Wikipedia Blocked in Pakistan Over 'Sacrilegious' Content (bloomberg.com) 112
Pakistan has blocked Wikipedia services in the South Asian nation after the platform failed to remove "sacrilegious" content. From a report: The action was taken because some of the content is still available on Wikipedia after the expiry of a 48-hour deadline, Malahat Obaid, spokesperson for Pakistan Telecommunication Authority, said by phone.
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We can only hope the slashdot editors go into hiding until this all blows over.
Impossible (Score:5, Insightful)
You can't argue with religious people, because faith isn't based on facts that can be proved or disproven. So from their point of view, they're right and you'll always be wrong if you don't agree with their religion.
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"Never argue with a fool, because onlookers will be unable to tell the difference." -- Someone who wasn't Mark Twain
"If a wise man contendeth with a foolish man, whether he rage or laugh, there is no rest." -- Proverbs 29 colon something.
Re:Impossible (Score:5, Insightful)
I see. And therefore, to combat woke, right-wing nutters in the US are banning books in school libraries and telling universities what they are allowed to teach. It all makes sense now.
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Book banning is an ancient, time-tested way of increasing book sales.
Public education has always been and will always be utter ruined by partisan bickering. After both sides have removed everything they think is too poisonous for a child's mind, there is basically nothing left.
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Because no one needs to read anything but the Good Book (no, not Harry Potter dumbass, I mean the Silmarillion!).
Re:Impossible (Score:4, Insightful)
"Both sides?" I'm sorry, but it's the far Right doing the banning here, not the center or the left.
That's right. The "party of freedom" is telling people what they can read, what kind of performances they can see, and what they can do to their bodies. A bunch of fascist hypocrites.
Public education in the United States is shit for a wide variety of reasons, mostly having to do with underfunding, partisan bickering, and a general disdain for education. Other countries' public education systems are doing very well, thanks.
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That's a homophobic, hateful dog-whistle, asshole. You can reframe teaching kids about the range of human gender expression and sexuality as "pedophile adjacent, anti-parent, pro-sexualizing children" but that's just hateful rhetoric right in line with White nationalist sentiment.
Nobody's talking about books with graphic descriptions of sexual acts in them.
And no, parents do not have the right to vet material in classrooms. They have the right to stand for election to the schoolboard and make their op
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Nice try, but we all recognize a White supremacist homophobic fuckwit despite the gloss.
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Good for you - I recognize and groomer when I see one too - looks at dskoll
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That's a strong take. I don't agree, but I respect your courage to put yourself in the pedophile adjacent, anti-parent, pro-sexualizing children camp.
I'm more for educating children about the basics and that does not include planting books with graphic descriptions of sexual acts in their classrooms.
You do realize that children since, at least, the beginning of agriculture and up until the industrial revolution witnessed in person graphic sexual acts at a young age simply by living with or raising animals on farms, and then simply looking at their own genitals and realizing they have similar parts.
Children also witnessed lots of other things, some of today's parents would prevent them from knowing.
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Sure. And that is up to the parents to decide when their prepubescent children get exposed to sexual materials and in what way. If you want to make an argument for schools picking up the slack for lazy, confused, and stupid parents I think there is one to be made. But it's not the kind of shit we have been seeing recently.
Personally I believe that you cannot maintain a child's innocence with ignorance. I have three children, all over the age of 23 and none of them have children yet due mainly to my policy
Re: Impossible (Score:3, Insightful)
By pointing at either side, IMHO, you totally miss your argument that you'd prefer more politics done in center.
That's properly done, usually, by not pointing at any side, but by seeking common values everyone shares. Like, across the political spectrum, people love their kids or don't like being cut off from information they seek.
Some religions are based on God and some not (Score:5, Insightful)
This suppression of Wikipedia is only tangentially related to religion and directly related to authoritarianism. That authoritarianism is expressed in some countries with state religions like Pakistan and some countries without state religions like China. Some left-wing US states like California ban/cancel some content, and some right-wing states like Florida ban/cancel other content. It has nothing to do with religion in the sense of personal beliefs but a lot to do with religion in the sense of imposing beliefs on others.
Re:Some religions are based on God and some not (Score:4, Interesting)
This suppression of Wikipedia is only tangentially related to religion and directly related to authoritarianism. That authoritarianism is expressed in some countries with state religions like Pakistan and some countries without state religions like China. Some left-wing US states like California ban/cancel some content, and some right-wing states like Florida ban/cancel other content. It has nothing to do with religion in the sense of personal beliefs but a lot to do with religion in the sense of imposing beliefs on others.
Beware of assuming that people who do not share your religion do not sincerely believe their own.
Just because sometimes authoritarianism is not motivated by religion does not mean that it never is.
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Woke is not a religion.
The definition is:
Woke: having or marked by an awareness of systemic injustices and prejudices, especially those involving the treatment of ethnic, racial, or sexual minorities.
And that's a problem for those who deny or would lie about the current and historic prejudices and injustices, and/or who do not want to acknowledge them.
Do Republicans and DeSantis lose in Florida if voters know accurate history? Probably not. But Florida government officials are trying to prevent current and
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Re:Impossible (Score:4, Informative)
Nazis were NOT socialists. This is a lie to try to brand all evil people throughout history as socialists and never as good God Fearing Capitalists. They had "socialist" in the name, but North Korea is also the "Democratic" republic of Korea without being democratic.
Re: Impossible (Score:2)
Re: Impossible (Score:2)
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"Woke: having or marked by a PERCEPTION of systemic injustices and prejudices, especially those involving the treatment of ethnic, racial, or sexual minorities."
There. Fixed that for you. Your statement assumed the "awareness" was accurate at all levels. It most certainly isn't.
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Woke is not a religion.
The definition is:
"It’s revealed Truth; opponents are sinners, questioning is heresy, and unbelievers must be converted or destroyed."
Sounds like a religion to me...
The proof exists in daily historic records going back to prior to the founding of the United States, and continues to be recorded in the daily transactions in the United States even to today. It is not a narrative, like a religious text. It is actual documents of human trafficking, slavery, discrimination and financial control or disadvantage due to race, sexual orientation and/or gender.
Anyone who denies this has a vested interest in the status quo of continuing ongoing inequity.
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While that might have been an early-modern definition of the word, it has also been popularly used as a pejorative that lumps harmful extremes and falsehoods together with that meaning.
For example, many people found the recent trend of race-swapping and gender-swapping in popular entertainment franchises left them feeling like their own race or gender was being marginalized or demonized thereby. They then started to use the word "woke" to mean "actively racist and/or sexist against white people or men."
Whe
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Not sure why they're so worked up. My race+gender has had a long run at the superiority games, I don't feel in any way diminished if someone else gets a chance.
Re: Impossible (Score:2)
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Woke is not a religion.
It certainly looks like a religion when they have articles of faith that cannot be questioned by science.
Obvious examples are in the denial of differences between races and sexes, while at the same time preaching diversity. An example might be to ask if men and women have the same intelligence. You could look at the data, and see the differences, one or the other having an edge depending on what type of test is done, e.g. verbal vs numerical. You might observe greater variance in one sex. But the truly wo
Re:Impossible (Score:4, Informative)
But the truly woke will state it as a moral certainty, they they *must* be the same, and any difference in outcomes *must* be due to external injustice, never ability or even personal preferences and choices.
Woke, n. Something I don't like and by the way I'm a fuckwit.
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and by the way I'm a fuckwit.
Ah, profanity. The last resort of the inarticulate motherfucker.
Or the ad hominem for somebody incapable of addressing the facts. Might as well call people a heretic or sinner. The parallel to religious bigotry is striking.
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Or the ad hominem for somebody incapable of addressing the facts.
Your opinions aren't facts and you would do well to ot treat them as such.
Also you're really butthurt over a quote. I'm quoting AmiMojo's sig which is itself a quote of an AC. Pretty funny that it applies so well in this case!
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Also you're really butthurt
Do you ever feel like a bit of a puerile fool, when you read your old comments and see schoolyard taunts like that?
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Given that you ignored the first part of my comment: no. No I did not. It was entirely warranted.
If you present stupid opinions as facts no one will engage you in rational debate because you're not being rational.
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So what part did you disagree with so violently, that you justified to yourself addressing another human being in such a way?
(I'm assuming you do not simply identify as a rude arsehole in real life, so must justify to yourself such behaviour. )
You might at least see why I'm perceiving this as a religion, given such emotional reactions?
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I certainly do see that you consider anti-wokeism as a religion. Your predilection for inventing your own facts and declaring them as truth fits.
It's interesting to me that you get butthurt about small interactions when you're prepared to make up while groups you be rude about.
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Woke is not a religion.
It certainly looks like a religion when they have articles of faith that cannot be questioned by science.
Obvious examples are in the denial of differences between races and sexes, while at the same time preaching diversity. An example might be to ask if men and women have the same intelligence. You could look at the data, and see the differences, one or the other having an edge depending on what type of test is done, e.g. verbal vs numerical. You might observe greater variance in one sex. But the truly woke will state it as a moral certainty, they they *must* be the same, and any difference in outcomes *must* be due to external injustice, never ability or even personal preferences and choices.
It is possible to acknowledge both historic injustices and biological & cultural differences, but the extremists on both sides can insist that only one is "one true reason". That is religion.
So variance of experience, ability, or appearance justifies discrimination, suppression, and harassment? That's a perversion of the definition of “woke” used regularly by those who would ignore historic and current happenings. Those who believe in a zero sum game and that acknowledging reality will cause them to lose an advantage over others.
Good luck on selling that to everyone else in the world!
In Australia we even have political prayers before meetings or events, that are statements of faith.
We acknowledge the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples, the Traditional Custodians of this land, with deep respect. May the Elders, past and present, be blessed and honoured.
That is not religion. That is an acknowledgment. Though, I might change the word “blessed
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The important thing about being anti-woke, is that you're allowed to lie about it! All is fair and politics and war. So MTG claims, with a straight face, that a single school got a $15 *B*illion dollar grant to teach CRT. It's ok, the ends (being elected) justify the means (lying).
Re: Impossible (Score:2)
CRT is a verb, not a noun.
It has no set definition, so it cannot be taught in the normal way facts are taught.
It assumes that racism is a natural, normal fact of human interaction.
For all of it's interaction with racism, it never purports to have a method of diffusing or overcoming racism, because of it's fundamental precept that racism is nornal.
It's mkre of the rearranging deck chairs on the Titanic than it is a rubric that reduces harm from racism.
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No one who bitches about CRT has a clue what it is, they treat it like some mythical human destroying movement and treat it like "socialism", a bogeyman that congress animals whine about to get more votes while being utterly ignorant. CRT has NEVER been taught out side of colleges, people freaking out about it are STUPID!
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You obviously do not know anything about it.
The things I stated about it are either direct quotes or exceptionally close paraphrases from the creators of CRT.
You either do not know that, in which case you are a complete buffoon, or you do know this and you are obfuscating based on lies.
Either way, you should be embarrassed by your own behavior.
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Faith based reasoning: assume the existence of "woke" then rail against it.
Re:Impossible (Score:5, Insightful)
Speaking for Christians, a huge amount of the Bible - even parts that weren't originally believed to be accurate - have been show to be so by archaeology.
Not parts that would validate any of the religious claims. You are being intentionally misleading and hence malicious.
Not what the Bible is for (Score:1)
Speaking for Christians, a huge amount of the Bible - even parts that weren't originally believed to be accurate - have been show to be so by archaeology.
Not parts that would validate any of the religious claims. You are being intentionally misleading and hence malicious.
The purpose of the Bible is not to tell you how things work, it's to tell you how to act.
In terms of game theory and/or psychology, the Bible edicts on "how to act" is directly in line with those actions and behaviours that have been shown to be optimal: the "Tit-for-tat" algorithm (begin with trust), get out of your house and do something (Jonah and the Whale), replace a higher order of rules at your peril (Tower of Babel), and so on.
Knowing how things work - the scientific viewpoint - wasn't even a thing
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Believe in a higher being and waste countless resources on that: Complete fail.
Nope. Your claim is an obvious lie.
Re:Impossible (Score:4, Insightful)
Ah but you are also using emotion instead of logic to draw conclusions.
For example, the ability to work miracles does not prove that God exists nor that one is a messenger of God. It might prove that one has some knowledge about the world that you do not (such as advanced science), or it might prove that one is good enough at trickery to fool you in to thinking that one can work miracles, or it might even prove that one person has superpowers. But even people with superpowers can lie, or be fooled, or hear voices in their head, or just be superstitious. So the demonstration of superpowers doesn't prove any claims the superhero might make about higher powers that are otherwise refusing to prove themselves.
The miracles that you see happening in peoples lives do not prove that there is an intelligent benevolent being causing those miracles to happen. On the one hand, you are probably operating on selection bias, seeing any good thing that happens as miraculous even if it is easily explained by simple human interactions or natural events. And any bad things that could have been miraculously prevented are simply accepted as divine will. People with such a bias will literally see miracles everywhere they look, whether they are there or not. And on the other hand, even if such miraculous events actually are happening, this does not prove that the cause of these miracles is a higher being that wants us to give ten percent of our income to a church. Or threatens to torture us all in fire if we don't believe in him. The specific doctrines are not proven in any way by events that we find hard to explain.
So that is the real disconnect. Extreme claims require extreme evidence. Here we have very weak evidence (heavily biased testimonies with no objective verification), and even if the evidence is true, it still doesn't prove the claims being made (it leaves the issue of the miracle's source unexplained).
So, miracles are a bad reason to believe in religious doctrines. Any argument that moves from "this miracle happened" to "God said he wants you to do this" is logically fallacious and unsound. At the very best, they could only be right by coincidence.
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In terms of Jesus' miracles, there's actually only one single miracle that all four gospels agree on, the Miracle of the Loaves and Fishes. Years ago a priest (catholic school) explained that it was just a morality tale, what actually happened was that everyone brought varying amounts of food and drink (since you don't walk out into the desert with nothing) but those with more than enough weren't willing to share with those with less than enough. The little boy shamed them into sharing, and there was plen
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It is illogical to believe anything in an absence of evidence. Sometimes, there simply isn't an answer. As much as we want an answer, simply making one up does not give us any good reason to believe it.
So, how did the universe begin? If we say "big bang" that leaves us wondering about how all the concentrated matter got there in the first place, and what it was doing prior to the big bang, and so on. And the only logically defensible answer to any of these questions is "we don't know, and we don't have
Re:Impossible (Score:5, Informative)
> Speaking for Christians, a huge amount of the Bible - even parts that weren't originally believed to be accurate - have been show to be so by archaeology.
Spider-Man fallacy
https://rationalwiki.org/wiki/... [rationalwiki.org]
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> The only way people are saved are by the work of the Holy Spirit dealing with the issues in their hearts
In other words, people believe in whatever religion, not because it makes any logical sense, but because they happened to experience a transcendental state, which they incorrectly assume proves whatever religion their culture and upbringing said is true.
Good (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Good (Score:5, Interesting)
This is even odder than that. Allah is considered so *other* that no one can say anything about her. Yet, Muslims go about claiming things are an insult to Allah. Since no one can ask her, how would they know?
The escape clause (didn't you just know there had to be one) is that Allah communicates through his angels....to people. That's just peachy. "How do you know that? An angel told me. How do you know it was an angel and not your own brain making shit up? Uh...well, I just know...and you are offending Allah by asking me these questions."
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If Allah sends Angels to talk to people, I can also state that an Angel spoke to me.
What makes your Angel's msg better then my Angel's msg?
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Weak God (Score:5, Insightful)
A real god would simply laugh at any criticisms, or smote those who utter blasphemy or apostasy by himself.
Then again, that god would have to exist, not made up in the minds of weak humans who cannot withstand anything, are easily offended, and get booboo feelings.
Re:Weak God (Score:5, Funny)
But god made Mohammed, the perfect man. The fascist, murderer, pedophile, rapist, slave-keeper, antisemite, illiterate, moron. Muslims love him.
We gotta watch it here, we might get Slashdot banned in Pakistan! 8^0
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A real god would simply laugh at any criticisms, or smote those who utter blasphemy or apostasy by himself.
Exactly what this god does, punish the infidels with bombs, crashed planes and such
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A real god would simply laugh at any criticisms, or smote those who utter blasphemy or apostasy by himself.
Exactly what this god does, punish the infidels with bombs, crashed planes and such
No, those are mere mortals who try to stand up for their powerless gods. In the end, they fail though, because man makes god in his own image, and man is going to fail when trying to impose beliefs on other men who have their own god, made in their own image.
Religion is merely more woke stuff.
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A real god would simply laugh at any criticisms, or smote those who utter blasphemy or apostasy by himself.
The real God does [biblegateway.com] simply laugh. He bides his time though ... and fulfills his promises in surprising ways.
This "Allah" guy, on the other hand ...
This was already documented at wikipedia (Score:2)
Blinding your own eyes to spite what they see. (Score:2)
Anyone who believes "ignorance is strength" is playing chicken with a brick wall.
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Anyone who believes "ignorance is strength" is playing chicken with a brick wall.
Hopefully. Although organized religion has a long and bloody history of being willing to do any conceivable evil just to keep its power intact.
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I read at +1. I do not see ACs. -- The internet does not make people stupid. It just makes the stupid ones more obvious.
You sound like a true believer, nothing matters except what others have already approved of.
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You sound like an asshole that cannot keep their mouth shut even when you have no valid comeback. Incidentally, +1 is the default posting level for non-ACs, but 0 is the one for ACs. But I guess these details fly right over your head.
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Even AC's can post something worth-while.
What good is a god who can't get shit done? (Score:5, Insightful)
Quite frankly, the least I'd expect from an all-powerful entity is that it can at the very least do what any mere mortal can do. Else, why bother worship it if it can't even do what I can do?
So since that god is obviously not turning Wikipedia off, there's only three possible explanations:
1. The god doesn't give a fuck, which essentially means you're wasting your time.
2. The god actually wants that content to exist, which essentially means you're pissing your god off.
3. The god doesn't exist, which essentially means you're REALLY wasting your time.
Choose for yourself.
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4. God is an aristocrat, prefers peons do the work
5. God is a middle manager, see 4.
6. God is a teacher, turning off Wikipedia is the lesson
7. God is just lazy
8. God doesn't know how (lost the manual for the Internet)
Just saying.
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9. God likes his followers to remain ignorant
10. God is overpowered. Can turn off Wikipedia but only by imploding the universe
11. God is clumsy. Worried he might turn off Pornhub instead
12. God forgot
13. God created Wikipedia in the first place
12. God procrastinates. He was definitely going to do it tomorrow
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4a. God prefers peons do the work as a demonstration of their loyalty to him (her?).
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4 is something where you have no use for that kind of god.
5, see 4. I already don't have any use for middle management, why elevate the lazy spongers to godhood?
6 What kind of lesson is this supposed to teach? A lesson should provide information that increases the usefulness or the effectiveness, what exactly does this accomplish?
7 is another "I have no use for that useless sponger" clause.
8 violates the omniscience clause for godhood.
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The god exist, but is neither omniscient, nor omnipotent. So not that powerful.
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Then why bother worship him? If I want to worship a bumbling fool who can't do jack shit, we have politicians for that.
Re: What good is a god who can't get shit done? (Score:2)
If they can't do jack shit, how do they keep on doing things that benefit corporations and the wealthy without ever failing?
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As if they need any help lining their pockets.
funny wikipedia has the opposite problem (Score:2)
Many articles of the world religions in wikipedia have religious teachings, mythical persons, miracles events stated as facts. WIkipedia needs an enema to flush out all that religious B.S., and to present such things as teachings of a religion.
What content (Score:2)
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Yes. Pictures (artistic, of course) of Prophet Muhammad (Peace Be Upon Him) in the English language page about Him (the corresponding pages in Pakistan's local languages,like Urdu don't have these pictures). It's a big no-no in Islam and a heinous crime in Pakistan (blasphemy) that would get you a death sentence there, if the vigilantes don't get to you first, with the same end result, while the police is watching.
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Thank you. These are the two sole relevant posts of this comment section. :)
P.S. That said there were periods in Islam when depicting their prophet was perfectly ok. These medieval depictions of him did not sprout from the ground by themselves.
Ah well if they don't value Knowledge (Score:5, Interesting)
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Don't forget they are nuclear armed.
Wonder if they found the recipe for nukes in the quran or actually had to follow science, which often contradicts many religions.
I'm not gonna talk about religion (Score:4, Interesting)
I'm not gonna talk about religion. Instead, politics.
What was Pakistan's endgame? Are they really blocking Wikipedia just to prevent their populace from reading it? They could not possibly have thought Wikipedia would concede--after all, Wikipedia is a nonprofit and probably doesn't get much donations from a poor (ish) country. Did they think Wikipedia is so liberal that they would concede to autocratic demands just to preserve free access in a poor-ish country? They might have, if the concession were not so great.
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An authoritarian government needs constant shows of power to keep its subjects obedient. And its enforcers needs to show their leadership they do something and are loyal.
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That may be true, but in this case they showed weakness by making a demand that would obviously not be fulfilled.
That's what theocracies do (Score:2)
It cracks me up (Score:4, Insightful)
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Paywalled article (Score:3)
it should be considered sacrilegious to make Slashdot submissions based on paywalled articles.
Distraction (Score:1)
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