See no evil, Hear no evil, Speak no evil; Journalists struggle during the Beijing Olympics
Posted by Manuela Barreto @ August 7th, 2008 in Media News
Do not make promises you cannot keep. Reporters from all over the world sent to cover the 2008 Beijing Olympics are currently protesting after they had been promised they’d be given the same freedom to report as they did in any other previous Olympic Games.
Apparently, Beijing failed to keep its word, and now it’s being confronted by a mass of unhappy reporters who complain of restricted internet access and blocked websites such as the Human Rights Watch portal and others of the sort. The conflict has reached a point where journalists have had to ask the IOC (International Olympic Committee) to intervene and investigate on this censorship ordeal.
However, we already know how harsh the Chinese government rules and regulations are at controlling Internet content. In some cases, it is even considered capital crime.
Apart from the censorship control system, China also keeps a close eye on the country’s daily online news and asserts on what should and should not be released. On a similar note, it also implements a stringent mechanism for filtering keywords. Certain specific subjects are of sensitive nature and become automatically eradicated as to avoid anyone researching on them.
Can it get more controversdial than this? We are talking about a country which will soon become if not already the world’s next super power, by far, -with over 220 million internet users- that’s number one in the world for them.
This is a milestone for China, the Internet is filling a void, and it would be absurd for the Chinese government to put a stop also on this.
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Comments
Nick Stamoulis
August 7th, 2008
Love the image… you can’t promise something you’re not willing to do. Beijing made a big mistake with this one…
m.barreto
August 8th, 2008
Hey Nick,
thanks!
Yeah, I guess they’re not setting too good of an example, are they?
Peter
August 13th, 2008
China have been making improvements in their censorship laws in the recent past. As for setting an example…USA and UK have our fair share of internet companies illicitly taking people’s info without their explicit information. And as for keeping promises…I think current political institutions in the ‘western’ world have broken quiet a few promises themselves in the past few years.
So generally i do think they are setting a good example (well better then us that is) through actually making improvements in human rights and civil liberties not like our governments who have been slowly eroding civil liberties for the past few years.
m.barreto
August 13th, 2008
Hey,
I’m gonna have to disagree. I don’t think they’re better off than the UK or US. China has absolutely the worst history a country can possibly have when dealing with human rights. We’re talking about a society that has complete and utter control over what goes out in the media, there’s is no freedom of press whatsoever and news only narrate what is convenient for the government. A society that imprisons leaders, arrests or attacks people for speaking out of order.You’re better off mute if you want to live in a place where you’re constantly afraid to speak your mind. Yes, it is true some of these things happen in other places, just not to this extreme.
Then finally, an escape opportunity arrives to the Chinese community, THE INTERNET, bearing in mind not all of them have access if at all to a computer or even cybercafe…and what do they do? they ban websites..they limit what the Chinese can and cannot see over the Web. Websites like the Human Rights Watch?? are you kidding..that just speaks for itself. They live as if it were a social experiment; they control what people see, read and do…pretty soon they’ll turn into robots.