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This coupled with the jail sentences for "disinformation" are predictable in autocracies like Russia. They desire to shutdown information and steer their subje

This coupled with the jail sentences for "disinformation" are predictable in autocracies like Russia. They desire to shutdown information and steer their subject populations into the path of correct thinking. Very disturbing to see the EU following down this path with the censorship of RussiaToday and other Russian propaganda outfits. As a citizen of a democracy it is essential that I have the right to access and evaluate all opinions. Even those which I find abhorrent.

djbebs 5y ago
The opposite is happening in the EU, where people are committing a crime if they hold the russian stance.
- frabbit 5y ago
  Two things on that: 1) that was somewhat my point: so-called liberal democracies are increasingly censoring and distributing information. Exactly the Orwellian-dystopia many of us fear. 2) If we are talking about the Czech and Slovak examples posted the other day¹ I doubt the Czech authorities, if correctly reported (they seem like extra-ordinary over-reach to me, so much so that I wondered if they were Russian psyops to make the EU look undemocratic and authoritarian), have a legal leg to stand on. The laws seem to refer to war-time. It's part of an attempt to threaten people to shut up or else. I was tempted to see this as a flare-up of anti-democratic thinking from a state long run by a Stalinist political class and only recently (2004) acceded to the EU. Like Poland and Hungary there remain serious questions about the commitment to democratic principles of such states. But then I checked myself and noted that this was unfair as the EU has issued no formal condemnation of this censorship and the public appetite for being spoon fed by their betters seems high. To be clear: Russia is committing a war crime in invading Ukraine and must withdraw. We must support the Ukranian people without allowing the authoritarians in our own societies to destroy the very values we claim to uphold. No censorship. 1. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30545186 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30545186
  - frabbit 5y ago
    Are there any Czech speakers that can help out? I have been trying to verify that "Prague Morning" story and cannot find references to it in their list of main newspapers in wikipedia.
    - frabbit 5y ago
      At this stage I am going to assume that it is a lie. I cannot find any reputable mainstream media references to it.
      - frabbit 5y ago
        Actually, having googled and looked around I am highly conflicted on this. There is no coverage either pro/con in The Times, The New York Times (https://www.nytimes.com/topic/subject/freedom-of-speech-and-expression https://www.nytimes.com/topic/subject/freedom-of-speech-and-...), LA Times, Washington Post, The Economist, The Guardian. There are mentions only on disreputable English language media like Breitbart, forums like Reddit that all go back to citing BalkanInsight¹,² who in turn cite a publication called TN Nova³. 1. https://birn.eu.com/news-and-events/meet-the-people-behind-birn-tamara-chausidis/ https://birn.eu.com/news-and-events/meet-the-people-behind-b... 2. https://balkaninsight.com/2022/03/01/czechia-mulls-penalising-support-of-ukraine-invasion/ https://balkaninsight.com/2022/03/01/czechia-mulls-penalisin... 3. https://tn.nova.cz/zpravodajstvi/clanek/455893-za-podporu-rusku-hrozi-vezeni-policie-uz-vysetruje-desitky-podnetu https://tn.nova.cz/zpravodajstvi/clanek/455893-za-podporu-ru... This root/source one is hard to evaluate. Not speaking the language or having much of a clue about it it is hard to tell whether their other stories about e.g. 30,000 Ukranian refugees arriving and being given apartments and insurance are meant to be laudatory or stir up resentment. But there is a website⁴ which seems to belong to the Czech Republic justice ministry if I am reading their ssl cert correctly. Using translation software suggests that this is accurate reporting of statements by their chief prosecutor: 4. https://web.archive.org/web/20220226184549/http://verejnazaloba.cz/nsz/informace-k-moznym-trestnepravnim-limitum-svobody-projevu-ve-vztahu-k-situaci-na-ukrajine/ https://web.archive.org/web/20220226184549/http://verejnazal... In addition I found what seemed to be a non-fake news media platform (Radio Prague (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radio_Prague https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radio_Prague) which reported the same interpretation in English⁵ here 5. https://english.radio.cz/chief-prosecutor-warns-against-public-support-russian-aggression-8743179 https://english.radio.cz/chief-prosecutor-warns-against-publ... and this Czech language one⁶ which is more detailed: 6. https://web.archive.org/web/20220226151448/https://www.irozhlas.cz/zpravy-domov/igor-striz-rusky-utok-nejvyssi-statni-zastupce-rusko-ukrajina-schvalovani_2202260944_jgr https://web.archive.org/web/20220226151448/https://www.irozh... While trying to discern if this is actually Russians trying to make the EU look like a bunch of authoritarians restricting information I found this fascinating quote on wikipedia: "Fake news outlets in the Czech Republic redistribute news in Czech and English originally produced by Russian sources. Czech president Miloš Zeman has been supporting media outlets accused of spreading fake news.[252] The Centre Against Terrorism and Hybrid Threats (CTHH) is unit of the Ministry of the Interior of the Czech Republic primarily aimed at countering disinformation, fake news, hoaxes and foreign propaganda. The CTHH started operations on January 1, 2017. The CTHH has been criticized by Czech President Miloš Zeman, who said: "We don't need censorship. We don't need thought police. We don't need a new agency for press and information as long as we want to live in a free and democratic society."[253] In 2017 media activists started a website Konspiratori.cz maintaining a list of conspiracy and fake news outlets in Czech.[254] " https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fake_news#Europe https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fake_news#Europe So where am I left? Uncertain. It looks like a real government website with a statement that to my probably naive eyes has been reported accurately in a few places. But I find it hard to believe that none of the big-hitter, reputable news outlets has completely refused to cover this. If this does turn out to be true and completely unreported then it's a terrible reflection of reputable media coverage. A lot of the states recently admitted to the EU have a fragile relationship with norms around democracy, free speech, invidual sexual and reproducive rights. This, if true, would definitely indicate that the ex-Communist czech government officials are on a very different tangent to the core states of the EU. If the story turns out not to be true then it's also a terrible reflection of media coverage in that this story is obviously out there doing the rounds and needs to be addressed and debunked. Would love to hear from Czech speakers/readers about how I got this wrong.
jokethrowaway 5y ago
This is why we need to get rid of the government and decentralise powers. Russia and China are indefensible. It took 200 years to go from the minarchism of the USA to the largest government in the world. Europe keeps becoming more and more authoritarian. No more wars, centralised stealing, bureaucracy, corruption, over-regulations The same services the government is offering, can be offered by private companies. We can build road, do healthcare and protect people. I really hope that after the last 2 years and now this, people will realise we need to change something.
- bluefirebrand 5y ago
  Do you think living under private companies would be actually an improvement? How do we keep them in check?
- 8note 5y ago
  You can protect people with money. Not that that's different from today, but under privatization, the poor are unworthy of protection, just like they're unworthy of healthcare today

djbebs 5y ago

The opposite is happening in the EU, where people are committing a crime if they hold the russian stance.

frabbit 5y ago
Two things on that: 1) that was somewhat my point: so-called liberal democracies are increasingly censoring and distributing information. Exactly the Orwellian-dystopia many of us fear. 2) If we are talking about the Czech and Slovak examples posted the other day¹ I doubt the Czech authorities, if correctly reported (they seem like extra-ordinary over-reach to me, so much so that I wondered if they were Russian psyops to make the EU look undemocratic and authoritarian), have a legal leg to stand on. The laws seem to refer to war-time. It's part of an attempt to threaten people to shut up or else. I was tempted to see this as a flare-up of anti-democratic thinking from a state long run by a Stalinist political class and only recently (2004) acceded to the EU. Like Poland and Hungary there remain serious questions about the commitment to democratic principles of such states. But then I checked myself and noted that this was unfair as the EU has issued no formal condemnation of this censorship and the public appetite for being spoon fed by their betters seems high. To be clear: Russia is committing a war crime in invading Ukraine and must withdraw. We must support the Ukranian people without allowing the authoritarians in our own societies to destroy the very values we claim to uphold. No censorship. 1. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30545186 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30545186
- frabbit 5y ago
  Are there any Czech speakers that can help out? I have been trying to verify that "Prague Morning" story and cannot find references to it in their list of main newspapers in wikipedia.
  - frabbit 5y ago
    At this stage I am going to assume that it is a lie. I cannot find any reputable mainstream media references to it.
    - frabbit 5y ago
      Actually, having googled and looked around I am highly conflicted on this. There is no coverage either pro/con in The Times, The New York Times (https://www.nytimes.com/topic/subject/freedom-of-speech-and-expression https://www.nytimes.com/topic/subject/freedom-of-speech-and-...), LA Times, Washington Post, The Economist, The Guardian. There are mentions only on disreputable English language media like Breitbart, forums like Reddit that all go back to citing BalkanInsight¹,² who in turn cite a publication called TN Nova³. 1. https://birn.eu.com/news-and-events/meet-the-people-behind-birn-tamara-chausidis/ https://birn.eu.com/news-and-events/meet-the-people-behind-b... 2. https://balkaninsight.com/2022/03/01/czechia-mulls-penalising-support-of-ukraine-invasion/ https://balkaninsight.com/2022/03/01/czechia-mulls-penalisin... 3. https://tn.nova.cz/zpravodajstvi/clanek/455893-za-podporu-rusku-hrozi-vezeni-policie-uz-vysetruje-desitky-podnetu https://tn.nova.cz/zpravodajstvi/clanek/455893-za-podporu-ru... This root/source one is hard to evaluate. Not speaking the language or having much of a clue about it it is hard to tell whether their other stories about e.g. 30,000 Ukranian refugees arriving and being given apartments and insurance are meant to be laudatory or stir up resentment. But there is a website⁴ which seems to belong to the Czech Republic justice ministry if I am reading their ssl cert correctly. Using translation software suggests that this is accurate reporting of statements by their chief prosecutor: 4. https://web.archive.org/web/20220226184549/http://verejnazaloba.cz/nsz/informace-k-moznym-trestnepravnim-limitum-svobody-projevu-ve-vztahu-k-situaci-na-ukrajine/ https://web.archive.org/web/20220226184549/http://verejnazal... In addition I found what seemed to be a non-fake news media platform (Radio Prague (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radio_Prague https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radio_Prague) which reported the same interpretation in English⁵ here 5. https://english.radio.cz/chief-prosecutor-warns-against-public-support-russian-aggression-8743179 https://english.radio.cz/chief-prosecutor-warns-against-publ... and this Czech language one⁶ which is more detailed: 6. https://web.archive.org/web/20220226151448/https://www.irozhlas.cz/zpravy-domov/igor-striz-rusky-utok-nejvyssi-statni-zastupce-rusko-ukrajina-schvalovani_2202260944_jgr https://web.archive.org/web/20220226151448/https://www.irozh... While trying to discern if this is actually Russians trying to make the EU look like a bunch of authoritarians restricting information I found this fascinating quote on wikipedia: "Fake news outlets in the Czech Republic redistribute news in Czech and English originally produced by Russian sources. Czech president Miloš Zeman has been supporting media outlets accused of spreading fake news.[252] The Centre Against Terrorism and Hybrid Threats (CTHH) is unit of the Ministry of the Interior of the Czech Republic primarily aimed at countering disinformation, fake news, hoaxes and foreign propaganda. The CTHH started operations on January 1, 2017. The CTHH has been criticized by Czech President Miloš Zeman, who said: "We don't need censorship. We don't need thought police. We don't need a new agency for press and information as long as we want to live in a free and democratic society."[253] In 2017 media activists started a website Konspiratori.cz maintaining a list of conspiracy and fake news outlets in Czech.[254] " https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fake_news#Europe https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fake_news#Europe So where am I left? Uncertain. It looks like a real government website with a statement that to my probably naive eyes has been reported accurately in a few places. But I find it hard to believe that none of the big-hitter, reputable news outlets has completely refused to cover this. If this does turn out to be true and completely unreported then it's a terrible reflection of reputable media coverage. A lot of the states recently admitted to the EU have a fragile relationship with norms around democracy, free speech, invidual sexual and reproducive rights. This, if true, would definitely indicate that the ex-Communist czech government officials are on a very different tangent to the core states of the EU. If the story turns out not to be true then it's also a terrible reflection of media coverage in that this story is obviously out there doing the rounds and needs to be addressed and debunked. Would love to hear from Czech speakers/readers about how I got this wrong.

jokethrowaway 5y ago

This is why we need to get rid of the government and decentralise powers. Russia and China are indefensible. It took 200 years to go from the minarchism of the USA to the largest government in the world. Europe keeps becoming more and more authoritarian. No more wars, centralised stealing, bureaucracy, corruption, over-regulations The same services the government is offering, can be offered by private companies. We can build road, do healthcare and protect people. I really hope that after the last 2 years and now this, people will realise we need to change something.

bluefirebrand 5y ago
Do you think living under private companies would be actually an improvement? How do we keep them in check?
8note 5y ago
You can protect people with money. Not that that's different from today, but under privatization, the poor are unworthy of protection, just like they're unworthy of healthcare today