Kuwait Says Social Networks Must Be Regulated To 'Safeguard The Cohesiveness Of Society'
from the i-had-no-idea-it-was-at-risk dept
Apparently, an unregulated Twitter and Facebook might lead to society coming apart at the seams. At least that appears to be the somewhat ridiculous assertion of the Kuwaiti government as it prepares to regulate the usage of social networking sites, officially in order to "safeguard the cohesiveness of the population and society." Of course, that's silly. Social networking tools are used all the time to bring people together and to have discussions -- and also for less socially beneficial reasons. But the technology is just a tool for communication. By itself, it's neither good nor bad. Of course, given how those tools have been useful in larger protests and even regime changes around the Middle East over the past 18 months, one might guess that this new crackdown is a bit more about safeguarding the power of the existing government.Thank you for reading this Techdirt post. With so many things competing for everyone’s attention these days, we really appreciate you giving us your time. We work hard every day to put quality content out there for our community.
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Filed Under: crackdown, kuwait, social media
Companies: facebook, twitter
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Seriously????
Of course they need to regulate social networks. You can't repress your people properly if they are allowed to communicate freely with no fear of punishment.
LOL That's the type of society they want to safeguard, scared sheeple. Good luck with that.
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Re: Seriously????
Wait, what?
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step 1: read the freakin' article, make a comment relevant to it
step 2: ???
Step 3: profit
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(╯°□°)╯︵ ┻━┻
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not much interest because...
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I'm so glad...
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Re: I'm so glad...
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Don't be fooled. These Arab Spring movements are not about democracy. This theme was created by Western media. It is about a global recession, government debt, and youth unemployment. Governments can enforce obedience (with the army), or they can buy it (with government entitlement programs). When 20-somethings are out of work, both Dictatorships and Democracies (Greece) will fall.
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Shouldn't we regulate the Telephone, Printing Press?
Think of the children!
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OMG!
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if it was up to me
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Cohesiveness-or repression
They don't like the idea of their power being challenged, so it figures that they have to get rid of anything or control those things that might lead people to think for themselves.
If unchecked, it will lead to events such as happening in Syria-mass murder by the government to stomp out any kind of rebellion. It may yet come to that, anyway.
Absolute dictatorships have a nasty way of getting even with dissidents and other pesky people.
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They're not safeguarding cohesiveness of society
The inhibition of communication necessarily destabilizes societal cohesiveness. But preventing the proliferation of new communication maintains the existing level of cohesion.
If they cared about societal cohesiveness, they'd make free and uninhibited communication the new status quo.
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Networks
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