Turkey heading for religious cyber-censorship

[Skybird]

According to a German article in Die Welt,
http://www.welt.de/webwelt/article54...vom-Staat.html
Turkey's new-born babies will get an email-adress from the near future on, which also is printed into the passport and ID papers. It should be valid for a lifetime. The already existing population should follow. At the same time, foreign services like Google, Yahoo and others will be forbidden and banned.

Controls of ID papers are common in Turkey, and citizens are required by law to always carry their papers with them. Since the state-given email-adress (featuring 10 GB webspace) not only should supress foreign influence in the internet in turkey, but should also be used for written communication between the state and the citizens, as well as amongst the citizens themselves, police controls of ID paper in the future could include a check of persons' internet communication as well, to see if they are ignoring letters by state offices - and to check their personal emails.

Turkey already runs a huge program to monitor the internet. thousands of pages commonly used in other countries, are banned. the turkish state says the initiative raises Turkey'S national security, since currently all emial traffic runs via servers in foreign countries. But it must be feared that it also means increasing censorship (which already is note rare). If the planned additonal state-run services must be used in Turkey to send emails, this means that security agencies can easily co-read personal mails. the feared raise in censorship is motivated by the creeping fundamentalising of the country by Erdogan's AKP. They also plan a state-run islam-compatible search engine to replace Google, that will automaically surpoess and fileer all content that is seen as unislamic and as an offence to Islam or Muhammad. Such an search-engine already exists, but currently attracts only few visitors, the german article says. the planned initiative will make the use of it mandatory, since foreign services will be terminated by the state.

Turkey is the country that just days ago called the Swiss a fascist country that is commiting crimes against humanity. It wants into the EU, where it would become one of the most powerful nations, due to its population size (biggest in the EU, then) and the formula of the EU favouring population size in EU votes, at the same time being one of the weakest economies in and finacial contributors to the EU. The Turkish president Erdogan has called Turkish migrants in Germany to actively resist integration.

Earlier this year I was told that the Turkish religion ministry is preparing such a move. But it was unreliable, personal report only. I thought the guy telling me, a Turkish ex-collegue of mine, is kidding. It seems he was not. At least it sheds some light on where this initiave really is coming from.

Right now, they already have bans of websites and censorship of "offending" content, but not so systematically as they plan to do it now. Right now, there are loopholes the knowing mind and the informed amateur can use. This is planned to become impossible in the future, if the religious fundamentalists around Erdogan get their way.

I could imagine the EU to follow in some not too far away future, regarding the banning of Islam-critical content. That would truly improve relationships with Islamic countries. The EU already has made criticism of religion in general and islam in special a crime, labelling it discrimination.

[AVGWarhawk]

Can SS be viewed in Turkey?

[Skybird]

Don't know whether or not they ban Nazi stuff, too. But in many Arab places they love Nazis, because Hitler really showed the Jews where to go, didn't he, ha!

[Shearwater]

Sounds great. I've heard that East Anatolians are among the world's most avid internet users.

[Oberon]

I know what China will be doing next then...

The EU already has made criticism of religion in general and islam in special a crime, labelling it discrimination.

Can you point out that law?

[Oberon]

Perhaps this should be shoehorned into the Buckingham Palace thread.

We all know where this is going and it'd be better off with the rest of the same style of posts in the Buckingham Palace thread.

Mods....please?

Thank you, Skybird.
Very educational, and interesting, thread.

Very educational, and interesting, thread.

Yes educational in the fact that Skybird again felt the need to write things that are not true to make his point.

[XabbaRus]

OK please lets not let this get to be a flame fest.

[Skybird]

FYI,

I have Tribesman on "ignore" since Thursday night, after half a year I simply was tired of it.

I recommend everybody to simply ignore people trolling the board, and not knowing or intentionally ignoring the difference between being clear in their speech, and being unpolite or even rude.

This board shows many examples of people who disagree with each other, or with me, on things of political or religious content as well as controversial issues like war and economy and ecology. But still most people communicate in a polite way, and accept these disagreements. That so many can behave like that naturally, is the major reason why the subsim forums are such a great forum on the web. Some people just cannot play that way, they try to ruin any thread they do not like by behaving noisy, by cheating, pointing fingers, offending people, telling lies about people, intentionally misinterpreting them, quoting them out of context, putting statements into in their mouths that never have been said that way - all this only to give somebody a bad name and discredit him.

I currently have ten names on my ignore list. What they all have in common, is the above descirption. Ignoring them has added tremednously to the board's peace, and my peace of mind as well. It is no censoring of opinion, but not tolerating bad behavior and unpoliteness. It is not beeing too weak to bear somebody disgreeing, it is simply clever not to have to waste one's time with noting the bad style of somebody else time and again.

Behavior, or lack of, is no surrogate for an argument, and trolling is someting that cannot be adressed by trying to communicate with it. One can be clear and determined in what one wishes to say without becoming rude or cheating towards the other.

Most people understand this. Some don't. Ignore the latter. That is not weak, but wise. I'm sure most of you do like that in your real lives anyway.


Xabba,

feel free to close the thread if you see the need arising, I will not be angry over that. I did not wish to start a new long debate, but just to direct attention to a news information that for us in Europe is of direct and immediate interest and could potentially affect us all (that's why I kept it separate from the stuck Buckingham Palace thread). This thread is more "read only" than "debate, please".

[heartc]

Originally Posted by Skybird

Don't know whether or not they ban Nazi stuff, too. But in many Arab places they love Nazis, because Hitler really showed the Jews where to go, didn't he, ha!

LOL. I'm pretty sure AVGWarhawk meant SS as in SubSim, not the Nazi SS.

Unfortunately, you won't learn this until next time curiosity gets the better of you and you temporarily disable your "ignore list", to read all the real talking points while pretending you can't hear them, so that you won't have to respond to uncomfortable points.

[NeonSamurai]

Originally Posted by AVGWarhawk

Can SS be viewed in Turkey?

With the criticism of the one true faith found here, They probably blocked Subsim a while back.


Gotta love censorship I wonder when they are going to start implanting locator chips into their citizens so they know their every move, preferably with thought monitors so that they can find all the unbelievers.

[Letum]

I do hope I have made it to SB's ignore list.
If not; must try harder.

[Skybird]

Originally Posted by Letum

I do hope I have made it to SB's ignore list.
If not; must try harder.

No chance, mate. You're just not mean enough. You are just a bit... complicated...