Iraq introduces nightly internet curfew • Hacker News Board

Re: Iraq introduces nightly internet curfew

#101

Post by monetus » Thu, Oct 10, 2019, 2:42 PM UTC

flyGuyOnTheSly wrote: post #89

freeflight wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Canada is part of FiveEyes, thus aid was offered [0] and very likely taken. The lack of Canadian large scale military participation was due to practicality and not moral objections to the invasion [1]: "The weakness of the Canadian military had been a factor in its very limited role in the 1991 Gulf War. While the military had been asked about the feasibility of sending 4 Canadian Mechanized Brigade Group (4 CMBG) fr…

Again, I was not in the military in the early 90s. I have no connection to Iraq personally. I do not collectively harbor guilt and constantly stress about the horrible things that the country I choose to reside in has done in their past. I have Hong Kong products in my house, and I interact with people who were born in Hong Kong all the time. The same cannot be said for Iraqi products or people. That is the point I a…

The responsibilties and attachments of a superorganism like a society differ too much from that of an individual's. It is so easy to let communcation break down when people discuss both of those things at the same time.

Re: Iraq introduces nightly internet curfew

#102

Post by Kalium » Thu, Oct 10, 2019, 2:46 PM UTC

mikorym wrote: post #74

euix wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In eastern political systems such as China and Russia, the prevailing sentiment among the masses is cynicism. In democratic systems it is hypocrisy. Pick your poison.

The one where you have the means of living together with self-determination.

How do you define and measure self-determination? What level of aggregation does it apply at?

Re: Iraq introduces nightly internet curfew

#103

Post by coldtea » Thu, Oct 10, 2019, 2:50 PM UTC

alexandercrohde wrote: post #85

emptyfile wrote: post #8

2019-10-09 https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2019/10/iraq-protests-latest-... >At least 110 people have been killed and more than 6,000 wounded in Baghdad and in the south, since security forces started cracking down on demonstrators. And the whole world is "outraged" about HK. Here on this thread the other posters are making jokes. If they killed every single person in the country no one would give a shit. Same way no…

>> If they killed every single person in the country no one would give a shit. Same way no one gives a shit about Yemen. What's your point exactly? Is it that human nature is broken, and that we should try to compensate for it [by trying to force ourselves to care more] ? (Because I wonder how many atrocities there are in the world, and how that scales if every internet stranger needs to be angry about every atrocity…

>Is it that human nature is broken, and that we should try to compensate for it

No, that if we should be aware, we should be aware for all injustices, not just follow the ones we are force-fed by hypocritical self-serving interests (e.g. our country's diplomacy and subservient media preferring this victim over that, or getting outraged at this player over that - because it suits some diplomatic plans).

Especially when they atrocities they point people to look at are much more minor than others they purposefully ignore...

In general, getting one's own opinion, as opposed following the government/media agendas of enemies and victim's du jour, and knowing when they're manipulated, is a good thing...

should see through crocodile tears hypocritic concern, and that we should be aware of all injustices

Re: Iraq introduces nightly internet curfew

#104

Post by ru999gol » Thu, Oct 10, 2019, 2:50 PM UTC

alexandercrohde wrote: post #85

emptyfile wrote: post #8

2019-10-09 https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2019/10/iraq-protests-latest-... >At least 110 people have been killed and more than 6,000 wounded in Baghdad and in the south, since security forces started cracking down on demonstrators. And the whole world is "outraged" about HK. Here on this thread the other posters are making jokes. If they killed every single person in the country no one would give a shit. Same way no…

>> If they killed every single person in the country no one would give a shit. Same way no one gives a shit about Yemen. What's your point exactly? Is it that human nature is broken, and that we should try to compensate for it [by trying to force ourselves to care more] ? (Because I wonder how many atrocities there are in the world, and how that scales if every internet stranger needs to be angry about every atrocity…

It has not really anything to do with human nature, its the power structures in the west that have vested interests to shape the mainstream narrative. Some atrocities are getting coverage, its not at all arbitrary which ones. Its more a sign of how incredibly effective they've become in pacifying the entire population in the west through media and politics, institutional corruption, sham elections, etc. Western democracy is beyond broken, will never get fixed and things will only get worse. But I agree with the majority of people who can still form coherent thoughts in their minds, much easier to just stick the head in the sand and deny that what I'm stating is demonstrably true.

Re: Iraq introduces nightly internet curfew

#105

Post by yorwba » Thu, Oct 10, 2019, 2:54 PM UTC

vkou wrote: post #77

bjourne wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Same thing is happening in Gaza where over 200 civilians have been killed in the March of Return demonstrations over the last year. Our Western media reporting is insanely narrow and single-minded. One can only hope that, since we are outraged about the HK situation (as we should be!), it follows that we should be outraged about other worse situations too.

Never happened, never will happen. You have thousands of gallons of e-ink spilled over police brutality in HK, a few drops on Iraq, and humm-hawws and 'well, they are all terrorists anyways' on Gaza. Otherwise intelligent people are incapable of understanding that their outrage is being directed to serve geo-political ends. Antagonising China is patriotic. Antagonising Israel serves no end, and is, also of course, an…

> Otherwise intelligent people are incapable of understanding that their outrage is being directed to serve geo-political ends.

"Direction" implies that there was a coordinated decision to inflate the importance of the Hong Kong protests by sending more journalists there to produce more articles. But Hong Kong was already an internationally important city with many journalists. Of course they were going to report on protests happening right under their nose.

For example, when the German broadsheet Die Zeit published an article on the protests, it was by the same journalist as always when there's something to report in Hong Kong. When they sent a team into Yemen, they weren't allowed into the country, operated from Djibouti and used a Yemeni reporter as a proxy to allow them to do interviews via video call; of course using a translator because there wasn't enough forewarning to learn a language for this assignment.

The difference in reporting difficulty explains the difference in reporting frequency.

If the media really wanted to patriotically antagonize China, they could have devoted similar attention to incidents in places like Nanjing, Zhuhai or Wuhan, but I only saw Wuhan make it into English-language media; that played out as usual when something happens where no (English-speaking) journalist is there to report on it.

Re: Iraq introduces nightly internet curfew

#106

Post by mc32 » Thu, Oct 10, 2019, 2:56 PM UTC

ru999gol wrote: post #104

alexandercrohde wrote: post #85

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>> If they killed every single person in the country no one would give a shit. Same way no one gives a shit about Yemen. What's your point exactly? Is it that human nature is broken, and that we should try to compensate for it [by trying to force ourselves to care more] ? (Because I wonder how many atrocities there are in the world, and how that scales if every internet stranger needs to be angry about every atrocity…

It has not really anything to do with human nature, its the power structures in the west that have vested interests to shape the mainstream narrative. Some atrocities are getting coverage, its not at all arbitrary which ones. Its more a sign of how incredibly effective they've become in pacifying the entire population in the west through media and politics, institutional corruption, sham elections, etc. Western democ…

If the West is bad at reporting, is it better elsewhere, maybe in China or maybe in Russia, even India? Or is it that almost everyone is like that?

Are people in Santa Barbara bad because they don’t keep up with things in Sparks NV too much?

Re: Iraq introduces nightly internet curfew

#107

Post by TeMPOraL » Thu, Oct 10, 2019, 2:58 PM UTC

flyGuyOnTheSly wrote: post #62

ephemeralism wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

well, you did invade them. Overthrew their government. but sure, other than that, next to no connection.

I am a Polish immigrant to Canada. Canada very reluctantly helped the US with their air raid campaign over Afghanistan, but as far as I am aware we didn't have much say in Iraq. And either way, I fail to see how that translates to having a closer relationship with their people. If anything, it distances them from our psyche. Obviously the invasion of Iraq was the wrong thing to do. I am not arguing that it was right…

The invasion did have a lot to do with shaping the oil market to the US liking, so if you're a western consumer of petroleum industry - which you are - then perhaps you might find some connection with the plight of Iraqi people after all.

Re: Iraq introduces nightly internet curfew

#108

Post by TeMPOraL » Thu, Oct 10, 2019, 3:00 PM UTC

flyGuyOnTheSly wrote: post #72

mlang23 wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your people invaded Iraq just 15 years ago. No matter what you say, I believe you have a rather large obligation when it comes to Iraq. It is easy to forget history, right?

I am a polish immigrant living in Canada. "My people" didn't do anything to Iraq.

FWIW, Polish army did help the US in Iraq, in the vain hope that if we kiss the US ass hard enough, we'll get visa requirements for Polish people removed...

Re: Iraq introduces nightly internet curfew

#109

Post by throwaway66920 » Thu, Oct 10, 2019, 3:01 PM UTC

owl57 wrote: post #18

mFixman wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think this is the most HN comment ever read. And no, having an Internet curfew for preventing bloody protests won't improve the well-being of citizens.

Depends on whether it's successful in preventing bloody protests. Almost everything is better than war.

What about war and progressive social change

Re: Iraq introduces nightly internet curfew

#110

Post by serf » Thu, Oct 10, 2019, 3:01 PM UTC

ephemeralism wrote: post #59

flyGuyOnTheSly wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have hundreds of products in my house that say "Made in Hong Kong". I don't have a single product in my house that says "Made in Iraq". It's not strange that North America doesn't care much about Iraqi plight, as we have next to no relationship with them or their people. Same as we all cannot afford to cry over every single other person's mother and father passing away, but we cry over our own parents passing.

well, you did invade them. Overthrew their government. but sure, other than that, next to no connection.

>well, you did invade them. Overthrew their government.

A one-person invasion? And he even succeeded at overthrowing a government all by his lonesome self? That's impressive.

This mild sarcasm I used above is to draw attention to the ludicrous idea that any citizen, anywhere, is responsible for the actions of their government.

Hee and haw about how we citizens brought whoever to power. I don't care. Until the day that government corruption ends and elections become fair, the governments' actions are not my own.

Call me when that day occurs.

P.S. here's a bit from the comic Doug Stanhope that hits a similar topic. [1]

"‘Oh, was that us?’ Was that me and you, Tommy? We saved the French? Jesus. I know I blacked out a little after that fourth shot of Jägermeister last night, but I don’t remember… "

[1]:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FKT4a-RMT5o