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UN Officials Remove Poster Mentioning Chinese Firewall
At a UN-sponsored Internet Governance Forum in Egypt, anti-censorship group Open Net Initiative was startled by a demand from UN officials to remove a poster mentioning Chinese Net censorship. When ONI refused the request, security personnel arrived and took away the poster. The group was promoting a new book, Access Controlled, a survey of Internet censorship, filtering, and online surveillance. A witness said, "The poster was thrown on the floor and we were told to remove it because of the reference to China and Tibet. We refused, and security guards came and removed it. The incident was witnessed by many." Here is a video of the removal.
The UN would be better than ICANN, right?
Anyone who thinks the U.N. exists in any way to help with human rights is insane. All you have to do is look at the list of nations on the U.S. Human Rights panel...
The U.N. exists to exert and expand U.N. control, wherever possible (just like any large organization, government or otherwise). Helping people is at best a secondary motive and sometimes not even not even a motive at all.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
Yes, I can. Unfortunately, it looks like kdawson can't.
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/d/d2/Internet_blackholes_en.png
The UN prefers the interests of member governments over western ideals? I'm shocked! Shocked!
Seriously, imagine the Republican Party leadership, and/or the Democratic Party leadership, if they never had to stand for elections. How much would they care about our interests? Now, remember that most of the UN doesn't belong to our culture either. Why would a bunch of government employees, mostly from dictatorships of one kind or another, be opposed to censorship?
-- Support a free market in the field of government
from the can-you-spell-hypocricy dept
Well, someone here obviously cannot...
Posted by kdawson on 23:04 15th November, 2009
That explains it, I guess.
The UN was originally the alliance of anti-Nazi powers: US, UK, and USSR. Out of the three, two were western. Now, however, most countries are not western and not interested in becoming western.
I don't see why the US is paying 22% of the costs.
-- Support a free market in the field of government
There are three ways to expand one's power:
1. Convince people to give you power.
2. Trade for it, which requires having something to trade.
3. Use violence or the threat thereof to get people to do what you want.
The UN doesn't have anything useful for #2, and "you and what army" for #3. #1 is the only option left to them, and sovereign nations are not very easy to convince to give up their power (except, maybe, for post-National Europe).
-- Support a free market in the field of government
One need only look at the "aid" money China lavishes on Africa in exchange for sweetheart deals to buy their natural resources to know why this happened.
Is anyone really surprised?
If it exists to exert and expand UN control, it's doing an utterly terrible job of it.
We are all lucky that the natural state of bureaucrats is one of ineptness.
But the U.N. is doing a lot more behind the scenes than you realize, the recent inter-nation secret copyright treaty is one facet of that... people here care a lot about copyright issues which is why you know about it, but how many OTHER similar secret multi-national treaties are being drafted that you and I know nothing about?
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
The video itself was very mild in content. A bunch of people standing around looking at a poster that had been knocked down. But the awful moment came when the guard removed the poster and you can hear people actually clapping. It so reminded me of that quote "So this is how liberty dies, with thunderous applause."
http://www.rootstrikers.org/
The sad part is how well the US and UK have been respecting Citizen rights lately. Maybe the issue is systemic instead of an isolated act of stupidity.
Shh.
"We condemn this undemocratic act of censoring our event just because someone is trying to impress or be in the good graces of the Chinese government.
That's what happens when you owe a lot of money to someone or want some of their money.
Up next: China takes back Taiwan and the US Government does nothing.
Now just remember that when you go to put all those Christmas gifts (Made in China) on your credit card (in a very circuitous route:Financed by China).
Yep! Now who's the Super Power, again?
It's NOT me! It's the meds! I'm on 1000mg of Fukitol.
That the UN itself has become an arm of the chinese government, in censoring anti-censorship advocates.
Prove it.
No, i wasn't kidding. One of the dangers of having governmental entities in control of information, and most of it being recorded only digitally: "facts" are a variable commodity.
---- Booth was a patriot ----
That's not made clear in the article.
Also, it was very odd the way everyone stood around the poster on the floor, not touching it or picking it up, as though it were a diseased, dead body which no one was willing to touch. So they called the police to come an take it away.
Why didn't the folks promoting the book just stand it up again, I wonder?
The closer you are to the code, the happier you are. - Ancient Geek Proverb
When will the rest of the world wake up and realize that China is NOT your friend?
I want to delete my account but Slashdot doesn't allow it.
Is it at all possible that rather than it being "anti-censorship", it was simply that they didn't want someone trying to hawk merchandise? Is it possible that the witness jumped to a conclusion and filled in the details for what he thought was a reason?
I noticed in the video that the room didn't have any other posters advertising anything.
This foolish ideology occasionally conflicts with hard reality: the security forces (of the United Nations) under pressure from the Egyptian people tear down the posters condemning Beijing's censorship of the Internet.
The hard reality says that both Egyptian culture and Chinese culture are inferior to French culture and Germany culture. In Germany and France, freedom of speech is a basic human right. Anyone -- citizen and non-citizen -- in Germany and France is entitled to freedom of speech. If a Chinese agent attempted to tear down similar posters in Germany, the German police would arrest the Chinese nitwit and throw him into prison for a few days.
In China (and Egypt), a nitwit tearing down posters condemning censorship would be praised as a guardian of the "great" Chinese nation, and the brave soul who displayed the poster would be thrown into prison for a few years.
Buddha damn Chinese (and Egyptian) society.
They were. At least if you believe their member states.
To take one example, muslim states never actually signed the human rights declaration, instead they signed a document that's called the "Cairo declaration of human rights in islam" specifying
-> sharia takes precedence over human rights, and the declaration cannot be understood except as a summary of sharia
-> women can not choose whether to marry, nor to whom
-> women are not equal to men, and have "duties" to perform
-> discrimination on the basis of religion is, in fact allowed
-> any action that might in any way convince a muslim to become either atheist or other faith, is punishable by death (yes, might, you read that correctly)
-> muslims have the duty (not the right, the duty) to use any amount of violence if there are any non-muslim members of government
-> any expression of speech that leads to "weakening of faith" is punishable by death, as is anything that could (not would, could) undermine governmental authority
These are the people that have majority in the "human rights council". These are the people Obama wants us to follow.
"We condemn this undemocratic act of censoring our event... "
The UN is a democratic organization and this act of censorship is completely democratic. It's wrong, but democratic.
That should be a lesson to those that confuse freedom and democracy.
This is not feasible. Too much of our food (and opium) comes from the the third world, too many critical minerals come from there, and too much of our sales of arms, pharmaceuticals, entertainment, and other processed goods goes to third world purchasers. And make no mistake, "second world" nations make little pretense of being democratic.
Are you willing to pay twice the current rates for computers because gold and mercury prices used for their manufacture are quadrupled? Even if you're willing, do you think many slashdotters would still be employed in that economy?
Not exactly. The League of Nations disbanded itself in 1946, giving its assets to the UN. The UN itself was first thought out in 1943 in the Tehran conference. It was during WWII, so only the allies were in attendance.
-- Support a free market in the field of government
malls cops won't let you set up a stand in a mall... unless you pay rent and sign an agreement.
Maybe these guys didn't do that.
Someone please explain to me why China is getting treated with kid gloves? Their idea of human rights is atrocious and a billion+ people are living under oppression, with limited to no freedom of speech and no freedom of worship. They look the other way where child labor is concerned, and they have most favored trading partner status with several countries (meaning they pay little to no tariffs while not gtranting those trading partners the same privilege). Why we're in a race with China to the bottom is beyond me.
Okay, well, I do understand that is a few politicians in the industrialized nations with clout who envy the power the elite in China have and desire the middle class to be expunged from existence so that everyone is dependent upon big brother, but how do the politicians in those nations justify their actions when questioned? They certainly won't admit the truth, I'm sure.
The Christian Right is Neither (Christian nor right). See: Matthew 23, Matthew 25, Ezekiel 16:48-50
Everyone knows that FOX news and Rush Limbaugh are to be compared with the National inquirer when it comes to news.
That's roughly accurate, although saying "everybody knows" is silly. Now, do you realize that CNN and MSNBC, and yes, even NPR, are no better? Or do you think they're magically better because they correspond more closely to your beliefs?
I think we offer them some silks in trade for their minerals as a stopgap, build a wonder in a city on the border to make our culture more tempting, and wait for their cities to pledge allegiance to US.
Thanks for the Link to the article.
Maybe you should've also included the following in your "summary":
Don't single out Muslims for this. I am not a muslim, but an evangelical christian, but I do recognise hypocrisy when I see it (usually). Having something in writing (and signed) does not mean that it is being followed. So, as you can see, it seems a lot of muslim countries don't follow their own stated declarations. But, believe it or not, neither some bastions of freedom in the Western World.
An example is the US and their segregation laws which contravened the UN UDHR or South Africa's Apartheid regime which flouted a few provisions. Or maybe the Australian goivernment denying citizenship rights to their indigenous population even after being signatories to the UDHR.
The sad part is it could have prevented WWII, if only the US were to have ratified it and backed it solidly. Instead, we stuck our heads in the sand until half-way through WWII. Sometimes the right thing to do is hard. So we do the wrong thing, promoting/allowing evil, and blame the evil we helped make.
Learn to love Alaska
Is it the custom in the US to use a person's middle name too, or just a way reactionnary focus groups have found to lump to gather Saddam and Obama ?
I'm asking because I only ever saw John McCain, Sarah Palin, Bill Clinton... but I keep seeing Barack Hussein Obama ?
The Cloud - because you don't care if your apps and data are up in the air.
That's roughly accurate, although saying "everybody knows" is silly. Now, do you realize that CNN and MSNBC, and yes, even NPR, are no better? Or do you think they're magically better because they correspond more closely to your beliefs?
With the exception of MSNBC which does have an unabashedly liberal bias in primetime, I'm not aware of either CNN or NPR promoting astroturf political rallies ("tea parties"), orchestrating the crowd. and promoting partisan language. To claim equivalency between Fox News and CNN and NPR just doesn't pass muster. There just never have been any blatant cheerleading on either of those. Complaints of "liberal bias" are limited to such wishy washy statement like "Postcards from Buster" having the audacity to show a lesbian family without commentary, the there being too many blue muppets on Sesame Street. Even a 2003 poll on perceived bias PBS revealed that only about 1 in 5 thought there was a liberal bias, lower than other networks or CNN. The only difference being that a third of Republicans thought there was a bias, versus 10% of Democrats.
The complaints of "liberal bias" against the mainstream media, have always been a canard. Rich Bond, 1992 chair of the Republican Party, said in an interview "There is some strategy to it [bashing the 'liberal' media]. If you watch any great coach, what they try to do is 'work the refs.' Maybe the ref will cut you a little slack on the next one." In 1996, Bill Kristol said, "I admit it. The liberal media were never that powerful, and the whole thing was often used as an excuse by conservatives for conservative failures."
A few years ago, as a student, I got to go visit the UN's Geneva campus, sponsored by one of the various non-governmental organizations (NGOs) that has a presence at the UN. While I was there, I got to go sit in on one of the meetings regarding the formation of the Human Rights Commission. (Committee? Council? I can't remember.) During the meeting, representatives from one of the other NGOs in attendance started to hand out flyers encouraging action in Darfur.
The representative from Sudan was not pleased with this, to say the least, and demanded they cease distributing the flyers. The NGO in question was informed that they were not to do that, and that they'd be removed if they continued to do so.
The UN is a farce when it comes to doing anything useful about human rights.
I smell bullshit. Let's take a closer look at that document shall we?
-> sharia takes precedence over human rights, and the declaration cannot be understood except as a summary of sharia
Wrong. It actually states that such rights are integral to Islam and the document is in accordance with Shaira, not that Shaira takes precedence or that it is a mere summary.
-> women can not choose whether to marry, nor to whom
Wrong. Nowhere does it state this, though it does state "Men and women have the right to marriage, and no restrictions stemming from race, colour or nationality shall prevent them from enjoying this right."
-> women are not equal to men, and have "duties" to perform
Possibly. Article 6(a): "Woman is equal to man in human dignity, and has rights to enjoy as well as duties to perform; she has her own civil entity and financial independence, and the right to retain her name and lineage." You are wrong on equality not being mentioned, but right on the duties, but to be fair men are tasked with duties too.
-> discrimination on the basis of religion is, in fact allowed
Wrong. From Article 1(a): "All men are equal in terms of basic human dignity and basic obligations and responsibilities, without any discrimination on the grounds of race, colour, language, sex, religious belief, political affiliation, social status or other considerations."
-> any action that might in any way convince a muslim to become either atheist or other faith, is punishable by death (yes, might, you read that correctly)
Possibly. Article 10: "Islam is the religion of unspoiled nature. It is prohibited to exercise any form of compulsion on man or to exploit his poverty or ignorance in order to convert him to another religion or to atheism." It mentions a prohibition, not a death sentence.
-> muslims have the duty (not the right, the duty) to use any amount of violence if there are any non-muslim members of government
Wrong. I'm not sure where you get this from. The closest is Article 23(b): "Everyone shall have the right to participate, directly or indirectly in the administration of his country's public affairs. He shall also have the right to assume public office in accordance with the provisions of Shari'ah." Was this what you meant? Where is the duty to violence?
-> any expression of speech that leads to "weakening of faith" is punishable by death, as is anything that could (not would, could) undermine governmental authority
Wrong. From the quote I assume you mean Article 22(c): "Information is a vital necessity to society. It may not be exploited or misused in such a way as may violate sanctities and the dignity of Prophets, undermine moral and ethical values or disintegrate, corrupt or harm society or weaken its faith. " Nothing there about death or governmental authority.
So I think I'll call this myth busted. Try reading something before spouting off hyperbole about it.
Now, do you realize that CNN and MSNBC, and yes, even NPR, are no better?
I would disagree with that, though 'better' does not mean good. They're better in the sense that breaking your arm is better than breaking your spine.
William of Ockham had no beard. The most likely explanation is that it was chewed off by squirrels every morning.
Everyone knows that FOX news and Rush Limbaugh are to be compared with the National inquirer when it comes to news.
That's roughly accurate, although saying "everybody knows" is silly. Now, do you realize that CNN and MSNBC, and yes, even NPR, are no better? Or do you think they're magically better because they correspond more closely to your beliefs?
Well, at least CNN and MSNBC don't just flat-out lie about the facts, report their own talking-heads points of view as news, or copy any political party's press releases as their own news reports the way Fox News does. From the looks of it, quite frankly, you'd think that Olbermann's and Maddow's teams do better fact checking than the Fox News newsroom does. Either that or Fox News newsroom simply ignore the results of their fact checking when it doesn't support the story they want to run, which quite often seems to be the case when they report on politics. Incompetents or liars, that's Fox News, take your pick.
My sig will be released in 2015 third quarter. Rating pending.
Even in US school speech is restricted to whatever the school want to restrict it to. One can argue to infinity whether freedom of speech should be universal and unrestricted , but it is NOT unbound. There are many example of restricted material of speech even in the US (try showing a boobs or yelling bad words in prime time). In France there is a law which say that school are SECULAR and no proselythism should be done. Whatever I always thought this was a very very good law.
And in France at least, there is an unspoken understanding between the press and the government. You don't say anything to embarrass government officials, and you get to keep your job.That is absolutely not true. So many scandal come out because PART of the press is not behold to their "master". That you do not read them or know them do not mean they do not exists. One such example I would citate is the "Canard enchainé" which poo-poo rightist, leftist, and centrist and do not mind earthing up scandal. Also Le monde at its time also unearthed a few political scandal. And a few other on TV radio I forget.
By the way, I know this because I'm French, I was born in France, and I've lived part of my life in France. Except that you are not right, and I am a french, I have lived there 25+ years. The only point where you are right is that we do not have "freedom of speech" as open and unbound as the US, but we *DO* have a liberty of expression.
C. Sagan : A demon haunted world:
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0345409469/
visit randi.org
This is not feasible. Too much of our food (and opium) comes from the the third world
The USA has enough food to feed itself. Europe's problem is Europe's.
This is my sig.