Google announced it will no longer censor search results in China. Do you think any government should be able to censor it's citizen's?

China's government obviously has the iability/i to censor its people and to keep them in the dark about topics the government finds inconvenient or unsavory, but it isn't their right. Personally, I think intellectual freedom is a basic human right, which should not be abridged by anybody. I'm a firm believer in the sanctity of privacy, as well.So, what China has been doing runs completely against my beliefs.

As such, I am thrilled to hear that Google is finally refusing to take part in it. Among the things China has been doing are: *Getting companies like Google, Microsoft to help them censor web searches and specific sites *Requiring its citizens to have state-sponsored web censoring software on their computers *Censoring text messages (they have recently decided to start filtering these, too) These types of measures have generally been implemented to stop people from being exposed to "smut", but many believe they have the further purpose of blocking political and religious sites. I personally don't believe that governments have any business criminalizing or censoring "smut" that hasn't harmed people in its production (i.e.

The government should be going after criminals like child pornographers and rapists, not keeping adults from seeing other consenting adults do "nasty" things). "That's icky" is not a good enough reason for the government to get involved, in my vision of a perfect world.So, even their given reason for implementing censorship doesn't justify it in my mind. Their alleged unspoken reasons--squelching political and religious freedom--are downright evil.

A nation's government is supposed to represent it's people, and to look out for their well-being.It isn't that hard to see how that second point gets twisted into monitoring people's communication and internet searching to keep them from "dangerous" ideas, or things that might contribute to their "moral corruption". One of the big problems with this line of thought is that somewhere along the line, someone has to make a decision about what's too controversial/alluring/disgusting/exciting/etc. To be allowed? Who decides where that line is?

Given that societies' values change over time, even if everyone in the current population of China agreed about what they should and should not be doing, what would give them the right to make that choice for all generations that follow them? Censorship of this sort makes it difficult for the government to truly represent its people, because it doesn't even let its people honestly represent themselves.It cripples communities' ability to identify and explore new ideas that might improve their way of life. It helps demonize unpopular ideas/groups by making it so the main experience most people will have with them is whatever propaganda the country's leadership wants them to see.

How can a government represent its people if it won't let them speak? How can it judge what's good for its people if it refuses to even consider their ideas of happiness? How will the government know if it's doing the best job it can if nobody is allowed to see the entirety of how other people around the world live, giving them a real standard to judge by?

Censorship like this is, at it's heart, a wholly negative URL5 makes the assumption that one's countrymen aren't smart enough to know what's good for themselves--that their desires don't matter, that their minds and moral fiber are too weak to deal with the real world. It stifles innovation, narrows world-views, and does little other than throw some camouflage over the uglier aspects of one's nation. After all, without dissenting views, or the ability to see the reality of life in another society, how can you truly judge what your nation is doing right?

So, in the absence of real evidence of criminal activity (meaning something causing measurable harm, not "illegal because we say so" crime), I don't think the government should be censoring anything. If information is being withheld, it should be because letting people see it would open people up to identity theft, or discrimination, or something else truly negative to the person whose information is being disseminated. Not because it would be problematic for the government, or make an entirely free-to-look-at-another-website individual grossed out/angry/etc.

I think what they do in another soveriegn country is their business, to a certain extent. Obviously I don't condone them starving their people or beating them to death, etc. Censorship by the government is normal though, everywhere except the US. The US is an experiment in human freedom.

We really do need to realize how fortunate we are to have all these freedoms, and that most people in the world don't have these freedoms. George W Bush tried to free the people of Iraq, and all he got for it was grief. The rest of the world is not ready for the freedoms we have here.

The people of the former Soviet Union are very suspicious of Americans when we talk of freedom. They don't trust that we mean it. They don't even have freedom of religion there, let alone freedom of speech.

Freedom of Internet? Ha! When we try to intervene, the rest of the world just hates Americans, and calls us arrogant.

So I say, let them live with their lack of freedom. Ignorance is bliss, I guess.

A nation's government has the ability to do many things. China only grudgingly allows anything and it has been that way since they allowed the first non-chinese through their borders. I think by some people living in a mostly free and socially unrestrictive environment, we of course think all countries should be this way.

We enjoy how we live and we want others to enjoy the same freedoms. Communist governments, inherently, do not believe this. So what we think they should do and what they think they should do come from two wildly different sets of cultural norms and values.

Governments that have the military backing can and do seem to do whatever they want whether the rest of the world likes it or not.

When speaking of governments, we should not forget the type of government China has. It is not democracy in true sense. Different systems have different ways and they may be right as long as people are happy with that system and government's decision.

Personally, I feel that any Government do not have the right to censor it's citizen's Right to Information. Everyone should have the right to see uncensored results. That is what Right to Information all about.

What Chinese government had been doing, was wrong. This simply means that the Government is trying to avoid transparency in its works and policies and if it is doing so, then there must be something wrong somewhere. But again, as I said earlier, if people of China accepts it and are happy with the censor, then it can no more be called wrong (it is always The People who is right).

Opinions, however, may differ from person to person. Hope that explains. Thanks.

Governments control the masses by controlling the flow of information to them and keeping them ignorant about the rest of the world. No truly free society will allow governement censorship.

I cant really gove you an answer,but what I can give you is a way to a solution, that is you have to find the anglde that you relate to or peaks your interest. A good paper is one that people get drawn into because it reaches them ln some way.As for me WW11 to me, I think of the holocaust and the effect it had on the survivors, their families and those who stood by and did nothing until it was too late.