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from the I-Disapprove-of-What-You-Say,-But-I-Will-Defend-to-the-Death-Your-Right-to-Say-It dept.
From an editorial in the Otago Daily Times out of New Zealand, Censorship a Trojan Horse:
It's an oft-cited maxim that the news media is the "fourth estate" upon which a healthy democracy stands.
It ensures the three traditional powers of state — the legislature, executive and judiciary — can be critiqued, challenged and curbed from quietly drifting into the arms of corruption and authoritarianism.
A free, fair, open and uncensored media is an antidote to state power and, for all its failings (and there are many), should be treasured as such. There are many countries around the world whose people would give anything for such a freedom.
Yet calls for the banning of certain opinion pieces, cartoons and commentary have risen in recent months, especially from those using social media, a world where such talk is becoming a trend. It is a trend we must confront.
Censorship is to suppress the harmful, the unacceptable, the obscene and the threatening from the media and other forms of public communication. Like a virus attacking democracy from the inside out, it was traditionally the tool of the dictator, though it is one used by many in power.
[...] It pays to query what those demanding censorship — be they celebrities, social-media activists or anybody else — see their ultimate goal as being.
To reduce hurt? To make the world a better place? Possibly, and those motivations are laudable. But the method employed to achieve them is not.
While censorship may be meant as a figurative horse upon which a better future rides, inside the belly of that horse lurks an army of conformity, quite capable of unwitting oppression.
History shows what happens when the fourth estate is no longer free to table all opinions.
It is a bleak picture. Without the disinfectant of exposure, power and ideals tend to corrupt even the most seemingly incorruptible.
(Score: 4, Informative) by jmorris on Tuesday October 02 2018, @03:51PM (13 children)
Everyone misses the elephant in the room on that one. WWI and WWII were real Wars, everyone understood that allowing enemies in our midst to undermine the war effort with sedition and serpent tongued enemy talking points in the mass media was not permissible.
Vietnam was not a War, Congress did not and had no intention of declaring War, with all that entailed. There was never widespread popular support for it and thus attempting to impose the typical war rules would have resulted in a popular revolution. So sedition and Soviet influence were permitted and the cause lost, millions died. Very sad. Whether it was "winnable" given our lack of unity is something the historians will debate for a long time. It certainly wasn't winnable with the leaders we had and a policy of allowing the opposing side free access to our mass media, that much can now safely be stated.
(Score: 3, Informative) by http on Tuesday October 02 2018, @04:27PM
For something that was not a war, a whole lot of american military personnel came home dead after killing a whole lot of not-american military personnel.
I browse at -1 when I have mod points. It's unsettling.
(Score: 2) by Azuma Hazuki on Tuesday October 02 2018, @05:10PM (7 children)
Sorry, can you say that in German? It's missing something in English, you know...
I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
(Score: 3, Insightful) by jmorris on Tuesday October 02 2018, @05:19PM (6 children)
Well no, that was actually sorta the problem. In both WWI and WWII we were fighting Germany while having large populations of Germans, speaking German and reading German language newspapers and having a fair amount of loyalty to Germany. Ain't it amazing now you can flip open a history book to a random event and see how immigration is at best a mixed blessing?
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Azuma Hazuki on Tuesday October 02 2018, @05:28PM (5 children)
Look into where the Germans got their eugenics ideas. Go on. I'll wait.
I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
(Score: 1, Troll) by jmorris on Tuesday October 02 2018, @05:33PM (4 children)
I'll go you one better. Look into where Gobbels got Propaganda.
Posted many times that WWII was a war between International Socialism (Allies) vs National Socialism (Axis). People who wanted to live free had no dog in that fight.
Or shorter still, quoting Moldbug's Last Red Pill: America is a Communist Country.
(Score: 0, Flamebait) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 02 2018, @05:50PM
Ah yes, the serious usage of "Red Pill", the most clear indicator of an unbalanced mind.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by Azuma Hazuki on Tuesday October 02 2018, @05:50PM (2 children)
Don't conflate the authoritarian/libertarian axis with the communist/laissez-faire axis. Authoritarians of all stripes will gravitate toward economic extremes, because it fits their worldview. You're being used by the authoritarian right, and if there ever was a contradiction in terms, it's authoritarian free-market economy. That's a logical impossibility, like a married bachelor.
I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
(Score: 2) by jmorris on Tuesday October 02 2018, @06:08PM (1 child)
1. A free market requires law and order, the rule of law, sound money, enforcement of contracts and a whole bunch of things the Left now deems bad ideas.
2. A unfettered free market is not the apex value for a civilization that expects to survive, it is just the most productive economic system. Even Ludwig von Mises says this in his magnum opus, Human Action
Balance in all things is the winning move. Liberty without responsibility is merely license. Go read the Founders, one phrase keeps recurring that we seem to abhor today: Ordered liberty.
(Score: 3, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 02 2018, @07:36PM
Ah yes, ordered liberty. I agree that freedom is slavery. If it weren't for the leftists, we would be able to have peaceful wars just like in the good old days. Some people call this ignorance, but people like you and me know that it's strength.
(Score: 2, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 02 2018, @05:23PM (2 children)
"Whether it was "winnable" given our lack of unity is something the historians will debate for a long time."
-
What utter bullshit.
The Viet Nam war was never "winnable" because on one side there were committed fighters who were natives and on the other side there
were people from other countries who were not personally invested in winning in the long run.
You need to shut the fuck up, little boy. I served in Viet Nam, and you didn't.
I'd stomp your fucking ass right now if you were in front of me, because I am sick and tired of jerkoffs like you spewing bullshit about situations they have only read about. FUCK YOU.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday October 03 2018, @08:30AM
Oh, Look! More "Stolen Valor" on SoylentNews!
(Score: 2) by MichaelDavidCrawford on Wednesday October 03 2018, @07:27PM
Specifically, Ho Chi Minh quite politely requested Vietnam be granted its independence from France at the 1918 Paris Peace Conference. He was ridiculed.
In 1955 the North Vietnamese totally surrounded the French at Dien Bien Phu then slaughtered so many of them that France granted Vietnam its independence. They could have done so in 1918.
Yes I Have No Bananas. [gofundme.com]
(Score: 3, Insightful) by MichaelDavidCrawford on Tuesday October 02 2018, @06:58PM
But millions of Vietnamese.
The war in Vietnam actually got started in 1918 when Ho Chi Minh attended the Versailles Peace Conference so he could request Vietnam be given its independence from France.
That he was ridiculed by all the rich white men there resulted in France's 1955 surrender at Dien Bien Phu, the 1968 Tet Offensive and North Vietnam's successful invasion of the south.
As General Vo Nguyen Giap said, "Nothing is more precious than independence."
If you don't agree with Vo, consider how precious America's independence is to us, or at least was during our revolt against Britain.
Yes I Have No Bananas. [gofundme.com]