User:Stevenarntson/group spaces/2009summeranalytical/group 4

Group members
sign in here with ":" (a colon and three tildes).
 * XinaDeMoss
 * SuzanneZimmer
 * Kimaule
 * MerrisaShepherd

=Group Analysis=

Problems: We started off with choosing a subject that was not very clear but very narrow. From that point we broadened our subject to encompass Freespeech and Censorship, two very large, even impossing subjects. We did not focus on spacific problems/solutions very well as a group, more we just left it open for each individual to research and write about. We could have been much tougher on eachother and just assigned spacific subjects to write a paragraph or two each week thus delegating the work out more evenly. But, we instead seemed to lose focus for a few weeks and not get as much done as we could have. We felt that the class did not have enough structure in it from the teacher's side of things and this made it difficult to organize when and how things were going from early on. Later as there was more structure and due dates coming up our habits, plus missing a week due to Labor Day, made us skip doing extra subjects and just shorten the length of the paper.

Successes: We got along as a group. The paper did get written and turned out fairly interesting.

Future strategy: One thing as a group we might do better in the future is perhaps giving ourselves mini "duedates" with assignments on spacific subjects such as; week 4 each of us write a whole paper (problems and solutions) about one example of censorship, be it government, media, personal, etc. It would not matter if we all ellected to do government examples. It might have better focused us as a group. One thing that did work well for our group was us not stepping on eachothers toes very much. We have left this class still very amiable toward eachother.

=Introduction= My friend once told me a story about when he was young. He never tried spicy food until he was in college. As a child his mother wouldn't let him try it. Whenever he asked she would just says "It's too spicy, you wouldn't like it!". Years later, he tried and loves it. Only then did he realized that his mother wouldn't let him ate spicy food because she didn't like it herself. This is how he realized that what is right for one person may not be right for someone else.

The desire to protect people from harmful ideas is a very basic one. Parents have to decide what to expose their children to from the day they are born. In all forms of communication, people try to put themselves in a positive light. On a human level, this is natural. But when people control forms of mass communication, this natural tendency has a different term: censorship. Whether it's to protect a populace from offensive ideas, or to suppress opinions which may weaken a corporation or government's position, censorship is common in all societies.

=Definition of Free Speech and Censorship=

When I was in elementary school they were teaching the class United States history as well as the history of Washington State, as was typical of public school students I was given a standard text book and that were all the information available on the subject in class. I learned about early American history and about the Native Americans. Then I went home to my dad and asked him why the story seemed to be so one sided, why did it seem more like a story then real history. He told me that the victors of wars write the history books. The losers, meaning the side that died, did not get to have their say in the books. My dad is part Osage, which was a tribe that migrated across the Midwestern parts of northern America. The Osage were a warrior tribe, competing for space with the Cherokee and other tribes of the area. They were almost completely wiped out by smallpox after the Europeans came to America after thousands of years of being great warriors they were completely wiped out by disease. I had never read about or heard anything about the tribe do to the fact that the people who wrote the history books completely just omitted them and hundreds of other small tribes that were wiped out by the diseases and other massacres of the Native Americans. I learned that by omission the government was not showing a darker side of its history and that was a form of censoring.

Censoring is just another word for banning or forbidding people to read, hear, or see what others have to say. Freedom of speech has been challenged and censored all throughout history of human society and organized governments. The ancient Greeks persecuted Socrates and put him to death for publicizing ideas outside of the religious beliefs of the time in 399BC. Instead of a willingness to listen to a new idea they silenced a single voice. In early Chinese history as well as many other countries it was believed that censorship was a legitimate way to control moral and political movements and ideas of the populous. Government control of information is still accepted today in many parts of the world.

=Types of Censorship= "Beeping" out "bad words" on the radio or on a television show. Or blocking out innapropriate things on a commercial.

Government censorship and propaganda
Censorship is often used as a form of control by many governments. Government censorship blocks differing opinions to keep people from questioning what the government does.

Not only are conflicting ideas censored, but any negative events or occurrences within those countries. The Tiananmen Square events produced a large stir in 1989 when the Chinese government ordered the suppression of a peaceful protest movement that had been carried out by students and civilians in one of China's major cities over two months in the spring of 1989. The center of the protest movement was Tiananmen Square, Beijing, where tens of thousands of students camped out to press their demands for democratic reform and a halt to China’s escalating corruption problem. More than one million people marched carrying banners and shouting slogans. On the night of June 3, 1989, the government ordered the Army to clear the square. In the afternoon, martial law troops moved into Beijing and clashed with civilians trying to block their way to Tiananmen Square. The troops cleared the square and opened fire on unarmed students and civilians in the surrounding area who resisted the suppression. More than 2,000 people died in various Chinese cities, 182 victims, including three who died at Tiananmen Square. More than 500 people were imprisoned in Beijing, and an unknown number were imprisoned in other cities. An additional unknown number were executed. Therefore, Tiananmen Square event became a warning to those who dared to go against the government’s law.

In the 1990s, the Internet gave people a new way to communicate and exchange information. Since the commercialization of the Internet in China in 1995, China has become one of the fastest-growing Internet markets in the world. The number of domestic Internet users is doubling every six months. With the development of the Internet, news reaches China from a multiplicity of sources enabling people to form opinions, analyze and share information and to communicate in ways previously unknown in China.

Lively on-line debates characterized the start of the Internet in China. However, the potential of the Internet to spread new ideas has led the authorities to take measures to control its use. In 1998, the government of China began work on the Golden Shield Project, designed "to construct a communication network and computer information system for police to improve their capability and efficiency." This project has become known outside China as The Great Firewall of China, a pun on the ancient Great Wall of China.

The preliminary work on the Golden Shield Project alone cost up to $800 million US dollars. The project includes a wide range of provisions that limit how information can be disseminated. Chinese web sites cannot show news from outside media without approval. Only licensed publishers can run news sites; other sites may only publish information already released by other sources. All sites must get approval from government offices. The project is estimated to use 30,000 police officers to monitor for illegal content. Unacceptable messages from online forums are often deleted within minutes of being posted.

Many outside websites are completely blocked from access. Other sites must follow strict guidelines in order to be available in China. Many companies provided pre-censored versions of their services for Chinese customers. This has led to criticism in other countries, who claim that these companies are helping the Chinese government to continue suppressing free speech.

One of the latest censorship events is the argument around Internet access during Beijing Olympics in 2008. China has branded the Beijing Olympics as the "High Tech Olympics!" and the "People’s Olympics!". Despite this, use of the Internet remains highly restricted in China. According to the International Olympic Committee for the Beijing 2008 Olympic Games, the Chinese government guarantees that the accredited media would have unrestricted Internet access during the games. However, journalists soon found that sites containing politically sensitive material were inaccessible.

Obviously, when it comes to free communication, it will be censored. Perhaps the government has a good purpose in mind; maybe they genuinely want to give their people the understanding that everything their country does is good. But instead of making people "harmonious", the censorship has the opposite effect. Skepticism, denial, and infuriation are the usual results.

Propaganda
Propaganda is a specific type of message presentation, aimed at serving an agenda. Even if the message conveys true information, it may be partisan and fail to paint a complete picture. Some people define propaganda as the deliberate, systematic attempt to shape perceptions, manipulate cognition, and direct behavior to achieve a response that furthers the desired intent of the propagandist. Propaganda is used by governments hand-in-hand with censorship to shape the opinions of people. At the same time that opponents' ideas are made unavailable, the government's ideas are pushed strongly.





There are two major types of propaganda. The first type is aimed at making the propagandist look good. The other is aimed at making the enemy look bad. The first type usually shows an authority figure, beautiful scene or a positive role-model. The idea is to associate the propagandist with beauty or strength. The second type often involves ugly caricatures or portrays negative acts done by the enemy.

An example which contains both types of propaganda is the WWII-era cartoon "Bugs Bunny Nips the Nips". Bugs Bunny meets a Japanese soldier on a Pacific island. The soldier shows many stereotypes of Japanese from that era: slanty eyes, buck teeth and a monkey-like body. These stereotypes go so far as to suggest that the Japanese aren't even human. Bugs defeats him using his wits and ingenuity. (Interestingly, partway through the cartoon the soldier recognizes Bugs, suggesting that even though they are enemies, the Japanese secretly admired American culture.) He also defeats a stereotypical sumo wrestler, suggesting that Americans can use their brains and prevail even against an enemy who has more physical power. Finally, the enemies are stupid. Even after being blown up by ice-cream bars hiding grenades, one Japanese soldier comes back for a free second bar.

Just as censorship attempts to remove the ability for people to choose based on their own intellect, propaganda is usually designed to appeal to peoples' emotions. In the long term, this can result in a populace that is not trained to think, but merely to react. The ultimate result is a populace that doesn't know where it stands in the world, and is easy to control.

After the Vietnam war, a lot people who worked for the losing government fled from the country, and the Communist party become the only political system. This has created a conflict between the people that still live in Vietnam and those that live overseas. The current government uses propaganda to create nationalistic pride to the point that the government is never wrong, and everything it does is good. Nationalistic pride, mixed with a feeling of racial superiority and with the idea that the government is never wrong creates a dangerous situation in Vietnam. Most issues are turned into “black or white”, within the political party and most people only support one side. Furthermore, people have become so used to the way the government works that they won't listen to outside opinions. They will continue to follow the government until it's too late. This process is known as "boiling the frog by warming the water." If the water is warmed up gradually, the frog may not feel it, and adapts. By the time the frog feels the heat, it won't be able to jump out of the boiling water.

Censorship is a way to control differing opinions; it shields the truth, and allows the people who support the government to come forward without hindrance. Even if someone might have a different view, they would rather not go against their culture, government, people, or race. Censorship is not just a way of controlling the people; it is there to make it easier on the people to be right no matter what. It is much easier to just magically make things go away, than to address them and possibly find an error. When self-censorship happens, it is not the government controlling the people. Self-censorship is millions of people putting their fingers in their ears and saying “I can’t hear you and I don’t want to hear you!!!'

Dangerous Information
Proponents of censorship often talk about dangerous information that should be controlled. They say that some information can be used to commit crimes and hurt people. In 1971, William Powell published the Anarchist Cookbook, a book that contains recipes and instructions for the manufacture of explosives, rudimentary telecommunications phreaking devices and other dangerous and illegal items. Many people were outraged and frightened that it would be used to encourage terrorist acts. In fact, the Anarchist Cookbook was mostly compiled from other sources of information which were already freely available. Also, over the years, it has been updated, expanded and even moved online with new information, by a large number of other contributors. In some ways it can be considered to be an early version of a Wiki!

This shows how difficult it can be to censor something. Even if a government decided that some information should be censored, where would they start? If the Anarchist Cookbook is illegal, what about the sources that Powell used to create it? Furthermore, what about good use for the information? For example, the Anarchist Cookbook includes sections on lock picking. While lock picking can be used in crime, it can also be used to rescue people or even just to open things when their keys have been lost.

Even now, the book is maintaining a remarkably high sales rate on Amazon. Few people seem to care that some of the "recipes" were quickly discovered to be dangerously, even mortally inaccurate, although several of the readers offering reviews of the book did revile it as "The Disgruntled Idiot's Guide to Rebellion" or, worse, as a catalyst for school shootings.

Ultimately, the book itself serves as a history lesson. This period in history was a very difficult one, and reading the book can help give us a perspective on what people thought at the time. In fact, it can show us how people's perspectives can themselves change. William Powell has changed his mind about the book. "The book, in many respects, was a misguided product of my adolescent anger at the prospect of being drafted and sent to Vietnam to fight in a war that I did not believe in. The central idea to the book was that violence is an acceptable means to bring about political change. I no longer agree with this." (He explains that the book was copyrighted under the publisher's name, not his, so he has no control over its continued dissemination.)

But fans of The Anarchist Cookbook are not so sympathetic to the author's aged retraction. As one of the readers reviews: "It is unfortunate that we lose our sense of outrage and angst as we grow into adulthood. Such is the case of William Powell. The Anarchist's Cookbook is a masterpiece and a perfect example of what the freedoms of the Constitution gives us to speak what we wish."

Censorship of the Arts
In many ways art can be considered to represent the culture it comes from. Art can also be used to communicate ideas that are unpopular or offensive to some. Therefore, it is a natural target for censors who wish to control the culture. Throughout history, art has been subject to censorship and controversy.

In the past, much of the censorship of the arts revolved around religious issues. The Bible has been banned in different times in history from England in the 1400s, any bible translated from the original text was forbidden. During Queen Mary’s reign she put forth a proclamation "that no manners of persons presume to bring into this real any messages, books, paper, etc. in the name of Martin Luther, John Calvin, Miles Cover dale, Erasmus, Tyndale etc. or any like books containing false doctrines against the Catholic faith". More recently in history in the Soviet Union banned all religious texts including the Koran, Bible and Talmud.

Another target for censorship is politically motivated. Before and during WWII Nazi-Germany banned several books including all publications by Karl Marx, this banning was included in all occupied countries as well. All works by Jewish authors were similarly banned even Bambi, by Felix Salten. An example of society banning a book is in Germany and many countries in Europe Adolf Hitler’s Mein Kampf is still banned today, all but the English and Dutch versions are owned and controlled by the government of Bavaria, when it was found that German citizens were able to purchase the books through amazon.com and BarnesandNoble.com there was a public outcry from the German populous, both companies agreed to stop selling this book.

Much of the current arguments about censorship revolve around popular culture and morality. In the 1920s, Hollywood had acquired a reputation as "Sin City". Because the Supreme Court had earlier ruled that movies were a business, not an art form, the industry was worried that federal censorship might soon arrive. So they created the Motion Pictures Producers and Distributors Association, headed by Will H. Hays. The "Hays Office" came up with a code of acceptable and unacceptable content, primarily based on Catholic theology. The code was very strict; in addition to portrayals of unacceptable behavior, movies were also forbidden to even mention topics such as people sleeping together, ridiculing religion, foul language or disrespect of the US flag. Furthermore, films could not depict anyone succeeding in a crime or otherwise antisocial behavior.

By 1934 the Production Code Administration gained the power to control all content produced by the major movie studios. As a result of the code, most local censorship boards were dissolved, and federal censorship never became an issue, but many people felt restricted by the limitations on stories they could tell.

The studios followed the rules of the Hays Office for 30 years. But several things happened in the 1950s that weakened the power of the Code, including the invention of television, growing popularity of foreign films which were not bound by the Code, and the Supreme Court overturning its 1915 decision, now saying that movies were entitled to protection under the First Amendment. By the mid-1960s, the Code was abandoned in favor of a rating system. Under the new system, no movies could be banned, but the industry hoped the rating system would keep morality groups satisfied.

In the 1950s, comic books had a similar problem as the movies had had 30 years before. Fredric Wertham published Seduction of the Innocent, a book claiming that comics caused juvenile delinquency, leading to government scrutiny of the industry. Again, in fear of potential federal censorship, the industry moved to create its own censorship code. The Comics Code Authority was created in 1954.

The CCA was even more restrictive than the movies' Production Code. In addition to rules banning depictions of excessive violence and sex, it limited the kinds of advertising that could appear in comics and included a rigid code of acceptable moral behavior. Interestingly, Fredric Wertham didn't feel like the Code went far enough, although later, comics writer Scott McCloud described it as "the list of requirements a film needs to receive a G rating was doubled, and there were no other acceptable ratings!"

Several provisions of the Code were very specific. It banned any depictions of zombies, ghouls, vampires and werewolves, as well as titles of comics that included the words "horror" or "terror". William Gaines, publisher of EC Comics, claimed that these rules were specifically aimed at damaging his company. EC Comics was one of the most popular publishers at the time, and its most popular titles were science fiction and horror comics, which often portrayed the proscribed characters. One of its most popular titles was "Vault of Horror", and a new title was in the works named "Crypt of Terror". After the Code was put in place, EC Comics had to stop publishing its most popular stories. With the exception of "Mad", which switched to magazine format to avoid the Code, EC shortly went out of business. This shows a very dangerous issue with censorship: once the tools to control expression exist, they can be used for selfish reasons, to help the censor profit at the expense of his competitors.

Censorship of the arts is an ongoing problem. It seems like each time a new form of artistic expression becomes popular, it becomes subject to censorship. Movies became popular in the 1920s, and were censored in the 1930s. Comic books began being censored after their popularity rose in the 1950s. Currently, video games are skyrocketing in popularity, and many people are attempting to restrict or remove their ability to be distributed. Even though there is currently a rating system for video games in place, people like Jack Thompson continue to call for outright bans.

The biggest danger of censorship of the arts is that all portrayals of illegal material are banned, no matter what merit they may have. No matter how one might define a code, it can include material that is valuable to society. For example, pornography has been under fire for all of history. But if pornography were to be banned, what would happen to works which educate people on safe sex? Furthermore, what is offensive varies from culture to culture, and even from person to person. Any time someone tries to define the choices available to everyone, it will eliminate some choices desirable by some. Instead of censorship, people must use their own judgment to choose the art that is suitable for them, and not try to dictate what is appropriate for others.

Corporate Censorship
In today world, corporation can own many companies, including media or Information Company. These companies want to present a good face in the public so they don’t want to say anything bad about themselves. Therefore, they may use censorship in the media that they own to suppress the unfavorable information, both media that they own and in media that they spent the advertising dollar.

Corporations use money and power to influence the media throughout the world. If a report is going to hurt a company's bottom line, then that report will not be shown on the nightly news. Reporters fear reporting the complete news because their jobs and position will be threatened. One example of corporations controlling the news was at the beginning of this summer. Two reporters from competing channels were in the midst of a rivalry that involved one slamming the other continuously with facts and information regarding the habits of the parent company who owned the station that they worked for, MSNBC and Fox. This was in June of 2009 between MSNBC's Keith Olbermann and Fox's Bill O'Reilly. GE owns both MSNBC and Fox so having both of these reporters slanders the other were causing GE to lose money. It was later revealed that the two were “reconciled” by order of the CEO of GE. But at the end of this one of the parties involved was quoted saying, “I promise you, CBS News and ABC News and NBC News are not influenced by the corporations that may own those companies.” a quote by Charlie Rose (Greenwald). Yet, after this reconciliation anything that negatively portrayed GE was no longer reported on either of these very popular news shows. A viewer responded to the change,”In my personal opinion, this was one of the rare useful pieces of information O'Reilly ever presented to his audience, and Olbermann was there to show how lousy the rest of O'Reilly's information was. Though it was in the context of a bitter feud, the two men were actually engaging in real journalism, at least in this case.”(Greenwald)

Maybe the biggest concern with corporate censorship is in conjunction with media conglomeration. After the Television Act of 1996, the FCC allows companies to own many more media outlet. As the result of this, a small number of companies own almost all the media in the United States. Many people are concerned that this will lead to an oligarchy, in which the media company that come together and decide what will be covered in the entire major news outlet.

=The big problem: Who decides what and how much?=

How can the people, media, and governments come up with solutions to this argument? Who are the ones that will be speaking for the masses, and how do they decide what and how much censorship or lack thereof is appropriate? And why can’t the masses decide for themselves?

With the United States government, we elect into office representatives that are suppose to stand up for our beliefs; be it the laws we put into place to detour crime, what programs we want run to help those that cannot help themselves and even how we interact with other governments.

The United States government was put into place by the people for the people so that the people could live free without restrictions or dictatorships. Over the decades the masses with the controlling voice has become more complacent, allowing someone else to "make up the rules" for them. The people need to stand up again and hold those accountable that were voted into office to protect our freedoms. The people can do this by not re-electing those that go against the public’s wishes.

The media were meant to report the news, both sides of it, and not be biased, have an agenda or censor what is reported. It was set up as a way to inform the people of all the events. Good or bad. The people should boycott the major controlling media that are not standing to those original values.

People should stand together to be heard, take back the freedoms they have given up over the years by becoming complacent, and rejecting the officials and media that hinder these ideals and have agendas that hinder these freedoms.

Possible solutions
When the United States was formed The Bill of rights was ratified into the constitution. The First Amendment stated, "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances." (US Bill of Rights) This became a large step toward freedom of speech for the former colony and because of this amendment many people throughout history have been able to fight for their right to be and say what they want to. This showed a government opens to the idea of limiting censorship in favor of allowing the people to express themselves freely.

Another example of governments becoming more open to the idea of freedom of speech is the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. The document was adopted and proclaimed by the United Nations on December 10, 1948. This was a historic event that was encouraged by the UN to be publicized and spread throughout the member countries and one of the basic things it says is, “Everyone has the right to freedom of opinion and expression; this right includes freedom to hold opinions without interference and to seek, receive and impart information and ideas through any media and regardless of frontiers.”(Universal Declaration of Human Rights) This document however, is not very well publicized today nor is it discussed in most classrooms to young students so the power of the document is lost. It was an effort of the United Nations to suggest a way for all the countries that are part of the United Nations to give all people a sense of freedom of self.

Alternatives to Censorship
People are always learning and copying from each other so by seeing scenes of people consuming alcohol or smoking, it gives a bad influence on the society. Hence censoring such scenes serves a useful purpose. In the past, many young teenagers were influenced by the media to think that smoking cigarettes made them look cool. This made widespread smoking among the youth a big problem because it was illegal to smoke at under 18, but the rules were being broken by "rebels". Instead of censoring depictions of smoking, today commercials warn people that smoking is bad and even highly hazardous to a person's health. The website www.thetruth.com has a series of commercials illustrating what could happen if you smoke, such as having your larynx removed due to cancer. A lot of teenagers changed their minds about how smoking made them look and now are more likely to try being healthier. Instead of restricting information via censorship, publicizing the "other side of the issue" gives people more options to make up their own minds.

Censorship is often started with good intentions, but because of the problems outlined above, it can have bad results. Often people do not wish to be exposed to things that they find offensive, but censorship takes control away from people. One alternative to censorship is a system of rating content. Perhaps the most well known attempt at self regulation is conducted by the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA), which rates motion pictures for particular audiences. For example, the contents of "G" rated movies are considered suitable for all audiences, "GP" requires parental guidance, "R," "X," and NC17 are considered appropriate for adults. These standards are offered as a guide to audiences and have never been strictly enforced. Parents may take children to see X-rated movies if they so desire. This approach retains the filmmakers' freedom to create any kind of movie they wish, and also the people's freedom to choose what kind of material they wish to see.

Many people argue that rating systems are just another form of censorship. In some cases, such as with comics, where the distribution system refused to carry non-rated material, this is true. But in the best case, non-rated material is still available, giving customers a choice. An example of this is in the music industry. After the Parents Music Resource Center created the "Parental Advisory - Explicit Lyrics" sticker in 1985, the record labels started releasing multiple versions of many albums, one with the label, and a "cleaned up" version without. Some people have even claimed that the warning labels have increased sales for affected albums, saying that kids are more interested in "forbidden" media. In fact, many youth buy stickers and t-shirts portraying the warning label, as a badge of defiance.

=Conclusion= The discussion of freedom of speech and freedom of expression is a long hard road. It is true that people have the right to their speech and expression and everyone has a widely different point of view, which makes this topic a very passionate one. Who is to say what should or shouldn’t be censored? Who is to say what is right or wrong, because to each individual this changes. The question is; should there be censorship in the Medias? If so who are the ones that make these choices and what lines are to be drawn. Does censoring freedom of speech and expression aid or hinder mankind?

Governments have stepped in for many generations to try and tell its peoples what is right or wrong for them, albeit some with good intentions; most have tried to hide the truth from their peoples as a means of control. There is a big difference from trying to censor say porn versus governments trying to keep the truth of an issue from the people.

When a Government does something, that can and will affect the peoples of its nation, be it good or bad, and hides it from them, they are effectively telling its people they have no rights, that they do not know what is best for them. Each government and the peoples of that nation are very different with different points of view and thoughts on what is considered right and wrong. And this should be respected. But governments are supposed to be there for the people, to protect the people from harm. Not harm of what they watch, hear, learn, speak or even do, but to keep them safe from the harm of enemies. Governments should not be allowed or feel they have the total control over what the people chose to say, think, believe, watch, hear or do. It is the peoples right to self censorship not the governments.

Beings that the topic of what should be censored or not in our Medias is an ongoing, passionate topic that will not go away anytime soon and there will always be people on both sides of this issue, there should be some guides to help people make their own choices. Knowledge, of all kinds, helps people to evolve. Some of this knowledge may be hard to deal with or comprehend, but it shows us what works and what doesn’t. The people make choices for themselves, with these freedoms, what is right or wrong for each one.

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"Censorship in China." Anesty International. Web. 14 Sept. 2009. .



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