This is an all out attack on ‘the commons’, places where the general public meet, witness, discuss, learn about all sorts of topics, applaud or challenge every day life. Autocracies/dictatorships cannot abide these spaces, they cannot stand questioning nor evaluation, they cannot allow knowledge and methods of thinking to be spread, they cannot allow potentially oppositional like minds to gather. Soon, as digital media gets reined in, so, too, will the physical spaces. Groups larger than three will be suspect and rousted. Spaces closed to people. Opportunities to meet, gather, celebrate or protest will become scarce. We will be forced to the Dark Web, the underground, the back alleys to communicate with each other. Very dark times are ahead.
By all that was holy, this is utterly appalling. I knew things were bad in the States, I knew they were continually getting worse, but this is just too despicable to tolerate. Our focus has been on the attacks on science - didn't even imagine anything so innocent being targeted. I'm in Europe and all they're talking about is Greenland...upsetting enough way to start the day - but this is too bloody personal, too painful.
I think dissolving the Corporation for Public Broadcasting was a mistake, but not an undoable one. a new CPB could help redistribute funds, from where there is plenty to where it is needed. And a truly independent CPB could arrange for materials to be copyrighted and preserved completely out of the reach of the federal government.
Someday, funding may be restored; but we can make sure that public media's very existence doesn't depend on an unreliable government.
This is an all out attack on ‘the commons’, places where the general public meet, witness, discuss, learn about all sorts of topics, applaud or challenge every day life. Autocracies/dictatorships cannot abide these spaces, they cannot stand questioning nor evaluation, they cannot allow knowledge and methods of thinking to be spread, they cannot allow potentially oppositional like minds to gather. Soon, as digital media gets reined in, so, too, will the physical spaces. Groups larger than three will be suspect and rousted. Spaces closed to people. Opportunities to meet, gather, celebrate or protest will become scarce. We will be forced to the Dark Web, the underground, the back alleys to communicate with each other. Very dark times are ahead.
By all that was holy, this is utterly appalling. I knew things were bad in the States, I knew they were continually getting worse, but this is just too despicable to tolerate. Our focus has been on the attacks on science - didn't even imagine anything so innocent being targeted. I'm in Europe and all they're talking about is Greenland...upsetting enough way to start the day - but this is too bloody personal, too painful.
And I feel helpless to respond...
I think dissolving the Corporation for Public Broadcasting was a mistake, but not an undoable one. a new CPB could help redistribute funds, from where there is plenty to where it is needed. And a truly independent CPB could arrange for materials to be copyrighted and preserved completely out of the reach of the federal government.
Someday, funding may be restored; but we can make sure that public media's very existence doesn't depend on an unreliable government.
I don’t think there is a will for what you suggest, Ken.