Do you believe in censoring information at all?

by sabastious 14 Replies latest jw friends

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  sabastious

  As Witnesses we all grew up with our information heavily censored. It has got me to thinking: do I think censoring information is ever a good thing?

  I had this Bethelite friend back when I was a Witness and he would be careful who he told about the craziness behind those doors. He knew that if he told certain people it could sow seeds of doubt about the Organization as a whole.

  Of course we should censor stuff like our battle plans as a country when we are at war etc, but that is not really what I am talking about.

  I am talking about information that could potentially put people into premature frenzies.

  Should the public be kept in the dark about certain things? If so, how do you figure out what should be censored and what shouldn't?

  -Sab
• 

  notverylikely

  I think information should, in general, NOT be censored. I do not think that everyone is entitled to know everything, such as personal details, however, especially if it is not relevant to the person asking.
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  WTWizard

  There is only one case to censor. And that is when guarding company secrets (that are not being used for nefarious purposes) or national security issues. Other than that, censorship is not beneficial. The citizens of a country are entitled to know every little thing going on within their own government (not to blab it to foreign countries, however) because they are going to be affected by what the government does.

  Private forums do have the right to censor as they see fit. Usually, this means not allowing spam posts (that is, pointless and meaningless items) everywhere, not allowing foul language, or keeping members from attacking other members. But, other people should have the right to start their own forums if they see fit to disseminate information. Bad information is going to look ridiculous if people are free thinking, because all it does is uses circular reasoning and attempted suppression of dissident viewpoints.
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  NeonMadman

  Generally, I don't believe in censorship, though there might be necessary exceptions in matters of national security. The danger in such, of course, is that the privilege to censor for "national security" might be abused for political advantage.

  I certainly don't believe that people should be ordered by religious authorities to avoid reading material that disagrees with the "party line." If a group of which one is a member tries to restrict his/her access to certain information, that should be a big red flag.

  On a private basis, I believe that parents should exercise care as to what their children are reading or viewing. The younger the child, the more discernment should be used as to what material is appropriate. By the time a child reaches the mid-teens or so (the age could vary depending on the intellect and maturity of the child), there should be very little material that the parents would prohibit. I should emphasize that I'm talking here about intellectual material: I would consider pornography a separate issue when dealing with minors.
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  miseryloveselders

  As far as information is concerned, absolutely not. People should be privy to as much available information as possible. Leolia posted from 1984 either yesterday or the day before, "Freedom is Slavery, Ignorance is Strength." Censorship is A-Ok so long as you're on top of the food chain, but for the rest of us peons, its pure misery. I don't ever again want to be limited in my access to information, or one might say both sides of the story. The WT enslaves people by peer pressured censorship. Religious leaders today wish to censor all discussion on anything they don't agree with, and they do it under the false premise that they want schools to teach both sides of the story. We know better than that however. They want to go right back to the same tyranny illustrated in movies like The Hunchback of Notre Dame.

  As far as information related to national security, yes I agree much of it should not be disseminated to the general public.

  I don't believe your question is extended to the entertainment on televisions or the radio, but I do believe the bar of whats appropriate has been lowered far too much. We've went from The Honeymooners sleeping in seperate beds, to Jimmy Smits and Kim Delaney showing their goods on NYPD Blue, to whats currently on prime time television. It's sad because anything goes, and its become overly difficult for parents to shield what their kids can be exposed to. Maybe I'm just getting older, but I think the younger generation coming up is twisted, much of it I blame on the entertainment.
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  Markfromcali

  I'm not inclined to frame things in terms of belief, shoulds and shouldn'ts - and that's exactly why information is not everything. Framing a question this way just prompts people to jump on expressing opinions in a very limited yes or no way, and this is not just being nit picky or another statement about shoulds said implicitly - these are real ways consideration of the information is limited.

  If we're to look at how it works then you can't just look at the availability of information, the way it's processed has to be taken into consideration and that of course varies between individuals. You mentioned information that could put people into premature frenzies, so why don't we look at what makes people react one way or another (or react at all) but focus completely on expressing opinion about censorship? (it's not a statement about this thread in particular, it's likely to be typical on any forum) It seems to me if you're going to address this particular question then you really have to look at the psychology on some level, otherwise it's pretty much just elaborating on one of two positions.

  The question becomes a matter of integration. I mean lets face it, the same information presented to one person might be world changing, and for another they just plain don't care. A lot of information IS available and would only take a little bit of googling to find, but lots of people would not know about it simply because they are not interested - but like children people are often easily distracted by the next -
• 

  sabastious

  Framing a question this way just prompts people to jump on expressing opinions in a very limited yes or no way

  The question was framed to spark discussion. Yes and no are the answers but yes's and no's lead to further examination.

  -Sab
• 

  miseryloveselders

  I'm not inclined to frame things in terms of belief, shoulds and shouldn'ts - and that's exactly why information is not everything. Framing a question this way just prompts people to jump on expressing opinions in a very limited yes or no way, and this is not just being nit picky or another statement about shoulds said implicitly - these are real ways consideration of the information is limited.

  If we're to look at how it works then you can't just look at the availability of information, the way it's processed has to be taken into consideration and that of course varies between individuals. You mentioned information that could put people into premature frenzies, so why don't we look at what makes people react one way or another (or react at all) but focus completely on expressing opinion about censorship? (it's not a statement about this thread in particular, it's likely to be typical on any forum) It seems to me if you're going to address this particular question then you really have to look at the psychology on some level, otherwise it's pretty much just elaborating on one of two positions.

  The question becomes a matter of integration. I mean lets face it, the same information presented to one person might be world changing, and for another they just plain don't care. A lot of information IS available and would only take a little bit of googling to find, but lots of people would not know about it simply because they are not interested - but like children people are often easily distracted by the next -

  So what exactly are you implying, Mark? I get what you're saying as far as those who are willfully ignorant. Short of grabbing them by the shoulders and yelling at them while looking at them eye to eye, they'll never be proactive in obtaining information or receptive to any information out there. However, I kind of pick up on another thought behind your post that you purposely didn't include. I don't mean that in a hostile sense either. However, I may be looking too far into what you posted, but I'm under the impression that you don't believe some information should be available, and not simply because people don't care, but also because you feel they may or may not be ready for whats presented to them. Do you believe that in some cases, the negatives of them being presented with some information such as their reaction to it, far outweigh the principle of availability of information?
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  Violia

  No, I don't need anyone to do my thinking for me or my reading. I can spot BS when I see it. The WtS never let us read other info, they were afraid. I don't want any speech censored offically, unoffically people will always find a wasy to censor that which they find not ok. EG, put book down, turn channel, not go to a web site, don't read that paper, etc.

  Let people read and listen to what they want. I don't need a keeper.
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  Markfromcali

  The question was framed to spark discussion. Yes and no are the answers but yes's and no's lead to further examination.

  Do you really think so? Again it's just an observation and nothing personal, plenty of people do this all the time and I don't think people actually think about it, asking for opinion in terms of a binary choice comes rather naturally for most. What if the question was framed in an open ended way like "what results from censoring or not censoring information"? Frankly I think the examination tends to be fairly limited, and will tend to result in one shot replies like votes with comments that does not necessarily promote further exploration. Then again, I also recognize that it may very well be that people are more inclined to participate in expressions of opinion than in-depth analysis, so it seems to be a bit of a catch 22.

  It's kind of hard to talk about this subject without specifics anyway. Also facts taken out of context will not mean much to people who are not in a position to put things in perspective, I'm sure most of us have met people who think JWs are all wonderful and largely ignore the peculiarities they are aware of simply because they don't know how it all ends up playing out in that social environment, besides they may be too busy framing it in terms of religious freedom. As another example a lot of us are probably familiar with some subjects enough to know that there is more we can dig into, but there is just so much time in the day though we recognize there's more to understand about it.

  So in one sense it kind of naturally works itself out, because unless you're really interested you're just not going to dig that deeply. Hopefully there is enough info generally available to prompt the people who are inclined to do that and take some responsibility for knowing those things, otherwise the typical reactions just won't do a lot of good and may possibly cause the frenzy you are eluding to. I don't even necessarily think it's a bad idea for children to learn about some things that may be a bit too early for them to handle, as they sometimes will anyway, but it's understandable that parents don't necessarily want to address certain topics since it's not a particularly easy task to help them deal with it.

  In a nutshell I guess since so much is available on the internet now, the work for us is to really work on ourselves intellectually and psychologically in order to be able to handle the information that is available. Just look at the truth about the JWs, people may come to know about all these things but they don't necessarily cope very well with it - the issue there is no longer an issue of censoring.