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Chinese Portals Pledge More Self-Policing
An anonymous reader writes "A slew of Chinese web portals have pledged to self-police even more, after signing on to a Beijing plan to 'clean up the internet'. Google and MSN have not joined the group." From the article: "The firms' pledge states that the Internet has become an important source of information and entertainment in China, now the world's second-biggest market with more than 100 million Web surfers. 'At the same time as the Web develops quickly, certain sites are transmitting unhealthy news ... and uncivilized voice services, including pornographic content that can be harmful to society,' said the pledge, which was dated earlier this month in a posting on Sina's Web site."
Sounds more like something Alberto Gonzales and the Bush White House would say.
The sad part is, while I'm writing this "tongue-in-cheek", if it were to be a headline in tomorrow's paper, nobody would be surprised.
But at least our whole country isn't behind a firewall meant to hide us from the truth.
Between forced abortions, organ harvesting of Falun Gong members, and poisoning sitting presidents at large banquets, China has shown its true colors time after time. I guess if China keeps funding our government, we have no choice but to look the other way.
A bit sad really.
Now there's a great tag for some Slashdot stories...
Lawrence Person (lawrencepersonh@gmailh.com (remove all "h"s to mail)
http://www.lawrenceperson.com/
You mean to tell me there is stuff on the internet BESIDES pornography? Why didn't anyone tell me!
Monstar L
Retard alert.
There is only ONE LEGAL PARTY in China. Get a clue and quit posting nonsense.
Please define "chosen".
Will code a sig generator for food
Actually, it's that kind of thing that has to be reported and made available. It's like trying to hide under the covers -- sure, you don't see any bad things, but you don't see any good things either. More importantly, you don't get to choose what you think is "bad" and what you think is "good." I think we'd pretty much all agree there are some moral absolutes (not killing or torturing others, taking the property of others without express permission, right to worship freely, etc.), but for anything not so cut-and-dried, it's up to the individual to determine where those things reside in their moral universe.
Censorship is not just about keeping things from people, it's also about telling people what they should think or believe.
GetOuttaMySpace - The Anti-Social Network
I thought we already cleaned the internet earlier this month...
And the world would be perfect if everyone just got more hugs...
Your so called absolutes are anything but, and even if they were, several are potentially contradictory, and would be prioritised differently in different cultures/situations, rendering them nonsensical.
kartune85 : Incapable of reason, observation or learning. A kind of dim, drab, flightless parrot.
I personally don't hate China. You can't hate a nation (never mind what people said about the USSR during the 50's and 60's); each nation is made up of diverse groups and not all citizens of a nation think alike. Nowhere is that truer than here in the United States.
What I hate is the Chinese government clinging to outmoded ideals and forms of control that in the end create hardship and ruin for the great bulk of the Chinese people. They treat most of their citizens like cattle -- just one example is the Chinese mining industry. The divide between the rural poor and the urban rich is a greater gulf than we have here. There is still political injustice and opinions contrary to the party line are not tolerated. Despite economic reforms, China is still a totalitarian regime.
To my way of thinking, the Chinese people deserve the same rights and privileges that I enjoy, but to get them, they will have to make the changes necessary to bring true reform. All I and others can do is urge them on and hope.
GetOuttaMySpace - The Anti-Social Network
Tomhudson, I'm against human rights abuses without regard as to who the perpetrator is. If human rights are abused by China, them I'm against it. If human rights are abused by George Bush, then I am against it. Those are my principles. What are yours?
Despite your tongue in cheek escape valve, the tone of your post apologizes for human rights abuses in China because you see some abuses in America. Does this mean that in tomhudson's world that two wrongs really do make a right?
Sounds remarkably like what Hollywood did in the 1930s or so and what American comics publishers did in the 1950s in the form of the Comics Code: In order to avoid being censored by government legislation, they decided to censor themselves.
Movies abided by rules such as: No prolonged kissing - never show even a married couple in the same bed - no revenge plots (the hero just happened to kill his enemies in self defence while pursuing nobler goals) etc. ad nauseam. The excision of politics was just an unwritten rule, but followed particularly religiously until the 60s.
The Comics Code was even more rigorous. It killed comics as a form of entertainment for adults up until the 1990s. Horror comics, erotic comics, realistic violence etc. ceased to exist. Nothing but spandex pap was left in its wake. And if you say now that you're a grown-up who reads Marvel comics, tell me: Just how grown-up do you feel while you're doing it? I feel about 12 years old when I dive into X-Men.
Yes.
Although, we're not so prejudiced as to just hate China. We hate America too. And Europe. And you.
The list of things we like is short: Google, Open Source, talking about complicated things, and CowboyNeal.
"Quoting yourself is stupid." -Me
Whether the news reports it and people read it or not, crap like this will happen anyway. Would rape stop if the news stopped reporting it? Hell no. We would be ignorant from the truth. Stomping a cat to death is despicable, immoral (by my standards), and most importantly, illegal anywhere I know of.
What if this happened in the USA? That woman would stand trial for animal cruelty and probably go to jail. Certainly not for as long as murder, maybe only a few months, but she would see justice. The video would definitely continue around the Internet, though. We would be free to watch or not to watch as we see fit. We would know that it happened and be able to form our own conclusions about it. Some people such as myself despise animal cruelty (I am not an environmentalist or vegetarian. Kill my beef and poultry humanely and let me eat it). Some people think it is ok. The key is that we have that freedom of thought, and while our government officials certainly try to enforce their moral standards on us, for the most part, they fail.
We are free to see the information for ourselves and form our own conclusions. While stomping a cat may be illegal in the USA, possessing and viewing a video of the act is not.
24 beers in a case, 24 hours in a day. Coincidence? I think not!
It's culture that is to blame for these things being contradictory and nonsensical. I think killing is repugnant; I believe most people would agree that taking another person's life is wrong. Of course then the problem becomes, if someone kills someone, what do we do? Do we kill them, in contravention of our belief? And culture creates a divide at this point: in some cultures, "an eye for an eye" is a perfectly acceptable idea, while in others, the prohibition against killing is inviolate, even to balance the scales of justice. That's culture talking -- groups of people with different belief systems trying to create a common framework of justice and right is going to be inherently contradictory, because for some the solution goes against everything they believe. That does not however, invalidate the main premise.
GetOuttaMySpace - The Anti-Social Network
Yahoo will give up anything a government asks for. They don't even question why a government would want some piece of information. I wish entities like the ACLU would go after Yahoo and make them start, at least, pausing and thinking before they act.
Chinese people elect their government the same way we elect circus clowns. They don't.
They had a revolution, and chose the bad choice over the really bad choice. Sure, some of them are content, but they know that they have no say about what goes on in their government. They know that the government hands out ultimatums such as this one (help us or go out of business) on a regulat basis.
The only way you can justify the Chinese people choosing their government is because they choose not to have another revolution. Given how difficult that is in a dictatorship with an iron fist, we really can't hold that against them.
The real question is what part the USA should play in helping them with their government. I say fuck'em. Let them do it themselves. We need to stop nation building and setting up puppet governments. If they never get a clue, too bad for them.
24 beers in a case, 24 hours in a day. Coincidence? I think not!
Hitler never actually came up with or did much of his atrocities himself, or even thought up the details in the first place. Instead he encouraged many of his cronies to come up with whatever ideas and act in whatever manner they thought would please their leader the most. And they happily complied.
I think the key here is to separate Chinese citizens from the Chinese government. While the citizens and ex-citizens that I have met have been nothing less than friendly, intelligent, and generally good people, their government is corrupt to the bone and doesn't really care about their people.
The alleged actions the GP poster mentioned all are the responsibility of the government.
24 beers in a case, 24 hours in a day. Coincidence? I think not!
Maybe you see more than me here, but as I type this most of the comments are not bashing china at all. I do see posts containing self-critical comments about the chance of similar stuff happening elsewhere as well. I guess the only one bashing people here is you.
molmod.com - computing tips from a molecular modeling
its lieing when it says i'm posting from a .gov.cn address, it is, please believe me! dont you? i'm just a regular user!
nothing happend in tienamen square, you have no proof! the chinese government doesn't lie! also nothing happend in tibet, its a lie too, you are all full of shit, please stop posting that somthing did happen. there is lots of pornographic content out there, i can get to every site and it offends me, when i login with my username bighairycunt i dont want to see naked people doing sick things with machines! i think this is a good idea to clean up the internet, there are lots of lies around
these comments are my own and my family has not been kidnapped and they do not have a gun to their head and i do not work for the government as a netcop, this is also a lie, somebody with much time on their hands created this idea. the government does not do these things!! why wont you believe me? i am jsut a normal person!
I've been seeing this recently. Whenever there's an article about Internet censorship in China -- a subject that's far more relevant to the topic of 'YRO' than are most of the articles we get -- people start to get defensive. And then, I get confused.
When the conservative party in Australia started trying to block content, Slashdot's reaction was "ah, too bad, Australians are getting screwed over by their dirty politicians again." When we talk about the activities of the RIAA or the MPAA in the U.S., we say the same thing. Yet when we say, "Too bad the PRC is restricting its citizens' rightful freedoms," it's "bashing." Why?
Besides, look at the comments. Most aren't even about China: They're about the Bush administration!
Compare and contrast with Islamic cultures, where a thief's hand is cut off for stealing.
Gamingmuseum.com: Give your 3D accelerator a rest.
...at least they have Google to look up to in their quest to self-censor.
Then again hearing Bush go on the attack against the press makes you wonder if it isn't merely a little more obvious in the case of China. I'm sure I'm not 100% right about this, but I can't remember a single newspaper officially taking the position that invading Iraq was wrong back in 2002/2003, not even the New York Times.
My sig is too lon
Warning: Keep out of reach of children. Slashdot may contain flamebait, trolls, and sheer nonsense. Slashdot may cause sleep deprevation, procrastination, or eye strain if used excessively. Use at own risk.
Only two things are infinite, the universe and human stupidity, and I'm not entirely sure about the universe - Einstein
The artical sights a few examples of things the government deems unhealthy, including stomping cats while in high heels and voic/porn services... FTA: The pledge comes amid a broader, ongoing movement by Beijing to clean the Internet of pornography and other content that leaders of the ruling Communist Party consider "unhealthy." So basicaly we are just looking at mainstream chinese internet affiliaes looking to keep the government off thier backs by being proactive in filtering content.
American people elect their president. They only have two permanent choices, but it doesn't matter in the end, since the incumbent preisdent sits no matter what (more Americans voted for Al Gore than Bush last time).
And no matter who you choose, there will be more DRM, more anti-terrorist measures (so that they can map you in more detail), and more invasions abroad.
Now, that is what I call a circus.
The majority of Slashdotters do NOT hate China or its people. But we do hate the Chinese Government and its continued suppression of it's people. The fact that you are equating the both the government and its people as one is part of the problem.
China is slowly becoming the new hegemonic power in the world, and while the US Government is a despicable sellout to corporate interests, at least it believes in relative freedom and democracy (if you discount the whole Patriot Act thing). But as China becomes a larger world power, its overwhelming ideals of government suppression, censorship and "big brother" mentality will be foisted upon the countries it interacts with.
What Slashdotters see in China is the potential future in store for all of us, and we don't like it one bit. So while the majority of Chinese may not believe in overwhelming censorship, Chinese Government does (and actively pursues) this type of culture, and we will continue to attack it in speech and writing until it stops.
"I may disagree with what you have to say, but I shall defend, to the death, your right to say it." -- Voltaire
Because the Chinese authorities launch a new "sao laji" (clean up garbage) campaign every month. Everyone participates initially, then it is all forgotten until a new campaign arrives. There is no one in charge over the internet in China, but there are different government bodies fighting for the power to regulate. Therefore, it is all a mess, and mostly words without action.
It is mostly status quo, and sometimes expanding, if you ask me.
That people rather attack the Bush administration is because that is so much worse. Restricting of freedoms is to be expected in a dictatorship, but less so in a democracy. Before you know it, China will be freer than America (and already is in many regards).
Even reading this makes me sick. May be that is the reason the details of such incidents are not made public.
/.ers knew, existed in Soviet Russia since 60s. Many people complained, including myself, to people who we trusted, but very few actually went out to the Red Square after Prague spring 1968 was suppressed, went on strike in Novocherkassk in 1962 and were shot to death on the streets by the Soviet army.
Now on more general note:
Chinese society is quite stable and as far as I know the dissidents are minority. And by dissidents I mean people who are ready to do at least little sacrifies in fight for their convictions, not people who grumble about politics to their wives in their kitchens
Same situation, as probably not so many of
The reason for the small number of dissidents is that both Chinese and Russian societies at their respective times were/are relatively stable and pieceful. People had some social security and some level of life was guaranteed by the state for the vast majority of population. Another reason of course was formidable effectiveness of the reppressive state apparatus.
Foreign public opinion had little effect though it was relatively easy to have a radio access to BBC, Voice of America or Radio Liberty. It again comes to bottom line of how much do you want what you do not have and how much you are going to pay to get that.
In Russia most people considered the possibility to freely form multiple parties or criticise authorities not worth the price they would have to pay for that. And the reason for that was that they were relatively fed, relatively clothed, lived in relatively decent homes and even had possibility to freely vent their despise of the government and government officials in their kitchens.
At the absence of any possibility of spiritual education of children that would give them an idea that some human values (dignity, faith) are worth more than their lives they inevitably grew up opportunistic and staunch materialists which is paradoxically (paradaxically, as usual, only on the surface) similar to what we have in US now. Very different paths, quite similar results.
Bottom line:
1. Let Chinese figure out for themselves what do they want and what are they are ready to pay for it. If people have no idea that they are living miserable lives, meaning they are happy with what they have, then what right do we have to impose our view on their life? Let us be more concerned about our own countries (US, in my case). Same applies to any other country, Iraq, Iran, DRNK, etc.
2. If the system works, do not fix it. Chinese country functions quite well (may be too well as far as their Western competitors are concerned?)
3. Your convictions, your ideology are worth the price you are going to pay to get them. The slogans might be "patria o muerte", or "from my cold, dead hands", or "for Lenin, for Stalin, for the great Communist Party" (there is issue of what is brainwashing, what is upbringing and what is legitimate convictions, I am leaving it out for now).
Can you say "laissez faire or death"?
Can you say "I am ready to go to jail for downloading even when the effectiveness of detection of this type of activity will be much higher than now"?
What personal sacrificies are you going to make for your convictions?
Sorry for off-topic.
I do not believe in karma. "Funny"=-6. Do good and forbid evil. Yours, Oft-Offtopic Flamebaiting Troll.
The solution to the problem of Chinese censorship on the Internet is simple enough -- we just make the internet flee China completely. How? [insert evil grin here]
Imagine a botnet, sending out rapid-fire cease-and-desist notices to every site operating in China, informing site owners of out-of-compliace content. Companies will struggle to remove content from the web fast enough to keep up with the vaguely threatening notices. That's the second edge of self-censorship, turned against the people wielding it: the fear of running afoul of the government will cause the mass removal of otherwise non-infringing content and leave the space behind the Great Firewall a vast wasteland.
For bonus points and delicious irony, a Chinese botnet could run this scheme. In fact, if they're monitoring incoming traffic, this may even be necessary.
Note: technically, above I said imagine...
You cannot truly appreciate Dilbert until you read it in the original Klingon.
It's easy, just find out which side is wrong, and kill them.
... in regards to "unhealthy content". Right now personally I am quite effectively battling all the filth that it is there, but I am talking about our kids, naive (in terms of good and evil, but, alas, quite shrewd in they ways of harming themselves) teenagers that they are.
Complete freedom is an easy way to financial success. Once the value of morality relative to value of wealth and other worldy things will start to grow, more and more businessmen will choose self-policing, God willing.
I do not believe in karma. "Funny"=-6. Do good and forbid evil. Yours, Oft-Offtopic Flamebaiting Troll.
Yes, this is what most people don't get about China, simply because they have not visited. The US is very centrally controlled. What is set as policy becomes real.
In China, the government may set policy, or some government organs may set policy, but what is implimented, how it is implemented or wehter it is implimented at all is decided on a lower level or levels.
This can be good or bad depending on the situation, but it does not a horrible autocratic dictatorship make.
Some say he is made with ascii, others that he is eyeballed daily by millions. All we know is, he is known as the Sig
Yes, all comments about China that aren't completely positive are "hate" and "bashing"... it couldn't possibly be because China, as a country, deserves criticism as much as other countries do. No siree, it's all hatin'.
My sig is too lon
Sure. You can go fuck a whore anytime in China without fear for retribution... it is illegal, but openly tolerated.
Try that in the US, and you may be sent to jail for fifteen years, stripped of your political rights (no more voting for Gore!), and also stripped of all your property.
Open up a copy in GIMP and take a close look. Everything up to picture 8 is posed in such a way as to make it look like something's happening (a la the bonzai kittens) but there's no harm whatsoever.
Picture 8 is an obvious fake.
Pictures 9 and 10 (which are the same picture), and picture 11, are inconsistent with picture 8, as well as the previous set of pictures. Picture 11 is such a bad cut/paste job that you don't even have to zoom in to see it for what it is.
This reminds me of the pps that one of my kids forwarded to me that allegedly showed an Iraqi kid having his arm run over by a truck as punishment for stealing a loaf of bread. Spend a few minutes looking closely at the pictures after reading how magicians saw women in half and you'll know what to look for. Another fake, but this time by someone trying to spread disinformation.
Yes, let's have government determine its legislative agenda by urban legends! This could be fun. For one thing, you wouldn't see too many KFCs around (they raise chickens without heads!) and parties will be forbidden, lest you wake up in a bathtub full of ice with a kidney missing. There will also be need for laws against drinking soft drinks out of cans (because of ultra-poisonous substances left on the outside of the can by rats and which could kill you instantly). While we're at it, let's have laws prohibiting the possession of daddy longlegs, because as everyone knows they have the most potent poison in the animal kingdom!
I can't see how such an approach could possibly go wrong!
My sig is too lon
Government Agent 1: *Web browsing for 'bad' content'* Oh look, agent 2.
Government Agent 2: *responds* What did you find?
Government Agent 1: *grinning* A website full of 'bad content' such as documents about the UN bill of rights, contraceptives, atheism, capitalism, GPL software, (CC)'d music, independent blogs with no recognizable identity, and philsophy.
Government Agent 2: *grins as well* Oh yes, we caught ourselves a really bad boy....
What we need to do is get about 20-30 of us on an open source style project (Creative Commons) and create a short clip that will appeal to Joe Sixpack, and educate him on why his freedom is important. Why can't we slashdot start a project to educate our fellow citizens? All Joe Sixpack knows is Fox News and the local newspaper, and most likely doesn't know any better or different. We still have the ability to create free media, and we still have free speech, so lets use it while we still can. Instead of sitting back and bitching on a forum about it, lets create something in a presentable and distributable format that Joe Sixpack can see, and show to all of his friends? I know that 911: Loose Change is spreading, but not fast enough as most Americans don't have time to watch a two hour video, and while it does a good job at LARTing most Americans, some still need more thorough adjustments. After showing my mom the Child Porn Act on slashdot a couple days ago, she stops and thinks, "Wait! I get it! They aren't going to really look for child porn when they do that." My girlfriend, after watching Loose Change still thinks it is OK for the government to view all internet traffic. The point is, the media is a powerful tool that we still have control of, and we need to embrace and implement it for the masses. We already have ourselves convinced, now lets do it to the normals.
Sig: I stole this sig.
Q.How was the chili today?
A. I'd give it one thumb up - the same it gave me.
I lived next to a rep from mainland China for a year. Quiet guy, friendly enough. He was here to sell industrial gloves, etc. I've dealt with other people there, and the one thing that has struck me the most is their earnestnest. Something we seem to have less and less of here.
The idea that the individual is insignificant? The idea that order and obedience are the most important virtues? The idea that forced abortions are OK? The idea that slave labor is OK? I can't wait :(
"A slew of Chinese web portals have pledged to self-police even more, after signing on to a Beijing plan to 'clean up the internet'. Google and MSN have not joined the group."
Time for 50+ posts explaining to us how, if it's not a government doing it, it's not censorship.
Just kidding.
Since you brought up the topic of U.S. government: while we may not have the free and open republic that some claim we have, our government really does respond to pressure from citizens. Usually by jerking their knees, but they do respond. When Chinese citizens protested in Tieneman Square in 1989, what did the government do to change or even acknowledge problems? Nothing. What did the U.S. government do when tens of thousands of U.S. citizens protested over a draconian immigration bill? Our Congressmen stopped what they were doing and started drafting a compromise. While it is a bit of a circus and I doubt they'll implement a good solution, the important point is that they listened. Jintao's government does not.
24 beers in a case, 24 hours in a day. Coincidence? I think not!
Yes, Jintao's government listens, but they are not ready to let go of power.
I think FLG sounds as bat shit crazy as any other religion. We have Mormons, Scientologist, and Christian Scientist who all expose views that in the context of normal modes of thinking are utterly insane and flagrantly self-destructive in some cases.
Hell, even your average and boring vanilla Christian sounds crazy if you were not raised to accept their views as normal. Their religion is built around a Jewish cult leader who they are utterly convinced was killed, was raised from the dead, ascended to a magical utopian paradise with a being of pure love, and they believe that this person will return to Earth brining an apocalypse that will shatter humanity. That is a pretty fucking crazy view to hold if you are not brought up with it.
Further, if you listen to what FLG advocates, what they are doing makes perfect sense. They have done the same thing every other religion has done. They have taken some old religious beliefs (a form of old Chinese mysticism in this case), modified them, and used them to explain the things in this world that they don't understand and don't believe that there is an rational explanation for. In the case of FLG, they have developed a mystical explanation as to why the Chinese government is so brutal, the environment is degrading, and why people don't feel self fulfilled. Is their explanation insane? Sure, it is as insane as any religious explanation. Are the things they are trying to explain insane? Hell no.
In the same way an early Jew or Christian might blame demons, the devil, or God for things that we later have come to accept as having rational scientific explanations, these people have done the same. They worry about government corruption and repression, the degradation of the family, the environment, and the downward spiral that they see humanity in. The only difference between the FLG and any other person who worries about these things is that the FLG have assigned a mystical (aliens in this case) explanation to why things are going as they have.
If you take a step back and replace the word "aliens" with the more familiar "demons", then their beliefs suddenly become absolutely no more crazy sounding then some extreme Christian religions. Arguing that "demons" are ruining the world is hardly a new thought. They have just modernized it by replacing the word "demons" with "aliens".
Look, I am not saying you should go sign up for FLG. They are, in my opinion, utterly insane. That said, they are no more insane then any other religion out there. Just because you and I find their beliefs crazy doesn't mean that their followers should be chased down, imprisoned, repressed, and in some cases murdered by the Chinese government. I don't want to see FLG persecuted any more then I want to see Mormons, Scientologist, and Methodist persecuted.
Further, the actions of the Chinese government just incite these people into believing their dogma. If you held the belief that aliens (replace "aliens" with "demons" if that makes you more comfortable) are corrupting humanity, and suddenly the government starts to brutally repress you despite the fact that FLG is pretty damn peaceful and benign in what it advocates, would that might not affirm your beliefs that aliens/demons are out to get you?
All I see in those searchs are claims and allegations by Falun Gong itself. Though what China is doing with them is despicable, the religion itself is hardly an unbiased commentators with privileged access to such information.
The facts of the matter are that:
Some of the organs China uses for transplantation, and yes, selling, come from executed criminals.
China claims that the criminals gave their consent. However, they have offered little evidence for this. (There is no evidence to the contrary, however.)
Some of the executed criminals are members of Falun Gong.
China isn't chasing Falun Gong members for their sweet, sweet kidneys. What is wrong in all of this is that Falun Gong members have been executed in the first place if they did not commit crimes that deserved execution, or that organs may have been donated without consent. (Some may argue that convicted and executed criminals in fact do not have to right to deny their bodies' use to save the lives of innocent people...) But for some reason, Falun Gong doesn't find the real crime to be interesting enough, but instead spins up this silly emotional excuse.
China does plenty of things wrong. Can't people please align criticism of China more closely to the actual facts, instead of hysterical screaming that only loses them credibility?
And no matter who you choose, there will be more DRM, more anti-terrorist measures (so that they can map you in more detail), and more invasions abroad.
There will be more of the things you consider bad because there are not enough people who agree with you. The government does respond to pressure. The problem is that DRM has no pressure from the masses and so gets no loving. Welcome to democracy.
There is plenty that politicians might love to do but can't because of the pressure of democracy. A draft will not be reinstated no matter how fucked up Iraq looks and no matter how badly politicians want to "fix" it. This will never come to pass simply because advocating a draft would be political suicide.
I am not saying that this is a perfect system by any stretch of the imagination. Democracy is far from an idiot proof system. If your masses are either uneducated, apathetic, or both, then a lot of "bad" things can be pushed through on the basis of pure apathy. What I am saying that unlike the Chinese system, it DOES respond to pressure from the masses. There are some very hard and definite limits on the government of a functional democracy set in place simply because the people will throw your ass out of office if you try to enact certain laws. When the whole country collectively moves in a certain direction, the government is powerless to stop such movement.
9/11 is a perfect example. I don't give a shit what person was elected president, after 9/11 there is not a single US president that could have chosen to NOT invade Afghanistan. The Taliban and Al-Qaeda looked guilty and a super majority of the American people wanted blood. If the president hadn't order an invasion, then congress would have passed a law compelling him to do so. If the president refused to follow such an order, he would have been impeached. If the people really demand something in a unified voice in the US (and most other stable democracies), they get, consequences be damned.
In the end, the government of a democracy truly is powerless against its people. Only apathy, a lack of consensus, and stupidity keep the people from forcing the government to do what they want it to do. When democracies fail to act in the right manner, in the end it is entirely the fault of the people.
Lets play a game. Lets take your sentence and rework it so that it fits every other religion in the world.
He said in the book that everyone's life is in danger and aliens are taking over. Your only way out is to join FLG.
He said in the book that everyone's life is in danger and demons are taking over. Your only way out is to give yourself to Christ.
Wow. A religion promising salvation and making money off of it? Holy shit! This is a revelation (ha ha, get it revelation)! Maybe the Catholics could try this. If they did they could collect enough money to own a sovereign state in the middle of Italy filled with some of the most expensive and extravagant structures in the world... oh wait. They do.
Your arguments against FLG can be made about any religion. You can argue that it is full of shit, it has no proof, they are making money off of people, and brain washing them. That fits the definition of pretty much every single modern religion. I might not fully agree with it, but hunting down, imprisoning, and in some cases killing these people is certainly not the answer. Generally killing someone or making them disappear into the black hole of China's political "judicial" system is not a great quality of life improvement.
And what do you have to do in China to get stripped of your political rights? Oh, right: live there. Prostitution is legal in some places in the US; I'm not aware of a jurisdiction where the customers get 15 years, and stripped of property and political rights.
In any case, while I think charging/paying for sex ought to be left to the two people involved, if I were to list rights in oreder of importance, the right to "fuck a whore" would not exactly be on top. In fact, I think the top would be the right to criticise the government and seek to change it (by peaceful means). That right is the key to all others after all.
In the US, we mostly have that right, so we should be most vigilant, and scream bloddy murder any time someone tries to restrict it even a little bit.
In China, excercising that right will get jailed, shot or just run over by a tank, so anyone who dismisses complaints about the opressive nature of the Chinese government as ignorant bashing is an idiot. An idiot with access to whores, perhaps; but still an idiot.
Ineffective (dare I say corrupt?) enforcemnet of laws whose violation doesn't threaten the government does not strike me as mitigating wholesale oppression of dissidents.
Bullshit. Exercising your rights in the US may also get you jailed, shot, or just run over by a tank, like in the Kent State massacre, or the Newark riots, or... or you may just get killed by a drive-by shooting because some teenagers are having fun, exercising their "right" to bear arms.
And let's not forget that those rights have existed for just a brief time for all citizens in the US. Rosa Parks, anyone? I heard she was just pardoned (!) for her crime to sit at a seat reserved for the White man...
And by the way, you do have the right to criticize the Chinese government and also change it, although the mechanisms are different than what you are used to.
Let me also remind you that the United States have six times as many people incarcerated as China per capita. Based on this fact only, I maintain that there is more freedom in China than in the USA. I have lived in both countries, so I should have a clue about it.
I remember tanning in a park in december in the US (for us Europeans, Arizona is hot enough in December!), only wearing underwear. Of course, the police arrived and threatened me with the death penalty unless I wore clothes. For me, that episode summarizes everything about the USA.
Self-policing is the primary means of censorship in the Chinese media. This bit of news just means that Chinese websites are adopting the same practices as the print media. The new consortium may just be a CYA type move to prevent any one site from being singled out by the government.
In the US, as far as I am aware, in living memory, peaceful protesters have been arested quite a few times, shot once, and never literally run over by tanks.
The Newark Riots were quite a tragedy, though I don't think they qualify as criticising and trying to change the government by peaceful means.
Now, the Kent State massacre is a bit more on point. People peacefully criticising the government were shot and killed. It was a terrible thing. But here's a couple things that strike me about it:
- While the government put under-trained National Guard troops in a position that created the atmosphere in which the shooting occiurred, the shooting was strictly against orders. The governemnt did not authorize it in advance or condone it afterwards.
- The Kent state massacre is the topic of several folk songs, one of which gets regular radio play to this day.
- No one has ever tried to hide it from anyone, indeed, Government funded museums have made documentaries about it.
Would you care to contrast any of this with Tiannamen square?
"...Rosa Parks, anyone? I heard she was just pardoned..."
Where do you get this stuff? The laws in question were invalidated long before I was born. The 'crime' of supporting democracy in China has been punished by death in my childrens lifetime.
"you do have the right to criticize the Chinese government and also change it, although the mechanisms are different than what you are used to."
Ahh! You can critisize the government, just do it in an officailly approved manner. My neighbor has their garage door painted as a great big billboard calling various US government officials murderers and crooks; it's an eyesore, but what you going to do? Think that would fly very long in china?
"Of course, the police arrived and threatened me with the death penalty unless I wore clothes"
But they didn't really, you're exagerating. Maybe they threatened you with a fine, which I'll agree is silly. I know of no jurisdiction in the US where indecent exposure goes beyond a misdemeanor.
In any case, I think you should be able to run around the park naked, sleep with hookers, and sell drugs if you want, and it bugs me that the US is imperfect on these fronts. I'll readily agree you may be more free to do these things in China. I'd rather vote.
"I have lived in both countries, so I should have a clue about it."
I'm sure you enjoyed the whores, how was the voting?
Frankly, how opressive the US is or isn't doesn't strike me as particularly relevant to the question of whether it is mindless china bashing to say the chinese governement are a bunch of totalitarian thugs. Independent of anyone else, strictly on their own merits, the Chinese government are a bunch of totalitarian thugs.
Wax lyrical about the wonderful freedoms in whatever country all you want. If the government can't be voted out, it's bullshit; they're totalitarian thugs.
China's government may be aggressively bullying ISPs into blocking content they don't like their own citizens to read or see, whether it's political or religious or sexual, but they don't seem to have taken any significant action against spammers, either the SMTP senders or especially the Spamvertised Web Sites and phishing sites that suckers respond to. So they're still annoying the rest of the world with their content. Maybe they beat up an occasional spammer in public, but mostly it seems to be left alone.
Bill Stewart
New Fast-Compression-only CPR http://preview.tinyurl.com/dy575ks
Remember David Koresh? You sure showed the American attitude toward cults in Waco, didn't you? Do you think there is any difference between the Branch Davidian and Falun Gong? Read up, boy.
Political prisoners? How about Gitmo? Those prisoners are prisoners of war, but not treated as prisoners of war, being denied their right to an attorney. Or in Abi Grail, the sheer torture has made the world shocked over how brutal the Americans are. They came to Iraq to liberate the people from Saddam's torture, only to continue the torture themselves.
How about the cleaning up of your own TV? Janet Jackson shows a nipple (a fucking nipple!) on TV, and the US goes nuts.
You guys think you are so much better. But why?
I've heard from lots of my friends who have watched this video, and it is indeed real- obviously there would be problems when you are trying to show STILL SCREENSHOTS of a VIDEO, that is supposed to MOVE. Heck, when I try to take a screenshot of a video at the wrong moment, it looks like a bad photoshop job too, so just blame it on ineptitude on the part of the person getting the screenshots. Sorry- it just makes me angry to see that people actually refuse to believe that such a thing could happen, or instantly dismiss such things as fakes without WATCHING the actual video, like a lot of people I knwo have.
OSx86 FTW
Someone was kind enough to forward a copy of the video to me, and its almost 100% certain its a fake. A VERY GOOD (or VERY BAD) fake, but a fake. There wre at least two kittens used. The kitten in the opening sequence is already dead, the head doesn't match up to the body in the sequence where they animate the front paws using a mask and shots from a second cat, there are two "mis-steps" where the kitten supposedly meows in pain even though the heel missed all body parts, and if you take the time to look you'll notice something missing in one shot - it took me 6 viewings to catch it - see if you can find it, they could have stepped 10 feet to the side and had much better lighting (but that would have made the use of props and a mask during editing harder to hide), artifacts that aren't from the video compression process, one section where a vertical stripe of pixels is just plain missing (bad frame-by-frame cut-n-paste?) etc. Still, even crushing a dead kitten underfoot is disgusting enough.
I'm sure that there are a bunch of slashdotters who can do better. And no, this is not a challenge. That's for Farkers :-)
Its like those "Evil Twin" videos that had a cat decapitated by a sun roof ... just sicker.
Now, having said that, it is still VERY disturbing. I woke up this morning and it still bothered me.
Could it happen? Sure - people are sick. Look at what passes for entertainment nowadays. But part of the joy that people get out of doing fake stuff is the knowledge that they've pulled one over. For them, its more of a "high" than if they had done it for real.
Hey, look on the bright side - we're overdue for another asteroid strike, and maybe some other, more worthy, creature will take our place. Maybe descendants of cats (though I would prefer dogs or bears :-)