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Censorship is the suppression of speech, public communication, or other information. This may be done on the basis that such material is considered objectionable, harmful, sensitive, or "inconvenient".
Censorship can be conducted by governments,
private institutions and other controlling bodies.
Governments
[ and private organizations may engage in censorship. Other groups or institutions may propose and petition for censorship.][https://www.aclu.org/other/what-censorship "What Is Censorship", ACLU] When an individual such as an author or other creator engages in censorship of his or her own works or speech, it is referred to as ''self-censorship
Self-censorship is the act of censoring or classifying one's own discourse. This is done out of fear of, or deference to, the sensibilities or preferences (actual or perceived) of others and without overt pressure from any specific party or insti ...
''. General censorship occurs in a variety of different media, including speech, books, music, films, and other arts, the press, radio, television, and the Internet for a variety of claimed reasons including national security
National security, or national defence, is the security and defence of a sovereign state, including its citizens, economy, and institutions, which is regarded as a duty of government. Originally conceived as protection against military atta ...
, to control obscenity
An obscenity is any utterance or act that strongly offends the prevalent morality of the time. It is derived from the Latin ''obscēnus'', ''obscaenus'', "boding ill; disgusting; indecent", of uncertain etymology. Such loaded language can be use ...
, pornography
Pornography (often shortened to porn or porno) is the portrayal of sexual subject matter for the exclusive purpose of sexual arousal. Primarily intended for adults, , and hate speech
Hate speech is defined by the ''Cambridge Dictionary'' as "public speech that expresses hate or encourages violence towards a person or group based on something such as race, religion, sex, or sexual orientation". Hate speech is "usually thoug ...
, to protect children or other vulnerable groups, to promote or restrict political or religious views, and to prevent slander
Defamation is the act of communicating to a third party false statements about a person, place or thing that results in damage to its reputation. It can be spoken (slander) or written (libel). It constitutes a tort or a crime. The legal defini ...
and libel
Defamation is the act of communicating to a third party false statements about a person, place or thing that results in damage to its reputation. It can be spoken (slander) or written (libel). It constitutes a tort or a crime. The legal defini ...
.
Direct censorship may or may not be legal, depending on the type, location, and content. Many countries provide strong protections against censorship by law, but none of these protections are absolute and frequently a claim of necessity to balance conflicting rights is made, in order to determine what could and could not be censored. There are no laws against self-censorship.
History
In 399 BC, Greek philosopher, Socrates
Socrates (; ; –399 BC) was a Greek philosopher from Athens who is credited as the founder of Western philosophy and among the first moral philosophers of the ethical tradition of thought. An enigmatic figure, Socrates authored no te ...
, while defying attempts by the Athenian state to censor his philosophical teachings, was accused of collateral charges related to the corruption of Athenian youth and sentenced to death by drinking a poison, hemlock.
The details of Socrates's conviction are recorded by Plato as follows. In 399 BC, Socrates went on trial
In law, a trial is a coming together of Party (law), parties to a :wikt:dispute, dispute, to present information (in the form of evidence (law), evidence) in a tribunal, a formal setting with the authority to Adjudication, adjudicate claims or d ...
and was subsequently found guilty of both corrupting the minds of the youth of Athens and of impiety
Impiety is a perceived lack of proper respect for something considered sacred. Impiety is often closely associated with sacrilege, though it is not necessarily a physical action. Impiety cannot be associated with a cult, as it implies a larger be ...
(''asebeia Asebeia (Ancient Greek: ἀσέβεια) was a criminal charge in ancient Greece for the "desecration and mockery of divine objects", for "irreverence towards the state gods" and disrespect towards parents and dead ancestors. It translates into En ...
'', "not believing in the gods of the state"), and as a punishment sentenced to death, caused by the drinking of a mixture containing hemlock.
Socrates' student, Plato
Plato ( ; grc-gre, Πλάτων ; 428/427 or 424/423 – 348/347 BC) was a Greek philosopher born in Athens during the Classical period in Ancient Greece. He founded the Platonist school of thought and the Academy, the first institution ...
, is said to have advocated censorship in his essay on '' The Republic'', which opposed the existence of democracy. In contrast to Plato, Greek playwright Euripides
Euripides (; grc, Εὐριπίδης, Eurīpídēs, ; ) was a tragedian
Tragedy (from the grc-gre, τραγῳδία, ''tragōidia'', ''tragōidia'') is a genre of drama based on human suffering and, mainly, the terrible or sorrowful e ...
(480–406 BC) defended the true liberty of freeborn men, including the right to speak freely. In 1766, Sweden became the first country to abolish censorship by law.
Rationale and criticism
Censorship has been criticized throughout history for being unfair and hindering progress. In a 1997 essay on Internet censorship, social commentator Michael Landier claims that censorship is counterproductive as it prevents the censored topic from being discussed. Landier expands his argument by claiming that those who impose censorship must consider what they censor to be true, as individuals believing themselves to be correct would welcome the opportunity to disprove those with opposing views.
Censorship is often used to impose moral values on society, as in the censorship of material considered obscene. English novelist E. M. Forster
Edward Morgan Forster (1 January 1879 – 7 June 1970) was an English author, best known for his novels, particularly ''A Room with a View'' (1908), ''Howards End'' (1910), and ''A Passage to India'' (1924). He also wrote numerous short stori ...
was a staunch opponent of censoring material on the grounds that it was obscene or immoral, raising the issue of moral subjectivity and the constant changing of moral values. When the 1928 novel ''Lady Chatterley's Lover
''Lady Chatterley's Lover'' is the last novel by English author D. H. Lawrence, which was first published privately in 1928, in Italy, and in 1929, in France. An unexpurgated edition was not published openly in the United Kingdom until 1960, w ...
'' was put on trial in 1960, Forster wrote:
Proponents have sought to justify it using different rationales for various types of information censored:
* Moral censorship is the removal of materials that are obscene
An obscenity is any utterance or act that strongly offends the prevalent morality of the time. It is derived from the Latin ''obscēnus'', ''obscaenus'', "boding ill; disgusting; indecent", of uncertain etymology. Such loaded language can be use ...
or otherwise considered morally questionable. Pornography, for example, is often censored under this rationale, especially child pornography
Child pornography (also called CP, child sexual abuse material, CSAM, child porn, or kiddie porn) is pornography that unlawfully exploits children for sexual stimulation. It may be produced with the direct involvement or sexual assault of a chi ...
, which is illegal and censored in most jurisdictions in the world.
* Military censorship
Military censorship is a type of censorship that is the process of keeping military intelligence and tactics confidential and away from the enemy. This is used to counter espionage. Military censorship intensifies during wartime.
United States
M ...
is the process of keeping military intelligence
Military intelligence is a military discipline that uses information collection and analysis approaches to provide guidance and direction to assist commanders in their decisions. This aim is achieved by providing an assessment of data from a ...
and tactics
Tactic(s) or Tactical may refer to:
* Tactic (method), a conceptual action implemented as one or more specific tasks
** Military tactics, the disposition and maneuver of units on a particular sea or battlefield
** Chess tactics
** Political tact ...
confidential and away from the enemy. This is used to counter espionage.
* Political censorship
Political censorship exists when a government attempts to conceal, fake, distort, or falsify information that its citizens receive by suppressing or crowding out political news that the public might receive through news outlets. In the absence of n ...
occurs when governments hold back information from their citizens. This is often done to exert control over the populace and prevent free expression that might foment rebellion
Rebellion, uprising, or insurrection is a refusal of obedience or order. It refers to the open resistance against the orders of an established authority.
A rebellion originates from a sentiment of indignation and disapproval of a situation and ...
.
* Religious censorship
Religious censorship is a form of censorship where freedom of expression is controlled or limited using religious authority or on the basis of the teachings of the religion. This form of censorship has a long history and is practiced in many soc ...
is the means by which any material considered objectionable by a certain religion is removed. This often involves a dominant religion forcing limitations on less prevalent ones. Alternatively, one religion may shun the works of another when they believe the content is not appropriate for their religion.
* Corporate censorship
Corporate censorship is censorship by corporations. It is when a spokesperson, employer, or business associate sanctions a speaker's speech by threat of monetary loss, employment loss, or loss of access to the marketplace. It is present in many ...
is the process by which editors in corporate media outlets intervene to disrupt the publishing of information that portrays their business or business partners in a negative light, or intervene to prevent alternate offers from reaching public exposure.
Types
Political
State secrets and prevention of attention
In wartime, explicit censorship is carried out with the intent of preventing the release of information that might be useful to an enemy. Typically it involves keeping times or locations secret, or delaying the release of information (e.g., an operational objective) until it is of no possible use to enemy forces. The moral issues here are often seen as somewhat different, as the proponents of this form of censorship argues that release of tactical information usually presents a greater risk of casualties among one's own forces and could possibly lead to loss of the overall conflict.
During World War I
World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, the United States, and the Ottoman Empire, with fightin ...
letters written by British soldiers would have to go through censorship. This consisted of officers going through letters with a black marker and crossing out anything which might compromise operational secrecy before the letter was sent. The World War II
World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...
catchphrase "Loose lips sink ships
Loose lips sink ships is an American English idiom meaning "beware of unguarded talk". The phrase originated on propaganda posters during World War II. The phrase was created by the War Advertising Council and used on posters by the United State ...
" was used as a common justification to exercise official wartime censorship and encourage individual restraint when sharing potentially sensitive information.
An example of " sanitization" policies comes from the USSR
The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, it was nominally a federal union of fifteen nationa ...
under Joseph Stalin
Joseph Vissarionovich Stalin (born Ioseb Besarionis dze Jughashvili; – 5 March 1953) was a Georgian revolutionary and Soviet political leader who led the Soviet Union from 1924 until his death in 1953. He held power as General Secreta ...
, where publicly used photographs were often altered to remove people whom Stalin had condemned to execution. Though past photographs may have been remembered or kept, this deliberate and systematic alteration to all of history in the public mind is seen as one of the central themes of Stalinism
Stalinism is the means of governing and Marxist-Leninist policies implemented in the Soviet Union from 1927 to 1953 by Joseph Stalin. It included the creation of a one-party totalitarian police state, rapid industrialization, the theory ...
and totalitarianism
Totalitarianism is a form of government and a political system that prohibits all opposition parties, outlaws individual and group opposition to the state and its claims, and exercises an extremely high if not complete degree of control and reg ...
.
Censorship is occasionally carried out to aid authorities or to protect an individual, as with some kidnappings when attention and media coverage of the victim can sometimes be seen as unhelpful.
Religion
Censorship by religion is a form of censorship where freedom of expression
Freedom of speech is a principle that supports the freedom of an individual or a community to articulate their opinions and ideas without fear of retaliation, censorship, or legal sanction. The right to freedom of expression has been recogni ...
is controlled or limited using religious authority or on the basis of the teachings of the religion
Religion is usually defined as a social- cultural system of designated behaviors and practices, morals, beliefs, worldviews, texts, sanctified places, prophecies, ethics, or organizations, that generally relates humanity to supernatural, ...
. This form of censorship has a long history and is practiced in many societies and by many religions. Examples include the Galileo affair
The Galileo affair ( it, il processo a Galileo Galilei) began around 1610 and culminated with the trial and condemnation of Galileo Galilei by the Roman Catholic Inquisition in 1633. Galileo was prosecuted for his support of heliocentrism, the ...
, Edict of Compiègne
The Edict of Compiègne (french: Édit de Compiègne), issued from his Château de Compiègne by Henry II of France, 24 July 1557, applied the death penalty for all convictions of relapsed and obstinate "sacramentarians", for those who went to Gen ...
, the Index Librorum Prohibitorum
The ''Index Librorum Prohibitorum'' ("List of Prohibited Books") was a list of publications deemed heretical or contrary to morality by the Sacred Congregation of the Index (a former Dicastery of the Roman Curia), and Catholics were forbidden ...
(list of prohibited books) and the condemnation of Salman Rushdie
Sir Ahmed Salman Rushdie (; born 19 June 1947) is an Indian-born British-American novelist. His work often combines magic realism with historical fiction and primarily deals with connections, disruptions, and migrations between Eastern and Wes ...
's novel ''The Satanic Verses
''The Satanic Verses'' is the fourth novel of British-Indian writer Salman Rushdie. First published in September 1988, the book was inspired by the life of the Islamic prophet Muhammad. As with his previous books, Rushdie used magical realism ...
'' by Iran
Iran, officially the Islamic Republic of Iran, and also called Persia, is a country located in Western Asia. It is bordered by Iraq and Turkey to the west, by Azerbaijan and Armenia to the northwest, by the Caspian Sea and Turkmeni ...
ian leader Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini
Ruhollah Khomeini, Ayatollah Khomeini, Imam Khomeini ( , ; ; 17 May 1900 – 3 June 1989) was an Iranian political and religious leader who served as the first supreme leader of Iran from 1979 until his death in 1989. He was the founder of ...
. Images of the Islamic figure Muhammad are also regularly censored. In some secular countries, this is sometimes done to prevent hurting religious sentiments.
Educational sources
The content of school textbooks is often an issue of debate, since their target audiences are young people. The term whitewashing is commonly used to refer to revisionism aimed at glossing over difficult or questionable historical events, or a biased presentation thereof. The reporting of military atrocities in history is extremely controversial, as in the case of The Holocaust
The Holocaust, also known as the Shoah, was the genocide of European Jews during World War II. Between 1941 and 1945, Nazi Germany and its collaborators systematically murdered some six million Jews across German-occupied Europe; a ...
(or Holocaust denial
Holocaust denial is an antisemitic conspiracy theory that falsely asserts that the Nazi genocide of Jews, known as the Holocaust, is a myth, fabrication, or exaggeration. Holocaust deniers make one or more of the following false statements:
...
), Bombing of Dresden
The bombing of Dresden was a joint British and American aerial bombing attack on the city of Dresden, the capital of the German state of Saxony, during World War II. In four raids between 13 and 15 February 1945, 772 heavy bombers of the Roya ...
, the Nanking Massacre
The Nanjing Massacre (, ja, 南京大虐殺, Nankin Daigyakusatsu) or the Rape of Nanjing (formerly romanized as ''Nanking'') was the mass murder of Chinese civilians in Nanjing, the capital of the Republic of China, immediately after the Ba ...
as found with Japanese history textbook controversies
Japanese history textbook controversies involve controversial content in government-approved history textbooks used in the secondary education (junior high schools and high schools) of Japan. The controversies primarily concern the nationalist ri ...
, the Armenian genocide
The Armenian genocide was the systematic destruction of the Armenians in the Ottoman Empire, Armenian people and identity in the Ottoman Empire during World War I. Spearheaded by the ruling Committee of Union and Progress (CUP), it was ...
, the Tiananmen Square protests of 1989
The Tiananmen Square protests, known in Chinese as the June Fourth Incident (), were student-led demonstrations held in Tiananmen Square, Beijing during 1989. In what is known as the Tiananmen Square Massacre, or in Chinese the June Fourth ...
, and the Winter Soldier Investigation
The "Winter Soldier Investigation" was a media event sponsored by the Vietnam Veterans Against the War (VVAW) from January 31, 1971, to February 2, 1971. It was intended to publicize war crimes and atrocities by the United States Armed Forces ...
of the Vietnam War
The Vietnam War (also known by #Names, other names) was a conflict in Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia from 1 November 1955 to the fall of Saigon on 30 April 1975. It was the second of the Indochina Wars and was officially fought between North Vie ...
.
In the context of secondary school education, the way facts and history are presented greatly influences the interpretation of contemporary thought, opinion and socialization. One argument for censoring the type of information disseminated is based on the inappropriate quality of such material for the younger public. The use of the "inappropriate" distinction is in itself controversial, as it changed heavily. A Ballantine Books version of the book ''Fahrenheit 451
''Fahrenheit 451'' is a 1953 dystopian novel by American writer Ray Bradbury. Often regarded as one of his best works, ''Fahrenheit 451'' presents an American society where books have been personified and outlawed and "firemen" burn any that ar ...
'' which is the version used by most school classes contained approximately 75 separate edits, omissions, and changes from the original Bradbury manuscript.
In February 2006, a ''National Geographic
''National Geographic'' (formerly the ''National Geographic Magazine'', sometimes branded as NAT GEO) is a popular American monthly magazine published by National Geographic Partners. Known for its photojournalism, it is one of the most widely ...
'' cover was censored by the Nashravaran Journalistic Institute
Nashravaran Journalistic Institute is the Iranian government agency that handles censorship
Censorship is the suppression of speech, public communication, or other information. This may be done on the basis that such material is considered obj ...
. The offending cover was about the subject of love
Love encompasses a range of strong and positive emotional and mental states, from the most sublime virtue or good habit, the deepest Interpersonal relationship, interpersonal affection, to the simplest pleasure. An example of this range of ...
and a picture of an embracing couple was hidden beneath a white sticker.
Economic induced censorship
Economic induced censorship is a type of censorship enacted by economic markets to favor, and disregard, types of information. Economic induced censorship, is also caused, by market forces which privatize and establish commodification of certain information that is not accessible by the general public, primarily because of the cost associated with commodified information such as academic journals, industry reports and pay to use repositories.
The concept was illustrated as a censorship pyramid that was conceptualized by primarily Julian Assange
Julian Paul Assange ( ; Hawkins; born 3 July 1971) is an Australian editor, publisher, and activist who founded WikiLeaks in 2006. WikiLeaks came to international attention in 2010 when it published a series of leaks provided by U.S. Army inte ...
, along with Andy Müller-Maguhn
Andy Müller-Maguhn (born 3 October 1971) is a member of the German hacker association Chaos Computer Club (CCC). Having been a member since 1986, he was appointed as a spokesman for the club in 1990, and later served on its board until 2012. He ...
, Jacob Appelbaum
Jacob Appelbaum (born 1 April 1983) is an American independent journalist, computer security researcher, artist, and hacker. He studied at the Eindhoven University of Technology and was a core member of the Tor project, a free software network des ...
and Jérémie Zimmermann
Jérémie Zimmermann (born 1978) is a French computer science engineer co-founder of the Paris-based La Quadrature du Net, a citizen advocacy group defending fundamental freedoms online and co-founder of Hacking With Care, a "collective compose ...
, in the Cypherpunks (book)
''Cypherpunks: Freedom and the Future of the Internet'' is a 2012 book by Julian Assange, in discussion with Internet activists and cypherpunks Jacob Appelbaum, Andy Müller-Maguhn and Jérémie Zimmermann. Its primary topic is society's relations ...
.
Self-censorship
Self-censorship is the act of censoring or classifying one's own discourse. This is done out of fear of, or deference to, the sensibilities or preferences (actual or perceived) of others and without overt pressure from any specific party or institution of authority. Self-censorship is often practiced by film producer
A film producer is a person who oversees film production. Either employed by a production company or working independently, producers plan and coordinate various aspects of film production, such as selecting the script, coordinating writing, di ...
s, film director
A film director controls a film's artistic and dramatic aspects and visualizes the screenplay (or script) while guiding the film crew and actors in the fulfilment of that vision. The director has a key role in choosing the cast members, p ...
s, publisher
Publishing is the activity of making information, literature, music, software and other content available to the public for sale or for free. Traditionally, the term refers to the creation and distribution of printed works, such as books, newsp ...
s, news anchor
A news presenter – also known as a newsreader, newscaster (short for "news broadcaster"), anchorman or anchorwoman, news anchor or simply an anchor – is a person who presents news during a news program on TV, radio or the Internet. ...
s, journalist
A journalist is an individual that collects/gathers information in form of text, audio, or pictures, processes them into a news-worthy form, and disseminates it to the public. The act or process mainly done by the journalist is called journalism ...
s, musician
A musician is a person who composes, conducts, or performs music. According to the United States Employment Service, "musician" is a general term used to designate one who follows music as a profession. Musicians include songwriters who wri ...
s, and other kinds of author
An author is the writer of a book, article, play, mostly written work. A broader definition of the word "author" states:
"''An author is "the person who originated or gave existence to anything" and whose authorship determines responsibility f ...
s including individuals who use social media
Social media are interactive media technologies that facilitate the creation and sharing of information, ideas, interests, and other forms of expression through virtual communities and networks. While challenges to the definition of ''social medi ...
.
According to a Pew Research Center
The Pew Research Center is a nonpartisan American think tank (referring to itself as a "fact tank") based in Washington, D.C.
It provides information on social issues, public opinion, and demographic trends shaping the United States and the w ...
and the ''Columbia Journalism Review'' survey, "About one-quarter of the local and national journalists say they have purposely avoided newsworthy stories, while nearly as many acknowledge they have softened the tone of stories to benefit the interests of their news organizations. Fully four-in-ten (41%) admit they have engaged in either or both of these practices."
Threats to media freedom have shown a significant increase in Europe in recent years, according to a study published in April 2017 by the Council of Europe
The Council of Europe (CoE; french: Conseil de l'Europe, ) is an international organisation founded in the wake of World War II to uphold European Convention on Human Rights, human rights, democracy and the Law in Europe, rule of law in Europe. ...
.
This results in a fear of physical or psychological violence, and the ultimate result is self-censorship by journalists.
Copy, picture, and writer approval
Copy approval is the right to read and amend an article, usually an interview, before publication. Many publications refuse to give copy approval but it is increasingly becoming common practice when dealing with publicity anxious celebrities. Picture approval is the right given to an individual to choose which photos will be published and which will not. Robert Redford
Charles Robert Redford Jr. (born August 18, 1936) is an American actor and filmmaker. He is the List of awards and nominations received by Robert Redford, recipient of various accolades, including an Academy Awards, Academy Award from four nomi ...
is well known for insisting upon picture approval. Writer approval is when writers are chosen based on whether they will write flattering articles or not. Hollywood publicist Pat Kingsley is known for banning certain writers who wrote undesirably about one of her clients from interviewing any of her other clients.
Reverse censorship
Flooding the public, often through online social network
A social network is a social structure made up of a set of social actors (such as individuals or organizations), sets of dyadic ties, and other social interactions between actors. The social network perspective provides a set of methods for an ...
s, with false or misleading information is sometimes called "reverse censorship". American legal scholar Tim Wu
Timothy "Tim" Shiou-Ming Wu (born 1972) is a Taiwanese American legal scholar and official in the Biden Administration tasked with Technology and Competition policy. He was also a professor of law at Columbia University and a contributing opinio ...
has explained that this type of information control, sometimes by state actors, can "distort or drown out disfavored speech through the creation and dissemination of fake news
Fake news is false or misleading information presented as news. Fake news often has the aim of damaging the reputation of a person or entity, or making money through advertising revenue.Schlesinger, Robert (April 14, 2017)"Fake news in reality ...
, the payment of fake commentators, and the deployment of propaganda robots "\n\n\n\n\nThe robots exclusion standard, also known as the robots exclusion protocol or simply robots.txt, is a standard used by websites to indicate to visiting web crawlers and other web robots which portions of the site they are allowed to visi ...
."
By media
Books
Book censorship can be enacted at the national or sub-national level, and can carry legal penalties for their infraction. Books may also be challenged at a local, community level. As a result, books can be removed from schools or libraries, although these bans do not typically extend outside of that area.
Films
Aside from the usual justifications of pornography and obscenity
An obscenity is any utterance or act that strongly offends the prevalent morality of the time. It is derived from the Latin ''obscēnus'', ''obscaenus'', "boding ill; disgusting; indecent", of uncertain etymology. Such loaded language can be use ...
, some films are censored due to changing racial attitudes or political correctness
''Political correctness'' (adjectivally: ''politically correct''; commonly abbreviated ''PC'') is a term used to describe language, policies, or measures that are intended to avoid offense or disadvantage to members of particular groups in socie ...
in order to avoid ethnic stereotyping
An ethnic stereotype, racial stereotype or cultural stereotype involves part of a system of beliefs about typical characteristics of members of a given ethnic group, their status, societal and cultural norms. A national stereotype, or nation ...
and/or ethnic offense despite its historical or artistic value. One example is the still withdrawn "Censored Eleven
The Censored Eleven is a group of '' Looney Tunes'' and '' Merrie Melodies'' cartoons originally produced and released by Warner Bros. that were withheld from syndication in the United States by United Artists (UA) since 1968. UA owned the dis ...
" series of animated cartoons, which may have been innocent then, but are "incorrect" now.
Film censorship is carried out by various countries. Film censorship is achieved by censoring the producer or restricting a state citizen. For example, in China the film industry censors LGBT related films. Filmmakers must resort in finding funds within international investors such as the “Ford Foundations” and or produce through an independent film company.
Music
Music censorship has been implemented by states, religions, educational systems, families, retailers and lobbying groups – and in most cases they violate international conventions of human rights.
Maps
Censorship of maps is often employed for military purposes. For example, the technique was used in former East Germany
East Germany, officially the German Democratic Republic (GDR; german: Deutsche Demokratische Republik, , DDR, ), was a country that existed from its creation on 7 October 1949 until its dissolution on 3 October 1990. In these years the state ...
, especially for the areas near the border to West Germany
West Germany is the colloquial term used to indicate the Federal Republic of Germany (FRG; german: Bundesrepublik Deutschland , BRD) between its formation on 23 May 1949 and the German reunification through the accession of East Germany on 3 O ...
in order to make attempts of defection more difficult. Censorship of maps is also applied by Google Maps
Google Maps is a web mapping platform and consumer application offered by Google. It offers satellite imagery, aerial photography, street maps, 360° interactive panoramic views of streets ( Street View), real-time traffic conditions, and rou ...
, where certain areas are grayed out or blacked or areas are purposely left outdated with old imagery.
Art
Art is loved and feared because of its evocative power. Destroying or oppressing art can potentially justify its meaning even more.
British photographer and visual artist Graham Ovenden
Graham Stuart Ovenden (born 11 February 1943) is an English painter, Fine art photography, fine art photographer and writer.
Some of Ovenden's art has been investigated as possible child pornography by US and UK authorities and in 2009, he was ...
's photos and paintings were ordered to be destroyed by a London's magistrate court in 2015 for being "indecent" and their copies had been removed from the online Tate gallery
Tate is an institution that houses, in a network of four art galleries, the United Kingdom's national collection of British art, and international modern and contemporary art. It is not a government institution, but its main sponsor is the U ...
.
A 1980 Israeli law forbade banned artwork
A work of art, artwork, art piece, piece of art or art object is an artistic creation of aesthetic value. Except for "work of art", which may be used of any work regarded as art in its widest sense, including works from literature ...
composed of the four colours of the Palestinian flag
The flag of Palestine ( ar, علم فلسطين) is a tricolor of three equal horizontal stripes (black, white, and green from top to bottom) overlaid by a red triangle issuing from the hoist. This flag is derived from the Pan-Arab colors and ...
, and Palestinians were arrested for displaying such artwork or even for carrying sliced melons with the same pattern.
Moath al-Alwi is a Guantanamo Bay prisoner who creates model ships as an expression of art. Alwi does so with the few tools he has at his disposal such as dental floss and shampoo bottles, and he is also allowed to use a small pair of scissors with rounded edges. A few of Alwi's pieces are on display at John Jay College of Criminal Justice in New York. There are also other artworks on display at the College that were created by other inmates. The artwork that is being displayed might be the only way for some of the inmates to communicate with the outside. Recently things have changed though. The military has come up with a new policy that won't allow the artwork at Guantanamo Bay Military Prison to leave the prison. The art work created by Alwi and other prisoners is now government property and can be destroyed or disposed of in whatever way the government choose, making it no longer the artist's property.
Around 300 artists in Cuba are fighting for their artistic freedom due to new censorship rules Cuba's government has in place for artists. In December 2018, following the introduction of new rules that would ban music performances and artwork not authorized by the state, performance art
Performance art is an artwork or art exhibition created through actions executed by the artist or other participants. It may be witnessed live or through documentation, spontaneously developed or written, and is traditionally presented to a pu ...
ist Tania Bruguera
Tania Bruguera (born 1968 in Havana, Cuba) is an artist and activist who focuses on installation and performance art. She lives and works between New York City and Havana, and has participated in numerous international exhibitions. Her work is in ...
was detained upon arriving to Havana and released after four days.
An example of extreme state censorship was the Nazis requirements of using art as propaganda. Art was only allowed to be used as a political instrument to control people and failure to act in accordance with the censors was punishable by law, even fatal. The Degenerate Art Exhibition is a historical instance that's goal was to advertise Nazi values and slander others.
Internet
Internet censorship is control or suppression of the publishing or accessing of information on the Internet. It may be carried out by governments or by private organizations either at the behest of government or on their own initiative. Individuals and organizations may engage in self-censorship
Self-censorship is the act of censoring or classifying one's own discourse. This is done out of fear of, or deference to, the sensibilities or preferences (actual or perceived) of others and without overt pressure from any specific party or insti ...
on their own or due to intimidation and fear.
The issues associated with Internet censorship are similar to those for offline censorship of more traditional media. One difference is that national borders are more permeable online: residents of a country that bans certain information can find it on websites hosted outside the country. Thus censors must work to prevent access to information even though they lack physical or legal control over the websites themselves. This in turn requires the use of technical censorship methods that are unique to the Internet, such as site blocking and content filtering.[''Freedom of Connection, Freedom of Expression: The Changing Legal and Regulatory Ecology Shaping the Internet'']
Dutton, William H.; Dopatka, Anna; Law, Ginette; Nash, Victoria, ''Division for Freedom of Expression, Democracy and Peace'', United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO), Paris, 2011, 103 pp.,
Furthermore, the Domain Name System
The Domain Name System (DNS) is a hierarchical and distributed naming system for computers, services, and other resources in the Internet or other Internet Protocol (IP) networks. It associates various information with domain names assigned to ...
(DNS) a critical component of the Internet is dominated by centralized and few entities. The most widely used DNS root is administered by the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers
The Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN ) is an American multistakeholder group and nonprofit organization responsible for coordinating the maintenance and procedures of several databases related to the namespaces ...
(ICANN). As an administrator they have rights to shut down and seize domain name
A domain name is a string that identifies a realm of administrative autonomy, authority or control within the Internet. Domain names are often used to identify services provided through the Internet, such as websites, email services and more. As ...
s when they deem necessary to do so and at most times the direction is from governments. This has been the case with Wikileaks
WikiLeaks () is an international Nonprofit organization, non-profit organisation that published news leaks and classified media provided by anonymous Source (journalism), sources. Julian Assange, an Australian Internet activism, Internet acti ...
shutdowns and name seizure events such as the ones executed by the National Intellectual Property Rights Coordination Center
The National Intellectual Property Rights Coordination Center (NIPRCC) is a U.S. government center overseen by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, a component of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security. The NIPRCC coordinates the U.S. gov ...
(IPR Center) managed by the Homeland Security Investigations
The U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) is a federal law enforcement agency under the U.S. Department of Homeland Security. ICE's stated mission is to protect the United States from the cross-border crime and illegal immigration tha ...
(HSI). This makes it easy for internet censorship by authorities as they have control over what should or should not be on the Internet. Some activists and researchers have started opting for alternative DNS root
The Internet uses the Domain Name System (DNS) to associate numeric computer IP addresses with human-readable names. The top level of the domain name hierarchy, the DNS root, contains the top-level domains that appear as the suffixes of all Interne ...
s, though the Internet Architecture Board (IAB) does not support these DNS root providers.
Unless the censor has total control over all Internet-connected computers, such as in North Korea
North Korea, officially the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK), is a country in East Asia. It constitutes the northern half of the Korea, Korean Peninsula and shares borders with China and Russia to the north, at the Yalu River, Y ...
or Cuba
Cuba ( , ), officially the Republic of Cuba ( es, República de Cuba, links=no ), is an island country comprising the island of Cuba, as well as Isla de la Juventud and several minor archipelagos. Cuba is located where the northern Caribbea ...
, total censorship of information is very difficult or impossible to achieve due to the underlying distributed technology of the Internet. Pseudonymity
A pseudonym (; ) or alias () is a fictitious name that a person or group assumes for a particular purpose, which differs from their original or true name (orthonym). This also differs from a new name that entirely or legally replaces an individua ...
and data haven A data haven, like a corporate haven or tax haven, is a refuge for uninterrupted or unregulated data. Data havens are locations with legal environments that are friendly to the concept of a computer network freely holding data and even protecting ...
s (such as Freenet
Freenet is a peer-to-peer platform for censorship-resistant, anonymous communication. It uses a decentralized distributed data store to keep and deliver information, and has a suite of free software for publishing and communicating on the Web ...
) protect free speech
Freedom of speech is a principle that supports the freedom of an individual or a community to articulate their opinions and ideas without fear of retaliation, censorship, or legal sanction. The rights, right to freedom of expression has been ...
using technologies that guarantee material cannot be removed and prevents the identification of authors. Technologically savvy users can often find ways to access blocked content. Nevertheless, blocking remains an effective means of limiting access to sensitive information for most users when censors, such as those in China
China, officially the People's Republic of China (PRC), is a country in East Asia. It is the world's most populous country, with a population exceeding 1.4 billion, slightly ahead of India. China spans the equivalent of five time zones and ...
, are able to devote significant resources to building and maintaining a comprehensive censorship system.[
Views about the feasibility and effectiveness of Internet censorship have evolved in parallel with the development of the Internet and censorship technologies:
* A 1993 '']Time
Time is the continued sequence of existence and events that occurs in an apparently irreversible succession from the past, through the present, into the future. It is a component quantity of various measurements used to sequence events, to ...
'' magazine article quotes computer scientist John Gillmore, one of the founders of the Electronic Frontier Foundation
The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) is an international non-profit digital rights group based in San Francisco, California. The foundation was formed on 10 July 1990 by John Gilmore, John Perry Barlow and Mitch Kapor to promote Internet ci ...
, as saying "The Net interprets censorship as damage and routes around it."
* In November 2007, "Father of the Internet" Vint Cerf
Vinton Gray Cerf (; born June 23, 1943) is an American Internet pioneer and is recognized as one of " the fathers of the Internet", sharing this title with TCP/IP co-developer Bob Kahn. He has received honorary degrees and awards that include t ...
stated that he sees government control of the Internet failing because the Web is almost entirely privately owned.
* A report of research conducted in 2007 and published in 2009 by the Beckman Center for Internet & Society at Harvard University stated that: "We are confident that the ensorship circumventiontool developers will for the most part keep ahead of the governments' blocking efforts", but also that "...we believe that less than two percent of all filtered Internet users use circumvention tools".
* In contrast, a 2011 report by researchers at the Oxford Internet Institute
The Oxford Internet Institute (OII) is a multi-disciplinary department of social and computer science dedicated to the study of information, communication, and technology, and is part of the Social Sciences Division of the University of Oxford ...
published by UNESCO
The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization is a specialized agency of the United Nations (UN) aimed at promoting world peace and security through international cooperation in education, arts, sciences and culture. It ...
concludes "... the control of information on the Internet and Web is certainly feasible, and technological advances do not therefore guarantee greater freedom of speech."[
A BBC World Service poll of 27,973 adults in 26 countries, including 14,306 Internet users, was conducted between 30 November 2009 and 7 February 2010. The head of the polling organization felt, overall, that the poll showed that:
:Despite worries about privacy and fraud, people around the world see access to the internet as their fundamental right. They think the web is a force for good, and most don't want governments to regulate it.]["BBC Internet Poll: Detailed Findings"]
BBC World Service, 8 March 2010
The poll found that nearly four in five (78%) Internet users felt that the Internet had brought them greater freedom, that most Internet users (53%) felt that "the internet should never be regulated by any level of government anywhere", and almost four in five Internet users and non-users around the world felt that access to the Internet was a fundamental right (50% strongly agreed, 29% somewhat agreed, 9% somewhat disagreed, 6% strongly disagreed, and 6% gave no opinion).
Social media
The rising usages of social media in many nations has led to the emergence of citizens organizing protests through social media, sometimes called "Twitter Revolution
Twitter Revolution is a term used to refer to different revolutions and protests, most of which featured the use of the social networking site Twitter by protestors and demonstrators in order to communicate.
Events known as Twitter Revolution
* 2 ...
s". The most notable of these social media led protests were parts Arab Spring uprisings, starting in 2010. In response to the use of social media in these protests, the Tunisian government began a hack of Tunisian citizens' Facebook accounts, and reports arose of accounts being deleted.
Automated systems can be used to censor social media
Social media are interactive media technologies that facilitate the creation and sharing of information, ideas, interests, and other forms of expression through virtual communities and networks. While challenges to the definition of ''social medi ...
posts, and therefore limit what citizens can say online. This most notably occurs in China
China, officially the People's Republic of China (PRC), is a country in East Asia. It is the world's most populous country, with a population exceeding 1.4 billion, slightly ahead of India. China spans the equivalent of five time zones and ...
, where social media posts are automatically censored depending on content. In 2013, Harvard political science professor Gary King led a study to determine what caused social media posts to be censored and found that posts mentioning the government were not more or less likely to be deleted if they were supportive or critical of the government. Posts mentioning collective action were more likely to be deleted than those that had not mentioned collective action. Currently, social media censorship appears primarily as a way to restrict Internet users' ability to organize protests. For the Chinese government, seeing citizens unhappy with local governance is beneficial as state and national leaders can replace unpopular officials. King and his researchers were able to predict when certain officials would be removed based on the number of unfavorable social media posts.
Research has proved that criticism is tolerable on social media sites, therefore it is not censored unless it has a higher chance of collective action. It isn't important whether the criticism is supportive or unsupportive of the states' leaders, the main priority of censoring certain social media posts is to make sure that no big actions are being made due to something that was said on the internet. Posts that challenge the Party's political leading role in the Chinese government are more likely to be censored due to the challenges it poses to the Chinese Communist Party.
In December 2022 Elon Musk
Elon Reeve Musk ( ; born June 28, 1971) is a business magnate and investor. He is the founder, CEO and chief engineer of SpaceX; angel investor, CEO and product architect of Tesla, Inc.; owner and CEO of Twitter, Inc.; founder of The Bori ...
, owner and CEO of Twitter
Twitter is an online social media and social networking service owned and operated by American company Twitter, Inc., on which users post and interact with 280-character-long messages known as "tweets". Registered users can post, like, and ...
released internal documents from the social media microblogging site to journalists Matt Taibbi
Matthew Colin Taibbi (; born March 2, 1970) is an American author, journalist, and podcaster. He has reported on finance, media, politics, and sports. A former contributing editor for ''Rolling Stone'', he is an author of several books, co-host o ...
, Michael Shellenberger
Michael D. Shellenberger (born June 16, 1971) is an American author and former public relations professional whose writing has focused on the intersection of politics, the environment, climate change and nuclear power, as well as more recently on ...
and Bari Weiss
Bari Weiss (born March 25, 1984) is an American journalist, writer, and editor. She was an op-ed and book review editor at ''The Wall Street Journal'' (2013–2017) and an op-ed staff editor and writer on culture and politics at ''The New Yor ...
. The analysis of these files on Twitter, collectively called, the Twitter Files
The Twitter Files are a set of internal Twitter, Inc. documents such as screenshots, emails, and chat logs that were provided in December 2022 by CEO Elon Musk to journalists Matt Taibbi, Bari Weiss, Lee Fang, and authors Michael Shellenbe ...
, explored the content moderation and visibility filtering carried out in collaboration with the Federal Bureau of Investigation
The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) is the domestic intelligence and security service of the United States and its principal federal law enforcement agency. Operating under the jurisdiction of the United States Department of Justice, ...
on the Hunter Biden laptop controversy
In late 2020, a controversy emerged involving data from a laptop belonging to Hunter Biden that was abandoned at a Delaware computer shop. The data was subsequently shared with the FBI, Republican operatives, and later the press. Forensic anal ...
.
On the platform TikTok, certain hashtags have been categorized by the platform's code and determines how viewers can or cannot interact with the content or hashtag specifically. Some shadowbanned tags include: #acab, #GayArab, #gej due to their referencing of certain social movements and LGBTQ identity. As TikTok guidelines are becoming more localized around the world, some experts believe that this could result in more censorship than before.
Video games
Since the early 1980s, advocates of video games have emphasized their use as an expressive medium, arguing for their protection under the laws governing freedom of speech
Freedom of speech is a principle that supports the freedom of an individual or a community to articulate their opinions and ideas without fear of retaliation, censorship, or legal sanction. The right to freedom of expression has been recogni ...
and also as an educational tool. Detractors argue that video games are harmful
Harmful is a rock band from Frankfurt, Germany, founded in 1992 and frequently compared to early Helmet and more occasionally to Blackmail.sefor an overview of reviewer opinions The band has released eight albums to date, the first two and the la ...
and therefore should be subject to legislative oversight and restrictions. Many video games have certain elements removed or edited due to regional rating standards.
For example, in the Japanese and PAL Versions of '' No More Heroes'', blood splatter and gore is removed from the gameplay. Decapitation scenes are implied, but not shown. Scenes of missing body parts after having been cut off, are replaced with the same scene, but showing the body parts fully intact.
Impact of surveillance
Surveillance and censorship are different. Surveillance can be performed without censorship, but it is harder to engage in censorship without some form of surveillance. Even when surveillance does not lead directly to censorship, the widespread knowledge or belief that a person, their computer, or their use of the Internet is under surveillance can have a "chilling effect
In a legal context, a chilling effect is the inhibition or discouragement of the legitimate exercise of natural and legal rights by the threat of legal sanction. A chilling effect may be caused by legal actions such as the passing of a law, the ...
" and lead to self-censorship.
Implementation
The former Soviet Union maintained a particularly extensive program of state-imposed censorship. The main organ for official censorship in the Soviet Union was the ''Chief Agency for Protection of Military and State Secrets'' generally known as the ''Glavlit
Main Directorate for the Protection of State Secrets in the Press under the Council of Ministers of the USSR (russian: Главное управление по охране государственных тайн в печати при СМ С ...
'', its Russian acronym. The ''Glavlit'' handled censorship matters arising from domestic writings of just about any kindeven beer and vodka labels. ''Glavlit'' censorship personnel were present in every large Soviet publishing house or newspaper; the agency employed some 70,000 censors to review information before it was disseminated by publishing houses, editorial offices, and broadcasting studios. No mass medium escaped ''Glavlit''s control. All press agencies and radio and television stations had ''Glavlit'' representatives on their editorial staffs.
Sometimes, public knowledge of the existence of a specific document is subtly suppressed, a situation resembling censorship. The authorities taking such action will justify it by declaring the work to be "subversive
Subversion () refers to a process by which the values and principles of a system in place are contradicted or reversed in an attempt to transform the established social order and its structures of power, authority, hierarchy, and social norms. Sub ...
" or "inconvenient". An example is Michel Foucault
Paul-Michel Foucault (, ; ; 15 October 192625 June 1984) was a French philosopher, historian of ideas, writer, political activist, and literary critic. Foucault's theories primarily address the relationship between power and knowledge, and how ...
's 1978 text ''Sexual Morality and the Law'' (later republished as ''The Danger of Child Sexuality''), originally published as ''La loi de la pudeur'' [literally, "the law of decency"]. This work defends the decriminalization of statutory rape
In common law jurisdictions, statutory rape is nonforcible sexual activity in which one of the individuals is below the age of consent (the age required to legally consent to the behavior). Although it usually refers to adults engaging in sexual ...
and the abolition of age of consent laws.
When a publisher comes under pressure to suppress a book, but has already entered into a contract with the author, they will sometimes effectively censor the book by deliberately ordering a small print run and making minimal, if any, attempts to publicize it. This practice became known in the early 2000s as ''privishing'' (private publishing).
By country
Censorship by country collects information on censorship, internet censorship
Internet censorship is the legal control or suppression of what can be accessed, published, or viewed on the Internet. Censorship is most often applied to specific internet domains (such as Wikipedia.org) but exceptionally may extend to all Inte ...
, press freedom
Freedom of the press or freedom of the media is the fundamental principle that communication and expression through various media, including printed and electronic media, especially published materials, should be considered a right to be exerci ...
, freedom of speech
Freedom of speech is a principle that supports the freedom of an individual or a community to articulate their opinions and ideas without fear of retaliation, censorship, or legal sanction. The right to freedom of expression has been recogni ...
, and human rights
Human rights are Morality, moral principles or Social norm, normsJames Nickel, with assistance from Thomas Pogge, M.B.E. Smith, and Leif Wenar, 13 December 2013, Stanford Encyclopedia of PhilosophyHuman Rights Retrieved 14 August 2014 for ce ...
by country and presents it in a sortable table, together with links to articles with more information. In addition to countries, the table includes information on former countries, disputed countries, political sub-units within countries, and regional organizations.
Canada
Very little is formally censored in Canada, aside from "obscenity
An obscenity is any utterance or act that strongly offends the prevalent morality of the time. It is derived from the Latin ''obscēnus'', ''obscaenus'', "boding ill; disgusting; indecent", of uncertain etymology. Such loaded language can be use ...
" (as defined in the landmark criminal case of ''R v Butler
''R v Butler'', 9921 S.C.R. 452 is a leading Supreme Court of Canada decision on pornography and state censorship. In this case, the Court had to balance the right to freedom of expression under section 2 of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Fr ...
'') which is generally limited to pornography
Pornography (often shortened to porn or porno) is the portrayal of sexual subject matter for the exclusive purpose of sexual arousal. Primarily intended for adults, and child pornography
Child pornography (also called CP, child sexual abuse material, CSAM, child porn, or kiddie porn) is pornography that unlawfully exploits children for sexual stimulation. It may be produced with the direct involvement or sexual assault of a chi ...
depicting and/or advocating non-consensual sex, sexual violence, degradation, or dehumanization, in particular that which causes harm (as in ''R v Labaye
''R v Labaye'', 0053 S.C.R. 728, 2005 SCC 80, was a decision by the Supreme Court of Canada on criminal indecency. The decision upheld consensual group sex and swinging activities in a club and alleged bawdy-house as being consistent with person ...
''). Most films are simply subject to classification by the British Columbia Film Classification Office The British Columbia Film Classification Office, part of Consumer Protection BC (legally known as the Business Practices and Consumer Protection Authority) in the Canadian province of British Columbia, is responsible for rating and censoring films u ...
under the non-profit Crown corporation
A state-owned enterprise (SOE) is a government entity which is established or nationalised by the ''national government'' or ''provincial government'' by an executive order or an act of legislation in order to earn profit for the governmen ...
by the name of Consumer Protection BC
A consumer is a person or a group who intends to order, or uses purchased goods, products, or services primarily for personal, social, family, household and similar needs, who is not directly related to entrepreneurial or business activities. T ...
, whose classifications are officially used by the provinces of British Columbia
British Columbia (commonly abbreviated as BC) is the westernmost province of Canada, situated between the Pacific Ocean and the Rocky Mountains. It has a diverse geography, with rugged landscapes that include rocky coastlines, sandy beaches, ...
, Saskatchewan
Saskatchewan ( ; ) is a Provinces and territories of Canada, province in Western Canada, western Canada, bordered on the west by Alberta, on the north by the Northwest Territories, on the east by Manitoba, to the northeast by Nunavut, and on t ...
, Ontario
Ontario ( ; ) is one of the thirteen provinces and territories of Canada.Ontario is located in the geographic eastern half of Canada, but it has historically and politically been considered to be part of Central Canada. Located in Central Ca ...
, and Manitoba
Manitoba ( ) is a Provinces and territories of Canada, province of Canada at the Centre of Canada, longitudinal centre of the country. It is Canada's Population of Canada by province and territory, fifth-most populous province, with a population o ...
.
Cuba
Cuban media used to be operated under the supervision of the Communist Party's ''Department of Revolutionary Orientation'', which "develops and coordinates propaganda strategies". Connection to the Internet is restricted and censored.
China
The People's Republic of China
China, officially the People's Republic of China (PRC), is a country in East Asia. It is the world's most populous country, with a population exceeding 1.4 billion, slightly ahead of India. China spans the equivalent of five time zones and ...
employs sophisticated censorship mechanisms, referred to as the Golden Shield Project
The Golden Shield Project (), also named National Public Security Work Informational Project, is the Chinese nationwide network-security fundamental constructional project by the e-government of the People's Republic of China. This project in ...
, to monitor the internet. Popular search engines such as Baidu
Baidu, Inc. ( ; , meaning "hundred times") is a Chinese multinational technology company specializing in Internet-related services and products and artificial intelligence (AI), headquartered in Beijing's Haidian District. It is one of the la ...
also remove politically sensitive search results.
Eastern Bloc
Strict censorship existed in the Eastern Bloc. Throughout the bloc, the various ministries of culture held a tight rein on their writers. Cultural products there reflected the propaganda needs of the state. Party-approved censors exercised strict control in the early years. In the Stalinist period, even the weather forecasts were changed if they suggested that the sun might not shine on May Day
May Day is a European festival of ancient origins marking the beginning of summer, usually celebrated on 1 May, around halfway between the spring equinox and summer solstice. Festivities may also be held the night before, known as May Eve. T ...
. Under Nicolae Ceauşescu Nicolae may refer to:
* Nicolae (name), a Romanian name
* ''Nicolae'' (novel), a 1997 novel
See also
*Nicolai (disambiguation)
*Nicolao Nicolao is an Italian given name and a surname. It may refer to the following:
Given name
*Nicolao Civitali ...
in Romania
Romania ( ; ro, România ) is a country located at the crossroads of Central Europe, Central, Eastern Europe, Eastern, and Southeast Europe, Southeastern Europe. It borders Bulgaria to the south, Ukraine to the north, Hungary to the west, S ...
, weather reports were doctored so that the temperatures were not seen to rise above or fall below the levels which dictated that work must stop.
Possession and use of copying machines was tightly controlled in order to hinder production and distribution of samizdat
Samizdat (russian: самиздат, lit=self-publishing, links=no) was a form of dissident activity across the Eastern Bloc in which individuals reproduced censored and underground makeshift publications, often by hand, and passed the document ...
, illegal self-published
Self-publishing is the publication of media by its author at their own cost, without the involvement of a publisher. The term usually refers to written media, such as books and magazines, either as an ebook or as a physical copy using POD (pri ...
books and magazines. Possession of even a single samizdat manuscript such as a book by Andrei Sinyavsky
Andrei Donatovich Sinyavsky (russian: Андре́й Дона́тович Синя́вский; 8 October 1925 – 25 February 1997) was a Russian writer and Soviet dissident known as a defendant in the Sinyavsky–Daniel trial in 1965.
Sinyavsk ...
was a serious crime which might involve a visit from the KGB
The KGB (russian: links=no, lit=Committee for State Security, Комитет государственной безопасности (КГБ), a=ru-KGB.ogg, p=kəmʲɪˈtʲet ɡəsʊˈdarstvʲɪn(ː)əj bʲɪzɐˈpasnəsʲtʲɪ, Komitet gosud ...
. Another outlet for works which did not find favor with the authorities was publishing abroad.
France
Amid declining car sales in 2020, France banned a television ad by a Dutch bike company, saying the ad "unfairly discredited the automobile industry".
India
The Constitution of India
The Constitution of India (IAST: ) is the supreme law of India. The document lays down the framework that demarcates fundamental political code, structure, procedures, powers, and duties of government institutions and sets out fundamental ri ...
guarantees freedom of expression
Freedom of speech is a principle that supports the freedom of an individual or a community to articulate their opinions and ideas without fear of retaliation, censorship, or legal sanction. The right to freedom of expression has been recogni ...
, but places certain restrictions on content, with a view towards maintaining communal and religious harmony, given the history of communal tension in the nation. According to the Information Technology Rules 2011, objectionable content includes anything that "threatens the unity, integrity, defence, security or sovereignty of India, friendly relations with foreign states or public order".
Iran
Iraq
Iraq under Baathist
Ba'athism, also stylized as Baathism, (; ar, البعثية ' , from ' , meaning "renaissance" or "resurrection"Hans Wehr''Dictionary of Modern Written Arabic'' (4th ed.), page 80) is an Arab nationalist ideology which promotes the creation ...
Saddam Hussein
Saddam Hussein ( ; ar, صدام حسين, Ṣaddām Ḥusayn; 28 April 1937 – 30 December 2006) was an Iraqi politician who served as the fifth president of Iraq from 16 July 1979 until 9 April 2003. A leading member of the revolution ...
had much the same techniques of press censorship as did Romania under Nicolae Ceauşescu but with greater potential violence.
Japan
Under GHQ occupation after WW2, Japan has been through massive Censorship, purge
In history, religion and political science, a purge is a position removal or execution of people who are considered undesirable by those in power from a government, another organization, their team leaders, or society as a whole. A group undertak ...
, media blockout. Criticism of policy of Allies before war, Any general criticism of the allied High Command, all general criticisms of the Far East Military Tribunal, all references to the role played by the Allied High Command in drafting Japan's new constitution, direct and indirect references to censorship of publications, movies, newspapers and magazines
All criticisms of direct inquiries against the United States.
In the four years (September 1945-November 1949) since the CCD was active, 200 million mails, 136 million telegrams were opened, and telephones were tapped 800,000 times.
Since no criticism of the occupying forces was allowed for crimes such as the dropping of the atomic bomb, rape and robbery by US soldiers, a strict check was carried out. Those who get caught are put on a blacklist called the watch list, and the person and the organization to which they belong are investigated in detail, which makes it easier to dismiss or arrest the "disturbing molecule".
Malaysia
Under subsection 48(3) and (4) of the Penang
Penang ( ms, Pulau Pinang, is a Malaysian state located on the northwest coast of Peninsular Malaysia, by the Malacca Strait. It has two parts: Penang Island, where the capital city, George Town, is located, and Seberang Perai on the Malay ...
Islamic Religious Administration Enactment 2004, non-Muslims in Malaysia
Malaysia ( ; ) is a country in Southeast Asia. The federation, federal constitutional monarchy consists of States and federal territories of Malaysia, thirteen states and three federal territories, separated by the South China Sea into two r ...
are penalized for using the following words, or to write or publish them, in any form, version or translation in any language or for use in any publicity material in any medium:
''"Allah", "Firman Allah", "Ulama", "Hadith", "Ibadah", "Kaabah", "Qadhi'", "Illahi", "Wahyu", "Mubaligh", "Syariah", "Qiblat", "Haji", "Mufti", "Rasul", "Iman", "Dakwah", "Wali", "Fatwa", "Imam", "Nabi", "Sheikh", "Khutbah", "Tabligh", "Akhirat", "Azan", "Al Quran", "As Sunnah", "Auliya'", "Karamah", "False Moon God", "Syahadah", "Baitullah", "Musolla", "Zakat Fitrah", "Hajjah", "Taqwa" and "Soleh".''
North Korea
Serbia
According to Christian Mihr, executive director of Reporters Without Borders
Reporters Without Borders (RWB; french: Reporters sans frontières; RSF) is an international non-profit and non-governmental organization with the stated aim of safeguarding the right to freedom of information. It describes its advocacy as found ...
, "censorship in Serbia is neither direct nor transparent, but is easy to prove." According to Mihr there are numerous examples of censorship and self-censorship in Serbia [B92, 19/02/2015. Retrieved 12/10/2016](_blank)
/ref> According to Mihr, Serbian prime minister Aleksandar Vučić
Aleksandar Vučić ( sr-Cyrl, Александар Вучић, ; born 5 March 1970) is a Serbian politician serving as the president of Serbia since 2017, and as the president of the Serbian Progressive Party (SNS) since 2012.
Vučić served ...
has proved "very sensitive to criticism, even on critical questions," as was the case with Natalija Miletic, correspondent for Deutsche Welle Radio, who questioned him in Berlin about the media situation in Serbia and about allegations that some ministers in the Serbian government had plagiarized their diplomas, and who later received threats and offensive articles on the Serbian press.
Multiple news outlets have accused Vučić of anti-democratic strongman tendencies. In July 2014, journalists associations were concerned about the freedom of the media in Serbia, in which Vučić came under criticism.Die Tageszeitung
''Die Tageszeitung'' (, “The Daily Newspaper”), is counted as being one of modern Germany's most important newspapers and amongst the top seven. taz is stylized as ''die tageszeitung'' and commonly referred to as ''taz'', is a cooperative-own ...
''Die Pampigkeit des Herrn Vučić – In Serbien werden Internetseiten attackiert, Blogs gesperrt und Blogger festgenommen. Die Betroffenen berichteten wohl zu kritisch über die Regierung (German)'' – The stroppiness of Mr. Vučić – In Serbia being attacked websites, blocked blogs and arrested bloggers. The victims reported probably too critical about the government
/ref>[Die Tageszeitung]
"Serbische Regierung zensiert Medien – Ein Virus namens Zensur"
taz.de; accessed 9 December 2015.
In September 2015 five members of United States Congress (Edie Bernice Johnson, Carlos Curbelo, Scott Perry, Adam Kinzinger, and Zoe Lofgren
Susan Ellen "Zoe" Lofgren ( ; born December 21, 1947) is an American lawyer and politician serving as a U.S. representative from California. A member of the Democratic Party, Lofgren is in her 13th term in Congress, having been first elected in 1 ...
) have informed Vice President of the United States Joseph Biden that Aleksandar's brother, Andrej Vučić, is leading a group responsible for deteriorating media freedom in Serbia
Serbia (, ; Serbian language, Serbian: , , ), officially the Republic of Serbia (Serbian language, Serbian: , , ), is a landlocked country in Southeast Europe, Southeastern and Central Europe, situated at the crossroads of the Pannonian Bas ...
.
Singapore
In the Republic of Singapore
Singapore (), officially the Republic of Singapore, is a sovereign island country and city-state in maritime Southeast Asia. It lies about one degree of latitude () north of the equator, off the southern tip of the Malay Peninsula, borderi ...
, Section 33 of the Films Act originally banned the making, distribution and exhibition of "party political films", at pain of a fine not exceeding $100,000 or to imprisonment for a term not exceeding 2 years. The Act further defines a "party political film" as any film or video
:(a) which is an advertisement made by or on behalf of any political party in Singapore or any body whose objects relate wholly or mainly to politics in Singapore, or any branch of such party or body; or
:(b) which is made by any person and directed towards any political end in Singapore
In 2001, the short documentary called ''A Vision of Persistence'' on opposition politician J. B. Jeyaretnam
Joshua Benjamin Jeyaretnam ( ta, ஜோசுவா பெஞ்சமின் ஜெயரத்தினம்; 5 January 1926 – 30 September 2008), better known as J. B. Jeyaretnam or by his initials JBJ, was a Singaporean politician, law ...
was also banned for being a "party political film". The makers of the documentary, all lecturers at the Ngee Ann Polytechnic, later submitted written apologies and withdrew the documentary from being screened at the 2001 Singapore International Film Festival
The Singapore International Film Festival (SGIFF) (Chinese: 新加坡国际电影节) is the longest-running film festival in Singapore. Founded in 1987, the festival has a focus on showcasing international films and providing a global platform for ...
in April, having been told they could be charged in court. Another short documentary called ''Singapore Rebel'' by Martyn See
Martyn See is a Singaporean filmmaker and the former Executive Secretary of the now defunct Singaporeans for Democracy.
Life and career
Martyn See has been a feature editor for local Singapore films, some of which include ''Mee Pok Man'' (1994, ...
, which documented Singapore Democratic Party
The Singapore Democratic Party (abbreviation: SDP) is a politcal party in Singapore.
The party was founded on 6 August 1980 by Chiam See Tong. During the 1991 general election, Ling How Doong and Cheo Chai Chen won Bukit Gombak SMC and Nee ...
leader Dr Chee Soon Juan
Chee Soon Juan is a Singaporean politician, activist and former lecturer who has been serving as Secretary-General of the Singapore Democratic Party since 1993.
Prior to entering politics in 1992, upon Chiam See Tong's invitation to join the ...
's acts of civil disobedience, was banned from the 2005 Singapore International Film Festival
The Singapore International Film Festival (SGIFF) (Chinese: 新加坡国际电影节) is the longest-running film festival in Singapore. Founded in 1987, the festival has a focus on showcasing international films and providing a global platform for ...
on the same grounds and See is being investigated for possible violations of the Films Act.
This law, however, is often disregarded when such political films are made supporting the ruling People's Action Party
The People's Action Party (abbreviation: PAP) is a major conservative centre-right political party in Singapore and is one of the three contemporary political parties represented in Parliament, alongside the opposition Workers' Party (WP) and ...
(PAP). Channel NewsAsia
CNA (stylised as cna), which is an acronym derived from its previous name, Channel NewsAsia, is a Singaporean multinational news channel owned by the country's national public broadcaster Mediacorp. It broadcasts free-to-air domestically in Sin ...
's five-part documentary series on Singapore's PAP ministers in 2005, for example, was not considered a party political film.
Exceptions are also made when political films are made concerning political parties of other nations. Films such as Michael Moore
Michael Francis Moore (born April 23, 1954) is an American filmmaker, author and left-wing activist. His works frequently address the topics of globalization and capitalism.
Moore won the 2002 Academy Award for Best Documentary Feature for ' ...
's 2004 documentary ''Fahrenheit 911
''Fahrenheit 9/11'' is a 2004 American documentary film directed, written by, and starring filmmaker, director, political commentator and activist Michael Moore. The film takes a liberal, critical look at the presidency of George W. Bush, the ...
'' are thus allowed to screen regardless of the law.
Since March 2009, the Films Act has been amended to allow party political films as long as they were deemed factual and objective by a consultative committee. Some months later, this committee lifted the ban on Singapore Rebel.
Soviet Union
Independent journalism did not exist in the Soviet Union
The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, it was nominally a federal union of fifteen national ...
until Mikhail Gorbachev
Mikhail Sergeyevich Gorbachev (2 March 1931 – 30 August 2022) was a Soviet politician who served as the 8th and final leader of the Soviet Union from 1985 to dissolution of the Soviet Union, the country's dissolution in 1991. He served a ...
became its leader; all reporting was directed by the Communist Party
A communist party is a political party that seeks to realize the socio-economic goals of communism. The term ''communist party'' was popularized by the title of ''The Manifesto of the Communist Party'' (1848) by Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels. A ...
or related organizations. Pravda
''Pravda'' ( rus, Правда, p=ˈpravdə, a=Ru-правда.ogg, "Truth") is a Russian broadsheet newspaper, and was the official newspaper of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union, when it was one of the most influential papers in the co ...
, the predominant newspaper in the Soviet Union, had a monopoly. Foreign newspapers were available only if they were published by communist parties
A communist party is a political party that seeks to realize the socio-economic goals of communism. The term ''communist party'' was popularized by the title of ''The Manifesto of the Communist Party'' (1848) by Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels. A ...
sympathetic to the Soviet Union.
Spain
Turkey
Online access to all language versions of Wikipedia
Wikipedia is a multilingual free online encyclopedia written and maintained by a community of volunteers, known as Wikipedians, through open collaboration and using a wiki-based editing system. Wikipedia is the largest and most-read refer ...
was blocked in Turkey
Turkey ( tr, Türkiye ), officially the Republic of Türkiye ( tr, Türkiye Cumhuriyeti, links=no ), is a list of transcontinental countries, transcontinental country located mainly on the Anatolia, Anatolian Peninsula in Western Asia, with ...
on 29 April 2017 by Erdoğan's government.
United Kingdom
United States
In the United States, censorship occurs through books, film festivals, politics, and public schools. See banned books
This is an index of lists of banned books, which contain books that have been banned or censored by religious authority or government.
By country
* Book censorship in Canada
* Book censorship in China
* List of books banned in India
* Book ce ...
for more information. Additionally, critics of campaign finance reform in the United States
Campaign finance laws in the United States have been a contentious political issue since the early days of the union.
The most recent major federal law affecting campaign finance was the Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act (BCRA) of 2002, also know ...
say this reform imposes widespread restrictions on political speech.
Uruguay
In 1973, a military coup took power in Uruguay, and the State practiced censorship. For example, writer Eduardo Galeano
Eduardo Hughes Galeano (; 3 September 1940 – 13 April 2015) was a Uruguayan journalist, writer and novelist considered, among other things, "global soccer's pre-eminent man of letters" and "a literary giant of the Latin American left".
Galean ...
was imprisoned and later was forced to flee. His book Open Veins of Latin America
''Open Veins of Latin America: Five Centuries of the Pillage of a Continent'' (in es, Las venas abiertas de América Latina) is a book written by Uruguayan journalist, writer, and poet Eduardo Galeano, published in 1971, that consists of an analy ...
was banned by the right-wing military government, not only in Uruguay, but also in Chile and Argentina.
See also
Related articles
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* Cancel culture
Cancel culture, or rarely also known as call-out culture, is a phrase contemporary to the late 2010s and early 2020s used to refer to a form of ostracism in which someone is thrust out of social or professional circles—whether it be online, on ...
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* , an organisation campaigning for freedom of expression, produces an award-winning quarterly magazine of the same name
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* Streisand effect
Attempts to hide, remove, or censor information often have the unintended consequence of increasing awareness of that information via the Internet. This is called the Streisand effect. It is named after American singer and actress Barbra Streis ...
Freedoms
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References
Works cited
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Further reading
* Abbott, Randy.
A Critical Analysis of the Library-Related Literature Concerning Censorship in Public Libraries and Public School Libraries in the United States During the 1980s
" Project for degree of Education Specialist, University of South Florida
The University of South Florida (USF) is a public research university with its main campus located in Tampa, Florida, and other campuses in St. Petersburg and Sarasota. It is one of 12 members of the State University System of Florida. USF is ...
, December 1987.
* Biltereyst, Daniel, ed
''Silencing Cinema''
Palgrave/Macmillan, 2013.* Birmingham, Kevin, ''The Most Dangerous Book: The Battle for James Joyce's Ulysses'', London (Head of Zeus Ltd), 2014,
* Burress, Lee.
Battle of the Books
'. Metuchen, NJ: The Scarecrow Press, 1989.
* Butler, Judith, "Excitable Speech: A Politics of the Performative"(1997).
* Darnton, Robert,
* Demm, Eberhard. ''Censorship and Propaganda in World War I: A Comprehensive History'' (Bloomsbury Academic, 2019
online review
* Foucault, Michel, edited by Lawrence D. Kritzman. ''Philosophy, Culture: Interviews and Other Writings 1977–1984'' (New York/London: 1988, Routledge, ) (The text ''Sexual Morality and the Law'' is Chapter 16 of the book).
* Gilbert, Nora
''Better Left Unsaid: Victorian Novels, Hays Code Films, and the Benefits of Censorship''
Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 2013.
* Hoffman, Frank
''Intellectual Freedom and Censorship''
Metuchen, NJ: The Scarecrow Press, 1989.
* Mathiesen, Kay
Censorship and Access to Information
Handbook of Information and Computer Ethics'', Kenneth E. Himma, Herman T. Tavani, eds., John Wiley and Sons, New York, 2008
* National Coalition against Censorship (NCAC). "Books on Trial: A Survey of Recent Cases." January 1985.
* Parker, Alison M. (1997)
''Purifying America: Women, Cultural Reform, and Pro-Censorship Activism, 1873–1933''
University of Illinois Press.
* Ringmar, Eri
''A Blogger's Manifesto: Free Speech and Censorship in the Age of the Internet''
(London: Anthem Press, 2007)
* Terry, John David II. "Censorship: Post Pico." In ''School Law Update, 1986'', edited by Thomas N. Jones and Darel P. Semler.
*
* Silber, Radomír. ''Partisan Media and Modern Censorship: Media Influence On Czech Political Partisanship and the Media's Creation of Limits to Public Opposition and Control of Exercising Power in the Czech Republic in the 1990s''. First edition. Brno: Tribun EU, 2017. 86 stran. Librix.eu. .
* Silber, Radomír. (2018) On Modern Censorship in Public Service Broadcasting. ''Cultural and Religious Studies, Volume 3'', 2018, .
* Wittern-Keller, Laura
''Freedom of the Screen: Legal Challenges to State Film Censorship, 1915–1981''
University Press of Kentucky 2008
{{Authority control
Historical negationism
Propaganda techniques