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Hugo Chavez, Socialism in South America

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Tryphena Absent

09:46 / 01.06.07

Difficult to get het up about someone shutting a station down when the nation that gets most het up about freedom of speech is imprisoning people without trial in a huge fucking internment camp.

All Acting Regiment

11:20 / 02.06.07

Indeed, and when we do get het up about a dodgy government shutting a TV station down it tends to be not so much the shutting-down that's the bad thing so much as the ridiculous reasons given/fact that no good reason exists. Whereas in this case the station is to all intents and purposes a US propaganda plant. And of course, the station is not actually being shut down.

Our Lady Has Left the Building

05:55 / 03.06.07

However there is also a widely- recognized codicil that any intentional triggering of Godwin's Law in order to invoke its thread-ending effects will be unsuccessful.

Tryphena Absent

08:07 / 03.06.07

And of course when a station calls for a military coup against the democratically elected government in a politically unstable country the government really should do something about it so that people don't die.

Shiny: Well Over Thirty

08:19 / 03.06.07

Also is the whole freedom of speach thing supposed to really be about the freedom of a media controlled by multimillion dollar big business to saturate a society with very partisan information? I'd certainly look on reports of large individuals being locked up or worse for expressing anti-Chavez opinions in public differently from how I look upon a viciously right wing media outlet being shut down.

Of course a genuinely independant media is a very useful thing in any free, democratic society - but can anyone actually think of anywhere in the world where the bulk of the media is actually y'know independant, as opposed to being largely controlled by either the state or big business or a combination of the two?

All Acting Regiment

12:54 / 03.06.07

Exactly.

Our Lady Has Left the Building

13:31 / 03.06.07

You know, with this obviously massively partisan media you all keep talking about, it's amazing George Bush's approval ratings are so low. I'm also seeing what people like David Aaronovitch and Christopher Hitchens (p-tup!) talk about when they go on about how Lefties used to be apologists for Castro.

ONLY NICE THINGS

15:02 / 03.06.07

I think that's the Spanish Godwin, Lady - in essence "If you hate freedom so much, why don't you just go to Cuba?".

So, question - how do the US government-appointed regulartory bodies, let's say, police the allocation of licenses to television stations - network, I assume, since the Caracas television channel mentioned above is still able to broadcast on cable and by web? And, further, how do Chavez' comments about Globovision differ from comments by the Bush administration about responsible reporting in the wake of 9/11, Enduring Freedom &c. Is it because Chavez has demonstrated a willingness to act extralegally to silence critical media? If so, how?

Tom Paine's Bones

18:54 / 03.06.07

Whereas in this case the station is to all intents and purposes a US propaganda plant.

And I think it's valid to say that the US government has declared itself an enemy of Chavez, so we are talking about a media outlet that has an agenda that makes it directly opposed to the democratically elected government of Venezuela.

An interesting analogy here is the previous UK broadcasting restrictions on Sinn Fein. Isn't it the case that the US is at least as much of a threat to Venezuela as the IRA were to the UK, and probably a greater one?

sleazenation

20:24 / 03.06.07

I'm not sure the comparison holds much water on several important grounds, not least the fact that the IRA was an organisation rather than a country.

Tom Paine's Bones

22:26 / 03.06.07

But the same could be said of the television channel in question, surely?

sleazenation

22:38 / 03.06.07

I'm not sure I follow you.

ONLY NICE THINGS

23:41 / 03.06.07

But the same could be said of the television channel in question, surely?

I think I see where the confusion arises. TPB was comparing the IRA to the US, and Sinn Fein to the television channel:

An interesting analogy here is the previous UK broadcasting restrictions on Sinn Fein. Isn't it the case that the US is at least as much of a threat to Venezuela as the IRA were to the UK, and probably a greater one?

So, the television channnel being shut down is equivalent to Sinn Fein having broadcast restrictions, because the television channel was an arm of US policy, as Sinn Fein is an arm of IRA policy.

It's an awfully inapt comparison,however, which I think fails to cohere on so many levels that it might be best to abandon it altogether now rather than pursue it.

Tryphena Absent

09:06 / 04.06.07

*ahem* And of course, the station is not actually being shut down

Tryphena Absent

09:14 / 04.06.07

This article explains what has technically happened...

Police stop protest as anti-Chávez TV channel taken off air

Radio Caracas Television, the country's "oldest and most popular" private channel, hosted an emotional farewell to viewers and depicted its imminent demise as a political watershed. "This marks a turn toward totalitarianism," said its director, Marcel Granier.

The government ridiculed the notion and said it was exercising its legal right not to renew the concession of a channel which had "polluted" the airwaves with anti-democratic coup-mongering as well as sleazy soap operas.

"That television station became a threat to the country so I decided not to renew the licence because it's my responsibility," Mr Chávez said in a speech on Saturday

ONLY NICE THINGS

09:26 / 04.06.07

*ahem* And of course, the station is not actually being shut down

Moral of the story - don't post at 2am...

sleazenation

17:52 / 04.06.07

There's an interesting article on the closure of RCTV here (its from the Guardian's Media section and registration is required).

Outside of that - there is probably a good thread to be had here on the subject of media ownership and the restrictions that various countiries (and various democracies) place on media ownership should people be interested...

Shiny: Well Over Thirty

18:17 / 04.06.07

Outside of that - there is probably a good thread to be had here on the subject of media ownership and the restrictions that various countiries (and various democracies) place on media ownership should people be interested...

I'd probably post to such a thread - there was more I was thinking of posting on the issue, but I realized it had very little to do with Venezuela and as such would probably be threadrot.

All Acting Regiment

07:41 / 05.06.07

Another interesting thread might be about how the right/authority can hijack notions of liberty, free speech etc. We've had a thread about the "PC gone mad" platitude, have we had one about the Danish cartoons? Any theory? I ask because the search isn't giving.

Tsuga

08:46 / 05.06.07

Here's one about the cartoons.

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