Libya Warns Against Use of Facebook

An anonymous reader writes "Many Libyan Internet activists have declared their support for the pro-democracy movements and revolutions in the Middle East. After seeing the power of the people succeed in Tunisia and Egypt, they created groups on Facebook to call for political and economic reforms in Libya. Libya's dictator, Muammar Gaddafi, has responded by warning against the use of Facebook."

Comments

There are many reasons to beware of Facebook.

[Kenja]

But this isn't one of them.

Re:There are many reasons to beware of Facebook.

[Anonymous Coward]

The printing press was not good for authoritarians. Neither is online collaboration.

Re:There are many reasons to beware of Facebook.

[ElectricTurtle]

I think you wildly conflate "support" with "acquiescence". A dictator can maintain power so long as the majority would rather not act against him. They don't have to like, let alone act positively toward, that administration.

Re:There are many reasons to beware of Facebook.

[FuckingNickName]

Unfortunately so. Just as today, capitalism is the will of the majority (sell what enough people want), and poverty is the method of purging the undesirables - whether by keeping them wage slaves or simply letting them die off through lack of good security and healthcare. It's not that there are alternatives - the outcome is inevitable, whatever label you put on your political or economic system.

Re:There are many reasons to beware of Facebook.

[FuckingNickName]

No, I'm not saying anyone "deserves" a dictator - I'm saying that the existence of a dictator/regime implies popular support for the dictator/regime. This doesn't mean the whole country supports the dictator; it may even be that the majority would prefer something different if it were presented to them but lack the imagination to think it up themselves (this is why propaganda is such an effective tool, both from within and without).

Here we go again

[Lyrata]

Help, help, I'm being repressed!

Re:Here we go again

[Anonymous Coward]

LIKE!

Then Warn Against the Internet!

[BoRegardless]

The "old guard" has no clue. Stiffling communication today will not work much longer.

The free information exchange makes people want to be free.

Re:Then Warn Against the Internet!

[LWATCDR]

I wouldn't bet on that. You sure do not hear about any protests in North Korea.
I fear that the dictators of the world have learned well from this. If you are going to be a dictator be a brutal ruthless dictator. Watch the news and will see that now when protesters show up tanks will too and not a show of force but as brutal force.
It is easy to talk about an uncrushable human spirit when you do not have a tank crushing your, your wife's, and or you children's bodies. Yep the old guard has learned well. No half measures anymore. If you are going to rule then rule with a brutal iron fist. Welcome to the world of unintended consequences. The results of the Internet revolution may be getting ride of the just moderately bad dictators but creating more really brutal ones.
BTW just to be clear I REALLY HOPE I TURN OUT TO BE WRONG.

Re:Then Warn Against the Internet!

[Turn-X Alphonse]

People don't want to be free, they want the illusion of freedom while being kept safe, The Internet isn't making people want freedom, it's showing them behind the curtain and the corruption there.

Re:just how many ways DOES he spell his name?

[Locke2005]

I believe HE spells it in Arabic script. All of your examples are attempts to phonetically spell it with Latin characters.