Strange Dilemma - What Would You Do?
I've received several messages from someone asking me to remove my Tibet Protest March video from YouTube:
The writer appears to be a woman living in Richmond, BC. "She" says that a friend of hers appears in the video and she fears for her safety if the video remains up.
Besides the obvious authenticity issue of the anonymous writer, this raises all sorts of issues of censorship. If you were in my case, what would you do?
Labels:
China,
free speech,
oppression,
Tibet,
video,
YouTube
6 comments:
I would offer to take it down in exchange for an interview with the "friend". If that isn't accepted then they probably aren't actually afraid of anything, and if it is you might get an interesting story.
Perhaps the prudent thing might be to take it down now, and simply repost if the interview request is rejected?
Interesting take. I should let you know though that I just received this message:
Hi there
I am responsible for a whole bunch of the other Vancouver Tibet videos on youtube.
I was wondering if anyone claiming to be Tibetan has emailed you asking to remove your video from youtube because she fears for her friends safety?
Cheers holmes5668
This person's videos can be found here: http://www.youtube.com/user/holmes5668
I've decided not to alter anything until I have proof positive that the "concerned person" is actually who they say they are.
If this fictional "she" feared for her safety so much, why did she appear at a public protest in the first place? There are lots of other options available to her.
I have known people who feared for their jobs, and so wore a paper bag over their heads during protest marches to further drive home the point - that they shouldn't HAVE to fear for their safety/livelihood by exercising their freedom of assembly and expression.
That was a long time ago, in a galaxy far, far away.
holmes5668 is convinced that this writer is a secret communist agent. I'd like a little more proof!
I don't know precisely where Canadian privacy laws now sit but I'm guessing that any person going out in public has to have a reasonable expectation that they'll be filmed by some camera, somewhere.
My money is on holmes5668.
The Commies understood the power of public sentiment well enough to spend the Cold War funding anti-West protests. It makes sense that they would want this hushed up.
The irony though, of using the threat of retaliation against Chinese/Tibetan civilians in order to suppress talking about abuse of those same civilians...
I agree that if you appear in public, chances are a news camera will capture your image.
Fear for someones' safety in Canada??
Oh please. We still have free speech, well mostly anyway, as long as it doesn't offend human rights 'bleeding heart, no common sense' tribunals.
Post a Comment