Parsa.azadeh

به زودی از کارم استعفا می‌دهم و بر می‌گردم ایران. باید آپارتمانم را پس بدهم. با صاحب‌خانه‌ام دعوایم شده و معاملات ملکی دارد بین‌مان وساطت می‌کند. هر جفت‌شان دزد و بی‌تربیت و تازه به دوران‌رسیده هستند.

وقتی برگشتم ایران نمی‌دانم می‌خواهم چه کار کنم. چند تا ایده تجاری دارم. بیزنس. دلم می‌خواهد پولدار شوم. خسته شدم از فکر کردن به پول، به دخل و خرج، به اجاره خانه، به وام خانه. چند ماه پیش یکهو خیلی قوی شدم، پر از «نیروی زندگی». همان موقع شد که تصمیم گرفتم برگردم و تا ۳۵ سالگی به وضعیتی برسم که دیگر به پول فکر نکنم، بتوانم از پول عبور کنم. به عنوان اولین قدم می‌خواستم از فرودگاه یک راست بروم کلانتری و پاسبان بگیرم و بروم مستاجر ۱۴ ساله‌ی آپارتمان نظام‌آباد را بلند کنم، با اُردنگی بلندش کنم، همانی که ۱۳ سال است اجاره نداده و پدرم هم هر وقت موضوع را پیش می‌کشی به سقف نگاه می‌کند. الآن ولی دوباره قدرتم را از دست داده‌ام. نفهمیدم چطوری پنچر شدم. نگران استعفایم هستم. باید بروم توی اتاق شیشه‌ای رییسم. می‌خواهم بگویم پدرم مریض است و کسی نیست ازش مراقبت کند چون فرزندانش مهاجرت کرده‌اند غرب. ولی دروغ است. پدرم مریض نیست، پدرم سالم است، منم که مریضم. کلن مریضم، یک مریضی طولانی که اسمش زندگی است. برهه‌های کوتاهی دارم که قوی می‌شوم و امیدوار می‌شوم و فکر می‌کنم «تمام شد، پشت سر گذاشتمش» اما پُر پُرش این دوره‌های قدرت ۳-۴ ماه طول می‌کشند و باز دوباره انفعال و بی‌بُتگی، و ضعف؛ امواج ضعف از همه طرف رویم می‌ریزند.

چند هفته‌ای است که به آن لحظه‌ای فکر می‌کنم که باید بروم توی اتاق شیشه‌ای رییسم. ازش خجالت می‌کشم. انگار نمک‌نشناسم. انگار با استخدامم بهم لطف کرده‌اند و حالا من در کمال قدرنشناسی به‌شان می‌گویم که لطف‌تان را نمی‌خواهم، مال خودتان. انگار آنها کار را داده‌اند و من خوش‌شانس بوده‌ام که توی این بازار آشفته کار گیرم آمده. آنها آن بالا هستند و من این پایین لای لجن‌ها. آنها پول و تکه های غذا را می‌اندازند و من مثل یک سگ گرسنه می‌پرم هوا و لقمه‌های غذا و اسکناس‌ها را می‌قاپم. برای همین خجالت می‌کشم که می‌خواهم استعفا بدهم. فکر می‌کنم رییسم وقتی بشنود با لبخند دست به باسنم بکشد و بپرسد «دیگه سیر شدی؟»

ایران سه سال کار کرده بودم و فکر کنم چهار بار استعفا داده بودم. آن موقع‌ها پررو بودم. می‌گفتم اینجا برای من کوچک است، کارتان مسخره است، یا موقعیت بهتری پیدا کرده‌ام. دنبال «موقعیت بهتر» بودم. به یکی‌شان گفتم حوصله‌ام از کارم سر می‌رود و بیشتر مواقع بی‌کارم. هفت سال از آن دوران گذشته و الآن توی شرکت سرم که خلوت بشود خوشحال هم می‌شوم، توییتر می‌کنم و اینترنت‌گردی. هنوز هم حوصله‌ام از کار سر می‌رود. مگر می‌شود از کار تکراری حوصله آدم سر نرود؟ کارها هم که الزامن همگی تکراری تا «بازدهی» بالا برود. الآن ولی قضیه‌ی کار را جور دیگری می‌بینم: کار می‌کنم تا حقوق بگیرم و حقوقم تبدیل به اجاره خانه و مرغ و گوشت و برنج و پول رستوران و سینما و بلیط هواپیما می‌شود. به پول احتیاج دارم. پول و اسکناس را خیلی دوست دارم. وقتی پول دارم خوشحال و قوی و خوشگل هستم. پوند، یورو، دلار؛ اینها علایق من در زندگی هستند.

این سری به رییسم می گویم که مشکلم پدرم است، اما مشکل پدرم هم من هستم. پدرم می‌گوید برنگرد. می‌گوید صبر کن، بمان، جا می‌افتی، ایران خبری نیست. خودم هم می‌دانم خبری نیست. هیچ جا خبری نیست. مگر قرار است جایی خبری باشد؟ خبرها توی فیلم‌ها و توی اخبار هستند، جفت‌شان دور و بعید، جفت‌شان غیرواقعی. تهران هم هیچ خبری نیست. آلودگی هوا و ترافیک. هفت سال پیش که تهران بودم چشم‌هایم مدام قرمز می‌شدند، دکتر نفازولین داده بود برای شستشوی چشمم، از همین قطره‌ها که حشیشی‌ها می‌ریزند توی چشم‌شان. الآن که برگردم لابد سر چهار ماه کور می‌شوم. دیگر «کار» هم نمی‌توانم بکنم. نمی‌توانم قراردادهای کارمندی با شرکت‌ها ببندم. به خودم قول داده‌ام دیگر کارمند نشوم. سرمایه برای کار آزاد هم ندارم. چند تا ایده تجاری داشتم. برای نزدیکانم ساعت‌ها توضیح‌شان داده‌ام. اینجا نمی‌گویم‌شان چون می‌ترسم دزدیده شوند. ولی بهرحال توانایی عملیاتی کردن ایده‌هایم را هم ندارم. نمی‌توانم برای پول، برای زندگی کردن این قدر کله معلق بزنم. به خانواده‌ام گفته‌ام برگردم تا مدتی می‌خواهم استراحت کنم و کار نکنم. آنها نمی‌دانند که کلن نمی‌خواهم کارمندی کنم. فکرش را هم کرده‌ام، اگر زیاد در مورد «آینده» سوال بپرسند یا مادرم زیاد «غم مادرانه» بروز بدهد می‌گویم پاره‌وقت استخدام شرکت «لوله‌سازان نوین» شده‌ام. هفته‌ای سه روز به هوای «لوله‌سازان نوین» می‌زنم بیرون و می‌روم خانه دوست‌دخترم.

از آن طرف می‌ترسم دوست‌دخترم هم حوصله‌اش از دستم سر برود. وقتی خودم حوصله‌ام از دست خودم سر می‌رود چه دلیلی دارد که بقیه مردم با من سرگرم بشوند؟ به اینها که فکر می‌کنم پکر می‌شوم. دوست‌دخترم تنها امیدم است. اولین باری است که این‌طور عاشق کسی شده‌ام. اما بعد از ۳-۴ ماه پریشب‌ها فهمیدم این یکی را هم گند می‌زنم تویش، همان‌طوری که قبلی‌ها را گند زدم. زن سابقم می‌گفت «تو لیاقت منو نداری.» خودم هم همین‌طور فکر می‌کنم. یعنی فکر می‌کنم لیاقت هیچ کسی را ندارم، دقیقن برای همین است که بدون استثنا هر وقت لب سکوی مترو و قطار می‌ایستم به پرت کردن خودم روی ریل‌ها فکر می‌کنم.

فکر می‌کردم بعد از دفاع فوق‌لیسانسم اتفاق خارق‌العاده‌ای می‌افتد. روز دفاع عباس داشت عکس می‌گرفت. زن سابقم زیردستی پلاستیکی بین استادها پخش کرده بود و به‌شان دانمارکی تعارف می‌کرد. دکتر خزاعی سه تا دانمارکی برداشت و دو تا سن‌ایچ. من دفاع کردم و هیچ اتفاق خارق‌العاده‌ای نیفتاد. ۱۹/۵ شدم. یکی از داورها بهم کار پیشنهاد کرد. شرکت دولتی بود و فرایند استخدامش طول می‌کشید. من می‌خواستم بروم کیش. تنها. یک روز بعد از دفاع نشسته بودم خانه، هنوز کار استخدامم درست نشده بود و معلوم هم نبود درست بشود. کانال چهار فیلم کنت دو مونت کریستو را نشان می‌داد. هیچ کس خانه نبود. من کره عسل و بربری یخ‌زده خورده بودم و فکر کنم خوشحال بودم. تلفن زنگ زد. خاله‌ام بود که با مادرم کار داشت. مادرم سر کار بود. خاله‌ام لابد می‌دانست. من هم که بی‌کار توی خانه. کلی برایم دل‌سوزی کرد و گفت «خاله جون بجنب.» هفته بعدش هشت صبح سر کار بودم. کیش هم نرفتم، لابد وقت نشد. کنت دو مونت کریستو هم نفهمیدم فرار کرد یا توی آن زندان تاریک پوسید. از آن روز تا امروز دقیقن نمی‌دانم چطور گذشت. کار و درس، یک رابطه مسخره که آخر سر پاره شد، همین. هنوز دلم می‌سوزد که کیش تنهایی را نرفتم و تقریبن مطمئنم همان روزی که خاله‌ام زنگ زد، همان روز من سر یک دوراهی ایستاده بودم اما حتی وجود این دوراهی را ضبط هم نکردم، ندیدمش، فقط یک راه را دیدم و همان را رفتم، راه پوسیدگی.

قدیم‌ترها جابجایی، عوض کردن کار و شهر و کشور، همین ها هیجانی داشت که کمک می‌کرد یک امیدی داشته باشم. الآن هیچ هیجانی نیست، این کارها و تغییر و تحول‌ها بیشتر مضطرب و ملتهبم می‌کنند. مثلن الآن از بس به استعفایم، به برگشتن به ایران، به جدایی از خواهرم فکر کرده‌ام قلب‌درد گرفته‌ام. مدام قلبم را می‌مالم و ترس برم داشته مثل عمویم در ۳۳ سالگی سکته کنم. خواهرم را نبینم چه کار کنم؟ می‌دانم الآن درست نمی‌فهمم چه بلایی سرم می‌آید، ولی حتی همین الآن هم می‌دانم که له و لورده خواهم شد. پریشب‌ها بیرون بود، من وقت خوابم بود و خزیده بودم زیر لحاف. کلید انداخت و با هوای سرد و یک عالم هیجان آمد توی اتاق. پالتوی سیاهش را داشت آویزان می‌کرد توی کمد و من نمی‌دانم چطوری، اما متوجه شدم این زن خوشگل و فوق‌العاده‌ای که جلویم ایستاده در حقیقت همان دختر بچه نق‌نقوی شش ساله‌ای است که یک عروسک پاره زده زیر بغلش و دامنی صورتی پوشیده که جای قلاب کمربندش یک ستاره دارد، همان دختربچه‌ای که دامنش همیشه همان بود، همیشه همان، چون رویش ستاره داشت. پالتویش را آویزان کرد و با هیجان داشت ماجرای آخرین تیک زدنش را می‌گفت و من فکر می‌کردم این‌طوری که نمی‌شود، نمی‌توانم به همین سادگی دیگر نبینمش. بعضی مسائل هزار تا بُعد پیچیده دارند، از هزار تا زاویه مختلف می‌شود نگاه و تحلیل‌شان کرد. اما ته تهش یکهو واقعیت مثل یک طوفان بی‌بند و بار می‌آید و تمام آن تحلیل‌های پیچیده را از بین می‌برد و پشت سرش یک خرابه جا می‌گذارد. پشت آن طوفان آدم تازه اصل ماجرا را می‌بیند: اینکه چطوری می‌توانم نبینمش؟

Daily Reporter: “I have to be on Twitter, it’s part of the job now. The editor expects it.”

Obits Reporter: “Nobody said I have to be on Twitter. Why don’t I have to be on it?”

News Editor: “Maybe because most of the people you write about aren’t going to check your Tweets afterward.”

Malala Yousafzai opened the Library of Birmingham in September. Her own book is now banned in Pakistani private schools. (Image Michael Scott/Demotix)

“My friend told me Malala is not a Pakistani or a Muslim; her real name is Jennifer and she is a Christian,” said ten-year old Fatemah, conspiratorially. “But I don’t believe her one bit,” she added waving the book “I am Malala”. She is reading the autobiography of Malala Yousafzai, the young Pakistani girl who survived an assassination attempt by the Taliban.

The rather precocious 10-year old went on to say the book “gave me something important to reflect on… That what I had always taken for granted, like education, does not come that easily for thousands.” She found Malala to be a “real hero” for standing up for what she believed in. Fatemah may just be ten but her views are reflective of the debate raging in Pakistan today, especially in the media, after the book surfaced and was subsequently banned in some private schools.

On 10 November, the All Pakistan Private Schools Federation (APPSF), announced the decision to ban the book from member schools for “being against the injunctions of Islam and the constitution of Pakistan”. The book will not be kept in the library of any of its schools and no co-curricular activities, including debates, will be held on it, Kashif Mirza, chairman of the APPSF told Index. Almost 25 million children, 10 million of which are girls, study at the federation’s 152,000 private school. They employ 7,250,000 teachers, 90 percent being women. The book has not officially been banned by the Pakistani government in state schools, but is not part of any school’s curriculum.

Yousafzai has been bagging one award after another internationally. In Pakistan, where the entire nation had rooted for her to win the Nobel Peace prize, the book has led to a slight dimming of that adulation. Having British award-winning journalist Christina Lamb’s name on the cover as co-author hasn’t helped. ”Lamb is reputed to be both anti-Pakistan and anti-Islam,” Mirza said.

Dr AH Nayyar, a noted educationist, said the reaction of the private school owners was that of “weak-kneed people” who are more worried about their “business interests” than what “is right and what is wrong”.

Rumana Hussain, a former principal of a private school who has written and illustrated several children’s books, finds it tragic that “the 25 million students who attend private schools in the country will not read the book. The millions who attend public schools, where the book isn’t banned but won’t be taught, bought or stocked, will not read it either.”

She lamented: “All of them will be deprived of the chance to read the account of a young Pakistani girl’s struggle for education – not only for herself but also for every Pakistani girl, every child - and get inspiration from her story.”

“We are not against girls education or against Malala,” argued Mirza. ”On the contrary, we are a great supporter of Malala’s mission of girl’s education and have always advocated for liberal, enlightened and empowered women. When Malala was shot, for the first time in the history of private schools, we held a strike and closed all schools.”

Today, however, Malala seems to have lost favour in the eyes of Mirza and many others who think like him.

“I have read the book and find it hard to believe that a child who of just 16 has so much knowledge of international affairs,” he said, implying that the west has used her “confused state of mind” to grind their own axe.

Dr Nayyar finds this argument hard to digest. “The book was written by a non-Muslim. How does her writing make Malala a tool in the hands of the west?”

But what exactly has Malala or Lamb written that has half of Pakistan in a tizzy?

“She has shown disrespect to Prophet Muhammad by not using Peace be Upon Him after his name. She speaks of [former Pakistani president] Zia ul Haq bringing the Islamic law of reducing the women’s evidence to half into the court. She can’t comment on that as it’s in the Quran and no more can be said about it. She also talks about her father referring to Satanic Verses and believing in freedom of expression. We can’t have young impressionable minds reading her, having her as her role model and going astray,” Mirza said adamantly.

What he failed to mention was that all this had happened during her father’s college days when he took part in a debate of whether Satanic Verses should be banned and burned. The Satanic Verses controversy, also known as the Rushdie Affair, was the heated and frequently violent reaction of some Muslims to the publication of  Salman Rushdie’s novel, first published in the United Kingdom in 1988. While few Pakistanis may have read the novel, most have been led to believe that it is an insult to Islam because it disparaged the honour of the Prophet Muhammad.

Malala’s father, while finding the book offensive to Islam had the courage to suggest, to a packed room of fellow students: “First, let’s read the book and then why not respond with our own book.”

Nayyar found absolutely nothing wrong with what Malala has stated. “That minorities are often attacked in Pakistan and that Ahmedis regard themselves as Muslims while the government does not; every word of these statements is true. Even the quoted statement of her father about Rushdie’s book Satanic Verses is praise-worthy; face a blasphemic book with a good book of your own,” he said.

“I think the ban is condemnable even if it applies to a few thousand schools,” said Zohra Yusuf, chairperson of the independent Human Rights Commission of Pakistan. “We should be opening up young minds, not shutting them. Malala’s story should be a great inspiration for students,” she added.

“I did not find anything objectionable in the book itself,” said Farah Zia, the editor of English daily The News’ magazine The News on Sunday section. “The only problem I had was the voice of the book, that switched between a 16 year old and a mature one,” added the mother of two.

While the ban has not been enacted across the board yet, she finds it ridiculous. Still, she hopes the controversy may make many curious enough to pick up the book and read it. On the other hand, she says the “atmosphere of fear being artificially created” may stop publishers from translating the book into local languages.

This article was originally posted on 15 Nov 2013 at indexoncensorship.org

The post Pakistan: debate rages over Malala book ban appeared first on Index on Censorship.

Australia has no grand constitution outlining civil freedoms and national character. The constitution is instead a lengthy, largely legislative document and does not guarantee freedom of speech or press outright. That notwithstanding Australia’s High Court believes that freedom of speech is implied within, however some press watchers believe it could be strengthened.

Despite a relatively free press Reporters Without Borders placed Australia at number 26 in its 2013 Press Freedom Index, up four spots from 2012 but still far behind closest neighbour New Zealand (number eight), as well as Finland, Jamaica and Costa Rica.

Outright press censorship and the highest profile cases of recent years have involved breaches of discrimination acts or incitements to hatred. Meanwhile press laws and reforms to them have been touted with scant success. Widespread internet censorship was defeated last year after Communications Minister Stephen Conroy rescinded the internet filtering scheme after five years trying to pass it.

However though always fearful of harming the children, and causing offence, most Australians see outright censorship measures as neither useful, fair or in keeping with national ideals.

A historical example might be the 1951 referendum on whether to outlaw the Australian Communist Party after Liberal Prime Minister Robert Menzies tried to ban it. Despite fear of the communist threat it was defeated by voters thanks to worries on curbs of freedom of speech and association.

Anti-discrimination laws, hate speech and other things untoward

In 2011 political columnist Andrew Bolt, who works for Murdoch-owned News Corp (Australia’s branch of News Limited), was found to have breached the Racial Discrimination Act in two 2009 articles after he implied lighter-skinned indigenous people identified as aboriginal for gain. Speaking outside court after the ruling he called it “a terrible day for free speech in this country”. He had argued his articles were within the laws of free speech provisions. In 2009 “shock jock” broadcaster Alan Jones was in trouble for breaching anti-discrimination laws for comments made about Lebanese Muslim men years previous. The court found he had incited hatred.

Age columnist Catherine Devenney was also fired after she live-Tweeted during the Logie television awards: “I do so hope Bindi Irwin gets laid” in 2010. Irwin was 13 at the time.

Most recently political organisation GetUp accused Channel Nine, Channel Ten and Channel Seven of censorship after they refused to run political ads attacking Rupert Murdoch and News Corp. Channel Nine did run the ads, albeit briefly, before pulling them and blaming a ‘coding error’ for the original airing.

National Director Sam McLean told Fairfax: “This is censorship, pure and simple. Channel Seven says it’s about taste but I don’t buy that for a second. Channel Ten told us they don’t want to criticise another media network – but this is about Rupert’s son Lachlan being [chairman] of Channel Ten.”

Reforms and laws

In March four media reform bills put forward by Labor under then-Prime Minister Julia Gillard were withdrawn after they couldn’t draw the needed amount of cross-bench support from MPs. All were controversial, with the ability to affect the press and drew considerable opprobrium from some quarters of the industry.

The most controversial, from an industry perspective, was the appointment of a Public Interest Media Advocate (PIMA), a watchdog for self-regulatory industry bodies like the Press Council. Called a “big stick… and de facto form of licensing” by Mark Pearson, a media expert and former Australian correspondent for Reporters Without Borders, and ‘Stalinist’ by News Ltd boss Kim Williams, it would have meant much more bureaucracy

“I find it absolutely breathtaking to be lectured by the Murdoch press about the privacy laws,” committee chairman Doug Cameron, a Labor senator, said in response to criticism by News Ltd boss Kim Williams.

Tony Abbott backed critics, calling it a threat to free speech. However in Parliament he seemed more concerned with the sitting government’s purported attacks on freedom of speech than how such laws might play out longer term. “This is a government which wants to hide the truth to protect itself. They don’t want to protect the national interest; they want to damage the national interest,” he said.

Two reports released this year have also been divisive. The Finklestein Report and Convergence Review looked at media regulation (by the government) and media ownership and diversity issues. The former has been lambasted as a threat to a free press, with national broadsheet the Australian noting that the paper had been compiled by many journalism academics either unused to or out-of-practise when it came to the rigours of day-to-day journalism and thus unreliable to offer advice.  A Daily Telegraph front page compared Information Minister Stephen Conroy with famous dictators including Mao and Stalin.

Writing in The Conversation, Associate Professor of Journalism and Media at Deakin University Martin Hirst noted, “But the “threat to free speech” line is not an argument that the anti-regulation ideologues actually believe, it is a populist sound-bite.”

The Assange factor

Australia has done very little for Julian Assange, who harbours deep resentment as a result. Former Prime Minister Julia Gillard called the Australian a criminal and earlier pushed for a government inquiry into Wikileaks. Former attorney-general Robert McClelland also, according to the Australian Associated Press, at point thought of cancelling his passport and charging him with treason. Assange, though still confined within the the Ecuadorian embassy in London, is running for the Australian senate with his newly formed Wikileaks Party this coming election, and has told reporters support for him and his website within Australia is high.

Australian journalist Wilfred Burchett suffered similarly at the hands of the Australian government, being denied an Australian passport application in 1955 at Prime Minister Robert Menzies’ discretion (he had lost his British passport). He tried several times through the 1960s to no avail and was only granted one under a Gough Whitlam-led Labor government after they could find no support to the treason allegations that had dogged the pro-communist reporter for years. Though long dead he remains a divisive figure and most recently Australia historian Robert Manne published a story in The Australian alleging he really had been on the KGB’s books.

Media ownership

Australia’s two largest print media companies are News Corp  and Fairfax, though both also have digital, radio and, in the case of News Limited, television interests. Australia’s wealthiest person Gina Rinehart bought a stake in Fairfax, but by 2012 was trying to offload despite being the biggest shareholder. She also bought a significant part of Channel 10, a commercial television network. These purchases had been touted for a while and worried many as Rinehart was seen as unfriendly to the press and with a strong right-wing agenda. She has argued against the controversial mining tax and also criticised high wages in Australia.

Despite owning a chunk of the press Ms Rinehart is not particularly friendly to it. Most recently she subpoenaed West Australian journalist Steve Pennells and Fairfax reporter Adele Ferguson to hand over materials relating to conversations with her son John Hancock that detail her ongoing feud with her children. Mr Pennells has written a series of articles on the family rift and Ms Ferguson a book on Rinehart.

Chris Warren, federal secretary of the Media Entertainment and Arts Alliance, told a rally of journalists outside West Australia’s Supreme Court, “This is the major challenge not just to free speech but to democracy in Australia.”

There have been some recent but as-yet unsubstantiated worries that should the Coalition win the election on September 7 funding may be cut to the Australian Broadcasting Corporation, the national broadcaster. Criticisms of left-leaning bias have been levelled at the ABC before, notably by Andrew Bolt who called for more conservatives to be on its board.

Internet

Communications Minister Stephen Conroy’s internet filtering scheme was, in contrast, far more wide-reaching and could have been far more dangerous. Not only were many sites to be blocked (nothing unusual in itself when it comes to issues of child pornography or other highly illegal content), but he ‘blacklist’ of sites marked out by the Australian Communications and Media Authority was not released publicly. A list of 1,000 leaked in 2009 showed that many of the websites in fact did not host illegal content. Distasteful, possibly, but as in the case of instructions on suicide or pro-Satanist sites, not illegal.

The government insisted it was not about curtailing freedom of speech or the internet but rather, according to Conroy: “The Government believes that parents want assistance to reduce the risk of children being exposed to such material.”

He said an independent body would have decided what sites were RC – Refused Classification (a demarcation that also belongs to films deemed unsuitable in Australia)

Dropped in 2012 five years after Conroy first proposed it the Coalition and Greens applauded the move even if it didn’t thrill the Australian Christian Lobby. Fourteen hundred known child abuse sites would be blocked under the via the Telecommunications Act instructing ISPs. Many, including shadow communications minister Malcolm Turnbull (formerly leader of the Opposition) had oft-pointed out that highly illegal content would not be affected by such a filtering system as it is already shared via Peer-to-Peer networks. ISPs such as Telstra and Optus (both major telcos) already blocked child abuse sites as listed by Interpol.

Turnbull also called it “bad for freedom of speech”.

One of the other criticisms were that blocking all such material from overseas sites would have slowed already sluggish net speeds.

The proposed system meant Reporters Without Borders listed Australia as a country “under surveillance” in 2012.

One legal expert speaking with Computerworld suggested that the Act should be clarified to state how ISPs might block websites.

“I think it may be that potentially the government might want to specify with greater clarity the types of websites that people will be prevented from accessing or that ISPs will … need to put in procedures to limit access to [them], as opposed to leaving it to some fairly broad-ranging powers of ACMA,” he said.

Facebook’s first Transparency Report states that in the first half of this year the Australian government made 564 requests related to 601 users. According to data the social networking site has made public it complied with 64 per cent of those requests. Requests were as often related to criminal cases as national security though no breakdown was given in the case of any country. The United States, in comparison, made 11,000 – 12,000 requests for 20,000 to 21,000 users.

Meanwhile a recent Google Transparency report states that the Australian government requested the search engine remove 145 items in the second half of last year, over 92 for the first half. Most were related to trademark infringement, privacy and security or defamation.

The Liberal-National Coalition just announced its internet policy two days before the election and almost a year after Labor abandoned its internet filtering system plan. Except, that it actually didn’t. The A$10 million plan would have required telcos and ISPs to censor or filter out ‘adult’ material unless users chose to opt out. The policy was called, possibly unsurprisingly, the “Policy to Enhance Online Safety for Children”. However only hours later shadow communications minister Malcolm Turnbull said release of the “poorly worded” policy had been a mistake and instead the Coalition would “encourage” parents to install software to filter out content that was not child-friendly.

The arts 

Media and the arts are rarely subject to censorship. In 2009, when China demanded a film festival to dump a Uighur documentary, the opprobrium was met with bemusement. However many things that insult and offend, for non-political reasons, are met with fearful censoriousness.

In May there was a furore in New South Wales when images at the Vivid outdoor photo festival were culled from the exhibition for being “too distressing”. Destination NSW, a state tourism body, was responsible for the decision which festival organisers found “embarrassing”.

”We think it is threatening to families. Would they want those children to see that?” Sandra Chipchase, CEO of Destination NSW, said of images that included photographs of the Cronulla Riots in Sydney, photos of the aftermath of bushfires in Australia, and victims of genocidal attacks in Rwanda.

“In that public domain area it’s about entertainment and engagement.,” she continued when speaking with the Sydney Morning Herald. Vivid is known for its arresting exhibitions. In a survey by the paper 27 per cent of the respondents agreed with the decision.

“The children’, actual or hypothetical, justify much.

Photographer Bill Henson has come close to being charged with child pornography in the past and his work still excites tremendous passion, and sometimes outrage, for his portrayal of nude pre- or pubescent children. A 2008 show in Sydney was raided by police. The New South Wales government changed its child pornography laws as a result in 2010. Artistic purpose was no longer a defence. A Commonwealth classification is now needed for images of naked children.

Prime Minister Kevin Rudd said at the time that his work was “devoid of artistic merit”. Much of the art world would disagree. Henson is regarded as one Australia’s leading artists with 30 years and many international exhibitions.

In 1996 Spanish artist Andre Cerano’s exhibit was removed from the National Gallery of Victoria after Catholics protested against works that included a photograph of a crucifix in urine, titled Piss Christ.

Films are not banned but “refused classification”; most recently French rape revenge film Baise Moi (Fuck Me) was again banned. Films with highly sexual content, sexualised violence and anything relating to pedophilia are usually of especial concern to the Board of Film and Literature Classification. The ratings system has undergone changes; the R-rating was brought in in the 1970s and restricts media to over-18s.

Laws

Under John Howard some 30 new anti-terror laws were brought in post-9/11 which according to Pearson infringed on work by reporters. Australia does not, however, have an Official Secrets Act though public servants are restricted from revealing information. This pertains more national security information (such as in the noted example of the identity of ASIO agents)  than anything which may simply embarrass the government.

There are also the almost-defunct D Notices which request media not report on certain topics related to defence or national security, issued by the Defence, Press and Broadcasting Committee, which last met in 1982. Whilst related to national security the system was voluntary and no penalty for ignoring requests – as they were quaintly called – exited; it was largely left to an editor’s judgement.

There are restrictions on information regarding terrorism and terrorists or suspected terrorists but often laws turn into a convoluted version of a Donald Rumsfeld quote and reporters aren’t allowed to know what they aren’t allowed to know and thus might know things they are not allowed to, without knowing.

Transparency can be a problem. Reporters Without Borders has noted the government’s unwillingness to grant access to asylum seeker detention centres and government departments will often officially offer no more information than a pre-prepared statement or press release.

Though individuals’ right to privacy has been upheld in individual cases there is no specific charter that protects the right to privacy; however, rape victims cannot be named in the press here as in the United States. Such things have been debated when looking at changes to press laws and were, obviously, especially apposite in the wake of the long running phone hacking scandals in the United Kingdom. News Limited has in the past come out against a Bill of Rights in Australia which, though shoring up privacy laws, could have also bolstered press freedom laws, according to analysts.

Pornography has long been classified and only in the ACT – Australian Capital Territory – was “hardcore” or triple X pornography allowed. It is a state, not federal matter however. The legality of prostitution is also state, not federally, regulated. It is largely illegal in South Australia and Tasmania and legal in Victoria and New South Wales.

The post From Assange to Murdoch: Australia’s free speech landscape appeared first on Index on Censorship.

Richard Dawkins and ex-Muslim campaigner Maryam Namazie at a rally in support of free expression, London, February 2012. Image Demotix/Peter Marshall

This week has seen an outbreak of atheist infighting, as Observer and Spectator writer Nick Cohen launched an attack at writers such as the Independent’s Owen Jones and the Telegraph’s Tom Chivers. Their crime, apparently was to focus criticism on atheist superstar Richard Dawkins for his tweets, particularly those about Islam and Muslims, while not criticising religious fundamentalists.

Jones and Chivers have both replied, quite reasonably, to Cohen’s article.

Dawkins’s controversial tweets display a political naivety that can often be found in organised atheism and scepticism. Anyone who’s witnessed the ongoing row within that community over feminism will recognise a certain tendency to believe that science and facts alone are virtuous, and “ideologies” based on something other than empirical data just get in the way.

Hence the professor can tweet the statement “All the world’s Muslims have fewer Nobel Prizes than Trinity College, Cambridge” as if this in itself proves something, without further thinking about the political, historical, social and, indeed, geographical factors behind this apparent fact, and then be surprised when people object.

I’m not going to suggest that Dawkins be silenced. He can and will tweet what he wants. And it’s worth pointing out that those on the liberal left who have raised concerns about Dawkins’s pigeonholing of Muslims can be equally guilty of treating all adherents to a religion as a monolithic bloc: this happens mostly with Muslims, but often, at least in the UK with Roman Catholics as well, as if declaring the shahada or accepting the sacraments is akin to being assimilated into Star Trek’s Borg. Any amount of non-Muslim commentators who opposed the Iraq war, for example will tell you that “Muslims” care deeply about the Iraq war, neatly soliciting support for their arguments while also casting themselves as friends of a minority group. And for a great example of treating “Catholics” as a single entity, Johann Hari’s address ahead of the visit by former pope Benedict XVI to Britain in 2010, takes some beating:

I want to appeal to Britain’s Roman Catholics now, in the final days before Joseph Ratzinger’s state visit begins. I know that you are overwhelmingly decent people. You are opposed to covering up the rape of children. You are opposed to telling Africans that condoms “increase the problem” of HIV/Aids. You are opposed to labelling gay people “evil”. The vast majority of you, if you witnessed any of these acts, would be disgusted, and speak out. Yet over the next fortnight, many of you will nonetheless turn out to cheer for a Pope who has unrepentantly done all these things.

I believe you are much better people than this man. It is my conviction that if you impartially review the evidence of the suffering he has inflicted on your fellow Catholics, you will stand in solidarity with them – and join the [anti-Pope] protesters.”

Hari is literally telling people what they think. A bit like the Vatican tries to do.

Communalist rhetoric, whether used to attack or support certain groups, is the enemy of free speech, as it automatically discredits dissenting voices: “If you do not believe X, as I say members of group Y do, then you cannot be a true member of the group; ergo you can be ignored, or censored.”

Nowhere is this more evident than in India, where communalism, thanks to the British Empire, is enshrined in law. The 1860 penal code of India makes it illegal to “outrage religious feelings or any class by insulting its religion or religious beliefs”. This establishes, in an odd inversion of the United States’s model of secularism, a state where all religions are privileged, while those who criticise them are unprotected. And in India, that can be dangerous.

Sixty-seven-year-old Narendra Dabholkar was killed this week, shot dead on his morning walk.

Dabholkar was a rationalist activist, in a country where that means a little bit more than agreeing or disagreeing with Richard Dawkins. Dabholkar and his comrades such as Sanal Edamaruku have for years been engaged in a war against the superstition that leaves poor Indians open to exploitation from “holy men”. A large part of their work involves revealing the workings of the tricks of the magic men, like a deadly serious Penn and Teller. Edamaruku famously appeared on television in 2008, trying not to laugh as a guru attempted to prove that he can kill the rationalist with his mind. Dabholkar was agitating for a bill in that would curtail “magic” practitioners in Maharashtra state.

Edamaraku is now in exile, fleeing blasphemy charges and death threats that resulted after he debunked the “miracle” of a weeping statue at a Mumbai Catholic church. His friend is dead. Both victims of those who have most to gain from communalism: the con men and fundamentalists for whom the individual dissenting voice is a threat. Atheists, sceptics and everyone else have a duty to protect these people, and to avoid easy generalisations, whether malicious or well meant.

The post Richard Dawkins, communalism, and the death of an Indian hero appeared first on Index on Censorship.

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زنی بود
از دکمه‌ی سِیو می‌ترسید
عینک تیره می‌زد
طوری شالش را پشت گوش می‌انداخت
که کسی به خاطر نیاوردش

در کامپیوترش هیچ عکسی نبود
هیچ نامه‌ای
مدام سطل آشغالش را خالی می‌کرد
انگار همین حالا لپ‌تاپش را از جعبه در‌آورده بودند

طوری در را می‌بست
که گویی
هرگز به خانه برنخواهد گشت

شب‌ها که مسواک می‌زد
اثر انگشتی از گردنش بالا می‌آمد
گلویش را می‌فشرد

لک‌لکی بود در آسمانی خالی
که خرچنگی رهایش نمی‌کرد

همسایه‌ها می‌گفتند
همیشه گردنش خراش داشت
و لبش مکیده شده بود
معلوم نبود
از کدام طرف

اردیبهشت نود و دو
سارا محمدی اردهالی

به ساعتم نگاه می‌کنم
زمان می‌گیرم
تکیه داده‌ام به باد صبا

دوم تیر نود و دو
سارا محمدی اردهالی

چگونه خیره نشوم به مردم
که می‌خندند و می‌بلعند هم را
در خیابان‌ها

تنه می‌زنند
به زنِ جوانِ مو سفید تو
و
نمی‌دانند
مردی
تمام روز ایستاده‌
به شب نگاه می‌کند

۹۲/۰۴/۱۶
سارا محمدی اردهالی

هر از چندی نوشتن را رها می‌کنم
به انگشتانم خیره می‌شوم

می‌گفتی زنان زیبا آزارت می‌دهند
و هر انگشت من زنی زیباست
که آرامت می‌کند

به هر انگشتم که نگاه می‌کنم
یاد زنی زیبا می‌افتم
که از دستش گریزی نداری

می‌خندم
و نوشتن داستان تو را از سر می‌گیرم

۹۲/۰۴/۱۹
سارا محمدی اردهالی

اگر مثل من از آسیب‌دیدگان تعطیلی احمقانه‌ی گوگل‌ریدر هستید و از گوشی‌ یا تبلت اندرویدی استفاده می‌کنید و قرتی‌بازی‌های جایگزینی مثل فیدلی بیش‌تر مایه‌ی عذاب‌ شما ست تا آسودگی‌تان، پیشنهاد می‌کنم اپلیکشین جی‌ریدر را نصب کنید. جی‌ریدر قرتی‌بازی ندارد، ساده و شیک است، سرعت بسیار خوبی هم دارد. این ابزارک را می‌توانید از سایت آن بگیرید یا از بازار ایرانی اندرویدی‌ها. ای بر باعث و بانی همه‌ی این دردسرها و ایضاً فیلتربافان محترم...!
 
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"ما همیشه عشق بزرگ زندگی یکدیگر بودیم،‌ اما نه وقتی که با هم بودیم، فقط وقتی که سعی می‌کردیم دوباره با هم باشیم (دوباره با هم آشتی کنیم)"

چند سال بود که کتابی را یک نفس نخوانده بودم، یک نفس یعنی یک و نیم روزه. "مفید در برابر باد شمالی" خوب بود،‌ در چند فرازش عالی بود، شاید چون بی‌نهایت ملموس بود، بازی‌های کلامی ما را داشت و برای این دوره و این نسل نوشته شده بود. ممنون از عطا.

مفید در برابر باد شمالی
Daniel Glattauer
شهلا پیام
ققنوس ۱۳۹۱

پ ن:‌ اگر یک وقت عطانامی خواست فیلم یا کتابی را به‌تان معرفی کند به محض این که اسم آن را گفت یک متکا بردارید و اگر زورتان رسید بخوابانیدش زمین، بیفتید روی صورتش و بنشینید. بعد از او خواهش کنید که دیگر یک کلمه هم حرف نزند. وقتی با اشاره‌ی دست قبول کرد از روی صورتش بلند شوید و ترجیحن آن اطراف نمانید. استعداد باورنکردنی‌ای در به ها دادن کل داستان با گفتن یکی دو جمله‌ی کلیدی دارد.

پ پ ن: کار جالبی که در ترجمه‌ی نه چندان درخشان کتاب دیده می‌شود استفاده‌ی رسمی از چای و قهوه به جای مشروب است. سانسورچی‌ها با همین هم راضی شده‌اند، مثلن یک بنده‌ی خدایی در داستان قهوه‌ی اعلا می‌خورد و لایعقل می‌شود. به عنوان یک اثر چاپ سال‌های آخر دولت سیاه احمدی نژاد متد جالبی بوده برای مجوز گرفتن.