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Supporting: World Day Against Cyber Censorship

By: Qwaider

On:Thursday, March 11, 2010 5:48:48 PM
In:Thoughts
Viewed: (4351) times

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Censorship is bad. In a country like Jordan we know how these limitations have hurt us gravely in the past. These will likely to hurt us more in the future. It might mean the end of the vibrant Internet community that exists today.

Cyber-Censorship is far from being our only problem in Jordan, We're suffering from a plethora of problems and challenges that continue to obstruct our way to progress and prosperity. From issues as simple as honor killings to poverty, to water shortage to climate change

Jordan is in a position to change all that, and make some good strides on improving the quality of living, enhancing freedoms and pushing forward to more liberties. From Women's right to grant her children the Jordanian citizenship to Freedom of speech on and OFF line.

We as Jordanians support any effort that would grant us our rightful freedoms. It's shameful if someone was to lose his freedom for writing an article, or worse, if someone posted a comment that might be sensitive to the point that it causes the site owner to get in trouble

Luckily, the Jordanian cabinet appears to be seeking to amend this bill/law to the point where it almost overturned it. Certain regulation is still needed to be there to cover all civil disputes. But that doesn't mean journalists should fear for their life or freedom for writing articles, or accepting user generated comments. Of course this decision by the cabinet is a great precedent indeed, however, it comes in line with what the King has directed over a year ago. It should come as no surprise.

I doubt people striving to keep Jordan in the dark ages are going to stand still. But, at least for a while, we can all rest assured that our cyber freedom of choice is intact.

Or can we?

Think about it...

With institutions like Almukhabarat watching anything and everything, with absolutely no control of the law over their actions. Do you think Declaring laws against freedom of speech or with it would make any difference?

Perhaps we need to get rid of our medieval ideas first, and remove all signs of anti-civility first, then start seeking our freedoms.

Governed by the law or not, these all seems to be illusions the minute the investigator's boot steps on your neck.

Happy World Day Against Cyber Censorship

Memories....

#1
Ghassan Yonis
Said
On: 3/11/2010 6:21:48 PM
SpamScore=[1]

1. "they overturned a new proposed law that would limit freedom of speech on the Internet" Do you have any link for that?

2. Already told this via email, but I' gonna write here for everybody to see:
Why online censorship is the most crucial, because in order to solve ANY problem, you need to talk about it first, with the new court ruling or the law the government trying to do (trust me, I was on the committee studding the law), NON of us can talk about pretty much anything from the subjects you mentioned. That's why.

#2
Qwaider
Said
On: 3/11/2010 7:06:29 PM
SpamScore=[-41.51]

Hi Ghassan, and Thank you for your comment. I made a mistake talking about the Judicial branch of authority as pushing back the new changes to the law. It was the cabinet that did that (Thanks for pointing that, I'll fix it)

Online Censorship is but one of Jordanian issues. We have many others. Plus we have great things Jordanian to talk about. We can't reduce all of Jordan to a single issues. We have many more

Quite frankly, other than talking about the King and the government, there's nothing really to worry about in terms of Censorship. As you know, for many years, Jordan has been enjoying this level of freedom with issues dealing from Homosexuality to Atheism. People can do and say whatever they want, no one would care. ONLY when it's about the monarchy or government when things become ugly.

We are all in support of Jordanian liberties, in every possible avenue. Against Cyber censorship too.