China Wants US-Owned Hotels to Censor Internet 279
jp_papin writes "The Chinese government is demanding that US-owned hotels there filter Internet service during the upcoming Olympic Games in Beijing, US Senator Sam Brownback has alleged. The Chinese government is requiring US-owned hotels to install Internet filters to 'monitor and restrict information coming in and out of China,' Brownback said Thursday. 'This is an insult to the spirit of the games and an affront to American businesses,' he said. 'I call on China to immediately rescind this demand.' US State Department spokesman Tom Casey said he wasn't aware of those specific requests from the Chinese government, but Brownback said he got the information on Internet filtering from 'two different reliable but confidential sources.' The State Department is apparently continuing dialog with China about freedom of expression."
Why not pull out our athletes until... (Score:5, Interesting)
Fuck that Censorshit!
I'll take good old US Style Blanket Surveillance any-day!
Thanks AT&T! For keeping us safe by spying on us for the Bush Gang -- even if it is completely unlawful to do so!
Re:China wants hotels in China to follow Chinese L (Score:5, Interesting)
Hell, a lot of hotels in the U.S. aren't even owned by U.S. companies, their owned by the Japanese. That's true, at least, of every single hotel in Hawaii.
Of course we expect these hotels to operate in accordance with U.S. law. Of course, the thing is that the Japanese tend to always seek excellenece in their endeavors -- and, in their view, excellence includes strict compliance with the law.
OTOH, many hotels owned by American companies and individuals don't operate in accordance with U.S. law -- cleanliness standards that aren't up to state and federal health codes, employing undocumented workers as housekeeping staff.
So uhh...what is it they're screaming and handwaving about again?
Newsflash! (Score:5, Interesting)
Don't like it? Your options are:
1. Don't do business there.
2. Ask them to change their laws. Good luck with that.
3. The Iraq thing. Good luck with that too.
A hotel is not an embassy; Chinese law applies within its walls.
Re:seriously... (Score:3, Interesting)
IOC is not US or "any other freedom loving person" (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:skeptical (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Following Chinese laws on Chinese soil? (Score:2, Interesting)
Next you're going to tell me that American citizens have their right to bear arms violated when they're in Europe.
You know, a guy called Timothy McVeigh spent three months complaining about that very issue across Usenet. See the thread 'No rights in the UK' on DejaNews. The thread only ended when he murdered two hundred people in the OKC bombing.
Yes, Americans do sometimes have some pretty weird ideas about foreign countries. China is no longer Maoist, arguably it is no longer communist according to any recognizable Marxist doctrine. But it is still a dictatorship. In political terms it is essentially on a par with Chile, the Philippines, or whathave you during the Nixon era military Juntas.
We now know that the US right greatly overestimated the threat from Communism. The communists never had the ability, still less the intention of expanding into Western Europe. The cold war was fought for domestic reasons, they had to have an enemy to point to. When the cold war ended they decided Islamic terror would be the next big thing. That is why they didn't want to eliminate Bin Laden, Regan made that mistake with the Communists. The invasion of Iraq was not a distraction from tackling Bin Laden, it was to cover up the fact that they want him alive and killing as long as possible.
In the process they made two major blunders. The first was that the invasion of Iraq led to the rise of Iran as the dominant regional superpower, a rise that was both predictable and predicted. The second that Bush turned out to have read Putin completely wrong.
Re:China wants hotels in China to follow Chinese L (Score:3, Interesting)
To be honest they should just wait until the games begin, then censor everyone themselves. Which they already can and do.
We'll censor our athletes, cause we're helpful like that. And we don't want any ungrateful comments about that smog, making us seem like bad losers. (Us being the UK)
Re:China wants hotels in China to follow Chinese L (Score:3, Interesting)
Unless these hotels are buying direct connections to a provider outside of China (and why would they?), they are already behind the Chinese Great Firewall and subject to its filtering.
Conversely, for China to honor its agreement about allowing unfettered Internet access during the Olympics, they will need to open up the wall for these hotels.
The Media Should Boycott the Olympics (Score:3, Interesting)
Getting rid of a totalitarian government ... (Score:2, Interesting)
When I was a child in 80's, we had communism here in Poland. There were bad times in terms of both freedoms and economy (virtually everything was limited - including such basic products as butter, sugar or milk) - there was nearly nothing in stores and if there was something, you could buy only limited amount of it. People were staying hours in queues to buy a piece of meat and one adult person could buy some around 1kg a month, no more. People were VERY angry, so communist government decided to waive their powers in exchange to a convenient and fairly safe retirement. Basically - in exchange for freedom and hopes of better economical situation, people agreed to forgive communists' past actions (including many illegal imprisonments, kills and other things regime did in the past) and not to harras them anymore. Many people think that it was a big mistake to let them go away unpunished but I think it was a great achievment to get rid of communism in such a peaceful way, without a single shot. The sole reason of communism fall was its bankrupcy. The same worked in Czechoslovakia, Hungary, Eastern Germany, Russia, baltic lands and other countries. Some countries did well and now enjoying freedoms in Western Europe style). Some did not so well and have fallen back into regime (say Russia, Bielarus). But we shared one thing in common - we all bankrupted. In some countries, like Romania, people were starving and their desperacy caused them to revolt and kill regime leaders.
And now look at those RICH regimes - as China or Russia. Their governments don't have ANY inventive to give away their powers. Officials running those countries don't have the same level of empathy that, say, slashdot crowd has (in general). They are damn cold blooded suckers committed to kill everyone standing in their way. On the other hand people also have no incentive to fight with regime - as long as one doesn't complain about government, one does well. At the point one gets in conflict, one gets into a big, bad trouble.
Back to China. Compared to communist Poland from '80s, they have very good economic situation (which Poland lacked) and a BIG MESS in terms of human rights. As I read stories about their practices of imprisoning, torturing and killing people, I doubt we had such a mess in Poland - even in stalinism times, in '50s. Imprisoning and killing someone just to have replacement organs for some f*ck'n official's wasn't seen in Poland since Nazi camps in '40s. Torturing and killing political opponents in such a grand scale also hasn't been seen in most of communist states since '50s. And it is common in China in 2008.
Summary:
- good economy will only strenghten regime, not weaken it; the only way to get rid of a regime is to bankrupt it and let them voluntary give away their powers;
- we should thank our corporate drones for strenghtening chineese regime to the point it got unstoppable and IMO became direct danger to all of us;
- I'm avoiding chineese products as much as possible, I won't go to China and I won't leave a single dime there; I won't watch olympic games in China;
Gering rid of a totalitarian regime (Score:1, Interesting)
The only way to get rid of a totalitarian system is to bankrupt it. Be it communism or something that we see in China. Helping their government by developing their economy and making them richer will only strengthen their grip. Thinking that it may make people more aware and demand freedoms was naive and shortsighted at best and IMO it was a plain lie produced by (mostly american) corporate drones. It was an excuse to make better profits in exchange to feeding one of the most bloody regimes in the world. In a totalitarian state people care less about freedom if a regime makes their economic situation better over time. In such conditions, regime can easily strengthen its grip in exchange of a better material situation of state's citizens. It can easily squash any opponents - citizens won't mind see them killed.
When I was a child in 80's, we had communism here in Poland. There were bad times in terms of both freedoms and economy (virtually everything was limited - including such basic products as butter, sugar or milk) - there was nearly nothing in stores and if there was something, you could buy only limited amount of it. People were staying hours in queues to buy a piece of meat and one adult person could buy some around 1kg a month, no more. People were VERY angry, so communist government decided to waive their powers in exchange to a convenient and fairly safe retirement. Basically - in exchange for freedom and hopes of better economical situation, people agreed to forgive communists' past actions (including many illegal imprisonments, kills and other things regime did in the past) and not to harras them anymore. Many people think that it was a big mistake to let them go away unpunished but I think it was a great achievment to get rid of communism in such a peaceful way, without a single shot. The sole reason of communism fall was its bankrupcy. The same worked in Czechoslovakia, Hungary, Eastern Germany, Russia, baltic lands and other countries. Some countries did well and now enjoying freedoms in Western Europe style). Some did not so well and have fallen back into regime (say Russia, Bielarus). But we shared one thing in common - we all bankrupted. In some countries, like Romania, people were starving and their desperacy caused them to revolt and kill regime leaders.
And now look at those RICH regimes - as China or Russia. Their governments don't have ANY inventive to give away their powers. Officials running those countries don't have the same level of empathy that, say, slashdot crowd has (in general). They are damn cold blooded suckers committed to kill everyone standing in their way. On the other hand people also have no incentive to fight with regime - as long as one doesn't complain about government, one does well. At the point one gets in conflict, one gets into a big, bad trouble.
Back to China. Compared to communist Poland from '80s, they have very good economic situation (which Poland lacked) and a BIG MESS in terms of human rights. As I read stories about their practices of imprisoning, torturing and killing people, I doubt we had such a mess in Poland - even in stalinism times, in '50s. Imprisoning and killing someone just to have replacement organs for some f*ck'n official's wasn't seen in Poland since Nazi camps in '40s. Torturing and killing political opponents in such a grand scale also hasn't been seen in most of communist states since '50s. And it is common in China in 2008.
Summary:
- good economy will only strenghten regime, not weaken it; the only way to get rid of a regime is to bankrupt it and let them voluntary give away their powers;
- we should thank our corporate drones for strenghtening chineese regime to the point it got unstoppable and IMO became direct danger to all of us;
- I'm avoiding chineese products as much as possible, I won't go to China and I won't leave a single dime there; I won't watch olympic games in China;
Re:IOC is not US or "any other freedom loving pers (Score:3, Interesting)
Of course, Private Eye does have a tendency to get successfully sued for libel, but they also tend to be accurate (often even *when* someone has successfully sued them for libel over the claims in question). Besides, this seems to mostly check out.
Re:China wants hotels in China to follow Chinese L (Score:3, Interesting)
OTOH I think the big surprise here is that the Chinese government doesn't filter the internet themselves at the ISP level. Why do they even need to ask for the hotel's cooperation on this? I was under the impression that the Great Firewall is implemented at the ISP level? Interesting... if this is not the case than what is preventing bootleg ISPs from selling unrestricted access at premium prices in order to turn a profit off of this government imposed censorship? I guess penalty of death would be a good deterrent there. The only reason for censoring your people is for fear that they will become educated to "the outside", realize how good it could be, and stage a Coup d'état. If I were the Chinese government I'd think twice about this and many other policies that inhibit human rights.