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The International Olympic Committee, or IOC, recently warned athletes participating in the 2020 Summer Games that any forms of political protest or messaging are strongly prohibited. They did this by putting out a three page document of guidelines that clarified Rule 50 of their charter. Rule 50 stated in part, No kind of demonstration or political, religious or racial propaganda is permitted in any Olympic sites, venues or other areas.

It would seem the initial rule was clear enough, but its apparent the IOC didnt think so. In any case, Rule 50 certainly wasnt working in the IOCs favor. It didnt stop Tommie Smith or John Carlos from raising their hands in a Black Power salute at the 1968 Olympics and it didnt stop Gwen Berry or Race Imboden from protesting at the 2019 Pan American Games.

In my eyes an additional document of guidelines clarifying something which was already clear to athletes is pretty pointless. I think the IOC should consider that some athletes think standing up for oppressed people is more important than running fast or even kicking a ball into a net. I mean, it's almost like some people have morals.

But dont get me wrong - Im glad the IOC is taking Rule 50 so seriously. This way, any athlete flashing a peace sign at the games is sure to be thrown out. Why? Because it would obviously be a political demonstration against the United States. I mean, we like war so much that a peace sign is obviously a political attack on our ideology.

You mightve thought that last one was funny but you have no idea of whats next. I mean, isnt it just a joke that people even still watch and support the Olympics? Its a bunch of men and women competing against each other to see whos best! But dont worry, its not competing to find a solution to world hunger, a cure for cancer or something similarly meaningful. It's competing for who can dope the most without being caught.

The Olympics even has medal charts where you can see who the world leader in medals won is. The United States takes great pleasure in winning the most medals and often is the country that does. It makes us feel better to have the fittest and best athletes up there on the medal stands. We also feel good having our obese citizens watch our great victory from home on television.

I think Rule 50 is a joke. I will personally be applauding any athlete that demonstrates at the 2020 Games and opposes the IOCs attempted censorship of athletes. Doing whats right and standing up for what you believe in comes above sport. The IOC has clearly lost sight of that.

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Opinion: Don't support the Olympics - Eastern Echo

Think about the social-media mobs of the 2040s

You may recognize UCLA professor John Villasenors name from our coverage of his survey on student support for disruption of speakers they oppose, and even violence against such speakers (a finding replicated in other surveys).

The senior fellow of the left-leaning Brookings Institution also warned that largely unwritten rules on campus have reduced viewpoint diversity to an all-time low.

The chilling effects of explicit campus policies are Villasenors latest target in The Chronicle of Higher Education.

UCLAs law school, where the public policy professor has a joint appointment, has a default policy of recording all instructors classes unless they opt out. Villasenor explains why he always opts out his 20-something student courses:

Todays students live in a world in which an increasing fraction of their lives is digitally surveilled. Their locations are tracked by their smartphones, their online activities are logged by app providers, their text messages are stored in their phones and in the phones of others, and their comings and goings are tracked by key cards and by cameras in building entrances and hallways. A highly interactive classroom should be a space beyond the reach of the digital panopticon.

He calls the college classroom an interesting in-between space that facilitates the sharing of diverse perspectives without the scripted, performative style of dialogue that is often on view in televised debates and other very public settings.

Recording these discussions threatens that they will be replayed to an unknown number of additional people in the future, perhaps without their original context or in a way that can otherwise be used against them, Villasanor argues.

How confident are we that colleges and universities will responsibly use these recordings for the foreseeable future? He speculates:

Imagine if recordings existed of the college or graduate-school classes that todays politicians and business leaders took in their student days. Its a safe bet that there would be a cottage industry of people working to dig those recordings up, scrutinizing them for any comments that could be weaponized, and triumphantly posting the fruits of their searches on social media.

If we want classrooms to be places where students can engage in candid, spontaneous discussion on complex topics that may rile up the social-media mobs of the 2040s if they become public, we should think twice about recording them, Villasenor says.

Read the essay.

IMAGE: rogistok/Shutterstock

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Students will censor themselves if I let the university record every class: professor - The College Fix

Given the wave of corruption that has plagued the region in recent years, the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR) asked the countries of the American continent to protect journalists and freedom of expression.

Journalists and people working in the media make an important contribution to democracy and the transparency of public management and are in a historic situation of vulnerability and discrimination, the Commission said in its recent report.

In the report released at the end of 2019, Corruption and Human Rights, the IACHR evaluates the impact of corruption on democracy, the rule of law and the exercise of human rights in the Americas.

In the second chapter, the report addresses the impact of corruption on press freedom, specifically regarding freedom of expression, access to information, protection of journalistic and communications sources, and the diversity and plurality of the media.

The organization mentioned the case of Hctor Flix Miranda versus Mexico, in which it said authorities had not carried out the relevant investigations regarding the murder of the journalist (1999), who investigated cases of corruption. It also pointed out the case of Vctor Manuel Oropeza versus Mexico, who also reported acts of corruption in his reports and was murdered in 1999. The Commission recommended that the Mexican country send a message of zero tolerance to those who commit attacks against freedom of expression.

Another case mentioned in the report is the murder of journalist Aristeu Guida da Silva

in Brazil (2016), in which the Commission establishes a relationship between the journalist's complaints and the subsequent crime against him, holding the State responsible for violating Articles 4.1 and 13 of the American Convention on Human Rights.

The report also notes that the crimes of defamation, injuria, calumnias and desacato are the most used in the region by those who seek to sue journalists because of their investigations. The use of the Criminal Code in these cases "is the most restrictive and severe" that Latin American countries can use against journalists, except for exceptions in which hate and violence is incited or false news is spread deliberately, the report said.

In that sense, both the Commission and its Special Rapporteurship for Freedom of Expression have indicated the application of criminal figures drafted in an ambiguous manner whose objective is to inhibit public debate and journalistic investigations. Venezuela, Cuba, Ecuador, Honduras, Nicaragua, Brazil, Peru and Guatemala continue to use these criminal figures in cases against journalists, the report said.

Especially in Venezuela, the Rapporteurship found that the application of the Criminal Code restricts, in that sense, the free dissemination of ideas and opinions, worsening with the creation of the law against hate, enacted at the end of 2017.

Nicaragua is another country that the Commission mentions with special attention in that regard, due to censorship and blocking of websites the report mentioned the blocking of Confidencials site on April 23 or of social network profiles, among other things, that have affected journalism in the last two years.

According to the report, the IACHR found that in Nicaragua, the State has directly and indirectly censored independent media, both through state agents and through violent actions of civilians sympathetic to the government. The murder of journalists is one of the most extreme forms of censorship, the Commission said, mentioning the murder of Nicaraguan journalist ngel Gahona who was killed while broadcasting one of the social protests in April 2018 on Facebook Live.

The Commission highlighted as "essential" for the exercise of journalism that the confidentiality of journalistic sources be protected. In this regard, one of the cases mentioned was that of Peruvian journalists Gustavo Gorriti and Rosana Cueva, who revealed a deep crisis in the justice system from the leak of telephone conversations between judges and politicians. One of the first responses from judicial authorities was to ask Gorriti and Cueva for the journalistic sources they used for their reports.

The document also highlighted the growing interest on the part of States in using technologies that increase their surveillance capacity. As an example of this, the report mentions the spyware program Pegasus, produced by an Israeli company, which was used in 2017 by the Mexican government to access the content of phones and devices of journalists, human rights defenders, lawyers and international investigators looking into the mass disappearance of students in Iguala in 2014.

The plurality of media is also an important part of freedom of expression, the document notes. In that sense, the report mentions as an example of the case of Radio Caracas Televisin (RCTV) against the Venezuelan State, when in 2007 the government decided not to renew its concession in an act of censorship. RCTV was a traditional outlet critical of the government of then-Venezuelan President Hugo Chvez.

For the Commission, freedom of expression is the cornerstone of a democratic society and therefore establishes three fundamental principles related to this right: The exercise of freedom of expression in harmony with other rights; the duties of journalists and the media; and the plurality of media or information.

"The double dimension of freedom of expression also implies the obligation to avoid the constitution of private or public monopolies aimed at shaping public opinion according to a single point of view," Commission's report said.

In one of its recommendations, the Commission proposes protection mechanisms for journalists, rights defenders and civil society persons who report acts of corruption in situations of structural violence in the countries of the American continent. Risk assessments and protection mechanisms should never require disclosure of sources or material used in journalistic investigations, the report said.

This report, carried out from resolution 1/18 issued by the Commission in March 2018, seeks to analyze the relationship between human rights and the acts of corruption that plague the region to suggest the development and implementation of public policies that strengthen institutions and encourage accountability, the organization said in a statement. Corruption promotes impunity, inequality and undermines the rule of law, it said.

The IACHR said in that resolution that the victims of corruption must be part and be considered in the analysis, design and application of mechanisms and policies to prevent, denounce and end corruption in their coauntries.

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IACHR report on corruption and human rights asks governments in the region to protect journalists - Knight Center for Journalism in the Americas

UK-based non-profit organisation Index on Censorship will be launching a new research project later this month that will expose the extent to which individuals with wealth and influence use vexatious legal threats to shut down investigations into their practices.

Despite recent changes to UK law more needs to be done both in Britain and abroad to tackle spurious lawsuits, the organisation said.

Chief Executive Jodie Ginsberg said that UK law firms were among the most heavily involved in legal threats to journalists outside the UK. We are still seeing people and organisations with almost no UK links bringing expensive and spurious defamation cases, she said.

The organisation also mentioned murdered journalist Daphne Caruana Galizia as an example of a journalist receiving such threats. Caruana Galizia had numerous lawsuits pending at the time of her murder, with some of the lawsuits brought by UK firms, they said.

Shortly before her death, Caruana Galizia had received letters from the London office of the firm Mishcon de Reya asking for some of her blog posts to be deleted. Caruana Galizias sons had accused Mishcon of seeking to cripple the journalist financially. According to British media reports, Mischon specialises in bringing defamation cases and had been hired to defend the reputation of a client doing business in Malta.

Such suits are a particular problem for independent media outlets and other small organisations. They are financially draining and can take years to process. Faced with the threat of a lengthy litigation battle and expensive legal fees, many who receive such threats are simply forced into silence, the organisation said.

News outlets find themselves receiving a letter threatening expensive proceedings unless online articles are rewritten or removed altogether, and demanding an agreement not to publish anything similar in the future. The letters often tell the recipient that they cannot even report the fact that they have received the letter, Ginsberg said.

The Shift has also been threatened with SLAPP (Strategic Lawsuits Against Public Participation) suits twice one by a Russian banker and another by Henley & Partners, Maltas concessionaire for the cash for passports scheme. The same firm also targeted Daphne Caruana Galizia prior to her assassination. In both cases, The Shift did not back down.

Meanwhile, the Maltese government has refused to ban the use of SLAPP suits in Malta.

The research project aims to interview journalists and media organisations across Europe about the extent of these threats and a final report containing recommendations for action will then be drawn up later in the year.

Link:
Index on Censorship project to expose 'vexatious' legal threats on journalists - The Shift News

Irans hardline authorities on Wednesday prepared for another round of protests by shutting down mobile Internet access to overseas sites in several restive provinces, an Iranian news agency reported.

Relatives of people killed last month during unrest over gasoline price hikes have called for renewed protests and commemoration ceremonies for the dead on Thursday.

The semi-official news agency ILNA quoted a source at the Communications and Information Technology Ministry as saying the shutdown was ordered by security authorities and covered the Alborz, Kurdestan and Zanjan provinces in central and western Iran and Fars in the south.

According to this source, it is possible that more provinces will be affected by the shutdown of mobile international connectivity, ILNA said.

In November, Iran shut down the Internet for about a week to help stifle the fuel protests which turned political, sparking the bloodiest crackdown in the 40-year history of the Islamic Republic.

The Internet censorship made it difficult for protesters to post videos on social media to generate support and also to obtain reliable reports on the extent of the unrest and government violence.

With Post wires

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Iran censors internet on the eve of new protests - New York Post