By GottaLaff
One of my all time favorites, George Carlin, who I knew briefly and loved longly (NSFW):
It's nice to live in a country that lets you say whatever you want, unless you're on national Tee Vee, in a school room, or at a Tea Bagger rally.
China, on the other hand:
China does, of course, have its own version of the dirty words (many, many more than the seven identified by Carlin), but the list itself is confidential.In China, the censoring is left up to each website. Outside of China, users find themselves typing headlong into Great Firewall of China.
Trying to figure out what is banned and what is not has taken on new urgency in the aftermath of Google's withdrawal from China over censorship concerns and the strong stance of the Obama administration on Internet freedom.
The Chinese government doesn't even call it censorship, the preferred term being "guidance of public opinion."
That's a little like duct taping someone's mouth and calling it "guidance of communication."
David Bandurski, a scholar at the China Media Project, based at the University of Hong Kong:
"The paranoia," Bandurski said, "is more effective than blocking certain words."
What does that remind me of? Thinking... thinking... Oh, I know!
PalinBeckRushBilloTeaBaggersBachmannFox.
That was my version of Carlin's seven words you can't say on Tee Vee.
So what are the unspeakable words that George Carlin would have turned into an instant classic routine?
Adult, adultery, brainwash, censorship, civil movement, core principles, corruption, credit crisis, Cultural Revolution, Dalai Lama, demonstration, dissident, economic bubble, Edgar Snow, evil, exile, fraud, genocide, impeachment, June 4, lust, mafia, mainland, mistress, Mongolian independence, multiparty, national secret, nurse, naked, one-party, overthrow, princeling, rape, Rebiya Kadeer, revolution, riot, scripture, sperm, state security, Taiwan independence, temptation, Tiananmen, Tibet independence, truth, yellow .
Temptation?
Truth??
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