Category Archives: Freedom of Speech

Media Studies 104A - 2015-04-02
Media Studies 104A, 001 - Spring 2015 Freedom of Speech and the Press - William B Turner Creative Commons 3.0: Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs.

By: UCBerkeley

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Media Studies 104A - 2015-04-02 - Video

MAGNA CARTA 3: Freedom of Speech Expression
The relevance of Magna Carta to current legislation on freedom of speech and expression, including religious freedom. Interviews by Chertsey Museum with Joan Smith, Executive Director, Hacked...

By: Chertsey Museum

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MAGNA CARTA 3: Freedom of Speech & Expression - Video

Cultures of Intolerance Podcast 3: #39;Satire: Whose freedom of speech? #39; audience discussion.
Podcast 3: Panel Discussion One: "Satire:Whose Freedom of Speech?" Audience discussion and summing up. Panelists: Merryl Wyn Davies (Muslim Institute), Tim Sanders (cartoonist), Pavan Dhaliwal.

By: ClaxtonBayNumber1

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Cultures of Intolerance Podcast 3: 'Satire: Whose freedom of speech?' audience discussion. - Video

Media Studies 104A - 2015-04-09
Media Studies 104A, 001 - Spring 2015 Freedom of Speech and the Press - William B Turner Creative Commons 3.0: Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs.

By: UCBerkeley

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Media Studies 104A - 2015-04-09 - Video

Freedom of speech in multiplayer is overrated. It's hard to argue that when people have the power to say anything to their teammates or opponents online, things can go south pretty quickly. For every affable or witty stranger you meet in a multiplayer match, there seem to be at least five players who derive their self-worth through anonymous aggression. That's one of the many reasons I've come to appreciate the way some games utilize controlled conversation, retaining most of the good and expunging the bad. They force you to be creative in how you communicate, while feeling infinitely safer for an antisocial gamer like me.

I've found myself drawn to two games that implement brilliant systems for limiting - but not eliminating - the dialogue between players. There's Hearthstone, where you can only communicate via a stock selection of six basic emotes, with unique voiceovers to match your chosen character. Meanwhile, you've got the messaging system in Bloodborne, which continues the Souls series' tradition of letting you leave notes for other players. It relies on a fill-in-the-blank format that offers more possibilities than Hearthstone, but still ultimately confines what you're allowed to express to other players. And though I can technically say less with these systems than all-speak text or open voice chat, they make we want to socialize so much more.

If you've never been a shy person, the idea of fearing multiplayer communication might seem strange. And it's not that I fear the conversations themselves; it's more about the ways they can detract from my gameplay experience by putting me in an awkward or uncomfortable position. Nobody likes being berated by strangers, but in the multiplayer arena, people seem to assume that everyone just has a thick skin by necessity, and that whoever's on the other end of that monitor or TV screen can take it. Those assumptions create a space where one person doesn't see the harm in a little smack talk, and another observes something very hostile that they want no part in.

I'll admit, straight-up, that I can be a pretty antisocial guy - the kind who's perfectly content to sit in his room playing games while a party rages in his living room. But I can also be outgoing when the situation calls for it (meeting someone for the first time, a job interview, dating, and so on). It's just that this extroversion can only be maintained for so long before I need a break, and being chatty with people I don't know on the internet feels like an expenditure of that same energy. I still want human connection in games, of course - otherwise, I'd simply avoid multiplayer games altogether. But it feels like I've been conditioned to assume that taking part in an online conversation with a stranger will either detract from my experience or waste my time and mental energy altogether.

Riot Games has put a ton of effort and resources into reducing 'toxic player behavior' in League of Legends, spending what must be thousands of dollars at this point to analyze what makes people act like a-holes, and what subtle tweaks can trick them into curbing their a-hole-ishness. But Hearthstone and Bloodborne sidestep the need for any of these psychological cues or slaps on the virtual wrist for bad sportsmanship, because their mechanics for multiplayer exchanges simply don't permit the kind of behavior that LoL is determined to correct. They solve the problem by preventing it from ever happening in the first place, without taking away the possibility for making connections and building rapport.

The most obvious benefit to limited correspondence between players is the fact that you'll never be on the receiving end of a verbal assault, whether it's some pre-teen screaming at you through a mic or a grown-up spewing profanities and racial epithets like their life depended on it. But there's also a strenuous side to any nice conversations you strike up with strangers. It's that awkward feeling when you want to stop talking, but they don't; when you seriously consider moving someone from your friends list to the blocked list, just to avoid that sinking feeling when they send you an unwanted invite to join them. I can vividly remember playing World of Warcraft and feeling like I owed my time to people who I only knew through guild chat, prioritizing their concerns over my real-life responsibilities. That's pretty unhealthy when it stretches for weeks on end.

My disillusionment with the value of online interaction wasn't just a product of being a hardcore MMO raider, either. There was that one time I was having a friendly chat with a Diablo 2 player, and we got to talking about how we both liked fighting games. For whatever reason, he saw this two-hour conversation as an invitation to ask if he could stay over at my house if he ever attended a tournament nearby. Or the day that I legitimately felt like a worthless piece of subhuman garbage after being berated in League of Legends by a premade group of teammates for losing us the game. Whatever made that Diablo guy feel so attached, or those LoL players so hateful, exchanging words was the root of the problem, and it made me vulnerable. After a while, saying nothing just felt so much safer.

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Saying less, talking more: my antisocial multiplayer experience

Calgary, Alberta, Canada (PRWEB) April 09, 2015

In response to the 'denier' hunt on Barack Obama's website, Friends of Science Society has released two video productions promoting freedom of speech on climate change. The English version questions why people must follow the religion of the IPCC and informs people of past witch hunts during the Little Ice Age where people were tortured and executed for weather cooking. The video entitled "Freedom of thought" is on YouTube. youtu.be/I0TxfZZN59k

Friends of Science salute the integrity and courage of the thousands of scientists who hold informed and rational, dissenting views on the alleged climate change 'consensus' who are now being cyber attacked as deniers on virtually every front in the US as reported in the Washington Times Mar. 5, 2015. In a Nov. 18, 2013 article in Macleans magazine, while on tour in Australia, Canadian eco-guru David Suzuki reportedly " drew criticism for suggesting the countrys new prime minister, Tony Abbott, is guilty of negligence and crimes against future generations for scrapping a carbon tax..."

The second video, in French, is an on-camera rendition of an earlier blog post by Friends of Science wherein Freedom of Speech/Libert de parole is the central focus, reminding people that the Declaration of the Rights of Man were developed during the brutal climate of the Little Ice Age, when famine gripped most of Europe. The YouTube video is here: youtu.be/16GJbs4U0Qg An English version of the text was published by Troy Media, Dec. 5, 2014 and the HuffPost covered the charitable foundation angle of the story Nov. 13, 2014.

Article 11 of that declaration says:"The free communication of thoughts and opinions is one of the most precious rights of man: any citizen thus may speak, write, print freely, save to respond to the abuse of this liberty, in the cases determined by the law."

Friends of Science are calling out the climate change bullies with these two videos and asking people who stand for freedom, justice, and scientific inquiry to stand with them and stop the climate change bullies.

About Friends of Science have spent a decade reviewing a broad spectrum of literature on climate change and have concluded the sun is the main driver of climate change, not carbon dioxide (CO2). The core group of the Friends of Science is a growing group of earth, atmospheric and solar scientists, engineers and citizens.

Friends of Science Society P.O. Box 23167, Mission P.O. Calgary, Alberta Canada T2S 3B1 Toll-free Telephone: 1-888-789-9597 Web: friendsofscience.org E-mail: contact(at)friendsofscience(dot)org

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Friends of Science Promotes Freedom of Speech on Climate Change in English and French as a Precious Human Right

NEW DELHI: Indias top court Tuesday struck down a controversial law that made posting offensive comments online punishable by jail, a rare victory for free speech campaigners in a country criticized for a series of recent bans. The Supreme Court said the 2009 amendment to the Information Technology Act known as section 66A was an unconstitutional curb on freedom of speech. Section 66A is unconstitutional and we have no hesitation in striking it down, said Justice R.F. Nariman, reading out the judgment. The publics right to know is directly affected by section 66A. The Supreme Court had been asked to examine the legality of the amendment, which makes sending information of grossly offensive or menacing character punishable by up to three years in jail. In 2012 two young women were arrested under the act over a Facebook post criticizing the shutdown of financial hub Mumbai after the death of a local hard-line politician. The charges were later quashed by a Mumbai court, but the case sparked outrage and fierce debate about online censorship in India. Law student Shreya Singhal, who filed a petition in the Supreme Court challenging the amendment after the two women were arrested, welcomed Tuesdays ruling as a big victory. The Internet is so far-reaching and so many people use it that it is very important for us to protect this right today, now, she said. Governments have their own political agenda. A law has to be for the people. Farooq Dadha, father of one of the young women, Shaheen Dadha, also welcomed the ruling against what he called a black law. Credit must go to everyone who fought against this law, including my daughter, he said. A series of bans in India have sparked accusations of a growing climate of intolerance under Hindu nationalist Prime Minister Narendra Modi. They include a ban on screening a BBC documentary on the gang-rape of a Delhi student that sparked mass protests in Delhi. Communications and IT Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad said the government would respond to Tuesdays ruling after reading the judgment in full, but that it was not in favor of curtailing honest criticism. The government had issued guidelines on enforcing the law, and argued in court that it could not be declared unconstitutional just because of the possibility of abuse. But the two judges hearing the case said the amendment could not be saved by the assurances of the government that it will not be misused. The court said the terms used in the act such as grossly offensive were too vaguely worded and open to abuse. What may be offensive to one may not be offensive to another. What may cause annoyance or inconvenience to one may not cause annoyance or inconvenience to another, said the judgment. Dozens of people have been arrested under 66A since its introduction in 2009, although no one has been convicted. Only last week, 19-year-old student Vicky Khan was arrested and thrown in jail in northern India for posting a quote on Facebook that he attributed to a local minister, after the politician denied making the comment. The charge was later dropped, but Khan described his experience as a nightmare for me and my family.

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Indian top court strikes down free speech curbs

DMK stands for Freedom of Speech: Treasurer MK Stalin
During a meeting organized by Centre for Media, DMK Treasurer MK Stalin talks about the virtue and importance of freedom of speech in today #39;s world. Connect with me on: Official Website ...

By: M.K. STALIN

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DMK stands for Freedom of Speech: Treasurer MK Stalin - Video

Media Studies 104A - 2015-04-07
Media Studies 104A, 001 - Spring 2015 Freedom of Speech and the Press - William B Turner Creative Commons 3.0: Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs.

By: UCBerkeley

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Media Studies 104A - 2015-04-07 - Video

Is Freedom of Speech being suppressed in the West

By: jonny kzj

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Is Freedom of Speech being suppressed in the West - Video