I agree with Wikipedia’s choice. Sure, censorship is necessary to protect a communist government from revolt, but the purpose of Wikipedia was to give information to everyone, even the Chinese.
I agree with Wikipedia for not agreeing to the censorship! Why should they do it for just one country? A little off topic but does anyone else have a class (or school) rules against using wiki as a source for research? My government class does the teacher doesn’t allow us to use it for research on papers because it is user submitted and not all of it is reliable…
We are not allowed to use it as a direct reference, but we can use it to guide our research in different directions. Wikipedia has been immensely helpful in having easily referenceable facts that lead to other (hopefully) more concrete sources.
My English101CompI professor told us today that he would not accept Wikipedia as a resource, but that doesn’t mean I will stop using it for a personal reference like the one stated above.
Good job Wikipedia. Defy China and communism! Okay, what China does with their people and censorship is wrong. I read an article in the paper today about Chinese doctors selling human organs.
We are allowed to use Wikipedia as a source if and only if we cross reference and qualify with at least one other source.
I think I’ve used Wikipedia on every reasearch paper I’ve done. I’ve always had the URL to the specific revision. Strangely, no teacher has commented on it yet…
a toltarian government controls its population by controlling the access they have to information.
China is not a free nation. Every aspect of peoples lives is controlled.
Looking beyond the obvious good PR this gives Wikipedia (after a recent old-style media backlash against it), they couldn’t filter themselves if they wanted to.
How are you going to filter something with such variety as an Encyclopedia, and thousands of editors?
The United States government controls which information you have access to.
What’s the difference?
The same way you’d filter language in a forum. Keyword filtering and moderator only editing can easily censor wikipedia.
Freedom of Information Act. Also, you are not at risk of being imprisoned for merely critiquing the US government.
The FOIA contains nine exemption and three exclusion clauses which allow the government to withhold information based on criteria described within. At what point does a government control too much information?
I would like to point out that communism in and of itself has nothing to do with censorship. In fact, at least in Marx style communism, it would not be present, as the workers would control everything and, unless they decided to censor things from themselves, would be free to read whatever they desired. Many communist states’ rulers have a tendency to do so, but then it isn’t truly communism, which has no ‘ruler’ class except the people.
Unfortunately, Marx style communism also requires a utopian mindset in regards to world politics, being that a true communist government cannot have a military or space program (both take money out of the economy and do not return it to the people). That is why “communism” as we refer to it, must also have censorship to protect the government from the people so that the military does not have to be standing and detract from the economy.
An example of this failing would be the USSR, where corruption, the long standing military, and the space program of the Cold War contributed a great part in the collapse of the Soviet empire. In that way, large scale “practical” communism and censorship do go hand in hand.
you are talking about information from the government, usually information regarding the actions of the government, or information that it deems vital to national security.
China restricts access to all information: information from the government, information from the citizens, information from other governments, other citizens, universities, private businesses, and even history itself.
The rights of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness do not exist in China. The right of a free press does not exist. The right to associate or peaceably assemble does not exist. The right to choose your own destiny, your career, to travel where you wish, all are forbidden.
I think what you have described better represents North Korea. To the best of my knowledge, China does have some freedom. People in China do travel ( but most of the population is too poor and can’t afford it ), people can choose their destiny, their career. They can do what makes them happy (with a few limitations of course.)
On the other hand, North Korea is a prison lead by a madman. No coming in or out, all food is provided by the government, children belong to the leading political party…very similar to George Orwell’s description of Oceania.
David
On the other hand again, we have Tiananmen Square, in which ~3000 students died from the government trying to quell a simple protest. China censors news, media, and the internet, something that the US government does not.
It is true that there are captitalist sectors to bring revenue into China, but they’re still subject to censorship and the lack of freedoms that we as Americans have.
Sure we do. We call it the FCC.
yeah… they don’t do too much censoring, more of politely “asking” shows to keep certain obscenities out of their programming. However, they “ask” in the way of threatening lawsuits if the show/radio doesn’t apply.
I worked with an engineer who grew up in China, and came here as a student. He decided to stay. When he was a child the government decided what classes he would take, what school he would attend, and what his assigned career would be.
He was not allowed to travel, inside China or out, without written permission. Every aspect of his life was controlled until he left.
He is a little younger than me, I would guess he was born in 1960. Things may have improved a little, but not much.
In China people are imprisoned for speaking against official government actions or policy. That is censorship.
There is no US government representative who review and censors what our media is allowed to print or broadcast on the evening news.
Having a list of 4 words (it use to be 7) that you cannot say on TV is not censorship.
American companies that are working with the Chinese governemt have set up gated communities. The company builds the factory, a school, stores, a clinic, and the community is walled in. Entire families live together inside the walls. They are not allowed to leave, no one can come in to visit. If you dont want to work there anymore your entire family must leave.
The standard of living those ‘workers’ have is lower than the people in US prisions. Im not saying these are prison camps, but its very close.