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Journalist Burned Alive In India For Facebook Post Exposing Corruption
arnott writes: Journalist Jagendra Singh used a Facebook page to expose corruption in the state of Uttar Pradesh in India. Though he posted under a pseudonym, he was quickly found and burned alive by police, allegedly on the order of the minister accused. He died a week later from his injuries. This is not the first case of a journalist being attacked in this state. Amnesty International had urged the local government to launch an official investigation, and now five policemen and a politician have been brought up on murder charges. What can Facebook or other companies do to help these journalists report on corruption in a safe manner?
Perhaps India should look into the US 2nd amendment. Moral majority prefer better living conditions for everyone, corruption apposes that, be messy but the smart money is on the masses.
It's not up to Facebook to do anything, other than comply with the applicable laws of the country they're located in. If the company inserted itself into a local and controversial political problem, then it could be putting its own employees at risk.
Breaking news: Organized crime runs the world.
“He’s not deformed, he’s just drunk!”
This is exactly why strong encryption is a non-negotiable right. Without it, you'll be killed for your words, opinions and beliefs.
A journalist who thought that he would be anonymous on Facebook? Really? His intentions may have been good, but I'm inclined to doubt his perspicacity.
Oh, I'm sorry sir, I thought you were referring to me, Mr. Wensleydale.
Indias legal excecutive is basically "Judge Dredd" in real-life. Courts are so behind, murder investigations and convictions can take up to 25 years before even starting. The police solve this on their own to maintain order by staging "encounters" for people who've killed more than once. They basically find you, arrest you for something petty they can pin on you and then shoot you for resisting/trying to flee.
With such factually absolute powers for the police, they're bound to turn corrupt.
I'd say it's no surprise that in such a system an exposure of police corruption get's you killed mafia style.
We suffer more in our imagination than in reality. - Seneca
Wow, that didn't long for the irrelevant anti-US swipe, just 5 posts. This has jack-squat to do with the US, you know. Isn't this brown-skinned people oppressing other brown-skinned people? Can't deal with that truth though, so let's make an obligatory mention of the "evil" US.. And if you'd care to look at real statistics, cops don't routinely kill "innocent" people; incidents have occurred, yes, but it's certainly not a matter of policy or even general practice. The media might have you think otherwise, but they promote the hell out of sensational dirt, it's good for their bottom line, which is all they really care about.
Look back up at my post, now look back down, you're on the Internet. Now look back up. I'm a signature.
...What can Facebook or other companies do to help these journalists report on corruption in a safe manner?...
For starters, they need to want to do something to help. Just because someone happens to post on a Facebook webpage, does that put the onus on Facebook automatically to protect that journalist? Probably not.
.
So it then comes down to Facebook actively wanting to provide such a mechanism for journalists.
Will Facebook want to do that?
Probably not, as Facebook appears to be more interested in tracking people than providing posting sanctuaries for journalists.
Even though he went by an alias on Facebook, he did post his own picture on the account. I don't think he was even seriously trying to conceal who he was; he probably didn't expect the corrupt official to take such a drastic step. Given that case, there's nothing that Facebook can do in this kind of situation.
Should add... if you actually read the article, the "pseudonym" he was posting under was nothing more than the title of "Shahjahanpur (City) News" with his photograph right there on it. He just setup a second Facebook account act as a news feed.
Plus there's murder charges in this case in India...
Do not look into laser with remaining eye.
Exactly this. Facebook - and other websites with "real name" policies - hardly seem the place to post anonymously. Want to post anonymously for free? Set up a Wordpress.com site under a pseudonym and post there. You can even share it on Twitter under a pseudonym account. Will it be impossible for people to find out who you are and where you live? Of course not, but if you do it right, it should be much harder to track than Facebook.
I found his FB page and it not only shows his photo, but lists his name (Jagendra Singh) right in the header. If that's anonymous than my Slashdot username is anonymous as well!
My sci-fi novel, Ghost Thief, is now available from Amazon.com.
If you're not very careful with your security, you might get burned.
Don't waste your vote! Vote for whoever you want, unless you live in a swing state it won't matter anyways
Not sure why I was down voted. Many American companies rely on people from oppressed societies to make profit. If we allow them to look the other way and pretend they are not associated with these governments, then we will soon be like them.
Laws are rules for the court, but merely a bottom bar to hit for life. Think beyond laws in your actions always.
Try that shit in the US where I have multiple concealed weapons. They try jumping me on the street because they didn't like my Facebook post, they're taking bullets to the head. I'm fairly certain guns are practically banned in most of India and this is probably why. They want only the rich and corrupt in power to have guns.
No, the evidence (number of live human burnings) simply has little to no correlation with gun rights, or lack thereof. It certainly does not provide evidence against gun rights.
All my liberal friends think I'm a conservative, all my conservative friends think I'm a liberal.
I found his Facebook page. Not only did he have his photo, but his full name on the page as well. If posting under your real name counts as a pseudonym, then I guess I'm posting under a pseudonym as well. *sits back confident that nobody will EVER guess my real name*
My sci-fi novel, Ghost Thief, is now available from Amazon.com.
Surely there could have been smarter ways to go about this than further solidifying the point that he was making...
Bing, there it is, the $10 "cognitive dissonance".. that didn't take long either. We're on a roll today.
Better question: how often do we have to see irrelevant posts that serve only to promote a poster's favorite hate obsession? Simply put, this happened in India, not the US. It would seem all roads of negativity lead back to the US. It gets old, that's all.
Look back up at my post, now look back down, you're on the Internet. Now look back up. I'm a signature.
Facebook has a policy against creating fake accounts or using false information.
Not saying this journalist should have regarded Facebook's policies as more important than his own security, but Facebook is not a platform for anonymity and I doubt even incidents like this will change their mind. It will probably just result in being told "then don't use Facebook for that purpose".
All my liberal friends think I'm a conservative, all my conservative friends think I'm a liberal.
Nothing.
It is up to local checks and balances to meaningfully protect their journalists and combat corruption in whatever form it may take. And, let there be a local population that will take a stand for such measures rather than appeal to the corporation.
If a system requires the brutality and death of journalist or more open-speaking critics so that checks and balances occur, that is more a question of how local governments of those systems can improve in meaningful ways.
If Facebook or any other corporation do take measures, even while appearing to protect journalists, it may also create an element of noise wherein the voices and opinions being expressed may become suppressed or unheard.
Furthermore, while trying to protect freedom of speech or press, we all may see such measures as acceptable, but when faced with court orders to lift anonymity in face of copyright or some other investigative effort... Let's say that there are some amongst us that just won't care about journalists as much as their bottom line.
The problem is to broad for corporate policy to adequately address.
Why is it Facebook's responsibility?
That's unheard of!
http://www.damninteresting.com...
Unless you count the thousands of still-living people there that have been declared legally dead by bribed public officials and stripped of their property.
There's nothing Facebook can do. There were probably only maybe 5 people who were capable of posting what he posted and "they" probably already knew about all of them and just narrowed it down to this guy somehow (or maybe the killed the others as well.)
It's like if your wife posts something under a pseudonym exposing your habit of leaving your socks on the floor.
Russia had gun control when Stalin was busy killing off - what? 20 million people?
China had gun control while it experienced it's revolution, also while it suffered the Japanese occupation, and during the time the Communists were killing off yet more millions.
Hitler enjoyed the benefit of gun control laws.
Pol Pot didn't have to worry about an armed citizenry.
I think the numbers support the necessity of gun rights. The difference between a free man and a slave is the right to bear arms.
"Windows is like the faint smell of piss in a subway: it's there, and there's nothing you can do about it." - Charlie Br
It seems like people in India like to set people on fire. Mostly women though
I specifically said "both literally and financially". If a woman drugs and rapes her husband - literally - and he calls the police, they will do absolutely nothing (well, besides laugh at him).
"The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants." ~Thomas Jefferson
Actually - yes I am. I watch people avoiding the police. I watch people saying "Yes sir" and "No sir" to the police. I watch people groveling in front of the police.
I address police in one way, and one way only. I address them as equals. I am a free man. Cop says "Stop!" I say, "What for?"
Delusional, you say? The numbers support my view. The cops don't come out into the rural parts of the country, and throw concussion grenades into cribs, killing little babies. They only do that in the cities, where hoplophobes have passed laws prohibiting peole from having weapons of their own. Tamir Rice wasn't executed in rural Kentucky, or Arkansas, or Texas. He was executed in a liberal stronghold, Cleveland, Ohio.
Delusional. Liberal gun control policies are most definitely a failure in the United States of America. Do a Google search for US cities with the highest crime and highest murder rates. All of them have very strict gun control laws.
"Windows is like the faint smell of piss in a subway: it's there, and there's nothing you can do about it." - Charlie Br
A corrupt official, or just a fan of Game of Thrones?
Troll is not a replacement for I disagree.
"innocent" being Aryan-code for "white".
Drones and tanks haven't really stopped ISIS or insurgencies.
And you can't use a nuke on your own cities. It's too indiscriminate to be effective and wrecks your own country.
An armed population can certainly take on the US military in sufficient numbers. The question isn't whether it is possible to take on the government, it is whether that possibility is worth the risk of more dangerous situations with more weapons out there.
Actually, over the long run, the danger of more weapons actually may be safer than the ability for governments to take complete control. Yes, you have school shootings and such, but the real megadeath inducing situations are generally created in response to highly centralized states run by a small junta who is able to keep effective control of their population, despite trampling on them. While you can argue that oligarchies are running the US now, even those oligarchies couldn't keep us in Iraq for any extended period of time, even though it was probably the right thing to do in the circumstances. A small group with full control of the US could easily become an imperialist nightmare that makes our past imperialist exploits look like child's play.
Guns aren't safe. They're just better than the alternative in the long run.
Make a little plan Sam. Seriously one needs to get out of the place before releasing a report. Encrypt it and send it into a trusted nation . Destroy any materials that you have in hand and take a long vacation to the elsewhere.
Facebook could make sure all of your personal information is kept very safe and confidential, and only made available to anyone who claims to be an advertiser wanting to 'target' you.
I'll see your senator, and I'll raise you two judges.
Just what they're doing now - serving as the medium for conscientious journalists and other concerned individuals to publish accounts of the bullshit going on in their corner of the world. Anonymity is tough, but it can be attained for such purposes. Such techniques should not be the responsibility of Facebook. And yes, anonymity tends to dampen credibility, so there's a balancing act to be performed if one wants to avoid the violent response of the corrupt little men being exposed, but let us give thanks that there there are those willing to take such risks for the sake of truth.
It isn't a matter of how important the journalist thinks FB's policies are, it is a matter of him posting in a place and in a manner that would give away his identity when he has no reason to believe that they wouldn't.
Facebook makes no claims to protect users from being discovered. Quite the opposite, really. They are very upfront about the fact that they want you to be identifiable.
I can only believe that this journalist either was unaware that it would go this far, or that he was willing to risk his life to make sure it got to a larger audience. He may have believed that he'd piss them off, but just have normal harassment, which may have been an acceptable cost for him to improve his standing as a journalist and the visibility of his story.
When Stalin ruled the soviet union (20 million people is a figure vastly overblown by the way, otherwise USSR would have been depopulated after that and WW2) Soviet citizens actually were armed to the teeth due to a civil war that only ended in in early 1920ies and widespread hunting.
Same in Germany, Hitler came to power in 1933, but his gun control law (which, by the way, was not vectored against ordinary citizens but jews and dissidents) only was introduced in 1938. Funny fact, Hitler's supporters back then in the late 1920ies and early 1930ies were Freikorps- private heavily armed (thanks to very liberal firearm laws in Weimar republic) paramilitary units. With sane gun control laws Hitler never would have been able to seize power. Thank you, gun nuts.
"It's such a fine line between stupid and clever" -- David St. Hubbins, Spinal Tap
She got the goldmine, I got the shaft...
Gun control is gun control. Some of what you state is true, while some of it is just so much spin.
http://www.nationalreview.com/...
"In 1931, Weimar authorities discovered plans for a Nazi takeover in which Jews would be denied food and persons refusing to surrender their guns within 24 hours would be executed. They were written by Werner Best, a future Gestapo official. In reaction to such threats, the government authorized the registration of all firearms and the confiscation thereof, if required for “public safety.” The interior minister warned that the records must not fall into the hands of any extremist group."
So, yes, the Weimar Republic did indeed pass the laws which made it possible for criminals to threaten and intimidate law abiding citizens.
"In 1933, the ultimate extremist group, led by Adolf Hitler, seized power and used the records to identify, disarm, and attack political opponents and Jews. "
Hitler's party took full advantage of not only a generally disarmed citizenry, but he also took full advantage of the database to identify his potential opponents.
The Republic committed the initial evil, and Hitler simply built upon that evil. The end result being, gun control is demonstrably WRONG!
"Windows is like the faint smell of piss in a subway: it's there, and there's nothing you can do about it." - Charlie Br
Wow, that didn't long for the irrelevant anti-US swipe, just 5 posts. This has jack-squat to do with the US, you know. Isn't this brown-skinned people oppressing other brown-skinned people? Can't deal with that truth though, so let's make an obligatory mention of the "evil" US.. And if you'd care to look at real statistics, cops don't routinely kill "innocent" people; incidents have occurred, yes, but it's certainly not a matter of policy or even general practice. The media might have you think otherwise, but they promote the hell out of sensational dirt, it's good for their bottom line, which is all they really care about.
0. Concur OP was kinda ridiculous.
1. The US has brown-skinned people too.
2. Concur that killing innocent people isn't a matter of policy, but it is much less clear how routine or common it may be. A part of that is statistics (routine across a lots of cops each day, so not routine for individual cops) and a part is obscured by the playbook (a culture which hates a cop who doesn't back up another cop, unions which care more about defending their members than about whether their members are murderers, and the press double-standard of releasing the record of praising or defending the cop while condemning the dead and noting all of the dead's criminal history.
3. Fundamental problem is the lack of good whistleblower channels and protections. Those are missing in the United States the same way they are missing in India.
Do you understand that the entire point of "gun control" means removing them from the police too (excepting rare circumstance).
Thought not.
+----------------- | What is the question!
...government in US kill people in their homeland (cops killing innocent people)...
If you think this is any sort of "official policy", even remotely, a simple google search will correct that ignorance.
...as well as abroad (bombing Middle East).
Well, the terrorists were targeting the US; now they are targeting each other. Not ideal, but, hey, they need to kill somebody!
to sum up! ...
You are silly.
- X/Y -
When Stalin ruled the soviet union (20 million people is a figure vastly overblown by the way, otherwise USSR would have been depopulated after that and WW2) Soviet citizens actually were armed to the teeth due to a civil war that only ended in in early 1920ies and widespread hunting.
http://istmat.info/node/31996
Actually - yes I am. I watch people avoiding the police. I watch people saying "Yes sir" and "No sir" to the police. I watch people groveling in front of the police.
I address police in one way, and one way only. I address them as equals. I am a free man. Cop says "Stop!" I say, "What for?"
Let me guess. You're a white guy.
Uh huh. Right.
Your just another idiotic American gun nut. We who live in places where idiots aren't armed pity your delusions.
You really have no clue what the fuck you're talking about. It sounds like you're referring to the recent incident in Georgia, but somehow assumed it was in Atlanta instead of rural north Georgia where it actually occurred. This article about it even has a depressingly-long list of instances where police used grenades like that, including instances in places like Wyoming and Montana.
The cops are goddamn thugs that are out of control, and encouraging private gun ownership is (part of) the answer, but the idea that rural cops suck any less than urban ones is laughable.
"[Regarding the 'cloud,'] ownership was what made America different than Russia." -- Woz
Is your real name Jason Bourne? Given the moniker you use and all... I am sure that is it!
"So long and thanks for all the fish."
If there's one thing the data has shown us, it's that we're all much safer in an interaction with the police if they honestly believe we might shoot them.
Do you reach into your waistband, just to make sure they know that you're not going to take any crap?
An interesting anagram of "BANACH TARSKI" is "BANACH TARSKI BANACH TARSKI"
Similarly, the people with the highest antibiotic use generally have infections. Therefore, antibiotics cause infections.
"When you have eliminated the unacceptable, whatever is left, however improbable, must be the truthiness" - Holmes
Do some research on WWII for partisans vs. troops. Take a number of brave and determined people with good personal arms. Put them against some badly led, badly equipped, badly trained regulars with poor morale. Watch the army unit win. The modern US Army is well led, well equipped, and well trained, and in an actual battle their morale doesn't matter that much.
Guns are effective for the Army because they have soldiers to wield them.
"When you have eliminated the unacceptable, whatever is left, however improbable, must be the truthiness" - Holmes
Sorry, you are the idiot. The number of 60 million includes WWI, Civil war, Stalinist repressions and WWII. It is right there in the article you cite. Here is the whole excerpt:
Excess deaths over the course of World War I and the Russian Civil War (including the postwar famine) amounted to a combined total of 18 million,[114] some 10 million in the 1930s,[29] and more than 26 million in 1941–5. The postwar Soviet population was 45 to 50 million smaller than it would have been if pre-war demographic growth had continued.[35] According to Catherine Merridale, "... reasonable estimate would place the total number of excess deaths for the whole period somewhere around 60 million."
Also, the population of USSR during Stalinist repressions was below 180 million. Look at the graph they show in the very same Wiki article:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...
Notice that they are at 180 million the 50-ties, while the great Stalinist purge was in the end of the 30-ies.
I do not endorse anything evil done by the fake communists - I am myself from a former communist state. But the amazing BULSHIT that westerners are misled to believe about eastern Europe and USSR are BEYOND imagination. Seriously, get a grip!
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