Slovenia is about to assume the rotating presidency of the EU, and Slovenian journalists are acting like their cousins to the north: they’re protesting against the attempt by the mandarins of Brussels to squelch free speech.
According to ANSAmed:
EU: Slovenian Journalists Sign Open Anti-Censorship Letter
Nearly 600 Slovenian journalists signed an open letter against censorship and political pressure, which was sent at the end of 2007 to more than 300 government leaders in the European Union, international organisations and newspapers, among others, on the eve of Slovenia’s assumption of the EU rotating presidency. In the open letter, the 571 signatories refer to the petition signed last autumn and presented on October 16 to Slovenia’s National Assembly. The signatories of the open letter point out that three months since the petition was tabled nothing has been done in order to verify the accusations made in the document against political interference with the media. “The EU is presided by a country, in which 571 signatories have launched an alarm against censorship and political pressure, but the government and Parliament of which reject any dialogue with the journalists,” the open letter reads.
By the way — I wanted to include a translation of Lionheart’s text into Slovenian for my earlier post, but the email address for my sole Slovenian contact no longer works. Slovenc, if you’re reading this: send your new address to unspiek@chromatism.net!
Hat tip: insubria.
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9 comments:
Is there something Slovenian I can buy?
On the subject of censorship, check out what 1389 posts about Australia:
Censorship - is this what we want?
I'm dumbfounded. Is this real? Do they only have petty politicians who don't bother to say "This is fundamentally wrong, don't do it!"
Baron,
Don't know if you get the WSJ so I'm pasting an article about Germany here since I don't think people can read it w/o a subscription.
Gastarbeiter and Crime
January 9, 2008
In politically correct Germany, even pointing out facts can be controversial, as Roland Koch discovered. "We have too many foreign juvenile criminals," the governor of the state of Hesse told the daily Bild recently. He called for tougher punishments, including deportation.
Mr. Koch's straight talk prompted his political opponents to accuse him of "xenophobia" -- a charge that stings in a country still haunted by its Nazi past. Mr. Koch, a Christian Democrat, is in a tough re-election race when voters in his state go to the polls on January 27. His Social Democrat opponents claim he is just trying to attract the bigot vote.
Whatever his motives, the statistics back up Mr. Koch. In Berlin, for example, one recent study shows that 70% of repeat offenders are foreigners or children of immigrants. Mr. Koch's proposals were triggered by an especially brutal assault just before Christmas that was caught on a surveillance camera and shown on television. Shouting "dirty German," an 18-year-old Greek and a 20-year-old Turk kicked an elderly man repeatedly in the head because he had asked them to obey the smoking ban in the Munich subway. The man, badly hurt, was hospitalized.
As in much of Europe, Germany is struggling to integrate its immigrants, especially Muslims, who constitute roughly 25% of the immigrant population. The socioeconomic background of foreign offenders, however, is very similar to that of native-born criminals: They typically are high-school dropouts and/or unemployed. That foreigners find themselves more often in that situation than natives is to a large extent the result of misguided welfare policies.
Germany's strict labor rules protect "insiders" -- that is, those who already have jobs. Generous unemployment benefits for "outsiders" have fostered a dependency culture particularly entrenched among foreigners. More than 40% of foreigners have no occupational training. The unemployment rate among non-citizens in Germany is, at 18.6%, twice as high as the national average.
Those who complain the loudest about Mr. Koch's "xenophobic" campaign are the same who, in the name of social justice, advocate policies that would make it even harder for unskilled immigrants to find jobs. Mr. Koch's Social Democratic critics, including his challenger, Andrea Ypsilanti, favor a nationwide minimum wage, which currently applies only in some sectors. A recently adopted €9.80 minimum wage for postal workers has already led to massive layoffs in the private mail delivery sector. Setting similar standards across the country would make getting out of the welfare trap all the more difficult.
At the same time, Germans have long deluded themselves that the Gastarbeiter, or guest workers, would one day return to their homelands -- including German-born second and third generations of "foreigners." A strict citizenship law based on blood lines was only recently loosened under the previous Red-Green government, making naturalization easier. Mr. Koch, in the upper house of Parliament in 1999, helped block government plans to ease the citizenship rules even further.
Cultural barriers to integration exist among native Germans and immigrants. And the resulting problems manifest themselves not only in random street crimes. A study released last month by the Interior Ministry showed an alarming affinity among Muslims in Germany for jihadist ideology. One-quarter of those surveyed said they'd be ready to use violence against infidels in the service of Islam. So much for the widely held assumption that Germany's Muslims, who are mostly of Turkish background, are more immune to radical Islam than are Arab immigrants.
The best weapon against crime and extremism is education, which starts at home. Immigrant parents need to examine why so many of their sons turn bad. In her book, "The Lost Sons," Turkish-born sociologist Necla Kelek blames an archaic macho culture among many Turkish immigrants for fostering violent behavior, especially against women.
While immigrant communities need to take a self-critical look at their failure to adapt to their new homeland, government policies must do their part to facilitate integration. It won't be the worst outcome of the current debate about foreign criminals if Berlin recognizes that social mobility, and the end of rampant welfarism, is key to successful integration.
"It won't be the worst outcome of the current debate about foreign criminals if Berlin recognizes that social mobility, and the end of rampant welfarism, is key to successful integration."
"The end of rampant welfarism" ?
I think WSJ has a point here, a very valid one. No matter how I look at it, I believe the welfare state as we know it will have to be cut back significantly. The economical prognosis in Denmark (unnoticed by most politicians) say so, and harsh economical reality may catch up with us in a decade or so. That would have interesting implications for quite a few things, not least how we spend money on supporting 'integration projects' or giving cash to the PLO/PA.
This is a bit of a stretch topic-wise but it touches on anti-censorship. This from my mother who is not inclined to consider these matters. She got it from friends in Iowa. I hope the word is getting out.
---
Dear Moslem
Association: As a professor of Mechanical Engineering here at MSU I intend to protest your protest. I am offended not by cartoons, but by more mundane things like beheadings of civilians, cowardly attacks on public buildings, suicide murders, murders of Catholic priests (the latest in Turkey ), burnings of Christian churches, the continued persecution of Coptic Christians in Egypt ,the imposition of Sharia law on non-Muslims, the rapes of Scandinavian girls and
women (called 'whores' in your culture), the murder of film directors in Holland, and the rioting and looting in Paris France. This is what offends me, a
soft-spoken person and academic, and many, many of my colleagues. I counsel you dissatisfied, aggressive, brutal, and uncivilized slave-trading Moslems to be very aware of this as you proceed with your infantile 'protests.' If you do not like the values of the West - see the 1st Amendment - you are free to leave. I hope for God's sake that most of you choose that option Please return to your
ancestral homelands and build them up yourselves instead of troubling
Americans.
Cordially,
S. Wichman
Professor of Mechanical
Engineering
As you can imagine, the Muslim group at the university didn't
like this too well. They're demanding that Wichman be reprimanded and the
university impose mandatory diversity training for faculty and mandate a seminar on hate and discrimination for all freshmen. Now the local chapter of CAIR has
jumped into the fray. CAIR, the Council on American-Islamic Relations, apparently doesn't believe that the good professor had the right to express his
opinion. For its part, the university is standing its ground in support of Professor Wichman , saying the e-mail was private, and they don't intend to publicly condemn his remarks. Send this to your friends, and ask them to do the same. Tell them to keep passing it around until the whole country gets it. We are in a war. This political correctness crap is getting old and killing us . If
you agree with this, please send it to all your friends, if not simply delete it.
If this can be validated and a relevant MSU e-mail address obtained we can send e-mails of support to the professor and the university.
Sigh - I really need to learn to make an attempt at validation myself before asking it of others.
The letter is true, It's from 2006 however.
MSU Letter
Charlemagne,
Thanks for the info. I just got the email today from my mom. She is 79 and it is not really in her character to send me stuff like this. I hope this means that the word is spreading.
Svetlana has an interesting take on Slovenian blunders in their first days of EU presidency. Masterfully edited and illustrated as usual.
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