is intimidating citizens of my country in any way for something such as practicing Falun Gong, then we have a serious problem that need s addressing.

I'm in no way in favour of military action, but this is clearly and act of war on their part if it is true.

No, it isn't. An "act of war" is when soldiers force their way across your borders, and attack your people. When that happens, and only when that happens, are you justified in marching your soldiers across their land, and attacking their people.

This is just plain international crime; if you voluntarily allow someone into your country, you can't piss and moan because they're there. If they break one of your laws, you arrest them, like you would any other criminal. Your recognize that your laws don't exceed your borders: and you keep a careful watch on them for that reason.

If you send your military out to attack another country because of a crime that someone who came from that country committed while they were visiting, that is an act of war. You can tell, what with the soldiers, and the invading, and the attacking, and all...

Sheesh... kids these days have heard the term "war" so badly misused that they don't even recognize it!

"War on Drugs. War on Poverty. War on Illiteracy". Now that the "War on Terror" really is a war, with real, live soldiers out killing real, live civilians, the kids are so conditioned that they don't realize that "war" isn't a natural state for a nation to be in.

*sigh*

There is no point to this post, other than to point out the abuse of language that's been ongoing for the last ten years. Sometimes I wonder if it's all be deliberate...

Re:Acts of War

[Curtman]

"No, it isn't. An "act of war" is when soldiers force their way across your borders, and attack your people."

I think that is a misrepresentation. When one nation disrepects anothers borders in order to persecute peaceful people for their beliefs, that goes against a fundamental principle in our society. People are free to believe whatever they like. Only actions that hurt others are justification for persecution, and even then there is cause for diplomacy.

"Your recognize that your laws don't exceed your borders: and you keep a careful watch on them for that reason."

That is what I am saying as well. China can wage war on its own citizens for practicing some religion or other, and that is one matter that concerns me. When China extends that war onto Canadian and U.S. soil, then it becomes something much more. It isn't tolerated.

You and I obviously have different interpretations of what an act of war is. I consider it to be an act that provokes war. In case it wasn't clear, I am not advocating any kind of military action against China, please don't act as if I am.

"Now that the "War on Terror" really is a war, with real, live soldiers out killing real, live civilians"

It may be a war, but it is not a war on terror by any means. The war on terror is in itself terrifying. They'll have to start fighting themselves soon to get anywhere.

mod parent up! rights are socially constructed

[fantomas]

Mod parent up - "rights" are socially constructed - they are agreed by a group of people - a society. Try arguing your rights to the local wildlife if you're the only person stranded on a proverbial desert island. But I don't think any rights are inalienable and universal: look throughout history, and even in the present you'll find differing opinions, even including the right to kill others without reasonable justification - (murder to you might be a reasonable political/military /religious/personal act to another). As parent notes, it's a whole grey area.

Re:mod parent up! rights are socially constructed

[Leldorion]

yes, and if you take a boat out of water then the physical forces that were acting on it in order to make it float aren't affecting it, ergo those force simply don't exist....right?

Re:mod parent up! rights are socially constructed

[PCM2]

Perfect example. A boat is not buoyant in air, in fact it has very little function (except maybe as a kind of hut). If you came from a culture on a water planet, you might feel that every citizen has a right to a shipshape boat (because, after all, if you didn't have a boat you'd eventually sink and drown). If you came from a culture that lived in cloud cities, on the other hand, that "right" might seem pretty perplexing.

Oh geez!

[csoto]

Now we don't just have a bunch of US/UK/whatever bloggers boring us with their mundane personal crap, now we have to find out about a few billion other people's issues with dairy products, their take on Episode III and other nonsense...

china's persecution applies internationally

[awehttam]

With China's government allegedly undertaking covert operations on Canadian soil, expanding its spy network, and the Canadian Government pressuring the City of Vancouver to take down "display boards depicting the persecution of Falun Gong from in front of the Vancouver Chinese consulate."; I can't help but wonder just how badly a person could be affected by adopting a blog this way.

Just a bit of paranoia to consider.

What if?

[DeanFox]

I don't mind pissing off a government like China by hosting their citizen's rant that "we're not free".

What gives me pause is if I open up my server, abet even just one directory, for anyone to use as a host, what's to protect me from bad people using it to host material that could get me arrested in my own country.

If it's a matter of free speech I'm all for that. But, once I open up my server, what if it turns out I'm hosting material plans for the next 9/11? I don't think I'm comfortable with level of risk.

I might be able to beat it given the chance to explain. But what are the odds I'd even get a trial? I'd just disappear and never be heard from again.

Re:What if?

[nickptar]

You run the server, so you should know what you're hosting. Use Babelfish. Delete anything encrypted. Anyway, it's only open to one person.

...as long as encryption is legal

[toby]

If you are allowed to use any reasonable form of encryption - SSL, SSH tunnel - then censorship is basically impossible. This is why attempts to censor or block access invariably go hand in hand with efforts to outlaw encryption.