Interesting fall-out from the rioting in France; the police there are censoring blogs:
French prosecutors shut down several blogs this week and arrested bloggers suspected of inciting violence, as officials moved to squelch riots that have rocked France for more than 10 days.
A prosecuting attorney from Le Tribunal de Grande Instance de Paris, who spoke under condition of anonymity, told Wired News that three bloggers and forum visitors allegedly posted messages that violated French criminal statutes governing violent speech. Two of the bloggers, who were arrested earlier this week, could be arraigned under violent speech statutes, the prosecutor said. The blogs in question, he said, were hosted on a French site called Skyblog, which is owned by Skyrock.
More on Wired.
Now, I'm not in favour of hate blogs by any means, but I always get twitchy when the state starts interfering in people's communication. I tend to believe that the police should intervene at the point when speech becomes action.
Technorati Tags: blogging, blogs, censorship, france, police
Hmmm, you speak nonsense on this, Mr Tinworth. I argue as follows that, if you think blogs should only be shut down at the point that words become action then what about blogs that might, say, show you how to sink a passenger ferry with a small bomb....following your logic to its rational extent, at what point do you censor? I use the extreme example to outline the nature of your argument.
I agree with you in the main. Democracy should rule, power should be held by the individual and implicitly 'the people', but, we are dealing with a different animal, i'm afraid.
There are cross-purposes here. The French situation is an odd one, and far be it for us to say we have good race relations - after all - it was our citizens that blew is up on the tube. I don't know what the answer is, but I dont think we should be knee jerk about things. Perhaps we need to take a stand and be a bit more hard in the face of terror? And this is from a fairly liberal chap.
All the best.