Chinese Bloggers Stage Hoax 437
Carl Bialik from WSJ writes "It seemed like the latest instance of a recurring story: Two Chinese blogs had shut down, apparently the victim of government censorship. 'Within hours, English-language bloggers and Western news media spread the word that the Chinese government had closed the sites,' the Wall Street Journal reports. The BBC spread the word, and its report was picked up by the French free-press group Reporters Without Borders. 'But in this case, it appears the Chinese government wasn't involved, the WSJ reports. 'By Thursday, a day after the shut-downs, the blogs were back up and running. In an interview, Beijing-based journalist Wang Xiaofeng of Massage Milk says he shut his blog down to make a point about freedom of speech -- just one directed at the West instead of at Beijing. He calls the Western press "irresponsible" and says that the hoax was designed "to give foreign media a lesson that Chinese affairs are not always the way you think." ' The BBC later corrected its story."
Re:Who is actually irresponsible? (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Yes they are (Score:3, Informative)
It doesn't really matter how liberal the troops are if all the Generals are raving Buchanon followers. Since the right tends to be populated by the robber barons (as well as their willing dupes), the robber baron in question is quite likely to be a republican.
In reality, bias towards the almighty dollar is what skews American (or even Arab) journalism.
This notion of a "liberal bias" in the media is just something that the republican party uses to stir up it's willing dupes.
Re:Kind of silly in my opinion (Score:3, Informative)
It's kind of like faking being hit by a car and then when people run out to help you, jumping up and screaming "fooled you!" Okay, so nice job, you fooled us, but only because we gave you more credit for not being a dumbass than we probably should have.
Those who speak out against Bush (Score:3, Informative)
http://www.alternet.org/rights/33027/ [alternet.org]
She's been under investigation by the FBI since then, and they're threatening to throw her in jail on sedition charges. They've been using scare tactics like interrupting her in the middle of her work at the hospital and confiscating her work computer "to look for evidence".
The future is arriving faster than you think.
Re:Those who speak out against Bush (Score:5, Informative)
Basically she wrote a letter to the editor identifying her job and then proceeded to publicly blast her employer as an employee. In the private sector, that'd probably get her fired. As a government employee, that's virtually impossible, so instead her bosses in the bureaucracy (who now look really bad to their bosses) are trying to make her life a little more miserable.
While I don't condone the screwed-up nature of the federal civil service bureaucracy, imagine the internal response if you had published a letter to the editor saying the CEO of your company was mismanaging several big aspects of the company and signed it with your name and job title. I'm pretty sure the response you'd get (if you worked at a large or small company) would dwarf the response she got from her bosses.
communism? (Score:2, Informative)
Re:Boys who cried wolf (Score:1, Informative)
Re:Serious Question (Score:4, Informative)
Netherlands.
For work. My dad came here because China was poor at the time (the late 1980s). I and my mother followed a few years later.
See? No conspiracies.