Meteor Blades still refuses to say why he banned Tom J, the secret censorship decision that inspired the Arab Writers Strike at Daily Kos. Weird, anti-openness must an important value for him and/or site property owner Markos Moulitsas, definitely more important than free speech. I mean, what is the problem, even the Daily Kos apparatchiks have lined up massively in favor (64% versus 28% against) of making banning an open process:
Well, otoh, there was this obscure exchange:
Meteor Blades, with respect, why was TomJ banned?
Sorry, I came here from FDL, I don’t know.
Also Jane Stillwater?
by thatvisionthing on Wed Oct 27, 2010 at 08:57:50 PM PDT
Multiple warnings, each previously suspended… (8+ / 0-)
… for a month and, after being reinstated, still either ignoring those warnings or violating the rules.
Don’t tell me what you believe. Tell me what you do and I’ll tell you what you believe.
by Meteor Blades on Wed Oct 27, 2010 at 09:08:55 PM PDT
What rule?
Was it Tom J’s comment with 2 HRs?
People here may know I/P rules but I don’t, sorry. Scanned the FAQs and still don’t get it. Thanks.
No answer.
But MB did take time in the Arab Strike Diary to tell three non-specified myfiredoglake users that they are lying about having been banned at Daily Kos. Since the Dkos banning process and who is banned is a complete secret, there is of course no way to know who’s lying and who isn’t (trust MB; asking to verify his statements is a bannable offense). Here’s Meteor Blades’ accusation (pro-censorship and anti-Palestinian recommenders noted):
For the record, at least three of.. (10+ / 0-)
Recommended by: Paul in Berkeley, LeftHandedMan, arielle, kalmoth, leftynyc, Corwin Weber, Its the Supreme Court Stupid, thebluecrayon, Mets102, angry marmot
…the “bannees” making “insightful contributions” on the myfdl comment thread of this diary are lying. They are NOT banned at all and have never been.
Don’t tell me what you believe. Tell me what you do and I’ll tell you what you believe.
by Meteor Blades on Wed Oct 27, 2010 at 08:21:54 PM PDT
P.S. Is it unintended irony, or does Meteor Blades’ tag line mean he wants to be known as a censor of political speech?
P.S.2. Arab Writers Strike at Daily Kos was yesterday’s 7th most commented on (294 comments) and 12th most viewed (553 viewers) diary at Daily Kos.
P.S.3. Here’s simone daud‘s original call for an Arab Writers Strike (non-Arabs welcome to join), and a reminder of what it is about:
We are definitely (5+ / 0-)
being personally abused in every essay.
I’m not feeling very welcome here.
The people that show up on every essay speaking to, and showing video of the crisis in Palestine get verbally abused and have their essays derailed by a vocal few who are trying to eliminate any Free Speech on the subject.
It is horrific when humanitarians and Peace Activists get shouted down by name calling and vile comments.
Tom J was a brilliant writer and a man concerned with our relatives there.
I had my ratings taken away months ago for uprating something by sheer accident, after removing it and apologizing for the scroll over. They were never returned.
I feel it is because I am an openly Arab man of Palestinian descent who speaks against the atrocities in Palestine.
But I am loathe to be silenced by those who throw “anti-semite” around to defend a Government that has run as far right amok as the Bush administration and beyond.
Let me sleep on this Simone.
P.S.4. For me, it is also about the big political blogs, and the obvious fact that they are the ‘public squares’ of the 21st century, where free speech rights have to be given priority over private property rights:
Herding sheep into bipartisan political positions (1+ / 4-)
is what censorship of the actual diversity of opinion among Democrats ends up being. And many of us are tired of the bipartisan and right-wing crap we get from the national Democratic Party and this Democratic Party subservient blog.
Free speech rights supersede Kos’s property rights. The correct analogy is claiming the right to free speech at a privately owned shopping mall. A shopping mall, like a big political [blog], is one of the only available ‘town squares’ of the 21st century.
Apparently, through some internal decision, the Kos admins have decided to permit the right wing proIsrael group, and it is large, to run the IP show at Daily Kos. For example, a principal player is Volleyboy, a pretender to left wing IP solutions, has been given the privilege of posting an IP Open Diary every week. No one supporting Palestinian freedom has this privilege. Unless the Kos admins are fully aware of their complicity in Israeli hasbara, I have not seen an act of hoodwinking this blatant. They are likely fully aware. DKos apparently, sometime back, made a decision to support the Israeli perspective on peace in the Middle East, perhaps following Obama, which will eventually amount to subborning Apartheid.
Knowing Kos and his blog entrepreneurship, i.e., money making mentality, I would have to guess, in the absence of evidence to the contrary, that he has decided that his bread is buttered on the right wing Zionist side. A protest among blog advertisers could potentially be catastrophic to income. In this regard, and I am just speculating, of course, the evidence continues to slowly pile up that income is at issue. Tom J’s banning is just one indication.
to see a supposed left-wing blogsite co-opted by Likudnics.
It’s not all that surprising. The PEP* phenomenon is alive and well among American “progressives”.
*Progressive Except for Palestine.
Yeah, not for me. I see a state building walls, and using theft to advance state objectives, and I see fascism.
My daughter is studying Arabic. As a side-effect of Arabic studies, she is now a profound skeptic, and even more, on the Israel question.
Good for her! Where is she studying?
Not surprising. Facism and preventing those who may possibly be Islamic or from “unacceptable middle eastern countries” from exercising free speech are commonplace. Why would the Kos site be any different? It tends to be a repository for accepted establishment beliefs on the middle east and very quick to stamp down on anything that goes against it.
KOS = Killer Of Speech