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Chinese Claim Internet Censorship Modeled on West
ubermiester wrote to mention a NYT article reporting on a Chinese Press Briefing. At the event Liu Zhengrong, supervisor of Internet affairs for the Chinese State Council, stated that the state control of Internet access is based on Western models. From the article: "Mr. Liu said the major thrust of the Chinese effort to regulate content on the Web was aimed at preventing the spread of pornography or other content harmful to teenagers and children. He said that its concerns in this area differ minimally from those in developed countries. Human rights and media watchdog groups maintain that Chinese Web censorship puts greater emphasis on helping the ruling party maintain political control over its increasingly restive society. Such groups have demonstrated that many hundreds of Web sites cannot be easily accessed inside mainland China mainly because they are operated by governments, religious groups or political organizations that are critical of Chinese government policies or its political leaders."
Deflect the attention from yourselves, and pretend that you're just doing the same thing the West (read: United States) is doing: just trying to protect innocent children on the internet ("Who will think of the children?"), at the same time attempting to change the debate from your own despicable censorship of speech and thought to the alleged transgressions of Western governments.
Except that the reality is easy for anyone to see: you (attempt to) suppress sites dealing with politics, religion, dissent, and anything critical of the Chinese government or that doesn't support positions sanctioned by the Chinese government. The West and US don't do this (no matter how much our friendly, local conspiracy theorists might claim it).
Come on, China. I thought you could lie better than that.
Tienamen square and all the other attempts at revolution as pornography?
For keeping me safe from seeing a pair of breasts. Because you aren't very good at keeping me safe from much else.
Seriously, it shouldn't be the government's job to keep kids away from porn. It should be their fucking parent's job. So China's argument is still BS to me.
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I think they consider it more like that Nazi stuff that many european countries disallow on their web sites. IIRC yahoo and ebay both got in trouble in europe for content much less explicit Nazi stuff than Tianammen SQ images
It's really not that different. Both governments believe that some of their citizens need to be protected from corrupting influnces ( a position that I do not agree with, BTW ). We here in the west, who are unduly obsessed with the silly idea of the innocence of childhood, protect one kind of citizen. They try to protect another kind.
Our governments are really very similar.
What is good for the goose should be good for the gander.
If a democratic wants to censor online pornography and other "objectionable" material then it has no business telling other countries what they should or should not censor.
Remember the case a long time ago when a couple based in California were jailed for breaking pornography laws in Tennessee?
Has been around since ever... it is still present in the western world, although less 'obvious' than in China. Give China a rest about that! US principle are not universal principles. I do not believe in censorship, I think it's wrong, but the 'great firewall' in China is not something *wrong*. Now China does infringe on many human rights I care about, that's a different business. But, heck, the US is in a bad position to talk about censorship. Political correctness is a form of censorship, absurd MPAA ratings are a form of censorship. And yes, China's right, there is a huge pressure for censorship of the internet in the US by prudes.
\u262D = \u5350
When, in the course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bonds which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the laws of nature and of nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.
Sometimes, dissolving bonds is necessary.
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In the west (except for Australia apparently, which isn't really in the west anyway) there are a lot of people who think porn is ok as long as it's contained to a place where we don't have to see it if we don't want to. As long as we know where it is, we can get it, but I don't want it shoved down my throat.
China may have a different cultural attitude towards porn, with a very large portion of the populace thinking that it must be banned, which gives the government more reasons to censor speech under the guise of getting rid of this terrible plague that everyone hates.
Don't kid yourself... the government in the US and other western nations would use this same excuse to censor your political beliefs if more of the population thought this content was objectionable. Therefore, the amount our government can censor us increases as the number of taboo subjects increase in our society.
"I have never let my schooling interfere with my education." - Mark Twain
Glad to know the fundies running China are up to the task of protecting us from porn, especially of that really depraved Tiennamen sort.
Flying is easy, just throw yourself at the ground and miss. -Douglas Adams
4) Torture some more people in Guantanamo Bay
The USA has no moral high ground when it comes to human rights violations.
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So...basically...China says their censorship is modeled on ours. How many people are going to have the little lightbulb go off and realize that is exactly what all these wonderful US crafted laws are about? How many are just going to scream about China trying to deflect blame? Certainly what China is doing is quite a bit worse than what is going on in the western world, but maybe people will see what IS going on in the western world as the path to what China is currently doing.
The only change I can believe in is what I find in my couch cushions.
On almost every news post there is some quack that trys to bash somone of a different political view.
What they say and what is actually true are almost always two different things, same could be said to the above quote. Let them say and do what they want, it's their country after all. Besides if someone in China really, I mean REALLY, wants to get to some information they are going to get it.
You really need to get off your political "high horse" and pull your head out of the ground and actually listen and understand, and then stop making everything so freakin political.
I do agree that pron is a small problem, but I don't think that it should be the gov't right to regulate it. I do however think that is the parents responsibility to regulate what their child/preteen is doing on the internet. But again it goes back to my previous statement: If there is something that you really really want on the "net", you WILL find a way to get to it.
Yes, right-wing conservatives, the Chinese say they're JUST LIKE YOU.
Oh yes, because the mainstream liberal political front of US politics has never worked against pr0n, violent video games or bad song lyrics... [rolling eyes]... please, stop trying to put a spin on this, the left does the same thing the right does. There is a common sense of morality that is considered the norm in this society and it has little to do with political lines.
Dedicated Cthulhu Cultist since 4523 BC.
While I imagine I am headed for -255 troll...People in power write laws, enact regulations, and monkey with the system to remain in power.
Consider redistricting, which should really be called the lottery for those in power. You get to redistrict to ensure you stay in power. What Tom Delay did with redistricting in Texas was not illegal, because the law was on his side. Was it right? Ask someone from each party and the answer is different. Perhaps the Democrats are just mad they did not think of it first, or glad they would not run that far outside the ethical center.
Or what happened at the State of the Union where Cindy Sheehan was arrested. I am not saying I agree or do not with her politics, but look at it from the outside. The President had a citizen arrested, who disagreed with him. That it was a Capital police officer, is a distinction made in the US.
George Washington warned about foreign entanglements, because the compromise our ability to make a stand. If we want the Chinese to change their behavior, then we need to offer them an incentive. Unfortunately, we have become seriously "entangled." China now holds sufficient US currency to bankrupt America. Not the philosophical bankrupt, but the real - worse than 1929 depression kind. Worse, we gave them full trade status because there was money to be made.
Walmart, the nation's largest employer, now imports over 80% of their goods from China and makes up 1% of the Chinese GDP. What do you think they or other industries will tell a President thinking about an embargo or a serious response to China's stand?
I am not suggesting we agree with the Chinese or even remain silent. But, we need to have something tangible or each time we speak out, we sound weaker. The Chinese know we have little affect on their future and find us more a curiosity than an threat. Until we can position ourselves to have real leverage, they have no reason to listen, or even care.
That's why it's such a brilliant novel. It's not specific to any one country or point in time. At the time it was released, it was probably a good parallel to any form of state control over its peoples and what they want them to think and believe.
That book has been around because it is still a relevant, insightful overview of what happens as state control gets higher and individual freedoms get eroded. It also shows how through manipulation, your government can convince you of their version of the truth and make it imposible for you to know otherwise.
The great thing about that book, is you can see parallels to current events, historical events, your country, other countries, different ideologies, and a whole bunch of things.
The early parallels you saw with the US and the later more direct parallels with China, well, it's a matter of degrees and awareness of it. What he only scratched the surface of at the beginning was no more entrenched than at the end; just for that one person, the perspectives had changed.
History is recorded by the victors. If you're told we've always been at war with EastAsia, well, eventually you'll believe it. Even when we'r at war with someone else.
Lost at C:>. Found at C.
Unlike the tolerance dogma that is currently in vogue where nobody is wrong unless they're not tolerant or disagree with you, China and the wingnuts believe there is an absolute morality. They both believe that porn falls into the 'wrong' category and its presence on the Internet makes it too easily accessable thereby promoting 'wrong' behavior. They may or may not agree on what exactly makes something right or wrong, but that's besides the point.
Almost without exception, the more politically repressive a government is, the more puritanical it is as well. Whether the repression is theocratic, communist, or whatever, attempts to control sexuality generally go hand-in-hand with attempts to control political expression. There's just a general mindset that likes telling people what not to do, and people with that mindset tend to come to power in such systems.
The correlation between ignorance of statistics and using "correlation is not causation" as an argument is close to 1.