The Surprising Truth About Internet Censorship In the Middle East 112
An anonymous reader writes "Internet censorship is common in conservative majority-Muslim countries, but it may have more to do with politics and technology than with religion. I.e., Iran is not so different from Cuba and China. From the article: 'in an attempt to uncover the various reasons — and ways — that countries clamp down on Internet freedoms, the U.S.-based watchdog Freedom House investigated the issue in 47 nations and released a study of its findings this year.
Employing a number of factors ranging from blogger arrests to politically motivated website blockades, the study ranked each country according to its degree of online freedom.
And, as it happens, Islamic countries do not stand out for their degree of censorship.'"
Re:No shit (Score:4, Insightful)
Religious leaders are just another dictator. Religion is only another tool to accomplish the same thing as the politics that teach and exploit strong feelings of strong nationalism/culturalism. The real tool of abuse in all cases is psychology and the sociopaths work their magic on a person from the first day of his/her life..
Re:No shit (Score:4, Insightful)
Religious leaders are just another dictator. Religion is only another tool to accomplish the same thing as the politics that teach and exploit strong feelings of strong nationalism/culturalism. The real tool of abuse in all cases is psychology and the sociopaths work their magic on a person from the first day of his/her life..
not quite. religion is voluntary. that's the problem with the political sphere: if dictators ruled by voluntary consent of the people, they wouldn't be dictators, would they?
Re:No shit (Score:5, Funny)
Yes, totally voluntary. All you have to do is say "You know what, I don't believe in Allah at all, I'm just going to life my life freely" and all the Muslims in the Middle East will take your decision respectfully and allow you to go about your business.
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You are making a point about apostasy, which is fair enough, but most of the muslims have no problem with my not believing in Allah, because I am not and have never been a muslim. There is a line between not following a faith and leaving one.
Extremists are another ball game entirely, but why is it that when americans think of muslims they think of terrorists, but when they think of christians they don't immediately equate with David Koresh or Theodore Kaczynski?
Re:No shit (Score:5, Informative)
You are making a point about apostasy, which is fair enough, but most of the muslims have no problem with my not believing in Allah, because I am not and have never been a muslim.
And it's great that you were born so lucky. If your parents were muslim and you wanted to not believe, 33% of the UK's muslim would want you dead [guardian.co.uk].
Not that your comment is even accurate on sharia. Muslims do not have any problem at all with not believing in allah. Not for muslims, not for non-muslims. However they will want to kill you for
1) any perceived insult to "the prophet" (insult allah all you want, another indication that islam's "god" is just a cruel stupid little medieval dictator)
2) any perceived insult to muslims as a group
3) not paying for their war on non-muslims (yes, you read that right. Also known as jizya)
Please note that this is not an exhaustive list. In particular, once they demanded any non-muslim give up their firstborn son in a system called "devshirme [wikipedia.org]". Or just start a genocide for no reason in particular. Happened more than 100 times in muslim history, including by the paedophile prophet himself, both on muslims and infidels for mostly imaginary reasons, so please don't claim this is somehow not part of islam.
Re:No shit (Score:5, Informative)
They're also isolationists... According to surveys here in Denmark, most non-western immigrants gets nicely mixed in with the native population in just a few generations - mixed marriages with both male and female immigrants - with the significant exception of Muslim immigrants. Even though they're one of the biggest non-western immigrant group, the number of marriages that does not involve a conversion to Islam by the native part can be counted on one hand. It just almost never happens. The actual numbers are 4-5 between a male immigrant and a female native, and ZERO where the immigrant is female. Even the numbers involving conversion are heavily skewed - while there's hundreds of male immigrants marrying female natives converted to Islam, the number of female immigrants marrying a danish native converted man are still less than a dozen. Most female immigrants basically marry either fellow immigrants or men from the homeland.
This all means that the integration of Muslims is bound to fail. And has failed consistently all over western Europe.
As a nice counterpoint, Asian non-Muslim women married to Danish native men are actually the biggest group by far within the mixed marriage community. And these Asian-Danish families are usually well integrated with higher-than-average income, higher-than-average educational level and zero ghetto issues (gangs etc.). The asian immigrants work and learn the native language. They dress like the natives too, don't make a fuss about weird dietary 'rules' and interact quite normally with everybody else, no matter what gender etc.
So, it's obvious to everyone that what the Muslims are doing is wrong. They either need to do what other immigrants are doing or go somewhere else. It can't continue like it has been. The tensions are getting stronger and it will end badly and then go to worse.
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Re:No shit (Score:4, Insightful)
There's a billion Muslims in the world today. Billion, with a B. If they were really as violent and fucked up as the average American seems to believe, we would have turned the planet into a glass-floored parking lot by now.
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Question: Why are there billions of muslims in the world
Answer: Because each muslim gives birth to 6 muslim babies, and no muslim baby is allowed to leave the religion without being killed.
Question: Reason why the planet hasn't been turned into a glass-floored parking lot
Answer: America. And other non-muslims.
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You may want to walk around in a few muslim countries, and check how it looks outside of tourist reserves. Just for kicks.
This ironically also explains why the whole planet is not a glass-floored parking lot. Learning nuclear physics effectively is not as easy in what we would consider a warzone stricken with dead bodies and constant violence for stupidly small offences.
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most of muslim holy wars were/are against other muslims.
just like most christian religious differences wars were against other christians.
and ALL of those wars were/are political.
this surprising truth is stupid since it's all about politics
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It appears you never read, or if you did, you never understood the studies, and the notion of cultural, national, and peer pressure, etc that are applied from birth, and how they affect your decision making process. Please, try to get through psych 101, at least. And don't feel too bad, you are only one of the multitude that believe as you do.
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Yes, religion is voluntary. That's why no-one is taught religious practices until they are 18 and can give consent. Wait, what?
Voluntary? When you're born, you're inculcated (Score:1)
Before you get the free will of childhood, you're circumcised or baptised. You are described as a $RELIGION child not a child of $RELIGION parents.
You DO NOT GET a choice when you're born to religious parents.
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Not me, of course.
Re:No shit (Score:5, Insightful)
"From the perspective of the theocratic government, "God himself is recognized as the head" of the state".
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Theocracy means religion(religious) is the ruling political power. So pretty much "duh".
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Much like America then. And before someone whines that there's a separation of church and state consider this:
There are very few openly atheist members of Congress. Pete Stark [wikipedia.org] is one.
You have "In God We Trust" on your money
You have "One nation under God" in your pledge of allegiance.
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You misunderstand. Theocracy means that religion is in power. Not just religious following a reasonably secular law. As in religious law is the law of the land.
America is very VERY far away from being a theocracy. It can perhaps be called a fascist state if you stretch your imagination enough (conglomerates are in power drafting laws). But not theocracy (religion is the law).
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So what do you call all the laws being proposed that redefine when a foetus is alive?
Anyone with any amount of common sense in a free society would have no objection to a woman's right to choose an abortion
The fact that "don't ask, don't tell" was even in place is a sign that the administration saw homosexuality as a cause for concern - if not an outright sin.
Arkansas law says in order to be elected, you must believe in a supreme being, despite the supreme court ruling it unconstitutional.
And this isn't jus
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I call them issues of ethics. You have to assign values to things and decide which one is more valuable. In case of abortion, it's a value of a foetus vs a value of choice over your own body after insemination. Most countries already assign specific values - abortion for "social reasons" is typically limited to a few weeks to a few months after insemination and forbidden afterwards.
These are very culture dependent regardless. Most people miss for example that many "christian" values are in fact cultural val
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Well, even more no shit... Religion is a method of people in power controlling people not in power... big woop.
Wrong question -- (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Wrong question -- (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Wrong question -- (Score:5, Insightful)
More than religion, culture. Some things seen as unappropiate by a culture, be a religion behind or not, are censored, banned, or even the infractors are in some ways punished, The difference is not so evident when you form part of that culture, and that culture is somewhat successfully pushed over a good amount of countries. There maybe some i.e. biological backing for some cultural opinion, but that most accepts the ban is mostly a cultural thing, not knowledge (and are accepted some things that should be banned by the same kind of biological backing). Between the examples in western cultures you have nudity, "soft" drugs, less than 18yo sex, political positions and a lot more.
If you ask a fish if is not disturbed by all that water, it would ask: what water?
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Between the examples in western cultures you have nudity, "soft" drugs, less than 18yo sex, political positions and a lot more.
How exactly are these things specific to "western cultures", whether by their presence or by their absence? You find these things all around the world - although of these, political positions are kind of absent among many native tribes, and even then, they tend to have a lot of the remaining stuff.
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Re:Wrong question -- (Score:5, Insightful)
The USA is highly religious
Sure, but the people who make important policy decisions are, in all likelihood, not very devout. I suspect that the truly devout believers never make it beyond state-level politics, and that even there they are a minority. The kind of people who get votes from devout Christians in America are people who understand how to exploit religion as a way to rally political supporters -- not exactly the sort of thing that religions teach people to do (find me the holy book that says, "You can trick people into thinking they have a moral obligation to support your political ambitions" and I will be impressed).
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Sure, but the people who make important policy decisions are, in all likelihood, not very devout.
That will change if Romney wins.
Re:Wrong question -- (Score:4, Insightful)
Sure, but the people who make important policy decisions are, in all likelihood, not very devout.
That will change if Romney wins.
Wow. You really don't know Mormons. Had he been an ordinary dude not running for office, most LDS adherents would die of laughter at the suggestion that he's devout.
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He's a Bishop. He has a temple recommend. He still goes to church, even on the campaign trail. Sure, he had to be a little shifty on his opinions of abortion, but that's because he's a politician.
Oh dear. You really don't know devout people.
They don't judge others by religious education, but by things like morality. Does he lie? Does he cheat? Will he walk all over people for personal gain?
If yes, he's not devout. Period. That's how a Mormon who cares about his/her faith will view him. They may still vote for him (most of the country votes for idiots anyway), but they won't think of him as religious.
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Re:Wrong question -- (Score:5, Insightful)
The kind of people who get votes from devout Christians in America are people who understand how to exploit religion as a way to rally political supporters
Isn't it effectively a distinction without a difference? Once a politician starts relying on the religious voters, he'll have to support a religion-driven agenda or risk being denounced as a turn-coat and kicked out of office - for a religious voter is a jealous voter. Whether he supports the religious agenda from personal conviction or for political survival is immaterial in the end.
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Once a politician starts relying on the religious voters, he'll have to support a religion-driven agenda or risk being denounced as a turn-coat and kicked out of office - for a religious voter is a jealous voter.
Not so, apparently:
Re:Wrong question -- (Score:5, Insightful)
I simply said that instead of comparing religion to oppression, we should understand that religion leads to oppression.
As am atheiest I have to disagree. There are plenty of religious people who believe exactly the same thing about atheism. I say both groups are missing the forest for the trees -- the most obvious common factor between groups like the Khmer Rouge, which outlawed religion, and groups like the Taliban, which mandate a severe form of religion, is extremism.
Whenever the people running the show value principles more than human lives you get oppression.
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Re:Wrong question -- (Score:5, Insightful)
The question is whether religion leads to oppressive politics and low technology
I think the question is the other way around: do politicians seeking to push oppressive policies turn to religion as a way to rally supporters?
Re:Wrong question -- (Score:4, Insightful)
This is a false dichotomy.
Actually, there is one more dichotomy. To think that for Iran, religion is not a political issue is ludicrous, since the Supreme Leader of Iran is as much a political as a religious office. These two are very much intertwined. And even if they didn't consider the need for these measures primarily for religious reasons, given that religion is a political issue for them, they'd still suppress calls for more lenient religious regime precisely because it's a part of their political program.
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Re: (Score:2)
Re:Wrong question -- (Score:5, Insightful)
This is a false dichotomy. The question is whether religion leads to oppressive politics and low technology, not whether oppressive politics are more correlated with oppression and low technology than religion.
I don't know that that's the question at all. It is folly to believe that any national body politic is driven by religion. To be sure, there's lots of posturing, but that's all about keeping the voters (Republican base) in line, or the various tribal factions (pick a Middle East country) for uniting in open revolt. Beyond that, the leaders don't give a shit about what god things when they're making policy. For all the stuff he got wrong, Karl Marx was dead on about religion being "the opiate of the people". Indeed, the much less seen quote is, "Religion is the sigh of the oppressed creature, the heart of a heartless world, and the soul of soulless conditions." Clearly, Marx understood the cynicism with which powerful political people view religion. Would that more of the world's "oppressed creatures" woke the hell up and realized how much they've been manipulated through the use of religion. Without that tool, the world would be a very, very different place.
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mabey in his day. I see it as the "crack coccaine"
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Re:Wrong question -- (Score:4, Insightful)
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Iran did the opposite, but the effect is the same. In those countries, either religion worshipping the government, or government worshipping religion runs your life, and you don't get to pick which.
Not surprising at all (Score:5, Insightful)
That's not surprising at all. Almost nothing about the alleged "conflict" between these countries and "the West" have to do with religion and it has a lot to do with post-colonialism and the Cold War. It's just that on both "sides" many people like to spin the issues in the direction of religion. It's ridiculous enough to speak about "Islamic Countries" as if they were a homogenous force or fraction.
Sorry for the many scare quotes but they are all appropriate in this case.
Re:Not surprising at all (Score:4, Insightful)
How about walking around in one of these countries and asking people if they live in an Islamic country? How about walking around in the souk, wearing a T-shirt with a crucifix or a Star of David on it? I bet you'd get an answer real fast, and it wouldn't have anything to do with colonialism or the Cold War.
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The OIC [wikipedia.org] would disagree with your statements. Especially after a majority of members called for the death of a 14 year old girl.
Report is pretty soft on the USA (Score:5, Funny)
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the US government does not criticize the US government
From the political journals of DUH (Score:4, Insightful)
What moron thought this was surprising? China doesn't censor internet for political reasons either, remember? It's due to porn and other moralizing.
Nope, not suprised by this (Score:2)
its about power (Score:4, Insightful)
China and Cuba censor at home, not abroad (Score:3)
Islamic countries are asking for international censorship of the whole Internet. So let them block anything they don't like at home. But they should not be allowed to expand their censorship policies to the whole Internet.
Surprising? (Score:5, Insightful)
Power is the key (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Welcome to Slashdot (Score:2)
Where the obvious and un-newsworthy are posted with impunity. Please give me more stories with studies finding tv as a babysitter is bad, religions are oppressive or fanatical and governments only care about their own interests.
With that out of the way, a fanatical religious leader who holds authority via his office over his people only leads to more extremes of the above mentioned.
Really? (Score:2)
[censorship] may have more to do with politics and technology than with religion
There are only a few country where politics rule! Almost all of the world is ruled by religion!
Re:Really? (Score:5, Insightful)
There are only a few country where politics rule! Almost all of the world is ruled by religion!
No, most of the world is ruled by culture. The fact of the matter is that very little of religion's commandments are actually followed, whether we're considering Christians, Jews or Muslims.
Having read all three books (Torah, Bible and Koran - what can I say, I like to read science fiction stories before going to sleep), I can tell you that they all (yes, all) condemn such things as stealing, killing etc.
If religion was so powerful, there wouldn't be that much violation of its fundamentals, like stealing and killing. Religion is used as a means to not-so-religious ends, and that is because all three monotheist religions,are easy to misquote, misinterpret, and misuse.
Getting rid of all religions could be A Good Thing...or not. Even if they went away, there would still be plain godless Ideology, which has been proven to be at least as effective in turning whole countries into shit for supposedly noble causes.
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The real point is the heavily intentional confusion between "religion [wikipedia.org]" and "church" in the general sense of religion community (sorry, there's no suitable Wikipedia article for it).
While the first one is actually philosophy, the second one is mankind in practice. So, getting rid of churches is very likely a good thing, getting rid of philosophy could not.
all about capital and power (Score:1)
When you have a government stifling free speech and expression, a government that is not for the people by the people, than you have either a dictatorship(iran mullah, north korea jim "ding dong ill", etc..) or monarchy(saudi arabia). Theocracy is a another method used by dictators and monarchs who are really capitalist to control the people. Dictators and Monarchs have wealth and live a luxury life while the people live in shit. Castro lives like a king while the people live in poverty, who is the capit
Editing lesson #402 (Score:2)
Internet censorship is common in conservative majority-Muslim countries, but it may have more to do with politics and technology than with religion. I.e., Iran is not so different from Cuba and China.
Not really the most fitting use for "I.e." It translates as "that is," so would make more sense to write it as:
Internet censorship is common in conservative majority-Muslim countries, but Iran is not so different from Cuba and China - i.e., it may have more to do with politics and technology than with religion."
From the article: 'n an attempt to uncover the various reasons
"n an attempt"? That mistake leaps out of the page. I'd usually joke about editors not even reading submissions, but it's getting beyond a joke.
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Capitalism is a law of nature, like evolution.
So, it's okay to set my little sister on fire if I think I'm not getting enough food or attention from Mommy? How about if your little brother sets you on fire for the same reasons? Avian chicks push the weakest chick out of the nest, so it's natural, right?
I think humanity invented civilization in order to dull the edges of that sort of psychopathy. Capitalism is an economic system designed to maximize profit and minimize costs and is exemplary in rewarding its best practitioners and innovators. Its do
Pot, meet kettle (Score:3)
Hypocritical American exceptionalists? (Score:5, Informative)
Question:
Do we really have more freedom in the U.S., or do we just permit freedom for ideas we believe in? Are we smug, hypocritical American exceptionalists?
Javed Iqbal was sentenced to 5 1/2 years for offering Al Manar on his cable TV system.
http://www.aljazeera.com/news/americas/2009/04/2009423233919457969.html [aljazeera.com]
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Al-Manar#Banning_of_broadcasts [wikipedia.org]
Occupy Wall Street wasn't allowed to express its First Amendment rights to assembly.
I'll take support for human rights whether it comes from the left or right. Freedom House seems to be the latter. I do wish they would show more concern about attacks on freedom of people like Javed Iqbal in their own backyard, but that may be an unreasonable request when you consider the source of their funds,
Here's what Chomsky said about Freedom House. Fair?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Freedom_house#Criticism [wikipedia.org]
Chomsky and Herman argue that the group's history has been characterized by excessively criticizing states opposed to US interests while being unduly sympathetic to those regimes supportive of US interests. The authors suggest this can be most notably seen by the way it perceived the US ally El Salvador in the early 1980s, a government that used the army for mass slaughter of the populace to intimidate them in the run-up to an "election", but Freedom House found these elections to be "admirable". Chomsky further claimed in 1988 that Freedom House "had interlocks with AIM, the World Anticommunist League [sic], Resistance International, and U.S. government bodies such as Radio Free Europe and the CIA, and has long served as a virtual propaganda arm of the (U.S) government and international right wing."
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Freedom House's board was filled with prominent neocons under Bush Jr: "neoconservatives such as Kenneth Adelman, Donald Rumsfeld, Paul Wolfowitz, Otto Reich, Jeane Kirkpatrick, Samuel Huntington, Zbigniew Brzezinski, and Malcolm Forbes Jr. on the board of trustees." Former CIA director & PNAC alumni James Woolsey under Bush Jr. was also a prominent player ( http://rightweb.irc-online.org/profile/Woolsey_James / http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/R._James_Woolsey,_Jr. )
Now there's more neo-liberals & the
hegemony (Score:1)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dominant_minority [wikipedia.org] prefer you to be poor/subservient/defenseless so that they can promote/protect their hegemony in the pretext of patriotism/democracy.
so that makes the UK ? (Score:1)
Otherwise (Score:1)
Middle East will witness https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Perestroika [wikipedia.org]