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Malaysian Blogger On Trial For Sedition
Posted by
ScuttleMonkey
on Mon Oct 06, 2008 05:39 PM
from the because-creating-martyrs-is-good-for-civil-obedience dept.
from the because-creating-martyrs-is-good-for-civil-obedience dept.
neonsignal writes "Raja Petra Kamarudin, a Malaysian blogger, is in court under the Internal Security Act, under which he can be detained indefinitely. He is well known for his commentary on the Malaysian government, and was arrested after a piece on the murder of a Mongolian woman, who was allegedly killed by two policeman and an associate of the deputy prime minister."
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adewolf tips news that the government of Malaysia is looking into the development of an internet filtering program. According to a Reuters report, "A vibrant Internet culture has contributed to political challenges facing the government, which tightly controls mainstream media and has used sedition laws and imprisonment without trial to prosecute a blogger." The Malaysian government insists that such a filter would only be used to block pornography, though critics of the plan expect it would be wielded as a political tool, censoring websites that are critical of the current administration. "An industry source says the government could impose the filters late this year or in 2010, coinciding with the rollout of a high-speed broadband network run by Telekom Malaysia. Malaysia aims to increase broadband penetration to half of all homes by 2010 as part of its drive to boost economic efficiency."
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Fuck "sedition" (Score:5, Insightful)
Man, it's about time that countries which value free speech got rid of sedition laws.. so as to send a clear message to countries that don't. What constitutes "sedition" is so vague, anyway, that the laws should be struck on just that basis.
Re:Fuck "sedition" (Score:4, Informative)
We've had one [wikipedia.org] since 1940. Thank you, FDR!
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
I think you posted in haste in an attempt to get your comment in quickly? This is MALAYSIA and this is NOT an area known for freedom of speech as near as I can tell.
When in Malaysia.. (Score:5, Interesting)
.. I read in the local English news paper about the "victory" of a muslim group that stopped the government changing a women's ID card which had her religion as Muslim.
Since she converted to Christianity she wanted her ID card changed. Yeah, that was big news at the time and gives on an insight into how backwards the place can be.
I say backwards not because it's about religion, but because I can't believe these strangers that don't know her have nothing better to do then demand the government not give her a new ID if she wants one because "if you're Muslim, you're always Muslim"
Posting Anon - I might still need to go back some day.
Re:When in Malaysia.. (Score:5, Interesting)
Or this woman who been jailed for her terrorist poetry.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/7084801.stm [bbc.co.uk]
Parent
Re:When in Malaysia.. (Score:5, Insightful)
First sign of a problem was that her faith was on a government card at all.
Parent
Re:When in Malaysia.. (Score:5, Informative)
Parent
Re:When in Malaysia.. (Score:5, Insightful)
The catch with that is change does not occur unless, instability forces it. A minority of people speaking out who a willing to accept the risks of doing so are the ones who force positive change. The only other change that occurs, is negative change, the ones who wish to maintain a facade of traditional values, of religious observance, while they corruptly loot the country to sate their own greed and lusts. That is the reality and the religious crap is just that 'crap' a diversion to keep the poor general populace focused on other issues, rather than their livings conditions versus the living conditions of the rich and greedy or that the legal system is distorted to provide one set of laws to protect the elite and another set of laws to persecute the rest.
Change can happen very fast, it is naturally always disruptive, that is the nature of change and it is most destructive when it is blocked from happening and comes as a dam bursting. Do you know when this happens, it happens when the corrupt leaders at the top are focussed on keeping everything they have stolen and will do anything to keep the corrupt system going as it is, with nothing but platitudes of offer for the rest of the population.
Any government with sedition laws sucks, there is no excuse, they are full of it and those leaders should be treated with contempt by every one who values freedom and democracy. Slavery was a cultural thing for centuries in a lot of countries, north, south, east and west and today very thought of sickens and infuriates most reasonable people, so culture is just a weak excuse not a valid reason, neither is racism ie. they are all citizens of Malaysia so it is Malays who rule the country, Malays who control the economy and Malays who prosper in the legal and medical profession, if you see it any other way, recognise yourself, you are racist and a bigot.
Parent
Re:When in Malaysia.. (Score:5, Interesting)
Given that Malaysia practices the most cruel and frightening kind of racial discrimination against Chinese and Indian minorities in all of South-East Asia, with their Nazi-like (and I'm not Godwinning here) racist ideologies of Ketuanan Melayu (Malay Supremacy) and Bumiputra (meaning "sons of the soil, which literally resembles Nazi Germany's "Blut und Boden" or "Blood and Soil") and engages in state sponsored discrimination against Indians and Chinese, I would imagine that some kind of aggressive change is long pending. That or remove the minorities from the country before the Malay racists conduct genocide on them all (which is their eventual intent). I;ve spoken to many overseas Chinese and Indians in he country, and most are literally afraid for their lives. Parts of Kuala Lumpur look like Russian Shtetls, or the Warsaw Ghettoes of WW-II, with violent, Malay mob-imposed racial segregation, discrimination and stigmatization.
Notice how the racist GP stigmatizes, demonizes and dehumanizes Chinese and Indian minorities as "not tied to identity", just like the Nazis stigmatized Jews as "alien non-Aryans and unbound to the blood and soil of Germany", or whatever.
Numerous international NGO's have detailed files on the massive levels of Jim Crow-style racial stigmatization of minorities that takes place across Malay society, their media, their government, all their major institutions, and the like.
Malaysia is a massive genocide waiting to happen, unless some kind of change isn't implemented NOW, preferably through international condemnations and sanctions of some kind.
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
There was a higher percentage of chinese during the time of British (before 1957), compared to now[0].
In the 1980s the Malaysian Government started encouraging large numbers of Indonesians to come over and become "Malays". Tons promptly came over, got Malaysian citizenship, but continued behaving like Indonesians instead of Malays (the Malays themselves tell me those aren't Malays, I dunno what do you think?).
That plus the dwindling birth rate of the Chinese (and Indians?) has led to the 65% Malay ratio.
It'
Re:When in Malaysia.. (Score:5, Insightful)
7th-century barbarism? Try 17th - as late as the 1690s, people in some European countries were still liable to be executed, not only for leaving Christianity, but for switching to the wrong sort of Christianity.
This in no wise excuses what is done to people in some Muslim countries today should they try to renounce Islam; I'm merely pointing out that it's not been so long since such treatment was commonplace in the West as well.
Parent
Works for me (Score:5, Insightful)
While I can't speak to the specifics of this particular government, or this particular implementation of the policy, I don't see any reason why sedition on a blog should be treated any differently from sedition on a streetcorner or a radio program or a billboard or a secret revolutionary committee meeting (for some definition of "sedition"; and obviously your mileage will vary based on local customs, values, and priorities).
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
I don't see any reason why sedition on a blog should be treated any differently from sedition on a streetcorner or a radio program or a billboard or a secret revolutionary committee meeting
I agree. If a society can't survive dissent it shouldn't survive. None of these should be suppressed.
Re: (Score:2, Interesting)
Dissent and sedition are two separate things.
Sedition aims to disrupt the public peace. Most societies, I imagine are quite capable of surviving disruption of the public peace, but that doesn't mean all--or even any--such disruptions should be permitted.
But of course the specifics will vary from society to society. What may be good-naturedly tolerated as peaceful dissent in one society may be quite rightly suppressed as an unacceptable threat to the public peace in another society.
And of course none of this
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Free speech is meaningless unless speech is completely, universally free.
There should be absolutely zero restrictions on what can be said.
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
I'll keep that in mind the next time I'm inciting your neighbors to riot, or urging them to lynch you, or advocating election fraud.
Re:Works for me (Score:4, Insightful)
Bah, I've had this argument before. Telling people to riot should be perfectly legal. If they actually riot, the charges should be incitement to riot. If they don't riot, there should be no charges at all.
Free Speech means you can say whatever you want. It doesn't mean that there is no accountability for what your speech causes. If the speech causes something illegal to happen, then the illegal activity is the problem, not the speech.
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Saying "hurrah free speech for everyone" only invites the nutjobs to spread their poison, and no-one will do anything because it'd be restricting their speech.
And that would work a lot better. Do nothing - they speak, and make idiots of themselves, people ignore them.
Suppress their speech, then they can play the victim card, become martyrs, validate conspiracy theories. Things go downhill quickly as the nutters join the squirrel parade.
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Re: (Score:2)
"If a society can't survive dissent it shouldn't survive?"
Such a statement is either flamebait or idiocy. The person who wrote it must not be able to conceive of the great pain and suffering that social disorder can bring. A society should not be scrapped just because it does not realize the author's ideal of social justice.
A stable, imperfect, society can always be replaced by something much worse. The social fabric, once torn, can be very hard to re-weave.
Re: (Score:2)
I don't see any reason why sedition on a blog should be treated any differently from sedition on a streetcorner or a radio program or a billboard or a secret revolutionary committee meeting
The streisand effect comes to mind. Even if you're okay with censorship, doing it on the internet is stupid. You can arrest someone on the street corner and silence them. If you arrest someone for a post on a blog, you're only going to get more people to read that post.
Granted, it would be more effective in the long run for the fascist to jail the blogger, but it's less effective if there's a particular post you want buried. Like if you are a dictator or prime minister wanting to, say, keep quiet the fa
Re: (Score:2)
Actually, the propaganda side-effects of martyrdom were well understood and commonly experienced long before the Internet came around. Blogs are a different form of communication, sure, but they're not magical. They may change the values of some of the variables of the propaganda equation, but they don't actually replace the propaganda equation itself.
Hmm.. Sedition (Score:3, Informative)
Have the plebes learned? One doesnt mess with those authority types, especially when they revel in power?
Happens here in the USA, happens in UK, happens in Germany, happens in Australia, and damn near everywhere else where there is power at a few people and the will to keep it.
Malaysia is NO different in that regard. We just cover it up a bit better.
Re:Hmm.. Sedition (Score:5, Insightful)
Parent
Re:Hmm.. Sedition (Score:5, Insightful)
First they came for the communists...
Talk to the many muslim leaders in the US whom have been arrested for preaching hatred towards western civilization.
BTW, the bloggers are mentioned in the 5th stanza.
Parent
Re:Hmm.. Sedition (Score:4, Interesting)
Can you provide any examples of Muslim leaders who have been arrested in the US for preaching hatred?
Parent
Re: (Score:2)
No need to replace anyone. People give up on blogs in their hundreds ever single day. How would you know? It would only be a blogger that could tell you. Or do you think CNN or Fox News or any mainstream news outlet will? How would you know?
Re:Hmm.. Sedition (Score:5, Insightful)
Don't you watch the news? There is no sedition in Western nations. There are only consumers, harmless foil-clad lunatics, criminals, and a few terrorists.
But yeah, cynical statements aside, there's less control here because the government simply doesn't fear us. Honestly, I could wear my fingers to the bone blogging about $700B bailouts, Iraq, Guantanamo, torture, the politicization of the DoJ, the Valerie Plame thing, etc, and nothing would happen to me because honestly my voice is worthless when it comes to these topics. People have seen it on the news so many times that the reaction is just, "Meh, shit happens." and nothing changes. Random words on the internet won't start riots, strikes, or boycotts, nor do they change anyone's vote in a meaningful way (how could they? elections are a popularity contest) - so why bother censoring?
Parent
Re:Hmm.. Sedition (Score:5, Insightful)
Mod parent insightful.
Yes. That's the thing. Hiding in plain sight. The truth is in fact out there, plain as day. But no-one cares. The fact that the media is for the most part complicit or even controlling much of what happens in the West notwithstanding.
This is the mistake of Malaysia and China and the old soviet states. Don't throw people in prison for speaking out, just make sure that reality tv and celebrities behaving badly is much bigger news. That way you can do anything you like. Anything at all.
Bread and circuses. It's astonishing that it's taken modern Governments so long to figure this out, the Romans nailed it 2000 years ago.
Parent
I call bullshit. (Score:5, Insightful)
Really? Happens all the time? Interesting. Then I suppose you can cite one instance in the USA, UK, Germany, or Australia where a citizen has been incarcerated for a minimum of two years without trial for a blog post that is critical of the government. Go ahead and include some links under my post. Take your time. I'll wait.
Your post is offensive on multiple levels: It minimizes Kamarudin's plight ("well what else should you expect when you criticize the government?"), but it also makes the claim that *every* other nation has just as bad a civil rights record. I can tell that you've never spent much time in Malaysia.
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Granted, not specifically two years (maybe, I haven't checked) and not for a blog post, however people in the early 70's in the UK were indeed incarcerated on a ship on a lake in Northern Ireland for long periods without trial. Read up on Internment, and then come back and call us all paranoid. The U
Re:I call bullshit. (Score:5, Insightful)
Are you referring to the Prevention of Terrorism Acts [wikipedia.org]? From what I can tell you could be held for up to seven days without being formally charged with a crime. It would be a *big* stretch to equate this with Malaysia's Internal Security Act, under which they can hold you *indefinitely* (though the Malaysian government claims that Kamarudin will be held for at least two years).
I'm not making the claim that these other countries are perfect. I'm refuting the GP's claim that all countries are just as bad. To say such a thing is just lazy relativism that trivializes the situation that this blogger is in.
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Never been arrested I take it? I got arrested on a faulty warrant and then lost in a bus around the country for someone who's name, prints, etc didn't even match my own. This is in the United States of America, CCA jails, and TransCorps. This happened while I was at work. I was an eight hour drive from home, if I'd known that there was some sort of problem I could have driven home to deal with it.
It turns out that they used my name in part and had a SSN "near" mine. That was enough for a bench warrant.
It to
uhh... no (Score:5, Insightful)
there is actually a difference between your rights in the say, germany, and malaysia. germans are more free than americans in some freedoms of expression, but don't dare mention nazis, for example, in germany. but in germany and australia and the usa, overall, your rights and freedoms to express views which run contrary to those in power is respected. no really, it is. to conflate that with what goes on in malaysia, and egypt, and iran, and china, and other places, where you can, and will be put in brutal conditions, simply for expressing a political opinion. of course its not pure freedom of expression in the west, but there are orders of magnitude in difference
to talk about your rights to expression malaysia in the same breath as roughly comparable to your rights to expression in germany, is to be woefully ignorant of the reality of the situation. this doesn't mean you aren't free to say lots of critical things in malaysia and get away with it. this doesn't mean you can't get abused by the authorities for simply expressing yourself in germany. but, overall, there are orders of magnitude of difference in the kinds of things you can safely say, and the punishment you face for saying unpopular things
and to not realize that, and to not think the difference is important and large, is pure ignorance on your part
Parent
Re: (Score:2)
if it did do you think the Chasers would still be walking free? (the blokes that gate-crashed APEC under the Canadian flag)
will lasers be involved? (Score:2)
In other news, several bloggers called for the U.S. to charge Malaysia, sending scores of /b/tards into uncontrollable lulz.
Looked up Sedition on Wikipedia (Score:3, Insightful)
Some interesting notes.. particularly the USA's Smith Act, which made it a crime to advocate or teach the desirability of overthrowing the United States Government, or to be a member of any organization which does the same.
I'm not a lawyer.. but doesn't the preamble of our own declaration of independence state "it is [the people's] right, it is their duty, to throw off ... Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security"
Man, I don't think I could ever be a lawyer.
I love my compiler too much - logic and consistency is actually enforced.
Malaysia..... (Score:3, Interesting)
Malaysia isn't such a bad place as far as countries that I've visited go... My wife is Malay, and she wouldn't move back. Every time I visit there, I get the feeling that it is slowly being dragged into the 21st century. There are still many laws that give native Malay's/Muslims preferential treatment over other ethnic groups (Indians/Chinese). My understanding is that this is fairly limited to things like low-interest government loans.... I dunno... I enjoy visiting there, I don't think that I'd want to live there though.
I'm shocked! (Score:3, Funny)
Free speech being restricted in a Muslim dictatorship? I'm shocked. Just completely shocked.
It gets even better (Score:4, Informative)
Read his comment at his website: http://mt.m2day.org/2008/content/view/12913/84/ [m2day.org]
Basically:
"You've insulted Islam, a jailable offense, even though we cannot prove that in the articles that we've printed out. But your style of writing is too sophisticated, and dumb people who are not at the same intellectual level as you could misinterpret what you say, and mistakenly think what you wrote as an insult to Islam. Hence, we are going to send you to jail for insulting Islam."
Re:trial shmial (Score:4, Insightful)
Yeah, but I'd rather be in gitmo then a Malaysian prison, or worse its neighbour, a Thai prison. In a Thai prison the guards will give you a chance to run for freedom and get shot rather then spend your sentence there eating cockroaches for nutrition (no I am not exaggerating).
Parent
Re: (Score:2, Funny)
If a Thai monkey doesn't move for 60 seconds, the cockroaches think it's fair game and they'll carry it off.
Re: (Score:2)
There are other ways... being audited for example, no fly lists. There's plenty of ways to remove your freedom -- seemingly legally.
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Would a Canadian do?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Omar_Khadr [wikipedia.org]
I'm not saying he's specifically innocent. I don't know enough about his case to say one way or another. But we have an extradition treaty with the US, and have requested his repatriation through official channels. So how come he's still at Gitmo?
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Also I don't think you understand what extradition means. You ask for extradition when you want to try someone in your own country. Canada doesn't want to put him on trial. They want to repatriate him whatever that means.
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Canada... My how I do truly love Canada. I even go there often as it is quite literally a short drive from me.
However... Canada has a smaller navy than many landlocked countries.
Canada hasn't got the balls to stand up against America (which is where I live and I wish they would).
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Re: (Score:2, Insightful)
Oh nice, a link to Aljazeera. That will really look great in the server log.
Shows the sad state of matters at your place/in your mind. Self censorship well done; did you report the submitter to authorities? That is probably what's left to make it complete 1984.
Go ahead and mode me down, have karma to burn, I guess. But this got me started as AJE is as reliable news source as any other, with ex BBC, CNN, ABC, Fox etc. people working there.
Re:that link is not safe for work in some places (Score:5, Insightful)
What's the problem with al-Jazeera? They're about the only independent Arabic-language station there is, consisting in large part of ex-BBC staff who went their own way after the World Service shut down their Arabic branch. Everyone else is under the thumb of some government or other. Are we not in favour of freedom of speech and information here? Plenty of Arab governments have tried from time to time to silence al-Jazeera, and so have the Americans, occasionally with GPS-guided explosives, yet they're still going - must be doing something right.
Parent
Re: (Score:2, Interesting)