The Bleeping Truth

[babylonsister]

http://www.atlanticfreepress.com/content/view/1645/81/

The Bleeping Truth
Written by Jayne Lyn Stahl
Thursday, 24 May 2007
by Jayne Lyn Stahl

So, you want the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the bleeping truth? Not only has this administration put government surveillance back on the map, and in ways that would make J. Edgar Hoover proud, but it has also engaged in the kind of censorship of scientific, and military, documents that would raise an eyebrow or two even at the Kremlin. And, burgeoning governmental intrusion poses a far graver threat to Internet safety than any garden variety computer virus ever could.

Among the more controversial issues former Vice President Al Gore mentioned last night on Larry King Live was this administration's unprecedented proclivity for blacking out parts of scientific reports on global warming, and anything else it considers "inconvenient." A study recently conducted by Oxford and Harvard, released last week, reports that fully two-thirds of the countries surveyed block or edit Internet social, and political posts.

While the nations surveyed include the usual suspects like China, Iran, and Korea, so-called "social filtering" is said to be happening in France and Germany where Web sites that deny the Holocaust are blocked. Whether we agree that Nazis and Holocaust deniers are not a desirable bunch, giving any government the right to decide what we see, and what we say, online may portend a dangerous trend. As John Palfrey, executive director of the Berkman Center for Internet and Society, suggests "The survey shows us that online censorship is growing around the world." (Agence France Presse) Coming soon to a Web site near you?

snip//

It's important to keep in mind, too, that the U.S. and most of Europe were not among those surveyed, and the folks at Oxford expect to find more nations that participate in the insidious practice of Internet snooping and blocking. The World Wide Web is, relatively speaking, in its infancy, and this is the first major study of its kind. Consider this in the context of what Al Gore, and others, report as censorship of scientific reports.

Mr. Gore is right. For those of us who look to the Internet for the kind of investigative reporting that would never make it past the editor's desk at mainstream newspapers, we'd better wake up to the fact that, sooner or later, we will see the same intrusion, and inability to tell the bleeping truth in cyberspace that we now see in the mainstream marketplace. Unless we want to lose our unfettered, and mostly unpaid, right to rant on a cyber-soapbox, we'd better start paying closer attention to censorship. The Defense Department has already blocked active service members from visiting You Tube on department computers, so it's just a question of time before the blocking spreads to a personal computer near and dear to you.

The only way to prevent this administration, or its clones, in coming years, from blocking out dissenting political and social commentary, on the World Wide Web, as well as anything it considers a threat to "national security" is to ask Congress to pass legislation that makes it a felony to intercept, edit, or block any post, Web site, or domain without a Court order. We must act now to protect the First Amendment, in all its applications, before it is so neutralized that it will no longer be able to protect us.

[Demeter]

1. Soviets Suppressed Science, Too Remember Lysenko?

Lysenkoism was a political campaign against genetics and geneticists which happened in the Soviet Union from the middle of the 1930s to the middle of the 1960s, centered around the figure of Trofim Denisovich Lysenko. Lysenkoism has also been known as Michurinism or Lysenko-Michurinism.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lysenkoism


Thing is, the Soviets gave it up as a stupid idea long ago, and they weren't doing it for "religious" fanatical reasons, either....not sure WHY they were supporting this charlatan, but the story at the above link is gruesome....he was selling snake oil, and a desperately off-track, ingnorant leadership was buying it.

[Uncle Joe]

2. Kicked and recommended

Thanks for the thread babylonsister.