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Two Dogs

Support Freedom! [PersonRank 10]

Thursday, November 9, 2006
17 years ago4,401 views

http://www.seedmagazine.com/news/2006/11/beijing_launches_one_dog_polic.php

It's coming soon... You know it!

Today I tried "two dogs" in Google.cn and got 39.9 million results.

But read the linked article--owning two or more dogs is now outlawed in China; and knowing the Chinese government, it's only a matter of time before simply searching for "two dogs" will be as suppressed as tightly as "Tiananmen massacre".

To search is to think about it, and thinking is the gravest crime in a dictatorship, for you might then do something about it!

Perhaps even as we speak, Google's staff is debating whether to censor this seemingly innocent phrase or to wait for the orders from Beijing.

And perhaps even just the single word "dogs" will make the blacklist, for to even consider the possibility of more than one dog might now get you sent to the organ-harvesting gulag.

But of course, if the word "dogs" is indeed banned, how will the Chinese propaganda department be able to continue to refer to the evil West or to traitors to Communism by that curious and odd insult: "running dogs".

Meanwhile, starving slaves in North Korea salivate at even the idea of having one dog...

It's got me too dog tired to think any more about it!

Philipp Lenssen [PersonRank 10]

17 years ago #

> Perhaps even as we speak, Google's staff is debating
> whether to censor this seemingly innocent phrase or to
> wait for the orders from Beijing.

I think Google doesn't debate what to censor, they just take orders. Whether or not that's better is debatable...

Support Freedom! [PersonRank 10]

17 years ago #

I think you're generally right, but when they went into China, Google's staff described how they preemptively made their initial list based on words other search engines ban and generally just knowing what is forbidden.

The government gets a wider ban on words semi-voluntarily by telling the companies to avoid any possibility of controversial search results than just from blocking their banned word list.

Thanks for the cool avatar!

Philipp Lenssen [PersonRank 10]

17 years ago #

> Google's staff described how they preemptively
> made their initial list based on words other search
> engines ban and generally just knowing what is forbidden

You got a link to the quote SF?

Support Freedom! [PersonRank 10]

17 years ago #

I forget where I had first read about how Google did the initial censoring, but this is a long (10 page) and detailed NY Times report on the subject. The link takes you to page 8 where there is discussion of how Google did their initial censorship.

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/04/23/magazine/23google.html?pagewanted=8&ei=5090&en=972002761056363f&ex=1303444800

A BBC article says this concerning self-censorship:

The company is setting up a new site – Google.cn – which it will censor itself to satisfy the authorities in Beijing.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/4645596.stm

Philipp Lenssen [PersonRank 10]

17 years ago #

That explains it thanks...

Andrew Hitchcock [PersonRank 10]

17 years ago #

要是你有一多個狗,就你能吃你的狗。

Haochi [PersonRank 10]

17 years ago #

I think that the positive and negative sides are pretty well-balanced.

<<要是你有一多個狗,就你能吃你的狗>>
Do you mean "If you have more than one dog, then you can eat your dog"? If so, it should be "要是你有多过一只狗,你就能吃你的狗". Oops, this is not a Chinese classroom. ;)

Support Freedom! [PersonRank 10]

17 years ago #

In North Korea this translates to:

"I'll fight you for the last scrap of your dog!"

Andrew Hitchcock [PersonRank 10]

17 years ago #

Thanks Haochi, I'm always trying to improve :)

Support Freedom! [PersonRank 10]

17 years ago #

Not to keep beating a dead dog, but there's a certain idiotic factor in the Chinese government's new "one dog policy". Supposedly their reason to outlaw owning two dogs is to control rabies.

You control rabies with vaccinations! Unvaccinated dogs, whether you have one or two or twelve, are all equally vulnerable to rabies.

If the government were concerned people couldn't afford vaccinations, here's the real--and obvious--solution: If the Chinese government was more concerned with the health of their own people (and dogs) than of building missiles to slaugher Taiwan's population, they would simply stop building the missiles and save enough money to vaccinate every dog in China a thousand times!

Of course in dictatorships there is a great deal of outlawing things (like a second dog instead of vaccinating all dogs) for no logical reason in order to intimidate and thus control the population, or to give police additional excuses to invade houses in order to further scare people and to look for other violations such as having two children or pro-freedom or religious literature.

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