Censorship, or what I like to call “controlled media”, is the control of ideas and content in our world. For as long as people have discovered that human beings have free will, there has been a way to regulate, govern and block the expression of its uses. There are many types of censorship when it comes to military, religion, political, public media or for just morale reasons. There have naturally been debates on whether censorship has truly been a restraint of expression, imposed to protect people from themselves and to others, or just, for the most part, futile in this day and age. I believe these are all valid reasons for why censorship has its pros and cons, but nonetheless is rather pointless.
Censorship is valuable when it comes to hiding sensitive military information since it can be used by the enemy. Some might say censorship is absolutely need in protecting your nation, which falls under military censorship purposes, but is it more important than for morale reasons? In the article The Web, the Spider and the Fly Seydou Amadou Oumarou & Rene Lefort basically answers that question, “Government restrictions can be enforced in the name of morality, but above all they are used to prevent the use of the Internet for "subversive" ends.” (2). The government may see censorship more has a way to protect themselves more than protecting its people, but I personally believe the people is more important as there is no need for government without the people. Censorship can protect people for several reasons. It blocks content such as pornographic images or dangerous, impressionable stunts from corrupting and harming the youth. Spreading racism, false/harmful information, offensive content, and detrimental influences to a different cul...
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...e directed to a Korean government block page. This lasted about two weeks until some of them found a way to bypass. I forgot how since I’m not that versed in the ways of the computer, but nonetheless this is just an example of why censorship is pointless to me.
I liken censorship to using a double-edge sword. It can be an invaluable weapon in theory, but it can also be misused and cause recoil. A suppression of ideas and content of course is good against the wrong people, but also inhibits and restrains people who are knowledgeable enough. Just imagine if they kept the information of the world being round not flat from people just because they thought Pythagoras and Aristotle were crazy and didn’t think people can handle the truth. In my humble opinion censorship is helpful in some occasions, harmful for many reasons, and a non-factor in the wide scheme of things.
Censorship, as defined in the dictionary, is, in the case of a book, to take out things thought to be objectionable. Censorship is far more than that. This mere word prohibits us from all things
Censorship is a concept with several different meanings. To each individual censorship has its own meaning. Is it a violation of our rights or is it a protection for our well being? Censorship in the generic sense refers to the suppression of information, ideas, or opinions. It occurs in all forms of communication from technological media to print media. Each society, culture, or individual's belief is violated by the codes of censorship that our society instills.
Freedom of speech and expression is one of the most important rights that we have in this country. Our forefathers knew this and acknowledged this in our great constitution which protects our rights as citizens in America. Censorship is a complete contradiction to this concept that has helped make America the greatest country in the world. If we do not stand up for our rights for free speech, someday it may be taken away all together. Everyday there are people out there trying to ban and censor things from Americans, things that as an American you have the right to view. Censorship must be stopped at all costs.
Censorship has been a big part of the world’s history and especially America’s history. One of the most quoted amendments to the United States constitution is the first amendment; “Congress shall make no law…abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press ...” This amendment guaranteeing free speech, press, and religion is still heavily debated and contested today. Censorship, as a challenge to free speech and press has been allowed many times and has been heavily debated itself. Many people censor for many different reasons and in many different forms. Censorship itself is not always a bad thing and has in some cases been used for protection of the general population.
The subject of censorship is a very controversial one, especially the banning of books. Many people believe they must protect themselves and others from the "evils" of many classic books and works of art because they can be deemed "indecent" in one way or another. Many believe that this is absurd and censorship in its current form is a violation of our First Amendment right to free speech. Personally, I align myself with the latter, however I do feel there are occasions where censorship is justifiable.
Censorship is detrimental to society. People can’t learn from their mistakes if we hide them. People can’t decide the best option if we say there are no options. People can’t understand each other if they don’t know what anyone is thinking. People can’t mature when they are “protected” from mean words.
Even some of the most authoritarian regimes around today allude to the fact that democracy is desirable. In the 2012 EIU's Index of Democracy, North Korea is ranked 167th in terms of level of democracy (the lowest ranked country on the index). Yet they mention democracy in their countries official name, “Democratic People's Republic of Korea”. Those outside of North Korea might look at this as some sort of sick joke, but it highlights peoples desire for fair and democratic process across the world. North Korea is an extreme case for lack of democracy, as well as an extreme case of government mandated censorship, but censorship is not limited to the low end of the democratic spectrum. It comes many shapes and forms and exists in some level in the majority of nations across the globe. This paper will outline and analyze ...
Military censorship occurs mainly in wartime, and is used to protect national security. Military censors have the authority to read the mail of service men and women. The censors can hold information from the press as well. Political censorship is used by governments that do not accept opposing ideas. "Democracies do not officially permit censorship, but many try to censor radical ideas".
Hence, censorship is essential in society to eliminate discrimination on basis of race and gender, protect children, maintain stability and restore what censor sees as lost moral values. Censorship occurs when expressive materials like books, magazines, movies, videos, music or works of art are restricted to particular audiences based on their age or other characteristics. http://www.ala.org/oif/intellectualfreedeomandcensorship.html) Censorship is not a recent development. It wasn’t imposed properly or there weren’t strict regulations before.
Censorship according to the Cambridge Advanced Learner's Dictionary & Thesaurus © Cambridge University Press can be defined as, “To remove anything offensive from books, films, etc., or to remove parts considered unsuitable from private letters, especially ones sent during war or from a prison”(Cambridge Dictionary). Censorship in the news and in the media takes many forms in todays fast paced world. Even with the slightly leak in information or even misleading information could cause todays world to be turned on its head and can cause people to interpret the issue in many ways which could have numerous implications. This is why such information is filtered by some governments around the world before it is aired or printed. There are countless arguments as to why or why not information should be censored as each individual is entitled to their own opinion. Censorship impacts people ability to choose freely as it is controls ideas and thoughts and thus influences their freedom of expression or their to express their views on issues, ideologies or even practice their faith.
Tackling censorship is much more important than it appears to be at the surface; taking down censorship would help preserve the expression of thought. It would help preserve the right to listen to the unaltered forms of everything. Most importantly, it would help preserve the rapidly weakening basic right of speech. Censorship has always altered the lives of many people, whether they know it or not. People are constantly exposed to the censored version of entertainment.
Censorship allows governments more control of society than they already have, slowly progressing governments utilizing censorship to a dictatorship. Often times, this censorship can lead to immense rebellions. A good example of this is in China, where Google has been censored by a provider called The Great Firewall of China, which censors information that could be viewed as defamatory or insulting to Chinese government and culture. According to the article “Google turns off China censorship warning” as published by BBC News Technology, “Google has had a rocky relationship with the Chinese authorities since January 2010, when the company said it may shut down Chinese operations due to a ‘sophisticated and targeted’ cyber attack. Google said at the time that it was no longer willing to censor the Google search engine”. Many journalists have also taken a look at Egypt, which also utilizes censorship. According to “Egyptian authorities step up censorship” as published by the Committee to Protect Journalists website, the new military-run Egyptian government is censoring news outlets and keep journalists, as well as the Muslim Brotherhood and its affiliates. “Egyptia...
Censorship has been around since B.C. times and originated in Rome. Censorship was enforced to protect our society by not allowing explicit content to be viewed in the media. It also protects child pornography and secret government information leaks. The problem is in some cases are hard to determine on what should be censored because even though something might be explicit content it portrays the point the publisher is trying to make. On the flip some people believe that these extreme crime scenes seen in media have caused people to commit these crimes in real life. Although the article, Broadcast Decency Rules delivers a somewhat convincing and effective argument, I disagree that the media should be censored.
Censorship affects our society in many different ways, it affects the music we listen to, the movies we watch, the books we read, and many other aspects of our everyday lives. Even though many might argue that censorship doesn't really have a place in a society that emphases freedom of speech and the freedom to express oneself, but censorship is an essential and needed part of our growing society, it's needed in the television industry, the Internet, and the music industry. Censorship helps to make our world a better place because it creates a better environment for us to live in.
For example, according to the Washington times “ Mousa Abu Marzook, a Hamas terrorist who is listed as a specially designated terrorist by the U.S. Treasury Department. Similarly, a website run by the and saw fit to run a piece on the meaning of jihad written by Muhammad Hussein Fadlallah, a spiritual leader of Hezbollah, another U.S.-designated terrorist organization.” This means that this man had a big role in terrorist attacks on American soil and if government sites weren’t censored to the public eye, they could have easily attacked the white house, which, was one of their plans to do back in 2001. The facts are that censoring topics like Islamic violence and our government policies is to help prevent mass hysteria and people of the wrong mindset of our government to obtain information that could cause an attack on the U.S. Censorship overall is trying to protect us from learning too much and from others to be learning to much of things they could use against the public and the