Tag: censorship

Categories
First Amendment rights too much government

Leahy versus the Internet

A censor’s work is never done. So, in a civilization where everybody salutes freedom of speech, censors must be especially clever, seeking new ways to hide their goals.

The latest camel’s rump under the tent? A bill to censor entire Internet domains on the grounds of alleged violations of rights that have not been prosecuted. Pending in the Senate and sponsored by Senator Patrick Leahy, it’s called the Combating Online Infringement and Counterfeits Act (COICA).

The bill would create two blacklists in response to accusations of copyright violation or sales of counterfeit goods. One would consist of sites to which Internet service providers would be required to block access.

The second would consist of sites to which ISPs would be merely encouraged to block access.

Any chance the government might pressure ISPs to ensure the “voluntary” censorship of disapproved domains … including domains with just a few pages of dubious legality but many pages of criticism of government?

Sounding the alarm, the Electronic Frontier Foundation notes that the Digital Millennium Copyright Act already gives copyright holders a means of taking action against copyright violations. The Foundation argues that Leahy’s bill would enable the U.S. to join the ranks of the “profoundly anti-​democratic regimes that keep their citizens from seeing the whole Internet.”

The Foundation’s message: “Tell Your Senator: No Website Blacklists, No Internet Censorship!”

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

Categories
folly general freedom ideological culture

Facebook’s Secret Shame

Facebook has had some bad press lately.

The popular social networking site got in trouble in recent months for the ever-​more-​cavalier way it treats users’ privacy. People complain that their data has been unilaterally exposed in ways they never expected when they first signed up for the service, and that privacy settings have devolved into a confusing, hard-​to-​tweak labyrinth.

Facebook seems to be adjusting its privacy practices in response to the bad publicity. But there’s another lamentable Facebook practice that has, unfortunately, received less sustained attention: Its willingness to shut down a user’s Facebook page solely because somebody else is offended by the viewpoint expressed on that page.

The “somebody else,” in the case I’m referring to, is the government of Pakistan, which banned Facebook because of a page encouraging people to display images of the prophet Muhammad in protest of threats of violence against the show South Park, which had made fun of making threats against people who display images of Muhammad.

“In response to our protest, Facebook has tendered their apology and informed us that all the sacrilegious material has been removed from the URL,” gloated Najibullah Malik, who represents Pakistan’s Orwellian “information technology ministry.”

It’s dangerous to cave in to demands for censorship. The folks at Facebook were faced with the loss of a large market, but they should have let the anti-​censorship page remain published and let Facebook users in Pakistan pressure their government to lift the ban.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

Categories
First Amendment rights too much government

You Go, Google

A few weeks back I asked what was going on with Google’s pledge to stop helping the Chinese government censor search results for sensitive topics like Falun Gong and Tiananmen Square. Google was presumably using its threat of withdrawal from the Chinese market as a negotiating chip to wrest privileged status from the Chinese authorities.

But the hope was naive. It was unlikely in the extreme that China would give up its program of censoring mainland culture and especially politics. It wants to control the dialogue and thwart political dissent. So I told Google, “Google, ya gotta go. Stop enabling Chinese censorship. Do as you promised and provide a desperately needed and inspiring example of refusing any longer to cooperate with tyranny.”

I feared Google would retreat from its public commitment. But now Google agrees that for the Chinese government, “self-​censorship is a non-​negotiable legal requirement.” So Google is redirecting Chinese users of its search engine (Google​.cn) to its Hong Kong search engine (Google​.com​.hk), where results are not currently censored because of the “one country, two systems” policy that has been at least roughly followed since China took over Hong Kong in 1997.

Whether citizens on the mainland will be able to get uncensored search results from the Hong Kong Google search engine is an open question at best. But any censorship of those results will now be perpetrated by China without Google’s active cooperation. Good for Google.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

Categories
First Amendment rights general freedom too much government

Googling and Snuggling No More?

After years of abetting Chinese censorship, Google may finally take a stand. The world leader in Internet search may no longer be willing to help impose the Red regime’s repressive measures. The last straw? A cyber attack on Google that originated in China and targeted email accounts of Chinese dissidents. Other companies were also attacked.

In recent decades, China has loosened controls on its economy. But it is loath to permit any significant scraps of civil liberty as well, like the right to speak out freely in criticism of the government.

China lets the Internet function within its borders. But it also erects firewalls, filters and other restrictions to block or limit access to various corners of cyberspace. For years, Google has cravenly played along, preventing phrases like “Tiananmen Square massacre” from being searched on the Chinese version of its search engine.

Google officers have long squirmed over their hypocritical willingness to “do evil.” Now a Google lawyer says the company is “no longer willing to continue censoring our results.…” They’re taking a few weeks to mull their next move. But they say they’ll leave China altogether if its government won’t agree to let Google’s search engine function freely.

China’s rulers won’t agree; so I hope Google does what it says it will do. Some things one should just not collaborate with. Tyranny is at the top of the list.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

Categories
First Amendment rights

Arresting Developments

Gustavo Rendon was arrested in broad daylight — right in front of his two boys. One St. Louis policeman threatened that his boys would be sent into foster care.

Rendon’s crime? He passed out fliers in his neighborhood. He spoke out on public policy — in this case, opposing an eminent domain land grab and promoting a petition effort to put the city’s development plan to a vote. 

Dave Roland, an attorney for the Show-​Me Institute, says this outrageous behavior is part of “an unsettling pattern” … of squelching free speech.

Roland also points to St. Louis’s attempt to force Jim Roos to take down a sign protesting the city’s abuse of eminent domain — a case still in court. He mentions a recent instance where the Northeast Ambulance and Fire District actually sought to ban citizens from public meetings. 

Roland’s “most disturbing” example concerns the Missouri Municipal League. The League has filed a lawsuit challenging the ballot titles for two anti-​eminent domain abuse measures, effectively putting both petition drives on hold.

At a recent meeting of the Missouri Bar Association’s Eminent Domain Committee, Municipal League attorney Carrie Hermeling admitted that their “main objective” is “to delay the gathering of signatures.” Adding, “[H]opefully we’re accomplishing that.” 

Thwarting the people, denying their basic rights — quite an accomplishment.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.