Fortress Russia: What Lessons Can We Learn from Putin's Campaign to Destroy Independent Media?

by Nomad

Russian President Putin's assault on the independent media in his country has been an undeniable triumph. And it took only five years. In fact, the Russian leader's success represents just part of a worldwide trend to convert the media into a tool of the state or of special interests. 

Putin's Subjugation of a Free Media

In the US, people might complain in exasperation about the media, its negligence, and incompetence and its willingness to cozy up to Corporate America. 

The fact that Donald Trump has been allowed to get this far without any serious examination of the man's character- indeed, his sanity- is an indication that it's not imaginary.    

There are legitimate reasons to complain about the sorry state of journalism. True or not, such carping also requires us to put a few things into proper perspective. 

Compared to other countries like China and Russia, (and even one of our NATO allies) the freedom of America's media is still something a lot of countries can only dream of.  

In those countries, Facebook comments are routinely monitored, tweets are selectively censored and woe to you, if your humble Instagram remark should attract the attention of an over-zealous government prosecutor. 

President Vladimir Putin once compared journalism to intelligence work, his former specialty when he was a KGB officer. He remarked:

Journalism, as concerns collecting information, differs little if at all from intelligence work. In my judgment, a journalist's job is very interesting.

It's a very enlightening quote if you think about it. In making the comparison, Putin ignores one of the main principles of a free press, and its most important feature, its independence from the state. 

Intelligence work is very different than journalism in that it does not work for the state. Unlike intelligence work, the information that journalists find becomes a public resource, freely available to citizens who care about discriminating the true from the false. 

Why Being an Atheist in Egypt Can be Dangerous for your Health

 by Nomad

Egypt provides us with an example of why blasphemy laws make a mockery of the war on terrorism and extremist ideologies. 

The right to question authority, in the Western-styled liberal democracies,to challenge the established view or to reject religious dogma is just something we all take for granted.

It comes with living in a free society. It's a fundamental liberty for all human beings that, when it comes for example to religious beliefs we are free to obey the dictates of our own consciences.

In Egypt, however, those who dare to openly express doubts about their faith risk  the threat of state-approved violence and legal prosecution.

The Gaber Case

If the reports are true, then the October 2013 arrest of Sherif Gaber, a student at Suez Canal University in the northeastern city of Ismailiya, was utterly surreal. 

It involved armored cars surrounding his home in the middle of the night. Was he, you might ask, some kind of religious extremist plotting an attack? Was he a jihadist ready to blow himself up for a distort interpretation of his faith?

No. 

His crime was only that he was a non-believer, an atheist. For expressing his skepticism, he was charged "for insulting Islam and promoting atheism."