Live A Lives English localization has come under fire, as yet another Square Enix title is being accused of censorship and poor translation.

Source: Live A Live (2022), Nintendo

RELATED: Eidos Montral Founder Describes Management Of Square Enixs Western Studios As A Train Wreck In Slow Motion

Originally released in 1994, the SNES JRPG takes place across multiple eras, each with their own twists on gameplay. From the ancient past to the far-flung future, from feudal Japan to the wild west, a mysterious threat seems to transcend time and space. The game didnt have an official western launch until its 2022 remake, with English gameplay of the SNES original coming from fan-translated emulators.

Twitter profile@iuntue, an account dedicated to cataloging inaccurate translations and censorship in localization of Japanese games, shared their thoughts on Live A Live Remake. As with several prior Square Enix titles, liberties appear to have been taken, typically avoiding content that could be deemed sexist or offensive. This is despite a study this year proving sexualized content doesnt cause misogyny or body image issues.

It should be noted that while Square Enix both develops and publishes Live A Live in Japan, the games worldwide release was published by Nintendo. Even so, thanks to Square Enix own ethics department and aforementioned recent history, one must wonder which of the pair dictated these changes.

Source: Live A Live (2022), Nintendo

Starting with the Imperial China chapter, Earthen Heart Shifu (Xin Shan Quan Master in fan translations) playfully teases bandit Lei Kugo over her temper. It could be argued he is either evoking the trope of a much older man either making flirtatious comments or testing her resolve to keep her temper; a flaw Lei eventually overcomes in the story as she becomes Shifus student.

In the English version however, Shifu doesnt outright tell her to keep her calm. Instead he reassures her that he wont forget her name, praises it, and cautions her to avoid the arrogance that led to him so easily halting her attempted mugging.

Japanese

Earthen Heart Shifu: All right, all right, no need to get so angry. Youre letting your pretty face go to waste.

English

Earthen Heart Shifu: You may rest assured that I will not [forget your name]. It is a good, strong name, worthy of pride. But pride will lead you astray if you let it. As it did not so long ago.

Source: @iuntue, Twitter

Moving to the Wild West, the Mariachi band appears to have lost their Mexican accents at first. @iuntue highlights how one band member greets you with A-amigo! in Japanese, but G-greetings, my friend! in English.

Source: @iuntue, Twitter

However, the English version does feature the band members speaking and singing in Mexican, with their words translated into English in brackets. They also use Spanish words when addressing the player in English, such as vaquero and pistolero, and dubbed lines spoken with a Mexican accent.

One also inquires, Tequila! Yes, tequila! Thats what you need, yes? which could be assumed to be a stereotypical Mexican drink. As such, if there was an attempt to downplay Mexican stereotypes, the only change made would be ditching the Spanish/Mexican word for friend.

Source: Live A Live (2022), Nintendo

A later scene also sees an outlaw harassing Sundown for sitting in his spot, has his advances rejected by Annie, and then hurls a child into Sundown who remained still up until that point. Pretending to make amends, the outlaw mockingly offers to buy Sundown a glass of milk, alluding to his perceived delicate nature.

As Sundown rejects the milk, the outlaw mocks Sundown in the same manner in English and Japanese. Sundown can then either remain silent or respond. In Japanese his response is curt, arguably fitting someone slow to anger, or wanting to avoid trouble and about to be pushed too far. In English its more of a quip, and almost looking for trouble.

Japanese

Outlaw: Or do you like it when the milk doesnt come from mamas titty? (Machine Translation: DeepL)

Sundown: Get lost.

English

Outlaw: Lemme guess: its not that you hate milk, but that you cant stomach it less its fresh from your mothers tits!

Sundown: Your mothers, maybe.

Source: @iuntue, Twitter

Players also have the option to swipe clothes from Annies wardrobe. In the original 1994 version at least, based on the English fan translation players can find Annies Nighty. In the 2022 English version, this is Annies Diary.

She still acts with disgust over the player obtaining it, and showing it to her has Annie responding Hey! This aint no library! Youre on thin ice, you two! However, as it was a nighty, players are able to equip the diary to the torso armor slot.

It could be argued that the censored version still works, as tucking a book under your shirt or jacket so its just in front of your heart is a trope that would fit in the wild west setting. Even so, it cant hide the fact it offers very little defense, much like a sheer nightgown. This is also not the only time a piece of inappropriate gear was renamed.

Source: Live A Live (2022), Nintendo

RELATED: Square Enix Heavily Censors Sexualized Artwork From Various Series For English Release Of Manga UP! App

In the original 1994 release, during the Near Future chapter, Watanabe can help the player obtain Taekos Panties, but not before several failed attempts including his own boxers. In the localized version of the 2022 remake his initial offer is Watanabes pocket lint (originally Watanabes Boxers). In other instances outside the home, Watanabes Boxers is changed to Watanabes Badge.

The reason for this change is because Akira is attempting to steal Taekos pocket money. Players are given Taekos Pouch (Taekos Jeans), Taekos Picture (Takekos Stockings), Taekos furious fist (Taekos Punch, with a notably softer sounding tap when Akira uses it on Watanabe), and finally Taekos Secret Stash (Taekos Panties).

@Iuntuenotes that this change is also reflected in the Japanese version, at least with the underwear being changed to money; specifically, Taekos Secret Savings via machine translation on DeepL. Again, these items may be equipped to certain armor slots despite their new titles.

Source: @iuntue, Twitter

Another point of contention among fans was the fact that, as detailed by Twitter user @KingOfPrinnies, this change makes the scene slightly out of character for Akira.

Now that Ive hit the Near Future chapter in Live A Live, I think Ive found my 2nd issue with the official translation, the userbegan (his first issue mentioned later in this article). The original lets Akira have Watanabe try to steal Taekos underwear, but thats been changed to have him steal money. Which, morally somehow seems worse.

Source: @KingofPrinnies, Twitter

Like, stealing the underwear of the woman who raised you since you became an orphan has some implications if you think about it, but like, now youre stealing the money shes been saving up. Like, dude, maybe that money was for THE ORPHANAGE YOU LIVE IN, @KingofPrinnies reasons. Dk move.

Source: @KingofPrinnies, Twitter

NPC Kazu also states Yukis so mean! She keeps calling me Sir Farts-a-Lot! But it wasnt me! In the original Japanese, Kazu states Yuki called me a pervert!

One more scene in the near future has Lawless, a cool and collected biker who Akira looks up to, offering slightly different dialogue. As he pilots a mecha with his dying breath, he reveals the truth about his past, and how he was responsible for something terrible in Akiras life.

His girlfriend Taeko interrupts, saying hes in no condition to keep piloting the mecha and needs to rest @iuntue shows how in both languages Lawless answers about doing the right thing to make amends, but in Japanese was censored, likely to prevent accusations of misogyny.

Source: Live A Live (2022), Nintendo

Japanese:

Lawless: Its not a womans place to but in When a man is setting things Straight

English:

Lawless: Sometimes youve gotta own up to your mistakes Consequences be damned. Am I Am I right?

@iuntue also notes that even the fan-translation wasnt accurate, as they went with Women always get in the way Right?

Source: @iuntue, Twitter

One final line comes from the Pre-History chapter, which is almost entirely devoid of text. While its amusing to think English localizers may have bungled a chapter with only one word of dialogue, there are menus, equipment, and skills found in this chapter.

At the end of Prehistory, @GeneKanichen explains, Pogo fks the girl and creates spoken language by saying LOOOOOOOVE!!! (Ai in Japanese). The scene is fairly suggestive, as Pogo is seen walking into a cave with a girl, and despite being comic relief ties into Live A Lives themes of humanity, love, hatred, and keeping hope for better things. The new game leaves it as AIIIIIIIIEEEE.

@LunarArchivist shares the fan-translation and official 2022 English versions side by side, much to their disgust. Jesus Christ.

Source: @LunarArchivist Twitter, @GeneKaninchen Twitter

Note: Spoilers for Live A Live from here.

In the games final chapter, @iuntue justifies that The localization kinda explains Aieee! if you pick Pogo at the end. While Pogo screams Aieee! again, Oersted understands this as him attempting to say love in Japanese. In English, he merely takes the cave-mans wild caterwauling as being passionate, and reminding him of love.

Japanese:

Pogo: Ai~~~!

Oersted: A Aika (Love)

English:

Pogo: Aieee!

Oersted: Such passion. Nay. Tis love.

Source: @iuntue, Twitter

What do you think of Live A Lives localization? Let us know on social media and in the comments below.

NEXT: Interview: Fan And Professional Translators Speak Out On Western Localization Issues And The Current State Of The English Manga Industry

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English Localization Of Square Enix's 'Live A Live' Found To Be Riddled With Poor Translation And Censorship - Bounding Into Comics

With the U.K.'s Conservative Party closing in on deciding who will inherit the mess left by Boris Johnson's tenure as prime minister, that country's governing apparatus will soon get back to the important business of intruding into people's lives.

At the top of the to-do list is the long-coming Online Safety Bill which, as has become traditional for legislation, does nothing that its title suggests. In fact, those who offend the government with their online speech or efforts to protect privacy may soon be a lot less safe.

"If the Online Safety Bill passes, the U.K. government will be able to directly silence user speech, and even imprison those who publish messages that it doesn't like," the Electronic Frontier Foundation's (EFF) Joe Mullin cautioned last week. "The bill empowers the UK's Office of Communications (OFCOM) to levy heavy fines or even block access to sites that offend people. We said last year that those powers raise serious concerns about freedom of expression. Since then, the bill has been amended, and it's gotten worse."

The Online Safety Bill is sold as a measure to protect children from predators and pornography, society from terrorists, and the public from all sorts of vaguely defined "harmful" content that might offend sensibilities, but it takes on that enormous task in an inevitably broad way. Mullin is far from the first civil liberties advocate to warn of the dangers inherent in allowing the British government's regulatory Office of Communication, commonly called Ofcom, sweeping powers over people's use of the internet.

"There are many reasons to be concerned about the #OnlineSafetyBill, the latest manifestation of which has just been launched, to a mixture of fanfares and fury," Paul Bernal, a lecturer at the University of East Anglia Law School, warned in March. "The massive attacks on privacy (including an awful general monitoring requirement) and freedom of speech (most directly through the highly contentious 'legal but harmful' concept) are just the starting point. The likely use of the 'duty of care' demanded of online service providers to limit or even ban both encryption and anonymity, thereby making all of us lessand in particular childrenless safe and less free is another. The political control of censorship via Ofcom is in some ways even worseas is the near certain inability of Ofcom to do the gargantuan tasks being required of itand that's not even starting on the mammoth and costly bureaucratic burdens being foisted on people operating online services."

That's a lot to worry about packed into a few words. But that's because the Online Safety Bill takes on a vast challenge in trying to make the internet "safe" from a vast array of dangers real, potential, and imaginary. Bernal attributes the overreach to lawmakers' obsessive concern with the online world's flaws. He likens it to a fixation with warts on a human face "and a desire to eradicate them with the strongest of caustic medicine, regardless of the damage to the face itself."

Bernal may be excessively charitable in attributing this massive piece of legislation to an honest misunderstanding of the online world. In June, Jacob Mchangama, founder of the Danish think tank Justitia, noted that the Online Safety Bill is part of a wave of legislation around the world that seeks to control the internet, including the European Union's recently adopted Digital Services Act.

"These regulatory efforts follow in the footsteps of the German Network Enforcement Act of 2017 and oblige online platforms to remove illegal content, including categories such as hate speech and glorification of terrorism, or risk huge fines," Mchangama wrote. "However, in liberal democracies committed to both equality and free expression, this approach raises a number of questions and dilemmas. Moreover, current hate speech laws have already caused collateral damage to political speech and protests in Europe. Further restrictions risk significantly suffocating pluralism and open debatethe flow of vital oxygen without which democracies cannot thrive."

Notably, the U.K. isn't exactly short of censorship powers even before adopting the Online Safety Bill. Earlier this year, Reason's Scott Shackford highlighted the case of Joseph Kelly of Glasgow, who was criminally convicted for mocking the death of 100-year-old Captain Sir Tom Moore, a military veteran and high-profile fundraiser for the National Health Service. In the United States, under the protections of the First Amendment, such behavior would have earned criticism. In Britain, that drunken tweet brought prosecution and community service in lieu of jail time.

Yet, British lawmakers think they have insufficient power to punish people on the internet.

Like the German Network Enforcement Act (widely known as NetzDG), the Online Safety Bill would offload much of the enforcement burden to social media companies and online services. Under that approach, government bureaucrats slap private companies with stiff fines if they fail to intervene to the government's satisfaction. The EFF's Mullin points out that the bill grants exceptions for "recognized news publishers" and other established media; smaller operators, then, are at the greatest risk of scrutiny and penalties if they guess wrong about officials' opinions of what content promotes terrorism, child abuse, or "psychological harm." That creates an incentive to muzzle more rather than less.

"The Network Enforcement law and its imitators create big incentives for social media companies to overregulate online speech and risk pushing extremists towards platforms that are even harder to survey," Justitia's Mchangama observed in 2020.

"When governments around the world pressure websites to quickly remove content they deem 'terrorist,' it results in censorship," Mullin adds. "The first victims of this type of censorship are usually human rights groups seeking to document abuses and war."

At least for now, the First Amendment shields Americans from similar attempts to control online activity. But North America as a whole isn't entirely immune. When the Online Safety Bill was first introduced last year, Canada's ruling Liberals proposed a similar measure. It died as the government called a general election, which the ruling party (barely) won. The government threatened to reintroduce the legislation, but that plan has been delayed by the inability of experts to agree on what should be regulated and how. Some members of the panel seem concerned about intruding on freedom, while others want private communications controlled, not just public postings.

"The advisory panel tasked with making recommendations for Canada's pending legislation on online safety has failed to come to an agreement on how online harms should be defined, and whether dangerous content should be scrubbed from the internet altogether," the Toronto Star reported July 9.

But an inability to define harmful speech and the legitimate boundaries of regulation didn't stop German and EU lawmakers, and it's not really slowing legislators in the U.K. Canadians are well-advised to look to Britain and Europe to see where their country is likely to go in terms of online government intrusion. The U.K.'s Parliament is expected to resume consideration of the Online Safety Bill this fall. If the measure becomes law, as seems likely, Britons online will be a little less safe.

See the original post:

U.K.'s Online Censorship Bill Causes More Harm Than It Prevents - Reason

The World Economic Forum (WEF) proposed a new way of censoring online content that requires a small group of experts to train artificial intelligence on identifying misinformation and abusive content.

The WEF published an article Wednesday outlining a plan to overcome frequent instances of child abuse, extremism, disinformation, hate speech and fraud online, which the organization said cannot be handled by human trust and safety teams, according to ActiveFence Trusty & Safety Vice President Inbal Goldberger, who authored the article. Instead, the WEF proposed an AI-driven method of moderating online content, where subject matter experts provide training sets to the AI so it can learn to recognize and flag or restrict content that human moderators would deem dangerous.

Supplementing this smarter automated detection with human expertise to review edge cases and identify false positives and negatives and then feeding those findings back into training sets will allow us to create AI with human intelligence baked in, Goldberger stated.

In other words, trust and safety teams can help the AI with anomalous cases, allowing it to detect nuances in content that a purely automated system might otherwise miss or misinterpret, according to Goldberger.

A human moderator who is an expert in European white supremacy wont necessarily be able to recognize harmful content in India or misinformation narratives in Kenya, she explained. As time goes on and the AI practices with more learning sets, it begins to identify the kinds of content moderating teams would find offensive, reaching near-perfect detection at a massive scale,

Goldberger said the system would protect against increasingly advanced actors misusing platforms in unique ways.

Trust and safety teams at online media platforms, such as Facebook and Twitter, bring a nuanced comprehension of disinformation campaigns that they apply to content moderation, said Goldberger.

That includes working with government organizations to filter content communicating a narrative about COVID-19, for example. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention advised Big Tech companies on what types of content to label as misinformation on their sites.

Social media companies have also targeted conservative content, including posts that negatively portray abortion and transgender activism, or contradict the mainstream understanding of climate change, by either labeling them as misinformation or blocking them entirely.

The WEF document did not specify how members of the AI training team would be decided, how they would be held accountable or whether countries could exercise controls over the AI.

Elite business executives who participate in WEF gatherings have a track record of proposals that expand corporate control over peoples lives. At the latest WEF annual summit, in March, the head of the Chinese multinational technology company Alibaba Group boasted of a system for monitoring individual carbon footprints derived from eating, travel and similar behaviors.

The future is built by us, by a powerful community such as you here in this room, WEF founder and chairman Klaus Schwab told an audience of more than 2,500 global business and political elites.

The WEF did not immediately respond to the Daily Caller News Foundations request for comment.

Content created by The Daily Caller News Foundation is available without charge to any eligible news publisher that can provide a large audience. For licensing opportunities of our original content, please contact licensing@dailycallernewsfoundation.org.

Link:

World Economic Forum Wants To Use AI To Automatically Censor Speech On The Internet - Daily Caller

Charita Goshay wrote one of her usual insightful articles in The Repository on July 24about the proposed "divisive subjects bill" ("Ohios divisive subjects bill a dangerous drift toward censorship"). She outlined rightful concerns that the bill would stifle the horrid parts of our history and would lead to censorship.

Based on the framework she detailed in her article, I don't see incompatibility between teaching history and eliminating hate in the curriculum. The history of slavery should be taught. Part of that lesson would be the justification used by slaveholders to practice slavery. The only reason for exposure to that rationale for slavery would be to expose how terribly wrong it was, not to defend it. End of the history lesson.

If the curriculum were then to go on to promote the idea that because some whites owned slaves all white people are oppressors, that would be prohibited, according to Charita's outline. It should be prohibited as being terribly wrong and terribly divisive.

As for censorship, it's here. Many news media and social media outlets already filter, slant, or ignore items they don't wish to feature. Recently, President Biden wanted to establish the Disinformation Governance Board. It had a narrow purpose, but many things with a narrow, well-intentioned purpose morph into something ghastly. Who knows where that would have gone? Fortunately, the effort has been paused. Censorship has no place here, but it is becoming more commonplace.

Donald J. Groom, Plain Township

Continue reading here:

Letter to the editor: Don't filter history or news; that's censorship - Canton Repository

A

ctivist and debut novelist Florence Given says she doesnt think young authors have to self-censor when creating fiction, despite the fears of literary grandees such as Anthony Horowitz.

Alex Rider creator Horowitz said this week that writers are running scared of creating characters who are a different gender or race than themselves for fear of criticism online, calling the trend worrying and saddening. Nobel prize winner Kazuo Ishiguro has raised similar concerns.

Speaking at the launch of her novel Girl Crush in Kings Cross, Given said she felt able to write anything. I like to be as expressive as I am in my work as possible. I hate the idea of self-censorship she said.

Given did qualify that writing based on her own lived experience was likely to have more depth than lives she knows less about. If I was to write a protagonist who was a black disabled woman, I dont think that would be very interesting she said. But she said that the whole point of fiction is to escape reality and to feel empathy, and people should be able to both write and read outside of their personal experiences.

The writer, who rose to fame after sharing feminist illustrations on Instagram, did admit she is has been sharing less with her 600,000 followers recently. I am definitely leaning more into privacy and I really like it that way she said.

However, she was adamant that this move towards privacy is not motivated by fear of being cancelled. Its a strange thing to have lots of people witnessing your evolution, but its not going to stop me from doing it. [My image] is changing every day, even in terms of how I express myself, my fashions, my gender, she said, adding Ive never been comfortable being something that Im not online.

The writer was recently labelled the voice of a generation, but she told us that she resented being put on such a pedestal. I dont want to do that and in fact, its embarrassing. It also just makes you look a bit silly because it makes you look like you think that about yourself. She continued, I feel like we cant let women make art that is popular without calling her the voice of a generation shes never going to live up to that title.

More:

Florence Given: I hate the idea of self-censorship - Evening Standard

MONICA HOOPERmhooper@nwadg.com

Henry Rollins will open the Innovation Speakers series at the Fayetteville Public Library with Libraries Are Punk Rock on Aug. 12. Rollins, the front front man from Black Flag and Rollins band, is an author, actor, activist, writer and more.

In choosing speakers for the series, we make selections based on criteria that include relevancy to Center for Innovation technologies and programs (podcaster, film maker, actor, producer, musician, photographer, maker, fabricator, entrepreneur, etc.), scope and range of work, and overall connections to libraries, says Melissa Taylor of the FPL Center for Innovation. Are they supporters or advocates for libraries? Do they support free speech and anti-censorship? Are they working on a project that promotes literacy and or education?

Rollins answered these four questions for Whats Up!

Q. The name of the program is Libraries Are Punk Rock. In what ways do you think libraries are punk rock?

A. I think libraries are libraries but perhaps the idea of access to information in a quest for clarity and truth, which is what punk rock means to me at least, can be realized at a library.

Q. I saw a couple of your talks during the G.W. Bush administration. At the time, many people thought that was the worst it could be, but now here we are in the not quite post-Trump era. While its easy to get caught up in how terrible everything is, I wonder what if anything still gives you hope that things can get better.

A. I think the USA was founded on a less than honest premise. When slave owners, with a straight face, are telling you all men are created equal, how well do you think things will be going forward? When women have to get the right to vote by a Constitutional Amendment only a little more than 100 years ago, you really have to take a look at your country. After doing so, I dont think anything happening in the USA presently is surprising as much as eventual. My optimism resides in young people and how theyll hopefully address the errors of the past, the misogyny, homophobia and racism of the present and correct them. Past that, Im not optimistic about the future of the USA as in its current concept and operation; its sustainability is predicated on a lot of people knowing their place and staying in it. Thats just not holding like it used to, hence some peoples desire to make America great again. Thats what theyre talking about. From the Supreme Court to whats happening on the street, youre witnessing progress struggling against regression. I predict a lot more gun homicides and mass casualty events.

Q. Since you are speaking at the library, what book(s) are you reading now? Whats the best book that youve read so far this year?

A. Ive not been reading much this year outside of my own work as Im trying to turn two manuscripts around. As well, Im writing a lot, or at least trying to, for a few other projects. Ive been finding the older I get, the less Im reading and the more Im writing. Im less interested in uploading and more interested in outputting. Also, being on tour, reading is difficult as Im either preparing for the show, coming down from one or trying to work on the aforementioned before and/or after the show. That being said, Im reading a collection of F. Scott Fitzgerald short stories called Id Die For You: And Other Lost Stories, Im re-reading a biography on Sun Ra by Szwed, I read some of the Trump disaster books, which I tried to avoid but they seemed too interesting to resist. The ones by Philip Rucker and Carol Leonnig and the one by Bob Woodward. Over the last several months, I also read The Devil You Know by Charles M. Blow. I havent had the chance to get a best book read so far this year. Usually I have one. I will say the last book that really knocked me out was We Were Eight Years In Power by Ta-Nehsi Coates.

Q. And finally, what bands are you excited about right now?

A. I really liked an album by a woman named Tamar Aphek on Kill Rockstars called All Bets Are Off that came out last year. The new Liz Lamere album Keep It Alive on In The Red is great. On the same label, the new Dion Lunadon album Beyond Everything is good. The new Automatic album Excess is great. The last several years have been really good for music.

Rollins returns to Arkansas for a show at 8 p.m. Sept. 24 ($29-$39) at TempleLive in Fort Smith. Keep up with him at http://www.henryrollins.com.

__

FAQ

Innovation Speakers:

Henry Rollins

WHEN 6 p.m. Aug. 12; line up at 5:15 p.m. to allow daytime patrons time to exit at closing time

WHERE Fayetteville Public Library Event Center, 401 W. Mountain St.

COST Free

INFO faylib.org/event/6867883

FYI The next Innovation Speaker will be Mixerman (Eric Sarafin) on Sept. 23.

More:

Henry Rollins talks free speech, censorship, technology and more at FPL The Free Weekly - The Free Weekly

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Disney+ Middle East announced that the company will not release "Lightyear" or "Baymax" on its platform.

The decision stems from the platform not releasing Pixars "Lightyear" in the region, due to the film featuring a same-sex kiss. The Disney+ series "Baymax" will also not be released since it includes LGBTQ characters.

"Lightyear" stars Chris Evans as the infamous space traveler that fans grew to love in Disneys animated film "Toy Story," released in 1995.

"Lightyear" stars Chris Evans as Buzz Lightyear from "Toy Story." (Getty Images / Getty Images)

However, Disney+ Middle East content will align with local regulatory requirements, and the platform will reportedly modify its content to avoid regional sensitivities, according to The Hollywood Reporter.

PIXAR'S 'LIGHTYEAR' SEES LOWER DOMESTIC BOX OFFICE SHOWING TIED TO HOST OF PROBLEMS

Despite Disney+ Middle East not showing kid-focused content with LGBTQ references, the platform will include films such as "Doctor Strange and the Multitude of Madness" which was banned from theaters in select Gulf countries such as Saudi Arabia and Kuwait.

This image released by Disney/Pixar shows character Buzz Lightyear, voiced by Chris Evans, and Sox, voiced by Peter Sohn, in a scene from the animated film "Lightyear." (Disney/Pixar via AP, File / AP Newsroom)

Over the past year, Disney has censored several movies across the Gulf, as films including "Thor: Love and Thunder," "West Side Story," and "Eternals" did not release in theaters due to their features of LGBTQ scenes and topics.

The move seemingly comes on the heels of the release strategy for the platform with the standards of the United Arab Emirates.

Disney+ Middle East will reportedly modify its content to avoid regional sensitivities. (iStock / iStock)

Although "Lightyear," "Baymax" and "Doctor Strange and the Multitude of Madness" failed to reach cinemas in the region, UAE culturally sensitive content for adult-focused audiences played in theaters.

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According to reports, the "Doctor Strange" sequel and "Eternals" were released in UAE cinemas, but with modifications as Chlo Zhaos movie "was edited to remove all public displays of affections."

"Content offerings differ across our many Disney+ markets, based upon a number of factors. Content available should align with local regulatory requirements," a Disney spokesperson told the outlet.

Disney+ offers parental controls for families to determine what children and other family members watch.

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Disney did not immediately respond to Fox Business' request for comment.

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Disney+ Middle East aligns with censorship policies, Lightyear won't stream on platform - Fox Business

Express News Service

BENGALURU: Scientists from across the globe, including India, who are refuting the Big Bang theory on cosmology are facing resistance and censorship from journals and archives of international repute where they get their research papers published for peer review.

The Big Bang theory holds that the universe was born out of a highly compressed, dense and microscopic point (called singularity), which exploded with a huge force some 13.8 billion years ago, resulting in everything arising from that singularity moving outwards in all directions. From this, all cosmic matter (as we know it today) was formed at different stages through time until now.

Twenty-four astronomers and physicists from 10 countries including reputed astrophysicist Jayant V Narlikar of Inter-University Centre for Astronomy and Astrophysics , Prof Sisir Roy of National Institute of Advanced Studies (NIAS) and Prof Amitabha Ghosh of Indian National Science Academy (INSA) from India are among the scientists protesting the censorship of papers that are critical of the Big Bang hypothesis by the open pre-print website arXiv.

As scientists engaged in the study of the cosmos and the relation of phenomena in space to those here on Earth, we strongly protest arXivs censorship of controversial papers on cosmology and specifically on the Big Bang hypothesis. Run by Cornell University, arXiv is supposed to provide an open public forum for researchers to exchange pre-publication papers, without undertaking to peer-review them. But in June 2022, arXiv was rejected for publication in three papers which are critical of the validity of the Big Bang Hypothesis.. No specific reason was given for these rejections, the scientists wrote.

Prof Roy, Arindam Mal of the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO), Ahmedabad, and Sarbani Palit of the Indian Statistical Institute (ISI), Kolkata also faced difficulty in having their research paper Redshift Periodicity and its Significance for Recent Observation, which counters the Big Bang Hypothesis published in standard peer-reviewed journals like Astronomy and Astrophysics Journal, Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society etc.

This was the sequel to our previous paper already published in Astronomy and Astrophysics Journal challenging the Big Bang Hypothesis, Roy told The New Indian Express.

In this paper, we analyzed the redshift data from galaxy-quasar pair and confirmed the periodicity of redshifts, which counters the Big Bang theory. This was first observed by the American astronomer Prof Halton Arp in the sixties of the 20th century. He had observed the physical association of this type of galaxy-quasar pair, said the Indian scientist.

According to the Big Bang Hypothesis quasars are considered as the objects situated at the farthest distances than galaxies. But according to Arp, if in the galaxy-quasar pair the galaxy is physically associated with quasar, then the galaxy and quasar are situated almost at the same distance. This observation contradicts the tenets of the expanding model (like the Big Bang model), said Roy.

Essentially it raises the question whether redshift has an alternate explanation to Doppler mechanism, according to which, the shift of the frequency (towards longer wavelength called redshift or towards lower wavelength called blue shift) occurs due the relative motion of the observer and the source. The expansion of the universe is explained using essentially the Doppler mechanism. However, the discovery of Emil Wolf from University of Rochester, USA clearly establishes that this shift of frequency of light may occur even in the absence of relative motion of the observer and the source, said Roy.

In the present paper we have shown that the redshift of the galaxy-quasar pair as observed by Arp and other astronomers is quantised and it challenges the validity of expanding or the Big Bang model using our methodology for the data analysis. We sent this paper to various leading international journals for publication but it was rejected without any critical review. Then we tried to publish it in an archive of Cornell University. The archive support team sent us a peculiar reasoning rejecting publication, said Roy. After much persuasion, they accepted the paper with a caveat that we must get it published somewhere if we want to have future submissions accepted on arXiv, he added.

This sort of censorship of scientific research is unfair and unfortunate, said Roy.

Whats the Big-bang theory?According to a NASA explainer, the Big Bang theory indicates how the universe beganas just a single point, then expanded and stretched to grow as large as it is right now. It is still believed to be stretching

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Anti-Big Bang theory scientists face censorship by international journals - The New Indian Express

By Arzu Geybullayeva |

( Globalvoices.org ) Turkish authorities are increasingly censoring content online that does not fit Turkeys religious values, morality, and family values in recent years. The most recent example is an investigation launched by the Istanbul Chief Public Prosecutors Office against Spotify.

The prosecutors office claims Spotify approved the playlist names.

The Office claims the music streaming platform, approved playlists that were insulting religious values and state officials. According to reports, the decision to launch the probe came after the Presidential Communication Center received a large volume of complaints that the playlists were fostering Islamophobia by insulting religious values and state officials.

Some of the playlist names include Songs Recep Tayyip Erdogan listens to when drinking raki, Songs God listened to when throwing Adam out of heaven, Songs prophet Ali listens to when driving high speed, and a podcast called Devlet Bahceli [leader of National People Party] concept hotel, Love with a girl wearing Shakira belt, according to Bianet reporting. It is not the songs specifically but the names of playlists that is drawing officials ire.

The prosecutors office claims Spotify approved the names of playlists, but according to Spotify rules, an individual user can create as many playlists as they wish without Spotifys approval or oversight.

One Twitter user shared the names of other playlists too, among them Gods ringtone, or Eve did not hear Gods announcement about banned fruit because she was listening to this playlist.

Others joked about which other platforms are next:

windows, excel and winzip are next!

Fear us!

Spotify facing investigation allegedly for insulting religious values and state leaders. Istanbul Chief Public Prosecutors Office launched an investigation against Spotify due to playlists names.

of course we will be investigating spotify when we have no issues thanks to our stellar justice system.

Spotify learned its lesson from generation Zs humor when creating playlists. Its managers must be in big shock, because this is probably the first time, they have ever faced an investigation of this nature.

This is not the first time Spotify finds itself in hot water in Turkey. In May 2021, the platform was ordered to remove inappropriate content from its site. In an interview with ArabNews, Cathryn Grothe, a research associate at Freedom House, said, Streaming services such as Spotify create a unique space where people can express themselves, relate to loved ones and friends over shared music or podcasts, and engage on a range of important issues, including human rights and politics.

Screenshot of Netflixs official Jurassic World Camp Cretaceous trailer via YouTube

Also in August 2022, the Chief Censor of Turkeys Radio and Television Supreme Council (RTK) launched a probe into Netflixs animated Jurassic World Camp Cretaceous series. We are determined not to allow content that may negatively impact our children and youth and that disregard our values, tweeted the head of RTK, Ebubekir Sahin. The show reportedly features LGBTQ+ characters.

In December 2021, RTK fined Netflix over the film More the merrier, claiming its plot and characters were immoral. The chief censor said the movie was based on a fiction in which homosexuality, incest relationships, and swinging are intensely experienced. In addition to getting a fine, the streaming platform was ordered to remove the film from its platform in Turkey.

In 2020, Netflix said it wont proceed with the local production of a film called If only (Simdiki Aklim Olsaydi) because RTK failed to approve the script of the show in which one of the characters was gay.

In 2019 RTK was granted powers to monitor online broadcasting ranging from on-demand platforms such as Netflix to regular and/or scheduled online broadcasts to amateur home video makers. Since then, online broadcasters have been required to obtain a license from RTK, meaning the organization frequently censors or rejects content it disapproves of. Netflix applied for a license the same year, while Spotify did so in October 2020 after RTK threatened to ban them otherwise.

Arzu Geybullayeva is Azerbaijani columnist and writer, with special focus in digital authoritarianism and its implications on human rights and press freedom in Azerbaijan.

This post is part of Advox, a Global Voices project dedicated to protecting freedom of expression online. All Posts

Written by Arzu Geybullayeva

Globalvoices.org

Featured image: Pixabay

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In Turkey, religious Values are used to censor online ontent - Informed Comment

A small-town library is at risk of shutting down after residents of Jamestown, Michigan, voted to defund it rather than tolerate certain LGBTQ+-themed books.

Residents voted on Tuesday to block a renewal of funds tied to property taxes, Bridge Michigan reported.

The vote leaves the library with funds through the first quarter of next year. Once a reserve fund is used up, it would be forced to close, Larry Walton, the library boards president, told Bridge Michigan harming not just readers but the community at large. Beyond books, residents visit the library for its wifi, he said, and it houses the very room where the vote took place.

Our libraries are places to read, places to gather, places to socialize, places to study, places to learn. I mean, theyre the heart of every community, Deborah Mikula, executive director of the Michigan Library Association, told the Guardian. So how can you lose that?

We are champions of access, she added, including materials that might appeal to some in the community and not others. We want to make sure that libraries protect the right to read.

The controversy in Jamestown began with a complaint about a memoir by a nonbinary writer, but it soon spiraled into a campaign against Patmos Library itself. After a parent complained about Gender Queer: a Memoir, by Maia Kobabe, a graphic novel about the authors experience coming out as nonbinary, dozens showed up at library board meetings, demanding the institution drop the book. (The book, which includes depictions of sex, was in the adult section of the library.) Complaints began to target other books with LGBTQ+ themes.

One library director resigned, telling Bridge she had been harassed and accused of indoctrinating kids; her successor, Matt Lawrence, also left the job. Though the library put Kobabes book behind the counter rather than on the shelves, the volumes remained available.

We, the board, will not ban the books, Walton told Associated Press on Thursday.

A few months later, in March, an anonymous letter went to homes in the area. It criticized the pornographic memoir and the addition of transgender and gay books to the library, according to Lawrence. That fired a lot of people up and got them to start coming to our board meetings to complain, he said. The concern from the public was that its going to confuse children.

The librarys refusal to submit to the demands led to a campaign urging residents to vote against renewed funding for the library. A group calling itself Jamestown Conservatives handed out flyers condemning Gender Queer for showing extremely graphic sexual illustrations of two people of the same gender, criticizing a library director who promoted the LGBTQ ideology and calling for making the library a safe and neutral place for our kids. On Facebook, the group says it exists to keep our children safe, and protect their purity, as well as to keep the nuclear family intact as God designed.

Residents ultimately voted 62% to 37% against a measure that would have raised property taxes by roughly $24 in order to fund the library, even as they approved similar measures to fund the fire department and road work. The library was one of just a few in the state to suffer such a loss, Mikula said: Most passed with flying colors, sometimes up to 80%.

The vote came as a shock to Lawrence, who left his job in part because of town officials criticism of the Patmos library and libraries across the US.

I knew that there were people that were upset about material in the library, but I figured that enough people would realize that what theyre trying to do with the removal of these books is antithetical to our constitution, particularly the first amendment, he said.

The vote comes as libraries across the US face a surge in demands to ban books. The American Library Association identified 729 challenges to library, school and university materials and services last year, which led to about 1,600 challenges or removals of individual books. That was up from 273 books the year before and represents the highest number of attempted book bans since we began compiling these lists 20 years ago, the ALA president, Patricia Wong, said in a press release.

Were seeing what appears to be a campaign to remove books, particularly books dealing with LGBTQIA themes and books dealing with racism, Deborah Caldwell-Stone, head of the ALAs office for intellectual freedom, told the Guardian last year. Celebrated books by Toni Morrison, Alison Bechdel and Ibram X Kendi are among those facing bans.

Im not quite sure what instigated the culture wars that were seeing, but libraries are certainly at the front end, Mikula said. Indeed, as states across the US move to deny LGBTQ+ rights, the ALAs No 1 most challenged book last year was Gender Queer.

When you remove those books from the shelf or you challenge them publicly in a community, what youre saying to any young person who identified with that narrative is, We dont want your story here, Kobabe told the New York Times in May.

Each library chooses its own collection, Mikula noted, an intensive process that involves staying abreast of whats new, listening to whats being requested, and weeding out selections that are rarely on loan.

Our librarians are qualified. They have advanced degrees, she said. We want to make sure that the people who have been hired to do this work are trusted and credible, and that theyre making sure that the full community is represented within their library. And that means having LGBTQ books.

If community members oppose the inclusion of certain books, there are formal means of requesting their removal, involving a review committee and ascertainment that the person making the appeal has actually read the book in question. But recently, she said, people have been going to board meetings, whether its a library board meeting or a school board meeting and saying, Heres a list of 300 books. We want them all to be removed from your library. And thats not the proper channel, but theyre loud and their voices carry.

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US library defunded after refusing to censor LGBTQ authors: We will not ban the books - The Guardian