| Authoritarianism - the check-list |
[Dec. 6th, 2007|10:19 pm] |
| [ | Tags | | | censorship, politics | ] |
| [ | mood |
| |  sore | ] |
| [ | music |
| | Space Station Soma: Tune in, turn on, space out. Ambient and mid-tempo electronica. [SomaFM] | ] |
Fred Clark provides a pithy look at 'democracy' today - derived from this article by Jonathan A. Becker, 'Putin and the Dawn of the New Authoritarians'. In it Becker provides a DSM-like check-list of traits of the modern authoritarian state, thus:
• Asserts substantial control over the media
• Uses television as a blunt instrument to prop up the regime and discredit its opponents
• Ensures that television stations are in the hands of the state or state sympathizers
• Subjects journalists to defamation suits for even minor criticism of the regime
• Restricts journalists' access to government officials
• Arrests journalists
• Bans or limits opposition protests or rallies
• Detains and beats opposition leaders
• Maintains power through electoral fraud
• Invokes threats to national security as a part of their general press crackdowns
• Censors the Internet
As Fred put it, "The DSM might say that a regime that presents seven of these 11 symptoms could be diagnosed as suffering from a severe case of authoritarian disorder. Presenting only five symptoms might be a case of moderate authoritarianism. In either case, the resulting clinically significant distress or impairment of democratic liberties would require immediate treatment."
See how many *your* country scores! I think the UK currently presents as a mild-but-worsening condition, the US as severe. |
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| 6 Apart - censoring you without your consent |
[Nov. 30th, 2007|09:47 pm] |
| [ | Tags | | | 6a, censorship | ] |
| [ | mood |
| |  irate | ] |
| [ | music |
| | Space Station Soma: Tune in, turn on, space out. Ambient and mid-tempo electronica. [SomaFM] | ] |
Shared by ![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif) featherynscale, from quite a few sources.
As many of you are no doubt aware, Our logging Overlords have been suffering a nasty series of knee-jerk censorship attacks since Strikethrough. The latest binge involves 'voluntarily' (for now) classifying your LJ as either Precious-Little-Snowflake-Friendly, 'Adult Concepts' (14 and over) and 'Adult Content' (18+).
Well... there's more.
"Some of you may know that you can now set your journal to either "Adult content" (which blocks viewers under 18 from viewing) or "Adult concepts" (which blocks readers under 14). There are also options to flag someone journal as "adults only", which puts it into the queue to the moderators who will look at it and flag it for you.
As a default setting, they have EVERY SINGLE JOURNAL set to filter out the "adult content" setting! So if your friends try to do the right thing and mark their porny LJ's appropriately, you CAN'T SEE THEM until you change your viewing settings. Which is kind of hard to figure out how to, even if you know you have to in the first place.
Go to your User Options page, and click on Journal - settings. The Viewing Options page will appear, and all the way at the bottom is a section called "AdultContent Options". Your "Safe Search Options" has been set to "use moderate filtering - filters explicit and adult content".
So if someone on your F-list has recently dropped off the map and you have no idea why, try going here and changing your settings. Otherwise, if their LJ is set to "adult" you won't be able to see any of their public entries on your friends page."
I am utterly opposed to this action. Here's one reason why.
I was a weird kid - and a very quick reader. By the time I was nine years old, I' had read all the kids books in my local library - and bless them, they gave me adult tickets once I told them. Not long after (once I'd pillaged the 'Myth, psych and occult' shelves, they allowed me closed-shelf access. By the time I hit double figures, I had access to any book I wanted to read.
And I read some weird-ass and very adult stuff. For example, I was reading Crowley, Leary and de Sade before I was twelve. Obviously I didn't quite understand all of it.. but I was not banned from doing so.
Therefore:
Anyone who tries to stop another lonely, bright and inquisitive kid from reading so-called adult content - in a library, online, anywhere - can go to hell.
Thus, my journal will never voluntarily classify itself to restrict access. The second 6A try to make it mandatory, I'm gone. |
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| Won't somebody think of the *children*, Vol.69 |
[Oct. 10th, 2007|11:59 pm] |
| [ | Tags | | | censorship, games, law | ] |
| [ | mood |
| | head-shaking | ] |
| [ | music |
| | Limbik Frequencies - Radio Elektro[u]nique | ] |
So, Wil Wheaton goes to buy a video game - and gets carded. (Apparantly he still looks enough like Wesley Crusher that it's a common problem.)
Then, after sharing a hearty laugh with the game shop manager and employee, they discuss the laws in California regarding selling games to kids:
' “Did it strike you guys as a little weird that parents groups and politicians were totally fine with the violence and criminal behavior in Grand Theft Auto, but as soon as their precious little children – who shouldn’t have been playing the game in the first place – could see some crappy simulated sex, they lost their fucking minds?”
They both laughed. It was clear that this was a regular topic of conversation in the store, among employees and customers alike.
A young couple walked up to the cash register next to me. The guy excitedly held a copy of Madden in his hand, while the girl – clearly a long-suffering Xbox Widow – patiently waited with him.
“I mean,” I continued, “don’t they know that their precious little children have access to far more explicit sexual material online? They’re worried about a simulated polygonal sex act while little Timmy can get all the bukkake he wants with three clicks?”
The guy next to me stifled a laugh as the manager finished ringing them up.
As they walked out of the store, the girl said, “What’s bukkake?”
The three of us at the counter didn't try to stifle our collective laugh.
“That’s not even the worst part,” the manager said to me. “Check this out: if I sold a minor alcohol, I’d get about a $300 misdemeanor fine. But they’re trying to pass a law in New York and here in California that would make it a $1500 fine and a felony for me to sell this game,” he held up the game I was buying, Dead Rising, “to the same kid.” '
(Link to the full story goes to Suicide Girls and is thus NSFW.)
Worth comparing the US situation to the recent banning - twice - of the game Manhunt 2. |
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