7 ms·

US Ranks 41st in Press Freedom Index Thanks to 'War on Whistleblowers'

232 points by raddad 10y ago

dogma1138 10y ago
I personally won't read to much into this, RFS has a very single minded political agenda, Mongolia has more press freedom than Japan and Italy, Georgia (in which the government closes TV stations at will) has more freedom than Greece, and Lebanon's press has apparently more freedom than Israel's.
- wfo 10y ago
  Their methodology is stated very explicitly. They do a questionnaire in all of the relevant countries and have a formula to derive the scores. You cannot begin with an intuitive notion of the countries that you want to have a high "press freedom" index and when the actual scores don't match your intuition blame it on the assumed bias of the source. I'm certainly open to the idea that this report is crap, but they have data, numbers, a sample, formulas, and reasoning and arguments for why they did things the way they did. If you think they are incorrect, explain why, don't just say "this doesn't fit my preconceived notions about the countries I want to believe are more free, so the people who did it are lying". For example, I'm not at all shocked that they rated Lebanon as having higher press freedom than Israel, in fact that's probably to me an indicator that they are doing something right and not just picking out statistical proxies for western european-style nations.
  - dogma1138 10y ago
    Not buying it sorry. I've read the report every year and they don't publish their aggregated data. The questionnaires are filled by local representatives of their choosing. They had have made political moves which go against their own statements and condemnations and they have quite a few very weird picks that don't even seem to correspond to their own summary of the country. And while it's true that I can't hold an intuitive understanding of the freedom of the press in various countries I can some how understand that countries where the government shuts down TV stations and news papers all day long probably have less freedom than countries where "organized crime" harasses Journalists.
    - duncan_bayne 10y ago
      Don't publish aggregated data == lying to suit an agenda. I literally can't think of any other reason.
    - wfo 10y ago
      Okay, I'd buy that the targets of the survey may very well be pre-selected to align politically with a particular set of positions. What do you mean by aggregated data? I'm fairly well trained in mathematics and statistics but I'm not sure what that phrase means -- does it not just mean the statistics derived from the sample? And doesn't it matter mostly how /the journalists/ feel about how much press freedom they have? Journalists may very well not be effected by overreaching hate crime legislation (journalism rarely involves writing hate speech) though laypeople see it as a violation of freedom of speech. Organized crime may feel more oppressive than certain oppressive governments. And the survey only purports to express the opinions of journalists in many countries about how free they feel they are, it doesn't pretend to solve a centuries old open problem in philosophy and accurately define 'freedom' and then measure it.
      - dogma1138 10y ago
        Aggregated data means actually publishing the data they've collected not some numbers that may or may not hold any relevance. For each country they should publish how many questionnaires were issued, who they were issued too (local journalists? foreign journalists?) split abuses to actual abuse of power by the state vs the nature of reporting from conflict zones, and maybe make those filled questionnaires public with or without the actual names?
  - victorhooi 10y ago
    I think anybody with even a rudimentary exposure to statistics, or survey methodology will tell you that what you said is, quite frankly, not even remotely true. Even a grad student could present statistics to show whatever they wanted (trust me I've done it...), and you can orient survey questions, or even ask them in a certain order that you will guarantee a certain response. It's like asking "What are your thoughts on the freedom of press that you enjoy?", versus "How do you feel about your government's attempts to curb press freedom?" As Ronald Coase said, "If you torture the data enough, nature will always confess." https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Ronald_Coase https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Ronald_Coase
    - wfo 10y ago
      Of course it is true. What you've said is the case about literally every study that has ever been done in a huge number scientific fields. The fact that you have used statistics to lie does not mean that these people have. They published their questionnaire, you can read it. They published a detailed description of their methods, you can read them. That's the best we can do in science. It is not only malicious but even worse, lazy, to say "I don't like your results, so your methods must be bad", which is literally all I've seen in this thread. That and "country X doesn't have literally the exact same definition of freedom of speech as the U.S., how could they possibly score high on a press freedom [which is only tangentially related to freedom of speech] index?!?!?! LOL"
      - victorhooi 10y ago
        Many, many other people on this thread have already pointed out the glaring ommissions and biases in this study. You don't need to hold a magnifiying glass to see them. For example - see this thread (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11538812 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11538812): > From the RFS entry on Surinam, position 22: "“public expression of hatred” towards the government is punishable by up to seven years in prison under a draconian defamation law. The controversial Dési Bouterse, who became president again in 2010 in an election, has managed to be amnestied for the 1982 murders of 15 political opponents including five journalists." > RFS on Jamaica at 10: " The very occasional physical attacks on journalists must be offset against this, but no serious act of violence or threat to media freedom has been reported since February 2009, a month that saw two cases of abuse of authority by the Kingston police." > Or even Ireland at 9: "... defamation lawsuits are common. Finally, interviewing police sources has been virtually impossible since the Garda Siochana Act of 2005, which bans police officers from talking to journalists without prior authorization." > Not a little biased are we? Amnesty for murdering journalists isnt my idea of freedom of the press, nor are defamation law suits, or a prohibition against interviewing the police. Whilst everybody loves a good US-bash, if you're actually trying to tell me reporters have it harder there than any of the above, then you are seriously deluding yourself.
deepnet 10y ago
A free press and whistleblowers are essential to democracy. Without a free press & whistleblowers democracy cannot function. It is clear from the last five years of leaks that elected governements around the world feel they must act in secret because they suspect the electorate would not approve. Without much more oversight this will worsen. Free Chelsea Manning. Pardon Edward Snowden. Drop the inditement against Julian Assange. Offer sanctuary to Mossack Fonesca's whistleblower. Lead by example.
- grecy 10y ago
  A free press and whistleblowers are essential to democracy. Without a free press & whistleblowers democracy cannot function. The scariest part of what you said is not that it's true, it's that you're being down voted for saying it.
  - Analemma_ 10y ago
    sigh... this again. He's being downvoted because statements like > "A free press and whistleblowers are essential to democracy. Without a free press & whistleblowers democracy cannot function." are applause lights that contribute nothing of substance to this conversation. Pick a bunch of random people-- hell, even random politicians-- and ask them if a free press is essential to democracy. I guarantee you 100% of them will say yes, and probably 100% of them actually believe it and aren't just cynical liars. This suggests that the causes of this muzzling are deeper than people simply not realizing how important a free press is, and that the solutions are more complex than repeating two-sentence mantras that everyone already agrees with.
    - Grishnakh 10y ago
      Given that the press doesn't have that much freedom in most of the world (even supposedly democratic countries), I think your statement that "everyone already agrees with" these mantras is plainly false.
      - carboncopy 10y ago
protomyth 10y ago
coming in at #22 is Surinam with a "“public expression of hatred” towards the government is punishable by up to seven years in prison under a draconian defamation law." The ranking for Slovakia at 12 seems at odds with its description "Defamation is punishable by up to eight years in prison, the harshest penalty for this offence in the European Union. Many legal actions have been brought by businessmen, politicians and judicial officials. Prime Minister Robert Fico initiated several during his first term. Censorship was tightened in 2014 by the adoption of a regulation limiting the number of journalists with parliamentary accreditation, restricting their movements within the parliament and banning them from photographing the personal property of parliamentarians."
jfaucett 10y ago
Can anyone provide: 1. What factors were used in deriving this list? 2. Who funds this project? I can't find it anywhere on their site.
- deleted 10y ago
  [deleted]
- nmrm2 10y ago
  1. Click on the "World Press Freedom Index" link in the first sentence of the article, then click on the "METHODOLOGY" link in the subheader (black and white bar). 2. Google gives multiple cited sources: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reporters_Without_Borders#Funding https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reporters_Without_Borders#Fund... http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/Reporters_Without_Borders#Funding_Sources http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/Reporters_Without_Borde...
  - jfaucett 10y ago
    thanks, my device was too small and the methodology link wasn't visible, I found it after zooming out though. methodology: http://rsf.org/en/detailed-methodology http://rsf.org/en/detailed-methodology questionnairre: http://rsf.org/sites/default/files/indexquestionnaire_anglais.pdf http://rsf.org/sites/default/files/indexquestionnaire_anglai...
ekianjo 10y ago
Netherlands at the top? The place where offensive tweets gets you a police visit ? Allright.
russell 10y ago
From the RFS entry on Surinam, position 22: "“public expression of hatred” towards the government is punishable by up to seven years in prison under a draconian defamation law. The controversial Dési Bouterse, who became president again in 2010 in an election, has managed to be amnestied for the 1982 murders of 15 political opponents including five journalists." RFS on Jamaica at 10: " The very occasional physical attacks on journalists must be offset against this, but no serious act of violence or threat to media freedom has been reported since February 2009, a month that saw two cases of abuse of authority by the Kingston police." Or even Ireland at 9: "... defamation lawsuits are common. Finally, interviewing police sources has been virtually impossible since the Garda Siochana Act of 2005, which bans police officers from talking to journalists without prior authorization." Not a little biased are we? Amnesty for murdering journalists isnt my idea of freedom of the press, nor are defamation law suits, or a prohibition against interviewing the police.
- Grishnakh 10y ago
  Or how about Germany at #12? They're prosecuting a guy for insulting Turkish Islamist President Erdogan!
  - nindalf 10y ago
    You're misrepresenting the reality on the ground in Germany. The government has zero interest in prosecuting the man, but had to when a foreign head of state pointed out a law that was on German books outlawed what the man said. They cannot choose to apply laws selectively so he will probably be prosecuted, acquitted and later the law will be struck down. It's worth mentioning that Germany really needs Erdogan to remain well disposed to them so that was an incentive too.
    - marcoperaza 10y ago
      When the law in question only allows prosecution with the consent of elected officials (which is not the case for other crimes), your rationalization falls flat on its face. Perhaps it is you who is misrepresenting reality. Also, caving on free speech for international political reasons is still caving on free speech. Protecting people from such political calculations is the whole point of constitutional guarantees of free speech in the first place.
sachkris 10y ago
Link to the ranking : http://rsf.org/en/ranking http://rsf.org/en/ranking Surprising to see that Singapore is at 154 and there is Eritrea below North Korea.
- victorhooi 10y ago
  When you surprised by Singapore - I assume you mean how low it is? I may be able to shed some light here - Singapore is considered a "kindly" dictatorship - basically, the ruling party is efficient and has a historical track record of running things well. Corruption, in the normal sense is near zero. So the population is happy to keep the status quo. However, opposition to the ruling party is next to non-existent (or was before, this may have changed), there is little to no freedom of the press (that includes web blogs), and if you try to challenge the government too loudly, they tend to either jail you or file defamation suits against you which they are guaranteed to win, and bankrupt you. I think it was William Gibson that described Singapore as "Disneyland with the death penalty" (although this was some time ago).
raddad 10y ago
Something which likely contributes to this rank or at least gives the appearance of it is this: These 6 Corporations Control 90% Of The Media In America http://www.businessinsider.com/these-6-corporations-control-90-of-the-media-in-america-2012-6 http://www.businessinsider.com/these-6-corporations-control-... Note this article is from 2012.
deleted 10y ago
[deleted]
anabis 10y ago
"Reporters Without Borders retracts Yasuda hostage comments" http://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2015/12/29/national/reporters-without-borders-retracts-yasuda-hostage-comments/ http://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2015/12/29/national/reporte... I am starting to think of them as just another irresponsible NGO.
- wahsd 10y ago
  They've never really been all that particularly responsible. It's reporters WITHOUT borders after all.
wahsd 10y ago
Let's remember here; Obama's War on Whistleblowers
anabis 10y ago
Japan is 72nd, and their biggest beef is "記者クラブ" (Journalist Club) were established domestic media gets precedence in press conferences. It partly looks like political maneuvering to get more question time in them. I wonder how other countries do it. I heard there are "first question rights" and "first rows" in the US also, so old hands like Helen Thomas had advantage.
xornor 10y ago
Finland and Russia has the most steepest border in the world if measured by the freedom of press.
- gulpahum 10y ago
  Finland shouldn't be at the top of the list. There is still self-censorship going on, especially related to opinions about Russia. It's called "Finlandization": https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Finlandization https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Finlandization
  - exprA 10y ago
    >especially related to opinions about Russia What year are you living in? There's certainly some self-censorship in Finnish media, but it's mostly related to PC-issues (e.g. disproportionate amount of of crimes committed by foreigners, and especially some humanitarian immigrants), but that's mostly a political statement by the reporters and certainly not a government policy (and thus does not extend to all of media).
known 10y ago
http://www.huffingtonpost.in/2016/04/12/india-racism_n_9667336.html http://www.huffingtonpost.in/2016/04/12/india-racism_n_96673...
known 10y ago
"Media does not spread free opinion; it generates opinion." --Oswald Spengler https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Decline_of_the_West https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Decline_of_the_West
calvinbhai 10y ago
Hard to believe India is at 133. The kind of manufactured news that is peddled by the Mainstream Media in India with no responsibility, I think it should be #1 !! Also, going through the methodology, I couldn't figure out which Indian languages are included in the survey, so, its quite possible that a major chunk of the Indian media was left out from the survey just because the translations were only in Hindi (thats my assumption).

232 points by raddad 10y ago

I personally won't read to much into this, RFS has a very single minded political agenda, Mongolia has more press freedom than Japan and Italy, Georgia (in which the government closes TV stations at will) has more freedom than Greece, and Lebanon's press has apparently more freedom than Israel's.

wfo 10y ago
Their methodology is stated very explicitly. They do a questionnaire in all of the relevant countries and have a formula to derive the scores. You cannot begin with an intuitive notion of the countries that you want to have a high "press freedom" index and when the actual scores don't match your intuition blame it on the assumed bias of the source. I'm certainly open to the idea that this report is crap, but they have data, numbers, a sample, formulas, and reasoning and arguments for why they did things the way they did. If you think they are incorrect, explain why, don't just say "this doesn't fit my preconceived notions about the countries I want to believe are more free, so the people who did it are lying". For example, I'm not at all shocked that they rated Lebanon as having higher press freedom than Israel, in fact that's probably to me an indicator that they are doing something right and not just picking out statistical proxies for western european-style nations.
- dogma1138 10y ago
  Not buying it sorry. I've read the report every year and they don't publish their aggregated data. The questionnaires are filled by local representatives of their choosing. They had have made political moves which go against their own statements and condemnations and they have quite a few very weird picks that don't even seem to correspond to their own summary of the country. And while it's true that I can't hold an intuitive understanding of the freedom of the press in various countries I can some how understand that countries where the government shuts down TV stations and news papers all day long probably have less freedom than countries where "organized crime" harasses Journalists.
  - duncan_bayne 10y ago
    Don't publish aggregated data == lying to suit an agenda. I literally can't think of any other reason.
  - wfo 10y ago
    Okay, I'd buy that the targets of the survey may very well be pre-selected to align politically with a particular set of positions. What do you mean by aggregated data? I'm fairly well trained in mathematics and statistics but I'm not sure what that phrase means -- does it not just mean the statistics derived from the sample? And doesn't it matter mostly how /the journalists/ feel about how much press freedom they have? Journalists may very well not be effected by overreaching hate crime legislation (journalism rarely involves writing hate speech) though laypeople see it as a violation of freedom of speech. Organized crime may feel more oppressive than certain oppressive governments. And the survey only purports to express the opinions of journalists in many countries about how free they feel they are, it doesn't pretend to solve a centuries old open problem in philosophy and accurately define 'freedom' and then measure it.
    - dogma1138 10y ago
      Aggregated data means actually publishing the data they've collected not some numbers that may or may not hold any relevance. For each country they should publish how many questionnaires were issued, who they were issued too (local journalists? foreign journalists?) split abuses to actual abuse of power by the state vs the nature of reporting from conflict zones, and maybe make those filled questionnaires public with or without the actual names?
- victorhooi 10y ago
  I think anybody with even a rudimentary exposure to statistics, or survey methodology will tell you that what you said is, quite frankly, not even remotely true. Even a grad student could present statistics to show whatever they wanted (trust me I've done it...), and you can orient survey questions, or even ask them in a certain order that you will guarantee a certain response. It's like asking "What are your thoughts on the freedom of press that you enjoy?", versus "How do you feel about your government's attempts to curb press freedom?" As Ronald Coase said, "If you torture the data enough, nature will always confess." https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Ronald_Coase https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Ronald_Coase
  - wfo 10y ago
    Of course it is true. What you've said is the case about literally every study that has ever been done in a huge number scientific fields. The fact that you have used statistics to lie does not mean that these people have. They published their questionnaire, you can read it. They published a detailed description of their methods, you can read them. That's the best we can do in science. It is not only malicious but even worse, lazy, to say "I don't like your results, so your methods must be bad", which is literally all I've seen in this thread. That and "country X doesn't have literally the exact same definition of freedom of speech as the U.S., how could they possibly score high on a press freedom [which is only tangentially related to freedom of speech] index?!?!?! LOL"
    - victorhooi 10y ago
      Many, many other people on this thread have already pointed out the glaring ommissions and biases in this study. You don't need to hold a magnifiying glass to see them. For example - see this thread (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11538812 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11538812): > From the RFS entry on Surinam, position 22: "“public expression of hatred” towards the government is punishable by up to seven years in prison under a draconian defamation law. The controversial Dési Bouterse, who became president again in 2010 in an election, has managed to be amnestied for the 1982 murders of 15 political opponents including five journalists." > RFS on Jamaica at 10: " The very occasional physical attacks on journalists must be offset against this, but no serious act of violence or threat to media freedom has been reported since February 2009, a month that saw two cases of abuse of authority by the Kingston police." > Or even Ireland at 9: "... defamation lawsuits are common. Finally, interviewing police sources has been virtually impossible since the Garda Siochana Act of 2005, which bans police officers from talking to journalists without prior authorization." > Not a little biased are we? Amnesty for murdering journalists isnt my idea of freedom of the press, nor are defamation law suits, or a prohibition against interviewing the police. Whilst everybody loves a good US-bash, if you're actually trying to tell me reporters have it harder there than any of the above, then you are seriously deluding yourself.

deepnet 10y ago

A free press and whistleblowers are essential to democracy. Without a free press & whistleblowers democracy cannot function. It is clear from the last five years of leaks that elected governements around the world feel they must act in secret because they suspect the electorate would not approve. Without much more oversight this will worsen. Free Chelsea Manning. Pardon Edward Snowden. Drop the inditement against Julian Assange. Offer sanctuary to Mossack Fonesca's whistleblower. Lead by example.

grecy 10y ago
A free press and whistleblowers are essential to democracy. Without a free press & whistleblowers democracy cannot function. The scariest part of what you said is not that it's true, it's that you're being down voted for saying it.
- Analemma_ 10y ago
  sigh... this again. He's being downvoted because statements like > "A free press and whistleblowers are essential to democracy. Without a free press & whistleblowers democracy cannot function." are applause lights that contribute nothing of substance to this conversation. Pick a bunch of random people-- hell, even random politicians-- and ask them if a free press is essential to democracy. I guarantee you 100% of them will say yes, and probably 100% of them actually believe it and aren't just cynical liars. This suggests that the causes of this muzzling are deeper than people simply not realizing how important a free press is, and that the solutions are more complex than repeating two-sentence mantras that everyone already agrees with.
  - Grishnakh 10y ago
    Given that the press doesn't have that much freedom in most of the world (even supposedly democratic countries), I think your statement that "everyone already agrees with" these mantras is plainly false.
    - carboncopy 10y ago

protomyth 10y ago

coming in at #22 is Surinam with a "“public expression of hatred” towards the government is punishable by up to seven years in prison under a draconian defamation law." The ranking for Slovakia at 12 seems at odds with its description "Defamation is punishable by up to eight years in prison, the harshest penalty for this offence in the European Union. Many legal actions have been brought by businessmen, politicians and judicial officials. Prime Minister Robert Fico initiated several during his first term. Censorship was tightened in 2014 by the adoption of a regulation limiting the number of journalists with parliamentary accreditation, restricting their movements within the parliament and banning them from photographing the personal property of parliamentarians."

jfaucett 10y ago

Can anyone provide: 1. What factors were used in deriving this list? 2. Who funds this project? I can't find it anywhere on their site.

deleted 10y ago
[deleted]
nmrm2 10y ago
1. Click on the "World Press Freedom Index" link in the first sentence of the article, then click on the "METHODOLOGY" link in the subheader (black and white bar). 2. Google gives multiple cited sources: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reporters_Without_Borders#Funding https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reporters_Without_Borders#Fund... http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/Reporters_Without_Borders#Funding_Sources http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/Reporters_Without_Borde...
- jfaucett 10y ago
  thanks, my device was too small and the methodology link wasn't visible, I found it after zooming out though. methodology: http://rsf.org/en/detailed-methodology http://rsf.org/en/detailed-methodology questionnairre: http://rsf.org/sites/default/files/indexquestionnaire_anglais.pdf http://rsf.org/sites/default/files/indexquestionnaire_anglai...

ekianjo 10y ago

Netherlands at the top? The place where offensive tweets gets you a police visit ? Allright.

russell 10y ago

From the RFS entry on Surinam, position 22: "“public expression of hatred” towards the government is punishable by up to seven years in prison under a draconian defamation law. The controversial Dési Bouterse, who became president again in 2010 in an election, has managed to be amnestied for the 1982 murders of 15 political opponents including five journalists." RFS on Jamaica at 10: " The very occasional physical attacks on journalists must be offset against this, but no serious act of violence or threat to media freedom has been reported since February 2009, a month that saw two cases of abuse of authority by the Kingston police." Or even Ireland at 9: "... defamation lawsuits are common. Finally, interviewing police sources has been virtually impossible since the Garda Siochana Act of 2005, which bans police officers from talking to journalists without prior authorization." Not a little biased are we? Amnesty for murdering journalists isnt my idea of freedom of the press, nor are defamation law suits, or a prohibition against interviewing the police.

Grishnakh 10y ago
Or how about Germany at #12? They're prosecuting a guy for insulting Turkish Islamist President Erdogan!
- nindalf 10y ago
  You're misrepresenting the reality on the ground in Germany. The government has zero interest in prosecuting the man, but had to when a foreign head of state pointed out a law that was on German books outlawed what the man said. They cannot choose to apply laws selectively so he will probably be prosecuted, acquitted and later the law will be struck down. It's worth mentioning that Germany really needs Erdogan to remain well disposed to them so that was an incentive too.
  - marcoperaza 10y ago
    When the law in question only allows prosecution with the consent of elected officials (which is not the case for other crimes), your rationalization falls flat on its face. Perhaps it is you who is misrepresenting reality. Also, caving on free speech for international political reasons is still caving on free speech. Protecting people from such political calculations is the whole point of constitutional guarantees of free speech in the first place.

sachkris 10y ago

Link to the ranking : http://rsf.org/en/ranking http://rsf.org/en/ranking Surprising to see that Singapore is at 154 and there is Eritrea below North Korea.

victorhooi 10y ago
When you surprised by Singapore - I assume you mean how low it is? I may be able to shed some light here - Singapore is considered a "kindly" dictatorship - basically, the ruling party is efficient and has a historical track record of running things well. Corruption, in the normal sense is near zero. So the population is happy to keep the status quo. However, opposition to the ruling party is next to non-existent (or was before, this may have changed), there is little to no freedom of the press (that includes web blogs), and if you try to challenge the government too loudly, they tend to either jail you or file defamation suits against you which they are guaranteed to win, and bankrupt you. I think it was William Gibson that described Singapore as "Disneyland with the death penalty" (although this was some time ago).

raddad 10y ago

Something which likely contributes to this rank or at least gives the appearance of it is this: These 6 Corporations Control 90% Of The Media In America http://www.businessinsider.com/these-6-corporations-control-90-of-the-media-in-america-2012-6 http://www.businessinsider.com/these-6-corporations-control-... Note this article is from 2012.

deleted 10y ago

[deleted]

anabis 10y ago

"Reporters Without Borders retracts Yasuda hostage comments" http://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2015/12/29/national/reporters-without-borders-retracts-yasuda-hostage-comments/ http://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2015/12/29/national/reporte... I am starting to think of them as just another irresponsible NGO.

wahsd 10y ago
They've never really been all that particularly responsible. It's reporters WITHOUT borders after all.

wahsd 10y ago

Let's remember here; Obama's War on Whistleblowers

anabis 10y ago

Japan is 72nd, and their biggest beef is "記者クラブ" (Journalist Club) were established domestic media gets precedence in press conferences. It partly looks like political maneuvering to get more question time in them. I wonder how other countries do it. I heard there are "first question rights" and "first rows" in the US also, so old hands like Helen Thomas had advantage.

xornor 10y ago

Finland and Russia has the most steepest border in the world if measured by the freedom of press.

gulpahum 10y ago
Finland shouldn't be at the top of the list. There is still self-censorship going on, especially related to opinions about Russia. It's called "Finlandization": https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Finlandization https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Finlandization
- exprA 10y ago
  >especially related to opinions about Russia What year are you living in? There's certainly some self-censorship in Finnish media, but it's mostly related to PC-issues (e.g. disproportionate amount of of crimes committed by foreigners, and especially some humanitarian immigrants), but that's mostly a political statement by the reporters and certainly not a government policy (and thus does not extend to all of media).

known 10y ago

http://www.huffingtonpost.in/2016/04/12/india-racism_n_9667336.html http://www.huffingtonpost.in/2016/04/12/india-racism_n_96673...

known 10y ago

"Media does not spread free opinion; it generates opinion." --Oswald Spengler https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Decline_of_the_West https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Decline_of_the_West

calvinbhai 10y ago

Hard to believe India is at 133. The kind of manufactured news that is peddled by the Mainstream Media in India with no responsibility, I think it should be #1 !! Also, going through the methodology, I couldn't figure out which Indian languages are included in the survey, so, its quite possible that a major chunk of the Indian media was left out from the survey just because the translations were only in Hindi (thats my assumption).