Blog - The Arabist

Entries in censorship (8)

Wednesday, February 1, 2012

5:59PM

The BBC censors the word "Palestine"

Issandr El Amrani |

Israel/Palestine

Media

bbc

censorship

This press release from the Palestine Campaign beggars belief...

PRESS RELEASE
for immediate release: 31st January 2012 *
*BBC Trust rules in favour of censoring ‘Palestine’
The BBC has admitted it was ‘overcautious’ in editing the word ‘Palestine’ from an artist’s performance on Radio 1Xtra and has said it is ‘looking to learn’ from the way it handled the situation.

However, in a ruling released today (31/01/12), the BBC Trust said the final content that was broadcast on the Charlie Sloth Hip Hop M1X – a music programme – was not biased and therefore did not breach its editorial guidelines.

The Palestine Solidarity Campaign (PSC) has spent eight months trying to find out why the decision was made to censor the lyrics of a freestyle performance by the rapper, Mic Righteous. Appearing on the Charlie Sloth show in February 2011, he sang: ‘I can scream Free Palestine for my beliefs’.

BBC producers replaced the word ‘Palestine’ with the sound of breaking glass, and the censored performance was repeated in April on the same show.

Amena Saleem, of PSC, said: ‘In its correspondence with us, the BBC said the word Palestine isn’t offensive, but ‘implying that it is not free is the contentious issue’, and this is why the edit was made.

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Feb 1, 2012 at 17:59 Comments Off

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Sunday, January 22, 2012

9:49AM

Egypt and censorship

Issandr El Amrani |

Egypt

arts

censorship

Khaled Dawoud reports on artists' concerns in Egypt:

The main conference hall at the Press Syndicate was packed with nearly all the big names in the Egyptian art and culture industry. Actors and actresses, poets, painters, musicians, novelists and writers all gathered on Saturday to announce the creation of the "Egyptian Creativity Front" to face what they see is growing pressure to limit freedom of expression and creativity in Egypt following the landslide victory political Islamic groups scored in parliamentary elections that concluded last week.

Where have these people been all this time? The Mubarak regime practised censorship – political, cultural, and other – widely. Often the reasons were Egypt's terrible legislation and bureaucracy of censorship, which is very politically malleable. No doubt an Islamist government may enforce some forms of censorship more (and others less).

I'm very glad people are organizing to protect freedom of expression and the wave of creativity of the last few years (culminating in the 18 days of Tahrir). But taking the position that the Islamists are the problem is the wrong approach, it's the legislation and the mentality of a ministry of culture that seeks to micro-manage cultural life that's the real problem.

One more thing: I am willing to bet any taker that, within a year, even if the situation for political or human rights really improves, we'll see some people writing of an Islamist winter in Egypt because they've banned a movie or something, and we'll have no mention that under the Mubarak regime courts for instance banned the reprinting of the Arabian Nights because it was considered too lewd.

Jan 22, 2012 at 9:49

Better distribution can defeat censorship

Issandr El Amrani |

Egypt

censorship

cinema

There is a good piece by Muhammad Khawly on film censorship up at al-Akhbar:

Cairo – “Early in the game, the Muslim Brotherhood has shown their true colors,” wrote art and cinema supporters on social networking sites in Egypt.

This statement and others like it were made in response to the authorities’ decision to withdraw the movie Wahed Sahih (A whole one) from Egyptian theaters.

“The Egyptian Board of Censors has said they intend to reevaluate the movie in order to delete some scenes and remove language that “deviates from public morality,” according to Sayed Khattab, the head of the board.

Khattab said that he plans to “form a committee to watch the movie a second time, a week after its release...because I received angry feedback on the expressions uttered by actress Basma [Hassan] in the movie.”

Of course the fact that Islamists are on the rise makes many worried about moral censorship. But that is only part of the picture. First of all, under Mubarak, censorship was widespread and often religiously-motivated. At least there will be (once military censorship is removed from the media) much less political censorship, hopefully, in the future of Egypt. That moral censorship — against irreverent treatment of religious matters, sexuality or foul language — will remain is actually largely more of the same, even if you had occasional waves of relative tolerance (often followed by a hardline to outflank conservatives) on this issue.

To me, censorship is only a small part of the problem, and one that has a relatively obvious solution: better distribution. Lack of good distribution channels seems to me a bigger problem than censorship. It's virtually impossible to buy many movies — new or old — in Egypt because they do not exist on DVD and there are few online sources of digital media (particularly legal ones that could remunerate the film's creators). Movies are screened in theaters and then can often disappear forever.

Digital distribution in particular could be one way to circumvent censorship, by creating a censored version and an "uncut" one available online (and thus circumventing national-level censorship). Even if it will then be accessible to a sub-section of the population initially, at least it will be out there. I cannot count the number of times I was frustrated by wanting to obtain (and pay for) a copy of a film I missed in the theaters. At least, it would be a good insurance policy against the ongoing battle with state censors.

Jan 14, 2012 at 12:49 Comments Off

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Thursday, July 23, 2009

12:00PM

Links for 07.22.09 to 07.23.09

Issandr El Amrani |

Egypt

Obama

rights

Writer banned from ‘DailyKos’ after satirizing settlements | Shame! More of the Worlds Worst Dictators | Parade.com | What, Hosni only at #20? מגזין הכיבוש Occupation Magazine | How Israel is hiring students and demobilized soldiers to wage a propaganda war through comments across the web. Israeli FM wants Hitler photo to mute world pressure - Yahoo! News | Pathetic. Saudi Efforts to Combat Terrorist Financing - WINEP | I hate to link to WINEP's fluff piece for Stuart Levey, but my hatred for the al-Sauds trumps all. Of course they tolerate individuals who donate to extremists, and we still don't know enough about their role in 9/11. Mubarak invited to Washington in August | The Cable | Egyptian reports had put date at August 15, this says August 17. But will it not be a state visit? Nothing formal announced by White House yet. Amnesty condemns Saudi anti-terror campaign | World news | The Guardian | This comes after years of hearing about how great the Saudi rehabilitation model is... but many of those arrested in anti-terror campaign are just dissidents.

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Jul 23, 2009 at 12:00

Haaretz blocked in the UAE

Issandr El Amrani |

Remember I was telling you about having a weird experience with the Haaretz website a few days ago, being occasionally blocked from accessing it? Apparently the block is now official in the UAE. Here's what a friend there got when he tried to access it:

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Apr 5, 2009 at 13:24

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Tuesday, March 31, 2009

2:45PM

Haaretz access banned from Egypt?

Issandr El Amrani |

Egypt

censorship

internet

A friend wrote this morning saying he couldn't access the Israeli newspaper Haaretz's site. I check and could read the main page fine, but clicking on stories such as this one I came up with the same message he received: