Rosio Pavoris a blog

Apparently WordPress.com has been blocked in Turkey.
I don’t understand why people are still seriously considering Turkey’s accession to the EU, considering that they keep doing shit like this. Most famously, they also blocked YouTube last March after someone posted a video claiming Atatürk was homosexual (which is probably the most ironic way they could have dealt with that), though that only lasted two days.

Turkey’s Great Firewall isn’t nearly as extensive as China’s, obviously, nor is it as hard to circumvent.
It just works on DNS level, so if you can specify different DNS servers than Turkey’s national ones, or you can access a website through its IP (which it probably isn’t, in WordPress.com’s case; subdomains can be odd), it’s trivial to get around the block.
If you can’t do that, you can just use Google as a proxy, or any of the countless proxy providers out there. Or you could use Tor or similar networks, which more people need to familiarise themselves with.

Still, since all of these things are likely to be beyond the average user still, and considering the influence of blogs and the influence of the blogosphere in keeping tabs on governments in general, this is a significant blow to freedom of speech (which, of course, is a basic human right, and the most important indicator of a free society) in Turkey.
Fewer people use WordPress.com than YouTube (I’m pretty sure), but the protest will probably be significant enough to repeal this block relatively quickly. Still, the fact that the Turkish government thinks they can get away with this (and without explanation) is a very bad sign.

You may or may not be aware that a while ago, bookseller Borders in the UK moved all copies of the comic book Tintin in the Congo to its adult section, and added stickers warning of shocking content, because it was considered racist. Since Tintin is Belgian, this made the news here at the time.

If you aren’t familiar with the album, in it, Tintin visits Congo, which was a Belgian colony at the time (1931). The actual storyline isn’t very interesting, but he interacts with the natives on several occasions, and yes, by today’s standards it’s quite racist.

And now, it’s in the news again.

Parket opent onderzoek naar racisme in ‘Kuifje in Afrika’

Bij het Brusselse parket is een vooronderzoek geopend naar de strip ‘Kuifje in Afrika’ van Hergé nadat een Congolese student een klacht had ingediend omdat hij het album “een belediging voor alle Congolezen” vindt.

A Congolese student filed a complaint because he thinks the album is “an insult to all Congolese”.
In particular, he objects to the stereotypical way the Congolese are drawn and speak, and the way Snowy talks to them.

This is a comic book written in 1931. Hergé was aware it was racist, but he was trying to capture the Zeitgeist of the time. He was quite explicit about this.
Nevertheless, he still toned it down when it was redrawn in 1946, and he even removed references to Congo being a Belgian colony, even though they wouldn’t become independent for another decade and a half. Newer editions are toned down even further.

Hergé has been dead for twenty-four years. The album is seventy-six years old, and somehow it went without lawsuit for all that time.
It’s a work of art, very obviously not intended to target blacks. It reflects the spirit of the time, and is emphatically not covered by hate speech or discrimination laws.

This guy is complaining about a cartoon dog thinking rudely in the general direction of cartoon black people.

It’s just a retarded attempt to get national attention, and apparently it worked.
If there was any sort of black/white racial tension in Belgium (there isn’t, really; Flanders can be retardedly racist, but really only towards brown people), this would be exactly the sort of thing to make it worse.

Congratulations, Mbutu Mondondo Bienvenu. You’ve successfully wasted the court’s time, and fed the stereotype of blacks being hypersensitive to racism.
Oh, and you got to appear on national TV. Go you.

FTC abandons net neutrality

The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) has decided to abandon net neutrality and allow telecoms companies to charge websites for access.

The FTC said in a report that, despite popular support for net neutrality, it was minded to let the market sort out the issue.

Ted Stevens be praised! The free market will solve everything!¹

Fucking corporatists. Where’s your democracy now?

¹ Offer void where prohibited, or for the poor, middle class, single parents, minorities, people who hold opinions we don’t agree with, people who have been charged with any crime regardless of whether or not they were convicted, enemy combatants, people on the East Coast, people on the West Coast, people who look a little funny, minors, the elderly, feminists, hippies, people who drive hybrids, and anyone we may have missed.

You’ve heard about how they’re banning violent pornography now, right? Well, not even just violent porn as such; “extreme” porn. It’s just aimed as S&M, but it’s so ridiculously broad that it can really apply to anything.
Not that it’d be more defensible if it were specific, of course.

Just read this “explanatory note”.

802. The Government believes that these clauses constitute an interference with Convention rights under Articles 8 and 10 but that for the reasons set out below this is justified as being in accordance with the law, and necessary in a democratic society for the prevention of crime, for the protection of morals and for the protection of the rights and freedoms of others.

I’ll repeat that, in case you missed it.

The Government believes that these clauses constitute an interference with Convention rights under Articles 8 and 10 but

Said Convention is the European Convention on Human Rights.
Once again.

The Government believes that these clauses constitute an interference with Convention rights

They know it violates human rights, and they passed it anyway.
Because porn… is icky (“The material to be covered by this new offence is at the most extreme end of the spectrum of pornographic material which is likely to be thought abhorrent by most people.”).

The Government believes that these clauses constitute an interference with Convention rights

This isn’t fucking Belarus. This is the UK, a country that was once half a millenium ahead of the rest of the world when it came to human rights and freedom.

The Government believes that these clauses constitute an interference with Convention rights

Yeah.

This time a little too close to home. Not Flanders yet, no. It’s the Dutchie Bible Belt again.

I’m not sure why fundies are so obsessed with children’s literature; that’s perhaps the only thing parents have complete control over. Still, after Harry Potter (obviously), they’ve now gone after a Flemish writer’s new book.
The writer I’m talking about is, of course, Marc de Bel.

De Bel has always been the only Dutch-language author I’ve been able to read. The first real book I ever read was Blinker en het Bagbag-Juweel, when I was five (though I think the target audience was twelve-year-olds).
He never treated his readers like idiots just because they were loli, and he didn’t ignore “naughty” topics if they made sense. So yes, his books had kissing occasionally, and death, and the recurring minor villains in at least one of his series were regular drug users.
But now the Dutch fundamentalists think he’s gone too far! And why?

Because a main character in his newest book might be… an ALIEN!

The Flemish title of the book (which is cowritten with Guy Didelez and aimed at ten-year-olds) is Alien (pronounced “ah-LEEN”; it’s the name of aforementioned main character), and it’s apparently about a guy who wonders if one of his friends is an extra-terrestrial.
But the Bible says extra-terrestrials don’t exist, apparently!

As such, the censors tried to take the book apart. They got de Bel to replace all instances of the blasphemous “godverdomme” (“goddammit”) with “verdikke” (closer to “darn” in connotation) and “shit” (which was apparently fine by them), and the Dutch release title will be Ik moet je iets vertellen (“I have to tell you something”).
They also tried to change the romantic relationship between the main character and Alien to a “just friends” one, but at that point, de Bel predictably told them to go fuck themselves (politely, I’d think).

I wish I could say this sort of thing was unexpected. At least it raised awareness of the dangers of ignoring fundamentalism for too long, and I think that’s why de Bel allowed them to change the title at all.

Hey, remember when Flanders used to be the backwater nest of religiosity, and the Netherlands were a beacon of progressive openmindedness?
(Yes, a handful of benighted idiots getting more vocal doesn’t necessarily constitute a threat to civilisation. Still, though.)

Those of you who follow Slashdot (for whatever reason) have probably heard of this by now: Swedish Foreign Minister Carl Bildt has a blog, someone posted a comment to the effect that wiping out all Palestinians would solve the Middle East problems, and Sweden has anti-hate-speech laws, and it holds “publishers” responsible for the contents of their website, even if it’s created by other people.
The Slashdot article claims a “leftist blogger” reported the comment, and now Carl Bildt is being investigated. Cue the right-wing dogpile in the Slashdot comments.

Of course, it’s not quite as simple as that.

First of all, the article linked to from the Slashdot article isn’t even about this case, and Bildt’s blog post, also linked, is in Swedish, which I don’t speak very well.
It seems to me, though, that the person who reported the comment isn’t identified anywhere, and the comments on Bildt’s post are only speculating that it’s someone on the left. As in, FUD.

Slashdot commenters seem to be latching on to the idea that this is a left-wing conspiracy, though, with the first comment suggesting the hypothetical leftist was also the one who posted the genocidal comment appearing within five minutes of the article being posted.
(Of course, the person reporting it must have been Swedish, and it’s a fair bet to say any given Swede is left of the center. If you look at it this way, then yes, I suppose it probably was a leftist.)

One way or the other, note that Bildt is only being investigated; hate speech laws only apply to incitement to violence. It’s not illegal to just express a goddamn opinion, even in Sweden.

Secondly, it’s very obvious those laws are bullshit, and I don’t think anyone really disagrees on this point. The only way to get them repealed, though, is to challenge them in court. And the only way to do that is by being sued under them.
It’s a shitty system, but that’s the way it works in most of the world.

So, far from this being a vast left-wing plot to undermine a poor conservative, it seems to me that this could just as easily be an attempt to get retarded laws repealed through a high-profile case.
If it was a leftist, it’s possible Bildt was picked specifically because he’s a conservative with a popular blog, so even if he loses, “it’s not a big deal”, but I really doubt that was the main consideration.

Either way, more quality journalism from Slashdot.

I’m guessing you heard about Salman Rushdie’s (deserved) knighthood by now. You’ve probably also heard of various idiots speaking out against it in the Muslim world, including the Pakistani Minister of Religious Affair (“If someone exploded a bomb on his body he would be right to do so unless the British government apologises and withdraws the ‘sir’ title.”) and the Minister for Parliamentary Affairs (“I demand the British government immediately withdraw the title as it is creating religious hatred.”), and a fuckload of people in Iran (that fatwa was issued by Khomeini, who was the spiritual leader of Iran at the time, and it was recently reaffirmed by his successor, Khamenei), but there’s one voice that surprised me: Baron Ahmed, the first Muslim member of the British House of Lords.

“This man – as you can see – not only provoked violence around the world because of his writings, but there were many people that were killed around the world and honouring the man who has blood on his hands, sort of because of what he did, honouring him I think is going a bit too far.”

What the fuck is wrong with people? This is like condemning the Jews for inciting the hatred of the Nazis, and it goes against everything freedom of speech is supposed to be.
It’s like the entire Muslim world is fucking four years old.

I’m pretty sure I linked to this video in the IRC channel before, but it’s amusing enough to merit posting it here.

A few days ago, Tim O’Reilly (of O’Reilly Media) wrote about the need for a blogging code of conduct, and composed a draft together with that guy from Wikipedia. I was hoping it’d be quietly ignored, but apparently the NY Times picked it up, and now so did Slashdot (apparently the NY Times carries more weight than O’Reilly’s blog, at Slashdot), so I guess this is big news now.

Personally, I think it’s just a predictable and childish knee-jerk reaction to that thing with that person overreacting because “she received death threats” in the form of anonymous comments on her blog.
Quite aside from that, it just wouldn’t work, since it would depend on people policing themselves, and people willing to do that aren’t the problem. That is, if you can even consider this a problem. I don’t.

More than just pointless, though, I think this sort of thing is actually harmful.
It’s being pushed by O’Reilly and that one guy, so clearly it’s going to carry some weight. They’ve stated that they would like technical blogs to implement it, presumably to grant them greater credibility. The obvious (and, I think, likely) slippery slope here would be that blog who don’t implement this CoC and effectively engage in self-censorship would not be considered credible.
O’Reilly is a big name in the open source (&c.) community, and while I’m not entirely sure he has this kind of leverage in that part of the blogosphere, it seems he might just gather enough support to do it. All with the best intentions, of course.

The main problem I have is that it would prevent anonymous comments. It’s an obvious knee-jerk to the Sierra incident, but it’s such a dangerous move.
What ever happened to just disemvoweling trolls and fucking forgetting about them? Get over it already.

If you’re that concerned about preserving the honor of Kemal Atatürk, maybe you shouldn’t spit on his grave.

Department of Homeland and Security wants master key for DNS

The US Department of Homeland Security (DHS) (…) wants to have the key to sign the DNS root zone solidly in the hands of the US government. This ultimate master key would then allow authorities to track DNS Security Extensions (DNSSec) all the way back to the servers that represent the name system’s root zone on the Internet. The “key-signing key” signs the zone key, which is held by VeriSign.

DNSSEC is a set of extensions of the DNS protocols that are intended to increase security all-round by making it pretty much impossible to spoof DNS (among other things). Apparently the DHS itself is involved in funding part of it, and they seem to feel they should be in complete control of it, and completely exempt from the DNSSEC measures the entire world is working to implement.

This sort of bullshit is why the internet, if it is to be government-regulated at all, should be regulated by an international commission, as I’ve said before, and why even people in countries the US isn’t likely to invade soon should keep a close eye on the self-important windbaggery that goes on there.
The DHS is looking to turn the entire world into their personal police state playground.

(Via Slashdot, which gets the implications of this completely wrong.)

I enjoy this.
This lawsuit is a joke (but this one isn’t). Can we move on yet?

Trial Over Muhammad Cartoons Begins in France
The Paris Mosque and the Union of Islamic Organizations of France contend that the newspaper, Charlie Hebdo, and its director, Philippe Val, are guilty of slander, an offense that carries a possible six-month sentence and a fine of up to 22,500 euros, or about $29,000.

[...]

The case is causing debate in a country where separation of church and state is considered a fundamental tenet of the national identity.

Slander my ass.
The cartoons were satire. Coarse, perhaps, but they demonstrated what they set out to demonstrate quite effectively: that religion opposes free expression.
The only debate this is causing is coming from people who feel that being intolerant of intolerance is worse than the intolerance itself just because they happen to be the ones doing the intolerating.

And PC-crippled politicians and pundits are siding with them, as this twit demonstrates.

As the crisis over the Danish cartoons depicting the Islamic prophet Muhammad appears to be dying down, it is time to create a system to prevent such a costly crisis from erupting in the future.

The system he has in mind does not, as you might have guessed, involve telling people to lighten the fuck up and recognise that free speech is a fundamental right.
No, he proposes to instate an International Religious Court, composed of a single Christian, Muslim, and Jew (because apparently those are the only religions in the world now, even though Judaism is only the twelfth largest), to police what people say about religion in public.

He’s not alone in this, either. According to this guy, the UN has voted on resolution against “Defamation of Religion” twice now, though it didn’t get sufficient support to pass either time, mostly because the West has this notion of freedom of speech.

Taking into account the negative stereotyping of religions that exist in various regions of the world, the Defamation Resolution proclaims that defamation of religions causes social disharmony and leads to violations of human rights.

Along the same lines, being female leads to rape, so we should outlaw women immediately.
Also look at who voted for and against this thing:

1. Supportive States: [...] All Middle Eastern states except Israel, an overwhelming majority of states from Asia, Africa, and South America voted for the Resolution. Russia and China, the two permanent members of the UN Security Council also voted for the Resolution.

2. Opposition States: [...] The opposition consists of predominantly Western states, including all members of the European Union, Australia, New Zealand, Canada, and the United States. Except for Japan and South Korea, no other Asian state opposes the Resolution.

So mostly what we have is theocracies and countries without much in the way of freedom of speech (currently, historically, or both) voting in favor, and civilised places (essentially) voting against. This by itself should tell you something about the contents of the resolution.
I have no problem with anti-discrimination laws, or even with anti-hate-speech laws (unlike some). This is not that kind of resolution.

What these people want is purely for people to be tolerant of their intolerance. This is not what cultural rapprochement means.
The people saying “But these are the traditional customs of these people, and we have to respect that!” are the worst cultural relativism has to offer. Arbitrary suppression of free expression is a human rights violation just as much as human sacrifice (say) would be, and its consequences arguably reach much further. Still, there’s nobody arguing human sacrifice should be legalised if it happens to be a traditional custom.

I’m not even getting into how you would even define a religion. Is the Cult of the Flying Spaghetti Monster a religion that would be protected under this? Is Scientology? Is Wicca? Is Mormonism? And if not, why would Christianity or Islam be?

(Partially via this guy.)

Everyone saw this, right? CNN did a story on a family that was essentially run out of town for being atheist, and then afterwards had a “debate” about it. The topic, and this was displayed in big letters in the background, was, I shit you not, “Why do atheists inspire such hatred?”.
The panel didn’t include any atheists, obviously, and even the token Jew said something about the US being a Christian nation. The consensus was that atheists should shut up, and clearly this was an example of anti-Christian bias. Seriously.
My favorite bit was “Don’t impose on my right to have prayer in the schools”, though the statement that Europe is now Islamist, and that’s because of atheists, is a close second. You’d expect this sort of thing on Fox News, but CNN isn’t supposed to be this far gone.

Lots of people took this apart, with PZ probably making the central point:

Whoa. Hey, Debbie Schlussel, how would you feel if a panel of Christians and Muslims met to discuss “Why do Jews inspire such hatred?”, and they decided that the problem is that Jews need to shut up and quit mentioning their beliefs in public?

Either way, apparently enough people complained that CNN took notice (and Schlussel as well). Tonight, they’re having Richard Dawkins on as a guest on the same program tonight.
This still being CNN, I don’t expect too much from it (also because Dawkins is fundamentally a nice guy), but at least it’s something. I’ll be posting the videos as soon as I find them~

No doubt you’ve heard of this by now, as it was on Slashdot.
From the article:

“Section 220 of S. 1, the lobbying reform bill currently before the Senate, would require grassroots causes, even bloggers, who communicate to 500 or more members of the public on policy matters, to register and report quarterly to Congress the same as the big K Street lobbyists. Section 220 would amend existing lobbying reporting law by creating the most expansive intrusion on First Amendment rights ever. For the first time in history, critics of Congress will need to register and report with Congress itself.
The bill would require reporting of ‘paid efforts to stimulate grassroots lobbying,’ but defines ‘paid’ merely as communications to 500 or more members of the public, with no other qualifiers.

In case you’d rather not wade through piles upon piles of right-wing freak-out over this in the Slashdot comments (and I really can’t blame you), I’ll give you the short of it:

It’s not true.

What the proposed legislation actually says is that if you’re getting paid to lobby for a cause, you have to register as a lobbyist, as has been the case forever, even (and this is the new bit) if you’re a blogger or other grassroots type lobbyist.
What confused the guy reporting this is the section that said that even if you are getting paid, if you have fewer than 500 readers, you still don’t have to register.

Now, to make it more interesting: I very much doubt this was an accidental misreading rather than a deliberate attempt at inciting hatred against (newly Democratic-majority) Congress.
The guy reporting this was Richard Viguerie, a well-known right-wing “figure-head” and head of American Target Advertising, an astroturfing business. The website it was posted to, GrassrootsFreedom.com, is associated with the utterly disgusting Family Research Council (which, among other things, support abstinence-only sex education, stricter obscenity laws, and teaching creationism in science classes, and is strongly anti-choice and opposed to LGBT right).
I really doubt it’s a coincidence they’d happen to misread something even the braindead at Daily Kos could interpret correctly.

(Also thanks to the folks in #pharyngula for bringing this to our collective attention.)

Update: The provision was stripped from the lobbying reform bill. All Republicans predictably voted against it (except Sam Brownback, who didn’t vote), and so did seven Democrats.
Slashdot announced this as “Bill to Treat Bloggers as Lobbyists Defeated”. “Provision to Treat Lobbyists Posing as Bloggers as Lobbyists Stripped from Bill” would’ve been more accurate, but you can’t expect accuracy on Slashdot anymore, apparently.

Kucinich: Congress To Take On FCC
“Also in consideration is the “Fairness Doctrine,” which required broadcasters to present controversial topics in a fair and honest manner. It was enforced until it was eliminated in 1987.

Kucinich said in his speech that “We know the media has become the servant of a very narrow corporate agenda” and added “we are now in a position to move a progressive agenda to where it is visible.”"

Ah, yes. The Fairness Doctrine. The problems with it should be obvious to anyone.

Free speech issues aside, who determines what is “honest, equal and balanced”? Honest should be easy, but it almost never goes together with equal and balanced.

Do we give global warning deniers as much attention as climatologists?
Do we give equal time to the guy who claims the Middle East issues are caused by tiny leprechauns and their opposition to the reptillian overlords of Atlantis?
Is the creationist viewpoint as valid as the evolutionist one? What about this one?

Last time it got repealed because of accusation of political pressure. What makes people think this wouldn’t happen again?
The Fairness Doctrine amounts to censorship by giving undue weight to crackpot issues.

But hey, given how the media have a liberal bias, Republicans should be all over this one, right?
They aren’t, and it’s pretty obvious why they aren’t: last time, it was instated by the Democrats as well, and the repealing of the doctrine allowed for a huge swing in the opposite direction. It created right-wing talk radio as we know it, essentially.
Possibly they’ll cooperate for a bit, and then have it pulled again, so the media can swing even further to the right. Meh.

(Via Slashdot.)

Internet should be run by key players: new ITU boss
“The Internet should continue to be overseen by major agencies including ICANN and the ITU, rather than any new “superstructure”, the new head of the International Telecommunications Union said on Friday.”

What this means is that the UN will not be making an attempt at taking over the services that keep our internets alive.

In one way, that’s a damn shame, because the Internet desperately needs to be regulated by some international, transgovernmental body if we are to have any hope at it not being crippled by incompetent US lawmakers pandering to special interests and operating with next to no understanding of technology.
On the other hand, the UN has proven itself pretty consistently to be worthless when it comes to dealing with technology itself, so maybe they aren’t the people to do it.

Still, as one Slashdot commenter more or less said: “I would prefer to have essential functions under the control of a bureaucracy that has no effective leadership when it comes to divisive issues than to a bureaucracy that caves to special interests every single time.”
Most other Slashdot comments seem to be in the vein of “UN sux lol!”, though.

The main problem, I guess, isn’t that the Internet needs more regulation, it’s that people who don’t understand it are trying to add more, and the UN could really go either way on that. Still, Ban Ki-moon is no Ted Stevens.

(Via Slashdot, obviously.)

Film at 11.

“Senator: Illegal images must be reported”

The headline makes it seem reasonable enough, until you read on and realise that “obscenity laws” also apply to most porn and, given the vagueness of the bill, possibly things like swearing.
And then, of course, you remember that “sex offenders” include people who get drunk and peed in a bush somewhere and were caught, and kids who mooned their high school principal.
Also note yet another attempt at having people register their e-mails, similar to the proposed Schumer/McCain bill due in January.

This won’t pass, obviously, and even if it did, it would be widely ignored.
This sort of thing is a dangerous slippery slope nonetheless, both because of the attempts to make the internet “child-safe” at the expense of freedom of speech, and because it takes even more rights and civil liberties away from convicted sex offenders.
I’m not sympathising with rapists or pedophiles, obviously, but very few people realise how incredibly easy it is to end up being labelled a sex offender, and how far-reaching the consequences can be. Add to that that if these people are online, they’ve presumably already done their time in prison. Double jeopardy isn’t just a segment on a game show.

And finally, people just need to stop trying to legislate what they don’t understand. Clearly the internet is beyond people like McCain and Ted Stevens and, to be honest, most of Congress. There’s no shame in letting more competent people deal with things, y’know.

But as long as blatant pandering continues to get votes, McCain (and others) will continue doing it. And if nothing else, “sex offenders” and porn make better bogeymen than even terrorists.

(Through Slashdot.)