With Olympics Over, China Re-Censors Internet

eldavojohn writes "We last left the story of Internet censorship in the People's Republic of China when the IOC had reached a deal with the Chinese government whereby some of the press restrictions were lifted. With the 2008 Olympics now but a memory, China has began censoring foreign news sources again. Maybe the West is making too big of a deal over this, as many Chinese citizens seem to like it that way."

Comments

"many Chinese citizens seem to like it that way"

[skgrey]

They don't like it this way, they just know better at this point. It's like hitting a dog with a stick anytime he goes to get a snack from you, eventually he won't go get the snack even if you aren't carrying a stick. The dog learns not to like snacks, because who knows if you are hiding a stick somewhere. It's just safer not to like snacks. The chinese people are tired of being hit with sticks and are afraid. It's fear, plain and simple.

Human Rights

[evanbd]

Maybe the West is making too big of a deal over this, as many Chinese citizens seem to like it that way.

Many US citizens liked slavery, once. And not letting women vote. The fact that only a minority is being oppressed doesn't make it not oppression, and it doesn't make it right.

I'm sorry if it makes you feel awkward to take a stand on basic human rights, but when it comes to issues of rights and ethics, not all viewpoints are equally valid.

Then again, I rather suspect you knew all that. I suppose I've been trolled.

An interesting attitude

[techno-vampire]

In America, people complain when the government starts censoring the news. In Soviet China, people complain when it stops.

Why wouldn't they?

[Anonymous Coward]

As far as most Chinese are concerned their government is great. For more than a decade the average Chinese citizen has seen there lot only improve. Naturally the government there is taking full advantage of this by giving themselves all the credit. Thus to many in China it seems that the government is doing a great job, and who are they to argue with success?

It won't last though. There's a generation of children being born who will take economic prosperity for granted. It's the nature of humanity, and by that same token they'll want more than just that. With economic power in their hands they'll want political power, and that's when the government will be in trouble.

people who prefer censorship

[james_shoemaker]

I have heard people complain about things like spam and porn on the internet and say "Why doesn't the government do something about it". If you frame the question properly in the US I bet you would get a surprising amount of support for government censorship.

They were censoring during the Olympics

[Anonymous Coward]

I was there during the Olympics and had internet access through a residential hookup. There was a lot of censoring going on: for example, URLs containing "blog" were generally not accessible. It was clearly not related to what was on the blog, but a blanket thing.

Re:...as many Chinese citizens seem to like it tha

[genner]

I think it can compare to when you first wake up or come out of a dark area. At first all of the light hurts your eyes and your initial reaction is to shield yourself or go back to the darkness.

So it like that bright shiney thing in the sky. I saw it once. I hate that thing.

Re:The Chinese are ignorant.

[Sinbios]

Uh, tank guy didn't get run over.

Anyway, you have to realize that Chinese values are fundamentally different from your own. "The Right Thing", to you, might mean freedom of expression, the right to bear arms, etc., but that's not true of all people. Here in Canada, we believe The Right Thing is gays should be allowed to marry, and nobody should walk around packin'. In China, people believe The Right Thing is a centralized, stable government.

Personally, I find it easy to understand the sentiments of the people you mentioned who believed Tiananmen was a case of "tough shit", because given China's chaotic political history, especially in the recent past, organized, stable government is a top priority for many people. And you can't blame them, given the shit they had to suffer through with unstable governments. Many people today still remember said shit, and deems it important to pass these values, namely avoiding said shit, down to the next generation. And the protestors were challenging those very values - the main goal behind the protest was further government reforms, and sought to basically remove the Party from power. In essence, completely disrupting the stable government that China had suffered through three or four periods of complete chaos for.

Obviously Westerners, when presented with the two sides, take the side of the idealistic students clamouring for rights and liberty, since you've enjoyed the luxuries of stable government for centuries. I mean, when was the last major revolution in the Western world? The French Revolution? The availability of these luxuries means that you no longer rank them as high as someone who's lived through several turbulent governments would, and instead prioritize further luxuries like the freedoms I mentioned above. Well, when you look at those freedoms from the perspective of someone who just came out of the feudal age, they're really not that essential to life. So you must understand why they don't rank as high on the list of priorities for a Chinese person.

Re:The Chinese are ignorant.

[Sinbios]

"Here in Canada" we have a charter of rights and freedoms, as a matter of fact, which -should- guarantee that every citizen in the country has equal rights and opportunity.

Don't twist my argument. My example was to show that different people in different countries have different moral grounds. Canada happens to have some similar things as the US due to similar culture, and as I said, have some dissimilar things as well. How about I protest your right to have guns?

Some morals go beyond boundaries, they're what join us together as human beings.

Wow, did you just single-handedly settle the absolute morals debate, and expected everyone to just go along with your assertion? The justification is that you believe this to be fact, thus everyone else should too? This is the exact underlying problem I'm attacking.

Secondly I find it absolutely laughable, and perhaps intentionally misleading that you would even -suggest- that the past few centuries have been in any way peaceful for the Western world (of which France is not considered a part, incidentally). Starting from the 18th century (a "few hundred" as you would put it), there have been over 40 major conflicts involving North America, either on its own soil or others (ones that you seem to have conveniently forgotten include both World Wars, the Vietnam and Korean Wars, and a few other blatantly obvious choices). Try reading http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_conflicts_in_North_America to educate yourself, assuming that Wikipedia isn't censored where you live. We have -not- had stable governments for centuries and we've been through our own share of atrocities ("Here in Canada" we also had concentration camps for the Japanese during the second World War, which you also seem to have conveniently forgotten).

You missed my point completely, perhaps intentionally. It was not about peace or conflicts. Internal chaos is not the same as conflict against other countries. Let me simplify:
- Government changes three times in the span of about thirty years, lots of people die, lots of people starve, lots of people homeless, not to mention all the opportunistic warlords making their own landgrab.
- Chinese person: "Shit, this sucks. Let's pick a government and stick with it for a while and trust it to do the right thing."
- After about another forty years of turmoil, things are finally starting to look up.
- Government censorship.
- Westerner: "HOLY FUCK THE GOVERNMENT IS CENSORING SHIT! OUR GOVERNMENT DOESN'T DO THAT, SO THAT AIN'T RIGHT! DOWN WITH THE CHINESE GOVERNMENT!"
- Chinese person: "Well gee, I don't really give a damn about the censored stuff or very explicitly and loudly expressing my ideas about how the government sucks. Also, the economy's booming lately, and changing governments suck. Yay government!

To summarize, your way is not necessarily the best way, even if it is the only way you know. Other people in other countries have had different circumstances and came up with different methods to cope, and developed different value systems as a result. Learn to look at things from a different perspective, and deal with it.

On a kind of related tangent, this is exactly the reason, in my experience, for a lot of Middle- and Far-East resentment against the US. Americans are on this moral high horse and tries to push their own values and standards onto everybody else, which is especially ridiculous considering all the hypocritical bullshit that goes on in America. You know what I'm talking about.

Yes, we do take the side of idealistic students clamouring for rights and liberty, because it's the same thing that we are clamouring for every day.

Clamour in your own country? Fine. That's the value system your society has decided to adopt. Quit judging other countries' value systems.

Freedom