Blogger.com Banned In Turkey 262
petermp writes "A Turkish court has blocked access to the popular blog hosting service Blogger (Blogger.com and Blogspot.com, owned by Google), since Friday, October 24th, 2008. According to BasBasBas.com, a Dutch blogger based in Istanbul, who alerted readers about the issue: 'It is suspected that the reason for this has something to do with Adnan Oktar, by some considered the leading Muslim advocate for creationism, who has in the past managed to get Wordpress, Google Groups, as well as Richard Dawkins' website [banned].'"
1 simple PGP script... (Score:4, Interesting)
You can block Blogger, but in its place will grow thousands of pages, you cannot stop them all! (but you can easily identify the creators I suppose).
This seems like a very irrational decision, surely this will be appealed.
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Well, fortunately most of the morons that blog won't be capable of uploading a php script to some random free hosting site, thank god.
Re:1 simple PGP script... (Score:4, Funny)
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It was also wrong, because it refers to Turkey as a muslim country, whereas (despite the alleged reason for this ruling) Turkey is actually a secular state.
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It was also wrong, because it refers to Turkey as a muslim country, whereas (despite the alleged reason for this ruling) Turkey is actually a secular state.
Exactly. When was the last time the Supreme Court tried to ban the ruling party because they broke the constitution by being too religious?
Re:1 simple PGP script... (Score:4, Insightful)
All religions are dogmatic , and extremly dangerous if they becomes to powerfull.
And it's everyone's right , or even duty , to guard against that. Period.
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All religions are dogmatic , and extremly dangerous if they becomes to powerfull.
Sounds pretty dogmatic there. Lets hope kdemetter never gets his own army.
Especially the people who are part of the religion (Score:2)
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It was also wrong, because it refers to Turkey as a muslim country
99% of Turks are Muslims [wikipedia.org].
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Bill?
Is that you Bill O'Rielly?
Turkey? (Score:5, Insightful)
I have to say, I'm really surprised this is happening in Turkey. Turkey is actually a fairly westernized country, and while it is predominantly Islamic, it is quite progressive on religious issues. Its constitution even guarantees freedom of religion (and Turkey has no official state religion), and since 1924 has maintained a secular government. I was led to understand that there is strong opposition in Turkey to the government interfering in matters of religion, but perhaps that is no longer the case for whatever reason...
Comment removed (Score:5, Insightful)
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>>>the authorities have tried to shut down all Orthodox seminaries in Turkey
A lot of this could be fixed by the E.U. (after Turkey becomes a member state). We had similar problems in the early United States, but the force of the central government forced the states to abandon their state-mandated religions & provide freedom. Likewise the European Union's central government could use its authority, backed by a Constitutional central court, to gradually but firmly force Turkey to stop persecuti
Re:Turkey? (Score:5, Interesting)
What ignorance. What about Bangladesh, Indonesia, Malaysia? They're all peaceful*, large Muslim nations. Indonesia has more Muslims than any other nation.
Besides, intolerance, genocide and xenophobia are a key part of any religious book. It might as well be in the job description. The problem is when people actually listen to the book, and that normally rises out of external issues (e.g. crippling poverty and corruption).
*Granted Indonesia and Malaysia fight a bit, but that's not religiously motivated.
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There must be two Indonesias, because the one you describe is very different to this one [smh.com.au].
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Pakistan is hardly "peaceful" by any means, given the increasing dominance of the Muttahida Majilis-i-Amal and the Jamaat-e-Islami (both vast and powerful Islamist parties), and non-Muslims have been and still are severely persecuted in Pakistan (Sangla hill riots, the 1971 Bangladesh genocide, the forced kidnapping and conversion of Hindu and Christian minorities), as numerous human rights NGO's and various condemnations by the USCIRF have documented exhaustively (in fact, Turkey is markedly better off).
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I didn't say anything about Pakistan; I'm well aware of the problems there, particularly in the optimistically named FATA.
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He's a muslim preacher that got jailed for conducting worship services in Indonesian (and Arabic) instead of just Arabic alone.
Seems he got the bright idea that his fellow indonesians should actually _understand_ what he is saying (most Indonesians don't understand Arabic).
He got jailed for inciting hatred. Great way of keeping Indonesia "peaceful" - jailing such people who incite hatred.
They burn down churches regularly in Indonesia. And christian
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Malaysia? The country the ruling party in which uses a slogan, "race, religion, nation"? The country which divides its citizen into Malay - first-class cream of the crop (bumiputra), and everyone else - second-class scum, and requires all Malay to be Muslim by law? (if you aren't Muslim, you aren't Malay). The country which forbids changing one's religion in the passport from Islam to anything else, because the mullahs won't recognize the change ("There is no such thing as leaving Islam. Apostasy is a crim
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Indeed, you are right in every aspect. Malaysia is a lot like Nazi Germany in this respect (compare their racist ideology of "Bumiputera" ie sons of the soil to Nazi Germany's "Blut und Boden" or "blood and soil"; same thing).
I am genuinely concerned about the situation with the Chinese and Indian minorities there. Race riots targeting them seem to be escalating, and Malaysian leaders like Najib Razak openly threatening Chinese Malaysians with genocide and Mahathir Mohamed who said that Indians in Malaysia
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I was actually talking about the religious books. They are a 'misinterpretation' but as an atheist I can't see any real reason why they are. The structure of Sunni Islam means that heresy is largely what you make of it, unlike Shia Islam and Judaism with their systems of scholars, or the highly centralised Catholic church where heresy is what the Pope says it is.
I would say that religious violence is always an excuse for other reasons. It doesn't change the fact that religion is a convenient excuse and labe
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Malaysia has peaceful elections. One party always wins, but you could say the same about Japan or Bavaria. Bangladesh has a two-party system no less democratic than America's. Indonesia's last election was verified as fine, with shortcomings, by Jimmy Carter.
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no less democratic than America's
Is that the same "America" whose elections Jimmy Carter said he wouldn't touch with a 10-foot pole because our voting system is so insane as to be beyond any hope?
Re:Turkey? (Score:5, Interesting)
"Turkey is the one Muslim country that does not directly attacks anyone with another religion, and commits genocide upon them."
Pretty much wiped out the Armenians in an inconvenient genocide. The Greeks are gone in repeated pogroms. Any equality was pretty much expressed in the form that everybody got genocided pretty much evenly.
They are now working on the Kurds. A decade ago it was illegal to speak Kurdish, name your child with a Kurdish name, broadcast in Kurdish, used Kurdish colors. This has been relaxed because Turkey wants in on international institutions.
I guess "equality" is a work in progress in Turkey with it trying it equalize everybody into being a particular Turk, God forbid if you are not.
You'd be insulting Turkishness (A criminal offense by the way)
G
Re:Turkey? (Score:4, Insightful)
Yes, Turkey has done some bad stuff and killed quite a lot of people, but never in the name of religion. Turkey is almost aggressively secular. The military is known to step in and take control whenever any religion gets to much power. There is at the moment 86 people in a single trial for treason because the tried to perform a coup against the government, which is run by an openly Islamic party (elected in a free and open election). But then the grandparent is also wrong in calling Turkey a Muslim country, the currently ruling party still tries to keep Turkey a secular country.
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Sure, Turkey might have tried to kill every Armenian, but at least it wasn't religiously motivated! That makes it all better...
Right.
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They weren't saying that made it better, just that it's a fault of Turkey, not Islamic law.
Re:Turkey? (Score:4, Interesting)
are you now (Score:2)
telling.
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Probably they do not hide behind 'Religion'.
Statistics OfTurkey's Democide [hawaii.edu]
CC.
Re:Turkey? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Turkey? (Score:5, Funny)
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In fact in both U.S.A. and France, publicly refusing the Armenian genocide is an offense punishable by law.
To paraphrase something that is said in practically every Slashdot discussion about censorship: So to fight the Turks, the Americans have become Turks themselves.
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It can't be punishable in the United States. It would fall against any sort of first amendment scrutiny. Other countries have laws against denying the holocaust, genocides, etc, but the US doesn't.
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I am wrong indeed on this. Noted.
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Not True: publicly refusing the Armenian genocide is only illegal in France, not in the U.S.A.
you have to be joking (Score:2)
entire armenia, until persian lands were under turkish control by that time. and leave aside armenians in general, the population of eastern anatolia and caucasian region wasnt even a number that could be counted by millions.
that being said, you have to really read and do research on anatolian history, for you dont know shit.
highway banditry (in a fashion of robin hood, but not that romantic and benef
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for example as of now, they are putting out a law that will practically ban alcohol sales. but, it doesnt come in the form of a ban. it comes like new provisions to existing laws to such an extent that, it will be almost impossible to get a license and sell alcohol.
this is called 'eastern cunning' here. much the way of islamists -> you
Turkey is a military dictatorship. (Score:5, Informative)
The modern western turkey was founded by Ataturk and is currently enforced by the military. The democracy part of Turkey ONLY exists as long as it does what the military wants and in the past the military HAS intefened several times when the elected leaders did NOT do what it wants.
The sad and confusing thing is that from a WESTERN point of view it is the MILITARY that is right and the public/voter/elected leaders who are wrong. It is the MILITARY that wants a STRICT seperation of church and state, even going so far that Turkey is NOT an islamic nation. It has NO STATE RELIGION. There is equality, press freedom etc etc. Because the military says so.
The voter however in recent years has been increasingly voting for religious parties. The reasons for this are complex. Part of the problem is that the current system works to well. In those cases people tend to forget what brings them their current prosperity. Turkey is doing amazingly well but it is a bit like the US where places like New York and LA are being outvoted by the people from the bible belt. So, right now the country is being torn. If the voter is allowed to elect religious leaders then that is the democracy that the EU wants in its members BUT it would also mean Turkey slides into an islamic nation the EU does NOT want on its borders. Allow the military to keep the current system and Turkey is dictatorship in all but name, something the EU could never allow a member to be.
As for the individual Turk, well, there is of course no such thing. You might as well label all US slashdotters along with that comment in Oprah story yesterday where she was considered new age because she said there might be more then one way to heaven then through jesus. The religious right is on the rise. Turkey is struggling with its desire to be a democracy and the risk this would cause it to slide into a islamic dictatorship.
It does raise the intresting question, if people elected their dictators, is it still a dictatorship? Make no mistake, the people who protest this bloggers ban are NOT intrested in democracy. They want to turn Turkey into an Islamic state where the islamic law rules. They just know that their best bet to get this is through the voting booth because any violent means to do this would be opposed harshly by the military.
Westerners find this hard to understand. We are used to thinking of the military as the opressors. Not the guardians of freedom.
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Why do you think that Islamic law contradicts democracy? A repressive, bloody tyranny-of-the-majority is still a democracy...
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That wasn't what I was picking at. GP said that further democratization of Turkey will lead to an Islamic state, which will, ironically, destroy democracy once it's in full power. It's that latter assertion that I'm challenging. I don't see how Islam is fundamentally incompatible with democracy (not the Western liberal kind, but the general principle of the rule of the people).
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It does raise the intresting question, if people elected their dictators, is it still a dictatorship?
You might recall that Hitler was elected by the German people. I don't think there's any question that he was still a dictator.
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a mistake you have there (Score:5, Informative)
first major coup was in 1960, against adnan menderes (who is, curiously and coincidentally, the first islamist leaning leader in turkish republic's history - the current islamist party comes from his party's roots). adnan menderes had increasingly become dictatorial in the late years of his reign -> he first censored all opposing papers, and then shut them down. then he shut down the opposition party. then his party moved to create a party organization called 'vatan cephesi' (motherland front) that you had to join. even so, they were naming people out of census registry in the radios each night, saying that these people joined the motherland front. situation was going out of hand. so, military intervened, and hanged the 3 political leaders of that party. that has set an example for all extremists in turkey -> they havent been able to find the courage to radically change the secular modern republic for 20 years.
in 1980, things were out of hand again. extremism was abound, and extreme right and left organizations were killing each other, bystanders, anyone daily. the daily average death toll in the country was 200. yea, you heard that right, 200 people a day.
politicians of the time were doing NOTHING. just bickering. a moderate party, an islamist party, a nationalist party, and a social democrat party. all bickering and nothing.
things were going this way for the last 5 years. and military was warning about deteriorating security situation within the country for those last 5 years.
all political leaders of that time were saying was 'it will be democratically solved, democracy is strong blah this bleh that'.
nothing happened. they did nothing.
and when in 1980, a huge throng of islamists have sat down during the national anthem and booed the national anthem in konya in 1980, declaring that they wanted an iranian style islamist government, within 2-3 weeks' time military had taken control of the country and locked up the extremist leaders, and put an interim government and called a group of experts to prepare a new constitution to prevent extremism from being able to change anything.
1982 constituton was put to vote of the people. people were SO fed up with extremism and the chaos environment that it got a whopping 80% approval rate and was ratified. this is the constitution we have today, and this is the constitution that islamist party is trying to change so they can move ahead with islamist proceedings.
just 1 years later, in 1983, elections were held and a technocrat, turgut ozal, a western style free market evangelist was elected with a whopping vote total. and he furthered the country until islamist elements got rise again.
so today here we are. the islamist party is trying to get rid of the elements in constitution that prevent them from establishing islamist and pro-religion laws, saying that 'it is the will of the people' (only 38% first election, only 42% last, a lot of reactionary votes and a lot of election fraud).
what is stupefying is that, european union SUPPORTS them. they are in the delusion that, if you let everything be in turkey, it will just become a country like belgium. but the last 40 years' history of turkey says otherwise.
the going is not good. it is a cosmic joke that european union is supporting and harboring a party that wants to break turkey from all modern values and enlightenment ideals. leave aside being contradictory, its self damaging.
Re:a mistake you have there (Score:4, Insightful)
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he summarized the issue correctly, but have portrayed as if the military was getting a dictator's role like as in the south american banana republics.
military stays silent at the wake almost everything. yet, IF a situation that may develop to push the country to a theocracy occurs, it starts to intervene. if situation is averted, it falls silent.
basically turkish army performs the function m.kemal and the first turkish assembly assigned it through initial laws in 1920s.
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Don't get me wrong. I do agree with you fully here - democracy is something that takes time to mature, and it is best if, while it does so, it is being guarded by some authoritarian means - so long as the latter are applied in the right direction. And this is the way I perceive the present situation in Tu
Democracy = elections + human rights (Score:2)
Yes, like when people elected Hitler. It was a crooked election, there was a lot of political maneuvering involved, it's true, but it's still a fact that Hitler was elected, and, given the political situation in Germany at the time, he would probably be elected in an honest system as well.
The definition of "democracy" isn't one of elected politicians only, that word has the connotation of a just and fair political system, one where the rights of
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I was led to understand that there is strong opposition in Turkey to the government interfering in matters of religion, but perhaps that is no longer the case for whatever reason...
For whatever reason? Have you been sleeping under a rock for the last 10 years? I guess you have, so let me get you up to speed: the majority in Turkey are conservative Muslims (of the 99.8% who are Muslim), and they can vote - and they have, indeed, voted in the traditionalist Muslim AKP that got 46.7% of the vote. The AKP had no problem forming a steamrolling government. The AKP has 340 out of 550 seats in parliament!
So that's your "whatever reason". The AKP govt. has been dismantling the pillars of turki
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As you said: "it is predominantly Islamic"
There is a big conflict between secularism + the near worship of Ataturk and actually following what the Koran says, based on very popular interpretations of Islam.
The muslims in Turkey who think they can have secularism, "The Ataturk Way" etc are either ignorant about their own religion (which is very common) or in denial.
If they really want to keep things as much as they are now, they are going to have to _actively_ work
Not a stupid idea (Score:2)
Why the muslims should be worried about interpreting the Koran? Because a fair number of extremist muslims are already doing their interpreting and you can see the _violent_ results of it.
If you're stupid enough to believe the extremists would leave people alone, you can skip the rest of this post.
The moderate musli
you dont know the half of it (Score:2)
second, the banning are generally tied to (for now) court orders resulting from court cases. like adnan oktar's, his lawsuits are generally based on defamation charges. some other lawsuits (not oktar's) are based on copyright charges.
so what happens is, a charge is filed in court, court decides, youtube, for example is banned. sometime passes. and that case is resolved, youtube is unbanned ag
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Since 1924, the educated and westernized upper classes in Turkey have maintained a secular government. But with the increasing education and prosperity of the middle classes, that is changing. Most people in Turkey want a religious government, not a secular one. There is always an assumption that education and prosperity will give rise to a decline in religion
idiots one after another (Score:2)
you must be talking about 1980 coup, that was done to PREVENT turkey from becoming an ISLAMIST dictatorship like IRAN.
immediately an interim government was set up, immediately a new constitution was prepared by experts and then put to vote of the ENTIRE country, and got approved, and in 2 years' time a new government was set up. in 1983 turgut ozal became the prime minister, which is the person that modernized turkey even further. nothing like greec
Is it you little piece of shit (Score:2)
i'd rather live in a military dictatorship any day, if i was to choose in between an islamist country or military dictatorship. not that there is any kind of military dictatorship in turkey tho.
you stupid pie
Reality knocks (Score:2, Insightful)
If you have followed events in Turkey this does not come as a surprise. Let's hope they will never be allowed to join the EU.
Re:Reality knocks (Score:5, Insightful)
Let's hope they change their ways so that we wish them to join the EU.
Re:Reality knocks (Score:5, Insightful)
Let's hope they change their ways so that we wish them to join the EU.
Like a German comedian of turkish descent once said:
What are you talking about? We're already here.
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It was only considered through political pressure from the UK, Spain, Poland, and US governments as a "reward" for Turkey's assistance in the Iraq War. Most other EU countries resisted Turkey's inclusion based on its appalling human rights record, and you know... geography...
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The Commission does not have any legislative right. It sounds like you are describing the Council with both executive and legislative power, though the Council does not have any executive rights in the EU, but in the members do in the individual states.
The Commission does have the right to propose directives and regulations in certain areas, but any new law PROPOSED by the Commission IS NOT LAW UNLESS PASSED AND POSSIBLY AMENDED BY THE EUROPEAN PARLIAMENT (and/or the Council depending on area).
If the parlia
heh they should jam all the religious nuts (Score:5, Funny)
on this bus [guim.co.uk]
fracking religion what good has it ever done
sigh
Re:heh they should jam all the religious nuts (Score:4, Informative)
btw the image is taken from this comment is free article [guardian.co.uk]
the article and the comments that followed make for an interesting sunday read
Thanks for the information (Score:2)
I followed the link you posted, those are truly interesting ideas they are raising.
The most interesting point someone raised was this: if religion gets so many subsidies and tax breaks, shouldn't atheist organizations be entitled to the same treatment?
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In the UK, the British Humanist Association, the Richard Dawkins Foundation and others do have charitable status; the latter also having similar status in the US. So they are indeed subject to tax breaks.
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Then go to North korea, because you might think that all this is only due to religion. Look around.
Comparing North Korea and any of your other examples introduces far too many variables. Why not look at a study which keeps these factors constant by only comparing instances of creator-worship in western democracies [smh.com.au].
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sometimes but not always sparing (*and* raping) young women.
what changed? now we have priests raping young boys
Read the books about what happened to the Romans they empire stretched the known world and culture that build great work, science that was ahead of their time, roads and aqueducts built, funny how their downfall came around the time the "church" came into existence and for the next 1000 years europe was plunged into a feudal dark age
Then go to America, look around.
american taliban [ucsd.edu]
The first well-kn
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How is Buddhism not a religion? It is practiced in many forms...Zen Buddhism is my favorite. I guess you can call it methodology or a practice. For many, including myself, it is at least a perspective that involves some level of belief. I guess the same could be said about our "objective" physical reality.
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Read the books about what happened to the Romans they empire stretched the known world and culture that build great work, science that was ahead of their time, roads and aqueducts built, funny how their downfall came around the time the "church" came into existence and for the next 1000 years europe was plunged into a feudal dark age
Bahahahaha. Correlation != causation. And anyway, whats a few hundred years of prosperous coexistence between friends?
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I don't think there's too much connection between the rise of Christianity and the fall of the Roman empire. The traditional argument as espoused by Gibbon's "Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire" is essentially that Rome spread itself too thin and became weak due to having to fund an enormous army and continually fight battles on all it's borders; a more recent argument is that instead it was primarily a matter of the barbarians (i.e Germanic/etc tribes surrounding the empire) becoming stronger under const
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great modding (Score:2)
So the guy who tries to correct the stereotyping is the guy spewing flamebait? Good modding there guys. Well done.
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Why bans happen this much in Turkey (Score:5, Informative)
I'm from Turkey. As far as I know bans happen this way: If court decides that the content is illegal (attacking personal rights, advertising drugs etc.) they contact the owner of the site and demand the content to be removed. If the owner doesn't comply they ban the site. Previously bans happened by modifying DNS data of the de facto ISP monopoly in Turkey and redirecting sites to another page with legal information. This was easily circumvented by using another DNS. Then they started blocking IP addresses. Interesting thing is they don't block IP addresses of all banned sites. They only do this to popular sites and I believe courts are not deciding this. Someone outside courts decides that they must do IP blocking or not.
The law which orders bans also have a precaution clause which permits getting a site banned before court decides that the content is illegal or not. Bad guys uses this legal loophole to ban web sites easily.
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Let's face it, Muslims. It's time to grow up, leave your 12th century beliefs behind, and join the rest of the adult world.
Well, I'm sure your post will convince them, oh brave and enlightened AC.
YouTube is still banned in Turkey (Score:5, Informative)
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Thanks for you mature comment. I hope by writing this, and listening to music on my computer I don't become a hypocrite.
Well, actually I don't think so :)
Copyright infringement (Score:2, Informative)
Hi,
As far i know,this has nothing to do with religious or scientific matters.
Blogger was shut down due to copyright infrigement;Digiturk, a satellite tv provider, asked some blogs to remove their content but when this did not happen,they chose to shut down all the blogs.
Which is admittedly an idiotic move...
BTw,people please stop bringing up Eu at every subject about Turkey.
Bad Turkey, no EU for you! (Score:3, Insightful)
And there are people who still argue that Turkey should be allowed to join the EU. We have enough problems as is, let us not compound them by giving (more) religious zealots power in Europe.
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I have always been a big supporter for Turkey in the EU. Turkey's way forward is in the Union.
However, they still have a lot of work to do, previously I thought that 2015 might be a reasonable timeframe, but this is clearly not the case.
We are probably looking on a 2020-2030 date now (at least). But a lot can happen in that timeframe.
I don't think I have met a single person who thinks that Turkey is eligible for joining the EU now, but the people supporting Turkey in the EU do this as a longterm goal. Becau
Catch 22 (Score:2)
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We shouldn't be blaming Turkey as a whole for it, but the present-day pro-Islamic government.
Turkey is pretty much the only Muslim-majority state which is actually a functional Western-style democracy (with its own troubles, such as ultra-nationalism, sure, but that's as close as it gets). If it falls, it will essentially mean the end of the "liberal democratic Islam" experiment. If it does not, it is something we can point at to the likes of Iran and Afghanistan as an example. I'd rather have the latter
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That was Texas. We've regretted it ever since.
Couple of points... (Score:2)
First of all, no one knows why the site was banned. The article admits it's pure speculation. Secondly, if the article's hypothesis is correct then unlike what some comments are suggesting, it was not to crackdown on anti-Islamic views but the exact opposite. A prominent Muslim creationist has apparently been promoting his views on Blogger so it's been banned, like other sites he posted on before. That's the theory.
And seriously, you're saying that Turkey shouldn't be allowed in the EU because it restricts
Culprit is found and... (Score:2, Informative)
Adnan Oktar/Harun Yayha (Score:3, Informative)
http://counterknowledge.com/?p=223 [counterknowledge.com]
http://counterknowledge.com/?p=157 [counterknowledge.com]
http://counterknowledge.com/?p=72 [counterknowledge.com]
He seems to have a stranglehold over the Turkish courts, and is gradually silencing any and all outlets of dissent under flawed defamation and libel law.
Reason of the ban... (Score:4, Informative)
The ban is not about Adnan Oktar or some religious subject but simply is about Digiturk which holds the right to broadcast the Turkish Football Super League.
Digiturk claims that the bloggers illegally streams the matches (you have to buy a receiver and a special card in order to view the Turkish Super League) from internet via their blogs.
Therefore they appeal to court and court bans the whole sites ending with ...blogspot.com abd blogger.com. Therefore the complete blogger has
been banned.
I admit that this is totally bullshit but not everything in Turkey is not about religion etc.
Best regards,
"anonymous coward".
As someone else mentioned (Score:5, Informative)
It's not a government ban, but actually caused vy a loophole in the law. (It has never been a government ban, nevertheless it's embarrassing).
*Any* court can order the ban of *any* website in Turkey. It only takes a single prosecutor deeming the case worthy, and a judge accepting it.
So for example, you can complain "google is infringing on my intellectual property", and if the prosecutor buys it, the judge can put in a preliminary motion to ban google. The ISPs can not do anything about it (except for going for an appeal).
The related law is being questioned, and will probably be replaced soon. (Hopefully).
Smash! (Score:2)
Why ban US sites? (Score:2)
Let's not argue... (Score:3, Insightful)
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I can stand blogs, but are you seriously comparing this to blocking thepiratebay.org?
You think that Demark is 'bad' because they have blocked a website that does nothing but contribute to the distribution of stolen content? And that Turkey is becoming 'as bad as Demark'.
You sir, are an idiot.
You can 'defend' the pirate bay all day long using legal loopholes and bullshit to talk your way around the facts, but the reality of it is that thepiratebay.org is used to facilitate the distribtution of content illeg
Good for Turkey. (Score:4, Funny)
Everyone is screaming censorship, but thats not it. They are saving themselves and the rest of the world. By Turkey not having access to blogger, all those people will no longer be made dumber by reading someones retarded online diary. The rest of the world will no longer have to be subjected to stupid blogs from Turkey.
No one has blocked the 3 blogs on the Internet that are actually useful, the other 4 billion useless online diaries will not be noticed when they disappear by anyone other than the emo that posts to them, and possibly a other emo's that cry with them after school.
We really do need to stop trying to shoehorn the censorship issue onto anything that we don't agree with. I can see how you might think this is censorship, but its not.
Nothing of value was lost in this ban, move on.
UPDATE ON BAN (Score:5, Informative)
Re: (Score:2)
Surely the White House wouldn't refuse to give interviews because someone asks hard questions! Oh wait...
Re: (Score:2)
Hussein has already banned interviews with a TV station in Florida because the station's reporter had the gall to ask Joe "The Senator" Biden some tough questions.
What, just one station? Man, he's FAR behind the McCain/Palin campaign!