Red China is huge! In fact - they don't get any bigger. China also has the Great Wall - one of the wonders of the ancient word. Built to keep out invaders and traders - it eventually failed. In the new millenium China is building a new wall to fight a wonder of the modern world. Over a billion people trapped in a despotic police state that is starting to crack from the inside out.
The Great Satan's infernal internet and the universal values of the human spirit like freedom of choice are downright scary to unfree regimes. 220 million online comrades spent over 8 billion bucks shopping on line last year in China - current filters were only able to handle less than 6 billion.
Unbridled capitalism hooked up with unbridled inquiry could very well spark the most awesome of all regime changes - from the inside out. China's illegitimate rulers are well aware of this. Reuters' Ian Ransom in Hong Kong admits that unfree, controlled media this size really needs to field an army to censor it noting that nearly a thousand arrests alone in 2007 is totally because
"China employs tens of thousands of human Internet censors and a vast network ofGood luck! Psychics project capitalist opportunities in 2008 to be way more than last year - nigh unto 20 billion bucks. Wasting resources on trying to monitor and control people's biz or free time fun is totally retarded. Unverifed sources claim China's net suffered several breakdowns when Paris Hilton hit Shanghai last month and 20 million hits for one of the Great Satan's premier hootchies was literally too hot to handle.
filters to control online information."
Last millenium, illegitimate regimes used ye olde 'crimes against the state' jazz to shut away and silence political opponents, honest dissent and selfish people who embraced undespotic concepts like capitalism or freedom of choice.
Being PR Saavy, regimes in the new millenium use different phrases - in the Islamic Republic of Iran, the theo cons and their secret police crack down on the everpopular 'unislamic activity'. Their best bud 4 ever Bashar's Syrian Computer Society prefers terms like political and internet crimes.
Jonesing around for new school terminology trying to totally smush a free wheeling nation of tech saavy smart people from delving into fearsome concepts like consensual representive democracy, China's handpicked ruler Hu Jin Tao floated several terms to a government censored, unfree media
"Efforts should be made to advocate things that are helpful to the prosperity of
the country, the rejuvenation of the nation, the happiness of the people, and
the harmony of the society."
Harmoniously hitting on indecency as a tyrants term for online crimes against the state is actually quite weak. The "P" word turns off decent comrades and all girl comrades in China's socialist paradise. Is it true or is it code?"
"Human Rights groups have said the campaign has been used as a thinly veiled pretext to crack down on dissent and round up online dissidents ahead of the Olympics."
China's Internet spokescat Mu Xuequan admitted it was tough work. Shenzhen City also first introduced the "Net Police"—a couple of cute animae police figures who follow all of a surfer's movements on the Internet. When they catch someone accessing banned material the terminal is immediately connected to the monitoring system and the offender is thus "caught".
"authorities shut down 44,000 domestic websites and homepages and arrested 868
people while investigating 524 criminal cases. The authorities will give special
attention to websites that deal in audio and visual programs, blogging, videos,
point-to-point services, and mobile phone sites."
This is significant - China is desperately fighting to keep control in a police state. And like Chancellor Palpatine in Star Wars III is totally frightened of losing absolute power. Despite the best despotic efforts - The Great Dragon is defenseless before the Great Satan's irresistible creation.
Firewalling online chats and critique of the ruling Communist Party and any friendly give and taken, open or honest chatting like the 3 T's - Tiananman Square, Tibet and Taiwan. Illegitimate laws ordering Web sites to register with authorities And all for naught.
Filter buster builder American Xiao Qiang laughs off Red China's risable attempts to control:
"And the great firewall, no matter how great it is, it just is like the Great
Wall in China. It's not going to stop the history going towards a freer, more
human society in China."
Senior Associate, Carnegie Endowment Minxin Pei confirms the internet is Great Satan's secret weapon - a real high tech, regime changing wall breacher than cannot be stopped,
"allowing more Chinese to have access to more information. And in the long run,
such information will undermine the legitimacy of the Chinese Communist Party"
6 comments:
I used to have a 'banned in China' banner on my blog, before the remodel. There was a website that showed if you were or not and I am proud to say I was!
The first time my husband went to China on business, he's been there several times now, he said China was coming on strong and was already so polluted in Bejing that it was nasty to breathe the air. That was a good 15 years ago.
This definitely bears watching, as the current regime wants at all costs to avoid a black eye from the Summer Olympics. They're going to find themselves in a tricky spot. Not only is there the increasingly pro-Western burgeoning middle class, but over a billion former farmworkers influxing from the countryside and needing jobs. That means the economy will have to continue to grow at breakneck pace, and business will put pressure on the govt to loosen their Inet grip.
Right Truth has been banned there almost from the beginning. Can you imagine NOT having internet access? It would be like getting cut off from the world.
Debbie Hamilton
Right Truth
Sadly, Google is on their side, having helped the Chinese by providing them with histories of what they searched and their IPs - so that the gov't could censor them. Great post, GF. China bears watching. North Korea as well.
GSGF,
I've been over there 5 times. 3-4 weeks per trip.
In the "Free Enterprise Zones", It's the most totally wired, online,tech-savvy society you'll ever see. (Look into the Chinese Free Enterprise Zones when you get a chance, and then give your readers a post on Free Market Vs. Socialism. I'm sure it would be memorable....)
The general concensus is that they have 40-45,000 internet censors working around the clock. Some sites are banned outright, some search phrases trigger a censor to look in, and some censors just wander the 'Net, looking for someone up to no good.
If you do a Google Image Search of "Tianamen Square", your first 8-10 hits will normally be the unknown protester standing in front of the tanks during the shakedown. Do the same search in China, and you'll get pictures of Chairman Mao's poster on one of the Tianamen walls.
The Chinese know this, BTW.
Bill Clinton described China's effort to censor the internet as like "trying to nail jello to the wall." (One of his few quotable moments.)
People should read this.
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