Some Countries Want To Ban 'Information Weapons' 321
DrgnDancer sends in an NPR piece on recent efforts to control so-called "information weapons" on the Internet. What's interesting is that the term "information weapon," as defined by many of the countries trying to limit them, doesn't mean what you would think. It's closer to the old Soviet term "ideological aggression." "At a UN disarmament conference in 2008, Sergei Korotkov of the Russian Defense Ministry argued that anytime a government promotes ideas on the Internet with the goal of subverting another country's government — even in the name of democratic reform — it should qualify as 'aggression.' And that, in turn, would make it illegal under the UN Charter. 'Practically any information operation conducted by a state or a number of states against another state would be qualified as an interference into internal affairs,' Korotkov said through an interpreter. 'So any good cause, like [the] promotion of democracy, cannot be used as a justification for such actions.' The Russians, and a lot of other countries such as Iran and China, apparently consider the free exchange of information to be an information technology threat. One that must be managed by treaty."
Technically this is old news. (Score:4, Insightful)
Countries that do not like freedom of expression will do a lot to prevent it, including going into conflicts or trying to push treaties and international agreements that conflate freedom of expression and terrorism.
They have been doing this since people had ideas to argue over. Look it up.
Yeah, I don't think so (Score:5, Insightful)
Security Counsel Veto (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Wow... so everything is aggression then (Score:5, Insightful)
Yes, and the UN is also contemplating a ban on Defamation of Religion [ifex.org].
Sadly ever ass-hat oppressive regime who doesn't like to be criticized, and every stupid idiot who believes in the tooth fairy wants to remove my right to criticize them or point out that they're idiots. People who embrace living in the stone age want to make it illegal for me to say that they're stupid for doing so.
So, allow me to preemptively say ... your country sucks if it takes away people's freedoms, your religion sucks if it confers an obligation on those of us who don't believe, your government sucks ... well, your government probably sucks no matter where you are. I retain my right to give offense, and if you don't like it, too damned bad.
Any religion or government which can't stand some criticism should be banned.
I'm all for the UN, but increasingly the backwards and the stupid are pushing an agenda that wants to wipe out the last thousand years of progress in human endeavors.
Not a new attitude (Score:5, Insightful)
The UN has been fixated on controling the internet (Score:2, Insightful)
for some time now. If they can get the internet classified as a weapon, well then they'll HAVE to regulate it!
Re:Wow... so everything is aggression then (Score:2, Insightful)
I'm for the UN Security Council, and various commissions and agencies, but I'm not in favor of the General Assembly doing crap like this.
Like when a UN forum on Racism keeps calling Zionism racist but won't label movements like Hamas, Fatah, Hezbollah or Arab Nationalism as racist. Nor will they call out and attack Saharan and Sub-Saharan slavery.
Re:Why would the US / EU want to broadcast Democra (Score:3, Insightful)
>>>The pushing of democracy in the Cold War, along with a healthy cultural push from film, tv, radio and music helped spur the end of one party rule in Eastern Europe
More like a bankrupt treasury.
I give zero credit to the 24 hour propaganda radio.
Re:NPR (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Why would the US / EU want to broadcast Democra (Score:0, Insightful)
Re:Ain't freedom a bitch? (Score:2, Insightful)
I think you're being affected by the same kind of syndrome as those Russians...
Here in Europe we don't really consider America to be the Land of the Free anymore. To begin with, it's a pain in the ass to enter that country, and they take your fingerprints when they let you enter. Then you loose all your rights as soon as someone claims you might be a terrorist. It's a country were Freedom of Speech has been replaced with Political Correctness. Regarding elections, their campaigns are so expensive that you have to befriend someone with deep pockets if you want to stand a chance (and that comes with some strings attached). Consequently, their foreign policy is more accurately described as "we need oil" than as "let's give those people freedom".
Sure it's not as bad a a proper dictatorship, but maybe you should be worried about those issues, and not just blindly support your country. The original ideals were great, but they have been kind of subverted along the way...
Re:Many in eastern europe did turn to democracy (Score:1, Insightful)
Yeah. Woosh!
A figure of speech in which the intended meaning is the opposite of that expressed by the words used; usually taking the form of sarcasm or ridicule in which laudatory expressions are used to imply condemnation or contempt.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Irony [wikipedia.org]
Sorry but things seemed to have gone over your head. The primary topic of this article is Russia, and Russia is hardly acting in a democratic fashion. If irony was attempted it was done quite poorly given that an obvious interpretation of the vague phrase was a criticism of Russia and the Putin machine.
Here we go... (Score:1, Insightful)
Sadly, the government will probably jump at this opportunity. "yes, the constitution gives you the right to free speech, however if you choose to use it we will have to extradite you to China to face trial there"
Re:Wow... so everything is aggression then (Score:3, Insightful)
Plus theres no way in hell countries like the US are gonna sign onto it.
until they add a trailer to the treaty involving copyright
Information as a weapon (Score:3, Insightful)
Woodie Guthrie's [wikipedia.org] guitar read "This Machine Kills Fascists". And indeed, every musical instrument, poet's pen, comedian's voice, do also.
(Photo of Guthrie and his facist-killing machine) [wikimedia.org]
"This song is Copyrighted in U.S., under Seal of Copyright #154085, for a period of 28 years, and anybody caught singin' it without our permission, will be mighty good friends of ourn, cause we don't give a dern. Publish it. Write it. Sing it. Swing to it. Yodel it. We wrote it, that's all we wanted to do."
This painting [wikipedia.org] was credited by an art historian who taught a class I took as starting the French revolution. The arts and information (e.g., The Federalist Papers [yale.edu] which contributed to starting the American revolution) have always been political weapons.
Re:Why would the US / EU want to broadcast Democra (Score:2, Insightful)
Except in the US the rural states are the ones the East and South keep poor by controlling large percentages of land through the BLM, National Forest Service, National Park Service and DoD.
Oh and we get the American Indian Reservations, you know the people the Blue States of the East and South kicked out 180 years ago, but the Red States feed, provide fuel and natural resources.
Look at Presidential Red States
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Red_state,_blue_state.svg [wikipedia.org]
They have the bulk of the military bases, Indian Reservations/Alaska Natives, food production and energy.
The Blue States are powered by the Red States, were the US to splinter along those lines, the Red States are in better strategic shape to remain a country. California, Oregon-Washington would be fine, but the North East is boned.
Re:Why would the US / EU want to broadcast Democra (Score:2, Insightful)
In one case a friend's parents had to vote for the last president or the university they worked for would have fired them.
Everybody might want to keep this example in mind the next time somebody tells us that we need voter verification built into our electoral system.....
And the US state after the same amount of time? (Score:5, Insightful)
Lets see, in the decades after the US became a democracy, it had no votes for women. Had legal slavery based on color of the skin. Denied citizenship to asians and the natives. Slaughtered millions of the natives and deported the survivors to concentration camps where they were expected to slowly die with no natural or mineral resources.
The former USSR nations are not doing great, but most have NOT yet slipped as low as the past of the US of A.
Why do you compare the US after 2 centuries of freedom with newly freed states?
Re:Memetic Warfare (Score:3, Insightful)
I have an idea that that part came after Jesus was a pincushion. A reasonably careful reading of the Bible shows two Jesuses. The Hippie, "Do unto others as you would have them do unto you" Jesus and the "Hey God is my Daddy, do what I say" Jesus. I suspect that the real Jesus (or possibly real men who were amalgamated into Jesus) was the first. The second came when a bunch of people realized that they could sell Jesus(A) as a product to buy them the power of Jesus(B). This idea is reinforced by the fact that when Jesus (the character) actually speaks, he normally sounds more like Jesus(A). When he is spoken for, he normally sounds more like Jesus(B).
There's legitimate wisdom in the New Testament. You just have to fish for it a bit.
Re:Why would the US / EU want to broadcast Democra (Score:3, Insightful)