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US Plunges To 46th In World Press Freedom Index

Posted by samzenpus on from the out-of-the-medals dept.

schwit1 writes "Reporters Without Borders puts out their Press Freedom Index every year, and the 2014 ranking came out today. It was not a good showing for the U.S. Specifically, the U.S. registered one of the steepest falls of all nations, down 13 slots to the #46 position, just above Haiti and just below Romania."

9 of 357 comments (clear)

  1. We're the best country in the world!!! Woo!! by erroneus · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Free nation! Under God! Best thing since apple pie.

    The US has really fallen from its optimistic condition so many decades ago. And that failure is not the worst thing about it. It's the fact that no one in the US seems to care.

    1. Re:We're the best country in the world!!! Woo!! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

      The do care. They want the government to arrest the journalists that reported this.

    2. Re:We're the best country in the world!!! Woo!! by StripedCow · · Score: 5, Funny

      The US, land of the free! (*)

      (*) applies iff you are the CEO of a MegaCorp.

      --
      If Pandora's box is destined to be opened, *I* want to be the one to open it.
    3. Re:We're the best country in the world!!! Woo!! by jellomizer · · Score: 5, Insightful

      We can't have Land of the Free OR Home of the brave.

      Because we are afraid of everything, we have elected to give up our freedom in trade of safety.

      After 9/11 there was little talk about this attacks being the price we may pay to live in a free society, and more talks about how to stop it again. Then we complained how these people were even allowed on the plane before, because of lack of proper intelligence.

      After the Boston Marathon Bombing, citizens gladly sacrificed their freedom and locked themselves at home until the bomber was caught. Then we complained left and right how we could have let these minor hints get us by and let these people back into the us.

      We Cannot live in a free society when we are afraid of the bad man getting us. To live in a free society we need to stand up and face these problems even if it means our death.

      --
      If something is so important that you feel the need to post it on the internet... It probably isn't that important.
    4. Re:We're the best country in the world!!! Woo!! by circletimessquare · · Score: 5, Insightful

      you act like racism and bigotry don't exist, and it's just a ploy to smear people

      that's some convoluted psychological denial going on there

      --
      intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it or sabotage it
  2. Re:How does press freedom drop because of leaks? by davecb · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Press freedom's drop was noticed because of Manning and Snowdon: now American-born reporters are afraid to come home. They've been threatened with both criminal charges and extrajudicial punishment for publishing the leaks. Net result? They get published in the UK.

    --
    davecb@spamcop.net
  3. Not to defend America or anything, by hey! · · Score: 5, Insightful

    but this is just a rank based on a number calculated according to an arbitrary weighting of factors. It is possible that the rank drop of the US might have been less had the factors used in calculating the score been weighted differently, or the cases used to arrive at the score been characterized somewhat differently.

    For example, the score weights "Pluralism" twice as much as "self-censorship" and four times as much as "transparency". Why? Can such things be weighted precisely at all?

    The scores for these factors are likewise arbitrarily scaled numbers in the range 0-100. The ranking of each country is a linear combination of non-parametric factors; as such the rank on such a score is so arbitrary as to be practically meaningless, or at best very imprecise.

    I think such a score might have some value in comparing a country's performance to its prior performance, or even to compare progress made in one country vs. another -- provided it is taken with a large grain of salt. But the nature of the score is such that very little can be inferred about country A vs. country B based on their relative ranks.

    As a liberal geek I'm all up for harsh criticism of America as a nascent plutocracy, but this particular story is just manufactured controversy.

    --
    Post may contain irony: discontinue use if experiencing mood swings, nausea or elevated blood pressure.
  4. Re:No... their stats suck by Chan+Jav · · Score: 5, Informative

    Think for yourself, but have a look here.

    Their statistics suck, even if their principles are sound.

    Let us look at the last few years worth of rankings
    2002 17th
    2003 31st
    2004 22nd
    2005 44th
    2006 53rd
    2007 48th
    2008 36th
    2009 20th
    2010 20th
    2011-12 47th
    2013 32nd
    2014 46th

    Seems like a yo-yo, maybe this index is more about creating headlines than true measure. Please do reference the On The Media story linked above.

  5. Re:How does press freedom drop because of leaks? by CanHasDIY · · Score: 5, Insightful

    None of which will happen under the current government.

    How on earth can you KNOW that he would be unfairly treated?

    You mean, aside from the existence of Gitmo, the repeated threats of death from various US officials, and the treatment Bradley/Chelsea Manning received when he/she was suspected of whistle-blowing?

    --
    An enigma, wrapped in a riddle, shrouded in bacon and cheese