China Declares War on Internet Pornography 346
segphault writes "The Chinese government has shut down nearly 600 pornographic web sites, and arrested over 200 people for distributing "obscene" content. The Chinese government has also started performing covert surveillance of mobile phone text messages in order to crack down on banking fraud and prostitution organized and perpetrated with text messages. Ars Technica has the story: 'With more than 100 million Internet users, China has the second largest population of web content consumers after the United States. Although the Chinese government promotes web use for business, education, and government activity, the communist regime has committed its resources to crushing web sites that challenge government authority, or distribute content that the government considers to be detrimental to society'"
Chinese government... (Score:3, Funny)
The jedys are going to feel this one.
Re:Chinese government... (Score:5, Funny)
Until they realized that http://images.google.com/ [google.com] wasn't blocked.
Re:Chinese government... (Score:2, Insightful)
Stop the Porn!! They say, and hey while you're at it - block any phrases that contain the terms "China and Human Rights".
My Dreamjob: (Score:5, Funny)
Watching P0rn from 9 to 5 at work... hm wait, that's not that different to my current job...
Re:My Dreamjob: (Score:5, Funny)
Re:My Dreamjob: (Score:4, Insightful)
In actuality the setup is used as a cash cow for the government -- in order to get a film distributed, you have to pay a fee for them to review it and approve it for distribution. It's kind of ridiculous.
Joking aside, it turns out that the job is quite mind numbing. the panel members basically sit in a room all day long watching porn on fast forward with the audio muted. they only slow it if they think something verboten (e.g. beastiality, child porn etc) is onscreen.
Watching porn at your leisure is one thing. But *having* to do so as your job? And you don't just get to watch the stuff you enjoy. You are trapped there watching *all* the bad porn that is being made. Umm, no thanks.
Re:My Dreamjob: (Score:5, Funny)
Re:My Dreamjob: (Score:3, Funny)
Why do I have a feeling it wasn't from typing? ;)
Re:My Dreamjob: (Score:2)
Right hand, I presume?
oh well (Score:2, Informative)
Proxies (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Proxies (Score:2)
And calling China "communistic" is quite an overstatement; they're radical socialists. If they were based on communism, I'm sure that the market (i.e. people) would not allow for porn to be shut down...
Re:Proxies (Score:3, Insightful)
If they didn't spam so relentlessly, what people do on their own time with their own bandwidth would be vastly less bothersome to the rest of us. As it is, if I turn spam filters off, I get roughly one-in-five of my email messages as sexual spam. And a bunch of those try their best
You didn't get the memo ... (Score:4, Insightful)
China stopped being communist when switched from a planned/command economy to a free market system. But they made sure to keep the authoritarian regime in place.
Back in the 1930s and 1940s, they called that fascism. I guess when the pots occupy the media and government infrastructure, they are unwilling to call kettles black.
Wow! 600 porn sites!!!!!! (Score:5, Funny)
Re: (Score:2)
Re:Wow! 600 porn sites!!!!!! (Score:5, Funny)
This must be really inconvenient for the fans, they'll have to visit non-Chinese-language sites and they'll have no idea what they're looking at.
I believe this is nothing new for china (Score:5, Informative)
In the past they have:
Communist country? Are you serious? (Score:5, Insightful)
I wouldn't get cross about this misnomenclature except that there have been a very few real attempts at Communist government, notably in India, and they shouldn't be dirtied by association. Let's be clear - if the Chinese people eventually overthrow or modernise their government, it will be the end of the process of the rise and collapse of large scale dictatorships in the 20th Century.
Re:Communist country? Are you serious? (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:Communist country? Are you serious? (Score:3, Interesting)
What do you mean by "most stringent environmental regulations"? I doubt China would pass into law, even if they knew it were totally unenforceable, EU-level regulations.
Re:Communist country? Are you serious? (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Communist country? Are you serious? (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Communist country? Are you serious? (Score:5, Informative)
True Communism is a Utopian Myth (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:True Communism is a Utopian Myth (Score:3, Insightful)
Seems like the larger the group, the tougher it is to have it work. You have to care enough about the other group numbers to devote yourself to the needed tasks.
Re:Communist country? Are you serious? (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Communist country? Are you serious? (Score:3, Insightful)
Are you joking? Remember something from history class called the Great Leap Forward [wikipedia.org]? Only 25 million people starved to death in China. But that's a drop
Re:Communist country? Are you serious? (Score:3, Informative)
"1984" extreme capitialism? Uh no. Did you read "1984"? "Brave New World" maybe.
Fascism and Communism dash off in opposites .... (Score:3, Insightful)
Fascism and Communism dash off in opposite directions. But they arrive in the same place. A feudalistic political/economic system where there is no distinction between governance and commerce.
So yes, when the international corporations BECOME the defacto government (by undermining political systems) than they effectively become the state and they will equally fit the "1984" paradigm.
BTW, just remember that China plays the same games as Big Brother (as does GW Bush). They are always stoking the people up
Re:Communist country? Are you serious? (Score:3)
Re:Communist country? Are you serious? (Score:2)
Umm, no. India tried a socialist approach of nationalization, where the state made almost everything, but so did the private industry. Were there instances where the state used unfair tactics to put down some private institutions? Yes, but that was more out of the greed of the politicians than due to any doctrine.
India's
India is not Communist (Score:2, Informative)
Re:Communist country? Are you serious? (Score:3, Funny)
Nowadays, the Inner Circle of the Chinese Communist Party gathers once a year to summon the spirit of Mao in a mystic ceremony, where the Chairman dispenses sage advice on such topics as: h
Re:Communist country? The USA is more so... (Score:3, Insightful)
Beginning with the Marshal Plan following WWII, the USA has given away more money and aid than all the other contries of the world combined. Japan and Western Europe were rebuilt by American generosity, and it was well into the 70's before they could begin altrustic donations, and then only because we bought their Volkswagons instead of Detroit's junk.
And now, 50
Re:Communist country? Are you serious? (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:I believe this is nothing new for china (Score:2)
Re:I believe this is nothing new for china (Score:3, Funny)
Look it up sometime.
Not only is it a right, it is one of the God Given Rights given to all men, from which all other rights are derived.
Maybe this phrase will help clear things up
"We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness . . . "
(And if porn doesn't make you happy, you probably aren't doing it right.)
Re:I believe this is nothing new for china (Score:2)
Re:I believe this is nothing new for china (Score:2)
Re:I believe this is nothing new for china (Score:2)
Porn is a God-given right? I missed that lesson in Sunday school...
The pursuit of happiness is described that way in the US Constitution. Then there's the Second Amendment to the Constitution, and its protections for free speech.
For Biblical references, I suspect your Sunday school left out all the good bits. Given that Lot thought God would be thrilled for Lot to send his daughters out to the crowd to keep the rowdy neighbors from bothering his angelic neighbors, the wife-ste
Re:I believe this is nothing new for china (Score:5, Informative)
And general Christian thought is that Lot was a hypocrite for doing so.
Widely thought of as a failure of David's, and the reason why he wasn't allowed to build God's temple.
By the Holy Spirit. According to church thought, Mary did nothing wrong.
First of all, nowhere in Genesis 38 does it say that Onan was married. Second, there were some very good reasons for levirate marriages to be performed during this period.
Porn? Porn is, as far as I'm concerned, defined as gratuitious sexual references in whatever format designed to titilate. Lot's actions showed us how screwed up he was. David's actions, too, go to show why God's chosen wasn't allowed to build the temple. Mary did absolutely nothing wrong, and there's no reference to sex *at all* in the accounts of her conception in the Gospels. The closest you have to any kind of graphic sexuality is the story of Onan, but the story was about how he was disobedient; it wasn't a pornographic story in any way, shape, or form.
Perhaps you're confusing "sex" with "porn," in which case yes, there are several sexual references and stories with sexual overtones in the Bible. But these references do not mean that the Bible is pornographic, any more than this post is pornographic.
Re:I believe this is nothing new for china (Score:4, Insightful)
At the very most, it's erotica - if we consider it to be an example of an ideal married relationship, rather than a metaphor for the relationship between Christ and the church (which is stretching it a bit, methinks).
A discussion of women's breasts as tasty fruit is tasteful (if you'll forgive the pun). But how is talking about the female form, even genitalia, considered to be pornographic? The purpose of porn is sexual titilation. The Bible is mostly story-driven, and its purpose is to teach and to inform; most of the stories themselves are there because they give us illustrations of fellow humans who have failed miserably or succeeded magnificently.
If you think the Bible is porn, wait until you see this anatomy textbook I've got! Talk about your playmate of the month!
Re:I believe this is nothing new for china (Score:3, Interesting)
While I would argue that the second amendment does indeed protect freedom of speech, the first amendment does so in a far more direct fashion.
The second is only effective in that you generally don't try to violently silence somebody who's got a gun.
1st: Freedom of Speech and Religion
2nd: Keep and Bear Arms
3rd: They can't force you to keep me in you
Re:I believe this is nothing new for china (Score:2)
Re:I believe this is nothing new for china (Score:3, Funny)
you insensitive clod.... they are also given to women... you sexist bastard..
Re:I believe this is nothing new for china (Score:2)
You insensitive clod... they are also given to monkeys [slashdot.org]...you humanist bastard
Porn =! Protected Speech (Score:2)
Re:Porn =! Protected Speech (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Porn =! Protected Speech (Score:2)
I dont agree that porn qualifies under the right of free speech. Therefore its not a right. its a privilege. And if the Chinese government wants to deny that privilege, i see no issue.
Aside from that, according to the way the constitution was written, the US supreme court DOES have the jurisdiction to decide what are protected rights are what are not, in this country at least.
Re:I believe this is nothing new for china (Score:2)
Ironically, this is probably a very popular policy in China, as the majority of the country is what Americans would call hardline conservative. This is especially true in rural areas. Not so much in the cities, which are changing so fast no one is really in control. Of course, I really can't quantify this
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:christian church leaderships are thugs (Score:3, Insightful)
And yes, if you go to a church and try to tell everyone wh
Not much different from America or other countries (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Ah and as opposed to america? (Score:2)
So the government of the USA speaks for all people of the USA, does it? And every US citizen loves their government and agrees with it? I agree that banning same sex marriages is harmful, I agree that the US government supports unpleasant national governments for its own profit (though I think of Saudi). But I don't agree that Government is synonymous with people. That is the same "For Us Or Against Us" Patriotism con touted by the government whenever it wants to do something that will hurt the people
Re:Ah and as opposed to america? (Score:2, Insightful)
So, h4rm0ny, why can't I be for justice everywhere? In the PRC and in the United States if the USA government is also disrespecting human rights? Are you for absolute right and wrong or is politics a team sport for you?
being a communist country (Score:2, Funny)
Nothing to see here, move on (Score:5, Interesting)
Furthermore, China is becoming more and more lax about porn, which any visitor to the country will realize within a day or so. Only the hardliners are still fighting it, but they might as well start a program to eradicate all the flies in the world. It is all in vain.
Now, why is China fighting porn? Because it is an old taboo since the times after the Tang dynasty. Before, China was sexually liberal, and now the times are turning again. This has to do with the opening up to the outer world in general, and with Internet in particular.
You should also note that there is no law against downloading or consuming porn in China. It is legal, it is practiced, and it is virtually unfiltered on the net (bar a few percent of the sites). What is illegal is copying and distributing porn, especially for commercial purposes. Spreading less than 20 "huangdai" (yellow tapes, porn videos) is not punishable. 20--99 tapes (or images) is punishable, and above 500 tapes (or images) is considered severe, with a potential lifetime imprisonment. This also goes for digital content.
The effect is that China is consuming as much porn as the rest of the world, but they won't be able to cash in on it. This is bound to change in the future, if you ask me.
Re:Nothing to see here, move on (Score:4, Insightful)
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/arti
Now who knows what other similiarities they have? Perhaps we'll find out that they actually torture prisoners in secret locations to fight the war on terror, similiar as China tortures a diverse range of seperatists for their own "war on terror":
http://www.cfr.org/publication/4765/chinas_war_on
Nothing to see here, move along people!
Re:Nothing to see here, move on (Score:2)
Oh, but there is one very big thing that they do not have in common. The Chinese government hates Christianity. There's something about empowering the lowly that threatens them. In fact, they are so anti-Christian, that the leader of the free world had to put on his pastor's frock and preach over there:
http://www.bennyhinn.org/yourlife/InTheNews-Chris t ian-Persecution/Bush-Challenges-China-on-Religious -Free [bennyhinn.org]
Re:Nothing to see here, move on (Score:2, Interesting)
You know why media reports about Gitmo have been scarce lately? Some bright military public affairs officer told the "journalists" that they were actually looking at Castro's prisons where he tortures pro-democracy dissidents and librarians and they lost all interest.
China's gulag system is called Laogai [laogai.org]. If you'r
Re:Nothing to see here, move on (Score:2)
I guess I just don't see the difference there.
Re:Nothing to see here, move on (Score:3, Insightful)
Far be it from me to stop a self-satisfied rant from completely mischaracterizing the political views of tens of millions of people, but are you talking about Western leftists like Amnesty Interational [amnesty.org]? Or maybe you mean Human Rights Watc [hrw.org]
Re:Nothing to see here, move on (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Nothing to see here, move on (Score:2)
China has a unique position (Score:2)
So because the citizens don't have rights, the government can do whatever it takes to make sure that no illegal communication takes place.
That being said, they must see the internet as a huge threat to stability. It has already been shown in other countries that when people are pee
Re:China has a unique position (Score:2)
Re: (Score:3)
Benefits of this... (Score:5, Interesting)
FTFA: The Chinese government also recently increased surveillance of mobile phone text messaging, a popular method of communication in China where 383 million individuals use mobile phones.
For one thing, I didn't know that it was that easy for the cops. I bet it's even easier here in the US. Now that I know that the police have this capabliltiy, I can be a bit more vigilant about my own civil liberites, as much as I can. These things that China is doing is bringing to light some of the capabilities that police around the world have.
I am curious though, exactly how easy is it? Can some local cops in anytown, USA do this?
Re:Benefits of this... (Score:3, Informative)
Technology wise, it is pretty straight forward. Legally, it requires a search warrant.
I know that many people are going to scream, the Bushies are doing it right now. Well technically, they are not. The NSA is monitoring communications that are crossing borders to other countries. Constitutionally, this is legal, for the same reasons that customs is allowed to search your luggage without a warrant when you ente
Re:Benefits of this... (Score:2, Funny)
Yeah, that's the governments job! *ducks*
Re:Benefits of this... (Score:2)
You're reading a lot of stuff into my short comment. But let me address just one point, I never said that only the Bushies have done it. In fact, I am well aware that other administrations of both parties have conducted such surveillence. In fact, the FISA legislation was inacted, in 1978, specifically because of what were considered abuses by the Kennedy, Johnson, and Nixon administrations [pbs.org].
Re:Benefits of this... (Score:2)
Quoting PBS as a source is laughable, they are as anti-Bush as it comes (except maybe CNN).
Look at http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/html/uscode50/us c_sup_01_50_10_36.html [cornell.edu]. Read it and you'll find (in Subsection 1802) that the Bush admin followed the rules as stated in this law. You'll also find that (in Subsection 1811) that no court order or notification to Congress is needed in time of war for 15 day periods. Looks like a loophole that if there was
Re:Benefits of this... (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:Benefits of this... (Score:2)
I may be misunderstanding you, but it really seems that you'd deserve a "naive comment of the day" award for that statement. Do you really think it's going to be that easy? Outside of the fact that it's difficult to maintain that you have a right to something in a dictatorship, anyway (heck, it's difficult in
On the other hand... (Score:5, Funny)
Re:On the other hand... (Score:2)
Bad idea... (Score:2, Funny)
It's all in the definition (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:It's all in the definition (Score:2)
War on Porn Vs War on Drugs (Score:4, Funny)
The War on Drugs
or The War on Porn
Place your bets now...
Re:War on Porn Vs War on Drugs (Score:5, Funny)
Consider yourself arrested.
Sorry for the Chinese (Score:3, Insightful)
The Chinese have misunderstood the Internet (Score:5, Funny)
Such a fundamental misunderstanding of how the Internet is, and was intended to be used will result in the Chinese people using the Internet for less desirable purposes such as dissent, subversion, and spreading dangerous ideas such as freedom of thought and expression.
Disturbing priorities (Score:3, Interesting)
I wonder whether the rest of the world would be for the better if China was completely segregated from the rest of the internet, with the only access through safe "portals" supervised by the government.
Re:Disturbing priorities (Score:3, Informative)
Hang on a minute, lets drop the scitsofrenic slashdot attitute for a moment so I can get this straight. Our piracy alright, fair-use blah blah, bittorrent rulzes!!1!, but China is "teh evil". Having visited there, I can tell you that piracy isn't really anymore rampant than here in the west. The primary difference is that the legal mark
Re:Disturbing priorities (Score:3, Informative)
Damn IM and text-messaging are rotting the kids' brains these days.
Bah!
Grumble grumble grumble.
To sum up (Score:5, Insightful)
Did I miss anything?
China no longer a communist state (Score:3, Insightful)
It does not seem like being oppressive is the problem the US or the EU has with communist states though, as they are conducting extensive business with China these days.
An oppressive facist police state is perfectly ok, as long as there are possibilities for making money from them. This makes a mockery of the argument that the US invaded Iraq to free the people from oppression.
s/China/Western World (Score:3, Informative)
Example: Starting January 1st 2006, it is illegal to have organized debate on how to by-pass copyright restrictions in Finland. It is also illegal to distribute software, also free software, that can be used to by-pass copyright restrictions. This is a violation of free speech in the Internet in The Free World(tm).
Another example: In many countries now it is illegal to inform that the World War II holocaust where claimed six million jews supposedly died is a hoax. You don't even need to be accused of lying, which you are not by informing about this issue, in many countries you will simply be put in prison on the vague charge of "denial".
And there are many, way too many, examples on how free speech is being violated and limited in the western world.
The first amendment seems to be the only one left in the USA now and it is under constant attack. Eye-ball the story and ignore place in the world (China), this is something every citizen should protest against, regardless of where in the world it happens - And it is, sadly, a trend that I see too clearly all over the world these days.
Btw. You might aswell start using http://tor.eff.org/ [eff.org] right away - Sadly, tools that allow anonymous communication have now become necessary and essential.
did I miss something? (Score:3, Insightful)
Don't get me wrong, I would jail the guy for thinking or saying this, but I wouldn't mod him up either.
(referring to parent post)
Damnit, China is not communist! (Score:3, Insightful)
As an aside, it seems that people want to blindly attach communism all the time. Yes, communism is bad, but to just blanketly poopoo it is stupid. The truth is that communism is one of the fastest ways to bring a country from total anarchy and poverty to a functioning economy. The problem is that Marxist socialism and communism don't dissolve into democracy like the ideaists said it would. Instead, the people in power don't want to let go of their power, and it becomes a totalitarian, oppressive dictatorship. China's transition to a capitalist dictatorship is probably less disruptive to the people and economy than the sudden switch from communist dictatorship to capitalist democracy in the former USSR. Yes, China's government really sucks and they need a revolution, but this needs to be considered objectively. Sudden revolution could be disasterous locally to China and globally. And things like this usually get worse before they get better.
Re:Damnit, China is not communist! (Score:3, Insightful)
All of that is short term. Without free enterprise the economy won't grow. The only countries that can sustain marxism for long are countries with a lot of natural resources to exploit. Communism will never work because absolute power will corrupt absolutely. Regulated captialism is the only economic system that works despite its flaws.
Hmmm spying on own citizens (Score:3, Insightful)
Wait a minute! Where have I heard the same thing recently?
Comment removed (Score:3, Interesting)
Why is sex so censored in communist countries? (Score:2)
Is it a function of the general social tilt of the culture (eg, Russian, Chinese, etc) or is there something about totalitarian communism that's anti-sex?
A met a couple of people from behind the then-iron curtain when I was in college in the 1980s and the impression they gave me was that the general social culture was very accepting of promiscuity and pretty open sexually despite porn being strictly black-
Re:Why is sex so censored in communist countries? (Score:3, Interesting)
Speaking as a marxist as well as someone who has studied some of the various ideologies behind communist movements (marxist leninism, maoism, etc), there is nothing specifically wrong about sexuality. What it comes down to is how you and your culture feels about it, and it
Finally... (Score:3, Funny)
Hey China! (Score:3, Funny)
Where's the outrage? (Score:4, Funny)
One this is for sure: if this article were about the United States clamping down, there'd be 900 comments thus far, with 899 of them calling the U.S. everything but Satan himself. But since it's China, nobody says (much of) anything. Just goes to prove once again that everybody's eager to call the U.S. the #1 enemy of...well, just about everything, but when real oppression happens outside U.S. borders, they're given a free pass.