Daily Archives: August 9, 2021

YouTube censorship actually works a lot like Chinese Communist Party censorship: the rules are vague and the enforcement is arbitrary. They want to encourage you to self-censor because you dont know where the red line is.

Washington, D.C.: In this edition of Indo-Pacific: Behind the Headlines we speak with Chris Chappell, the New York City-based creator and host of the popular and respected China Uncensored YouTube channel (1.67 million subscribers).

China Uncensored has just launched an edition subtitled in Hindi.

China Uncensored has earned a reputation for fearless and well-researched coverage of all things China. Helping to ensure editorial independence, Mr Chappell co-owns America Uncovered LLCalong with co-producers Matt Gnaizda and Shelley Zhang. Together the team not only produces China Uncensored, but two other shows as well, the longer form podacst China Unscripted and America Uncovered.

Q: How did you get the idea to start China Uncensored?

A: I started China Uncensored in 2012 because I wanted to talk about how much China affects all of us, no matter where we are in the world. I realized most people think of China as just a normal country, similar to any liberal democracy. But its actually ruled by an authoritarian communist party. Its like North Korea, but with better PR.

But I didnt just want to make a show that exposed the Chinese Communist Party and their plan to take over the world. I also wanted to make the show entertaining and funny, so people would actually watch it. And as a bonus, authoritarian regimes hate being laughed at.

Q: What other YouTube channels do you have, and what are they about?

A: I produce China Uncensored with Matt Gnaizda and Shelley Zhang. We also started a podcast on YouTube called China Unscripted, where the three of us interview experts on China issues. And we also created a YouTube channel called America Uncovered where we try to cover US news in an entertaining, nonpartisan way.

Q: What has the reaction been from viewers?

A: Ive been absolutely blown away by the interest in China Uncensored, even when we were first getting started. We went to Hong Kong in 2014 to cover the Umbrella Revolution. At the time, we were a tiny YouTube channel. We were excited when a video hit 10,000 views. That first night in Hong Kong, a young woman came up to me and thanked me for doing China Uncensored. Then a young man stopped us and told us his university professor was showing our videos in his class. It was the first time I realized we were actually having an impact.

In 2019, we spent a lot of time in Hong Kong covering the extradition bill protests. During one protest, we met an American fan of the show. He told us that after seeing our coverage in Hong Kong, he flew to Hong Kong to support the protesters. I felt really touched to hear that.

I originally started China Uncensored to help Americans learn more about China. But we get viewers from all around the world now, especially from English-speaking countries that are dealing with China. Weve had tens of millions of views from India.

Q: What has the reaction been from YouTube?

A: We started having problems with YouTube in 2017, when they began restricting advertising on channels covering current events. Our revenue plummeted. If it werent for direct support from our viewers, we would not have been able to keep making our show.

And YouTube censorship has gotten worse. We had a lot of trouble with our coverage of the 2019 Hong Kong protests. YouTube demonetized and age-restricted videos, which means they reached far fewer people. YouTube also removed several of our videos about Chinas coronavirus crackdown in 2020. But when we made a fuss about it on social media, YouTube often reversed their decisions.

YouTube censorship actually works a lot like Chinese Communist Party censorship: the rules are vague and the enforcement is arbitrary. They want to encourage you to self-censor because you dont know where the red line is.

But it goes beyond YouTube. The Chinese Communist Party puts their censorship pressures on any company that does business in China. That in turn incentivizes those companies to censor on the Partys behalf.

Back in 2017, we had an Apple TV app for China Uncensored. Apple removed it from their app store in China, which we expected. But they also removed our app in Hong Kong, which they shouldnt have done, because Hong Kong was supposed to be free from Chinese censorship. And the worst part is they even removed our app from Taiwan, a completely different country. We started an online petition and Apple eventually restored our app in Hong Kong and Taiwan.

The biggest problem with this kind of Big Tech censorship is that it restricts the audience we are able to reach. China Uncensored would never get on a major US TV network, because they all have too many business interests in China. Thats why we own and produce China Uncensored ourselves. Our show used to be broadcast on NTD, a television network started by Chinese dissidents. But its not broadcast there anymore, so we really have to rely on YouTube, which has the largest audience for video content on the internet.

Q: What is coverage of China usually like in the US?

A: The China coverage that reaches most Americans doesnt reflect the reality of whats happening in China. There are Western journalists inside China who are doing their best under difficult circumstances. But the Chinese Communist Party is making it harder and more dangerous to report from China.

And its scary to see how easily the Chinese Communist Party can get their narrative into American media. For example, when it comes to the coronavirus, everyone knows that the Chinese authorities are not reporting the real outbreak numbers, but no one knows what the real numbers are. So media end up reporting the fake numbers, because thats all they have. The Chinese regime also relies on friends of China to present opinions in US media that align with the regimes narrative.

Q: Are there other China stories that you think need to be covered?

A: I think weve really seen a rise of Chinese Communist Party-style authoritarianism around the world. Every time we talk to activists from authoritarian countries, they have a story about how the Chinese Communist Party is supporting their dictator. The Party supports these regimes financially and also by teaching them their censorship and surveillance techniques. In return, China gets resources, trade, and political support in the UN.

The Chinese Communist Partys style of authoritarianism is creeping into liberal democracies as well. And thats because most people have a distorted impression of China, like its all glittering skyscrapers and high-speed trains. They dont see the true dysfunction of the Chinese regimes rule, and all of their human rights atrocities that paved the way for such rapid development. So its easy for people to think the Chinese system is one we should all adopt.

Q: You recently interviewed Major Gaurav Arya on your show and have started a Hindi subtitled version. What do you think American audiences can learn from India about China?

A: India is really on the front line with China. I think the Indian public understands the threat from the Chinese regime in a way that most Americans dont. And that can translate into policy, too. Look at what the Indian government did with banning TikTok and other Chinese apps versus how the US government treated the issue.

When Chinese troops started a conflict last year along the Line of Actual Control, people not just in India, but around the world saw what could happen if we dont keep the Chinese regimes aggression in check. It was a real wake-up call for our American audience. Seeing India push back and not give in to those claims, and eventually force China to withdraw, showed that there is a way to confront the Chinese Communist Party successfully.

Cleo Paskal is Special Correspondent with The Sunday Guardian as well as Non-Resident Senior Fellow for the Indo-Pacific at the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies.

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'YouTube censorship works a lot like CCP's' - The Sunday Guardian Live - The Sunday Guardian

Aug 4 - Laws that ban the teaching of critical race theory in schools are setting a dangerous precedent by turning the government into an arbiter of ideas, according to the nations largest organization of legal educators.

The Association of American Law Schools (AALS) this week took the unusual step of issuing a public statement in defense of critical race theory and the rights of educators to decide if and how it should be taught.

The efforts to ban critical theories, just like other attempts at censorship, undermine one of the primary purposes of education: teaching students how to think for themselves, reads the AALS statement.

The organization also condemned personal attacks on legal academics whose scholarship centers on critical race theory, which is centered on the idea that racism and prejudice is embedded within legal and other societal systems. AALS executive director Judith Areen said Wednesday that she has spoken with one law professor, whom she declined to name, who had to stop answering her personal phone because she was receiving so many hateful calls.

She had to get a different number, Areen said. Its a shame that were in a time where disagreements about ideas are personalized.

Critical race theory emerged from law schools in the 1980s and has always been somewhat controversial. It became a political flashpoint in the past year, with Republican lawmakers in more than 20 states introducing legislation that would restrict schools from teaching about critical race theory and structural racism.

Texas, Arizona, Florida and Ohio are among the states where such restrictions have been enacted through legislation or state education department policy.

The laws proposed or passed in states to ban the teaching of critical race theory are designed to stifle a full exploration of the role of race and racism in United States history and, in so doing, they also erase some people from the very classrooms in which they have a right to be full participants as students and as educators, according to the AALS.

Association leaders felt they had a special obligation to speak out against attacks on critical race theory given its unique connection to law schools, Areen said. The foundations of critical race theory date back to the 1970s, when law professors such as Harvard Law Schools Derrick Bell began exploring how race and racism shape law and society, even absent racist intent. A small group of diverse legal scholars later began organizing conferences and writing on the subject, and the field continued to grow.

The murder of George Floyd and the Black Lives Matter movement renewed attention on critical race theory, among both proponents who see it as an important lens through which to view history and current events and critics who say it is divisive and perpetuates intolerance. Former President Donald Trump spoke against it while in the White House, as have many other Republican lawmakers over the past year, heightening the divide.

Its not the first time that law schools have taken a public stance on the issue. The five law schools within the University of California system joined forces last September to defend critical race theory after the Office of Management and Budget banned critical race theory training within the federal government, at Trump's behest.

We cannot stand silent in the face of the OMBs absurd claim that critical race theory is contrary to all we stand for as Americans and should have no place in the federal government, the UC law deans wrote in a public statement at the time. CRT is most assuredly not contrary to what we stand for.

(This story has been updated to reflect that Derrick Bell was at Harvard Law School when he began working on what would later become critical race theory.)

Read more:

Partisan war over teaching history and racism stokes tensions in U.S. schools

Many Americans embrace falsehoods about critical race theory

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Law school association: Banning critical race theory is censorship - Reuters

"Bastards!" Grandma Nuria shouts out in a cemetery. She's full of despair as she utters the expletive, her impassioned monologue carrying within it questions about the futility of war and fighting.

It's unclear at whomthe old woman is directingthe abusive word: the soldiers or those who send them to fight in a war. What is clear, however, is that she is full ofgrief over the loss of her husband, a veteran of the Soviet-Afghan war, who isburied in the cemetery.

And now another member of her family is going off to war. This time it's her grandson, and Nuria fears that he, too, may not come back alive.

The scene in the cemetery is from the play "The First Bread," written by a young Russian playwright and staged by a young Polish director at the renowned Moscow theater Sovremennik, which means "contemporary."

Since it wasfoundedin the 1960s, it has built a reputation as Russia's best-known experimental stage. The premiere of "The First Bread" took place in July. After that, Sovremennik wanted to close down for the summer break. But instead, the ensemble wasplunged into days of turbulence.

A scene from the play by Rinat Tashimov that has ruffled feathers in Moscow

Members of an association called "Officers of Russia" did not like the performance. They interpreted Nuria's swear words as an insult to World War Two veterans. And Nuria's grandson's affection for another man in the play was seen as propaganda for homosexuality.

These things are currently considered criminal acts in Russia. The "officers" and another veterans' association personally complained to the Moscow city administration and the mayor about the play and even wrote to the Russian Investigative Committee and the state prosecutor's office.

The story soon took on a life of its own. The left-wing nationalist pro-Kremlin organization "Serp" (South East Radical Block) went public, calling the director and the play "talentless." Its supporters even tried to disrupt a performance at the Sovremennik theater, though they didn't succeed.

The Veterans Association demanded the director's removal. When the storybecame a media sensation, the management at Sovremennik was forced to react and deleted controversial passages from the grandmother's monologue.

Butit didn't end there. The advisory council of the Russian Ministry of Culture also waded into the controversy and demanded that an extra commission be set up to check all Moscow theaters for compliance with the so-called National Security Strategy.

The strategy document had only recently been updated into lawby President Vladimir Putin. The complainants honed in on a passage calling for the"preservation of moral, spiritual and patriotic values."

The Russian Ministry of Culture distanced itself from the demands of the council, which has only an advisory function. But the threat had beenmade, raising the question of how much censorship there really is on Russia's stages.

In a city like Moscowwith more than250 theaters, this is a highly political question. After all, theaters are not only extraordinarily popular with the population butare also considered free spaces for important social debates.

"The current relationship between the state and the theater does sometimes look dramatic, and the level of theatricality in these conflicts is quite high," Alexander Rodionov, director ofTeatr-Doc, an independent theater in Moscow, said. The goal of such conflicts, he says, is to "encourage self-censorship among theaters."

Rodionov's small but well-known theater consistently attracts attention with its staging of uncomfortable issues. In an interview with DW, Rodionov emphasized that, according to the constitution, there is no censorship in Russia. This is "important, valuable and fair for Russian culture," he said. The conflicts usually sounded louder and more frightening in words than they were in reality, he added.

Ukrainian-born Liya Akhedzhakova, who acted in 'The First Bread,' is an outspoken critic of the Kremlin

Theater critic Marina Davydova, on the other hand, fears that such incidents will occur more often in the future. "The fact that the Russian judiciary is now concerned about a play in which there is not a single indicationof a crime shows that society is becoming radicalized," she said in an interview with DW.

The former director of the Novosibirsk State Opera, theater manager Boris Mezdrich, experienced that firsthand. After the Russian Orthodox Church took legal action against his production of Richard Wagner's "Tannhuser" for allegedly offending religious feelings of believers, he lost his job as theater director in 2015.

Mezdrich believes that in the future there will be more so-called citizen groups "whose feelings could suddenly be hurt." To prevent the situation from escalating each time, he would like to see the state play a mediatingrole and out-of-court settlements.

In the meantime, Mezdrichhimself is well back in business and does not see the scandal surrounding the "Tannhuser" production only negatively. "I got a huge boost to my reputation," Mezdrichsaid."That helped me mentally."

At the Sovremennik theater, things have calmed down again. The ensemble is on summer break. "The First Bread" doesn't feature in the theater's new program, at least for now.

This article has been translated from German

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Could Russia's theaters face censorship? - DW (English)

The August 5 episode of the News 24 show Sabse Bada Sawal lasted 48.57 minutes when it was aired on TV and live on the channels social media handles. But when it was uploaded on YouTube afterwards the episode ran into only 44:28 minutes. What was missing?

Seasoned sports journalist Chander Shekher Luthras criticism of the Narendra Modi government and its sports programmes. His entire section lasting 4 minutes 29 seconds had been edited out.

On the live show, Luthra, who has written for Newslaundry, complained how successive sports ministers, including the incumbent Anurag Thakur, lacked vision.

In our country, we have sports ministers such as Uma Bharti or Sunil Dutt who arent interested in sports. Or like Anurag Thakur who the Supreme Court had removed from BCCI, the journalist said. What kind of signal are you giving? Youre doing your own propaganda. Sportsmen should be given respect and jobs.

He also spoke about how the Khelo India scheme was launched in 2017 with the promise of improving the countrys grassroots sports culture, only to do the opposite. The Khelo India budget has come from squeezing the budgets of other sports activities, he claimed. Schools and college game budgets have been shut down to make Khelo India. This isnt for sports, it is government propaganda.

Afterwards, Luthra shared the YouTube video of the show in his circle, not knowing his segment had been cut out. He learned only when a friend called him after midnight and told him his remarks hadnt made it into the Youtube video.

This is censorship. I have come across things like this often but such a blatant thing has happened for the first time where they have actually censored some part of it, Luthra, an independent journalist, told Newslaundry. In his tweet last night, he remarked that someone in the government had begun censoring sports debates as well and wondered if Mr Goli Maaro, a reference to Anurag Thakur, only wanted to hear Cheer for India.

When Newslaundry asked the shows host, Sandeep Chaudhary, why they had deleted Luthras segment on YouTube, he told us to contact the News 24 digital team and declined to speak further. We couldnt contact Manoj Meena, the head of the channels digital operations. We then called the channels Noida headquarters, where a man who identified himself as a security guard said there was nobody around we could speak with. We also sent an email seeking comment to the channels editor-in-chief Anurradha Prasad. This report will be updated if we get a response.

On the show, Chaudhary spoke about the problems that Indias sportspersons face and even agreed with some of Luthras points. The shows title was a rhetorical question, asking if sportspersons are remembered in this country only when they win medals. Which is why its surprising that News 24 deleted Luthras segment. The YouTube video jumps from journalist Harpal Singh Bedi talking to Chudhary winding up the show.

Luthra, who is joint secretary of the Press Club of India, told Newslaundry that hed been blacklisted by pro-government channels in the past, so this isnt the first time his criticism of the government is being stifled.

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This is censorship: News 24 slyly edits out journalists criticism of Anurag Thakur, Khelo India - Newslaundry

Its been nearly two decades since France stopped testing nuclear weapons in French Polynesia.

But many across French Polynesias 118 islands and atolls across the central South Pacific were disappointed last month when President Emmanuel Macron, on his very first trip to the territory France has controlled since 1842, failed to apologize for the nearly 200 nuclear tests conducted between 1966 and 1996.

Faced with dangerous powers in the concert of nations, I wish to say here that the nation owes a debt to French Polynesia, Macron said in a July 27 speech. He went on to admitthat the tests on the Mururoa and Fangataufa atolls were not clean in any way but stopped short of an official apology.

Related:The pandemic wiped out tourism on Pacific island nations. Can they stay afloat?

Guillaume Colombini, who works for Radio Te Reo-o-Tefana, saidwhile they werent expecting an apology, it was still devastating not to get one.

So, when you do something wrong, whatever it is, if you go and see the people you have hurt and you say, Listen, Im sorry for what Ive done, said Colombini, it is easier for the community to say, OK, we accept, heres forgiveness, or No, we dont accept. You have to do something for us.

Colombini, 41, grew up in Tahiti during the last decades of the nuclear tests and said he remembers seeing images of blue lagoons turning white after bombs were set off. He can recount the hyper-polarization of the issue and the anti-nuclear demonstrations spurred across the Pacific.

Although testing stopped more than two decades ago, its legacy lives on in French Polynesias politics, health, economy and environment, he said.

Related:Samoa confirms prime minster but struggles are 'far from over'

Scientists have long estimated some 110,000 people were affected by the radioactive fallout many of them French Polynesians who worked at the testing sites. However, a study released earlier this year revealed that France underestimated the level of toxic exposure during the atmospheric tests that took place in the 1960s and 70s.

The Mururoa Fileswas based on a two-year investigation of more than 2,000 declassified French state documents as well as various interviews conducted in French Polynesia.

We found that they underestimated the level of [nuclear] exposure by factors of two to 10..."

We found that they underestimated the level of exposure by factors of two to 10, depending on the tests and locations, said Sebastien Philippe, a researcher and lecturer at the Princeton School of Public and International Affairs with the program on science and global security and co-author of the study.

Thats two to 10 times higher than the estimates given by Frances Atomic Energy Commission in a report produced nearly a decade after testing stopped. The findings compiled by Philippe and his team found, among other things, that one reason the estimates of radiation exposure were so low is that France did not take into account contaminated drinking water.

Ultimately, this systematic underestimation not only made it more difficult to link cases of cancer to the nuclear tests, but it also made it harder for victims to get compensated.

The compensation process was scientifically broken..."

The compensation process was scientifically broken, and I think the reason for that is the government really realized how much money it was going to cost them, and decided it would be easier to deal with this in court, Philippe said.

More than 400 claims have been filed against the French government, but only about half have been settled in the last 10 years. Philippe said this was allowed to happen because of the French governments censorship and secrecy surrounding the nuclear testing.

One upside of the release of this study, he said, was the French governments commitment to open more government archives to the public a commitment that President Macron made on his recent trip. The French government did not respond to The Worlds request for comment about Marcons trip.

Related:Hawaiians highlight surfing's cultural roots as it makes its Olympic debut

The underestimation of the radioactive fallout also made it difficult to fully understand the scope of irreversible environmental damage from the nuclear testing.

Keitapu Maamaatuaiahutapu, a physicist and climate scientist at the University of French Polynesia, said the destruction was particularly bad when the testing went underground in the mid-70s and bombs were set off in boreholes drilled into the atolls.

These bombs had power 100 to 1,000 times more than the bomb dropped on Hiroshima, he said.

Whole lagoons full of coral were decimated and fish populations were poisoned for years. Now, theres also a concern that the atolls may break apart a process being sped up by rising ocean levels due to climate change, he said.

And the release of the radioactivity from those holes, not only would that create [a] tsunami, but it would pollute the ocean.

And the release of the radioactivity from those holes, Maamaatuaiahutapu said. Not only would that create [a] tsunami, but it would pollute the ocean.

France continues to control all of the information about the damage caused by nuclear testing, including heavily guarding the test sites themselves, he said, so there might not be a way to tell when something might happen. Both the Mururoa and Fangataufa atolls are more than 700 miles away from the main island of Tahiti.

Maamaatuaiahutapu also said that he doesn't believe that French Polynesia will never get an official apology from Paris, and that also creates political problems.

Experts saidthat French Polynesians who are loyal to France dont want to criticize Paris, because it supports the territory with some $2 billion a year.

On the other hand, the independent movement, which both Maamaatuaiahutapu and Colombini are part of, supports every effort to hold France accountable, and to spread the word about nuclear tests across the Pacific a place known mostly for its beauty.

"If you look beyond [the postcard], theres something you cannot even imagine.

In every other Pacific Island, you have the same, said Colombini, who also spent more than a decade working in French Polynesias tourism sector. You have the postcard, but if you look beyond that, theres something you cannot even imagine.

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New study on nuclear testing in French Polynesia reveals Frances censorship and secrecy - The World