Gul Bukhari, in this weeks op-ed, writes a hilarious summary of the Youtube ban drama: Advocate Akram Sheikh had filed a civil miscellaneous application in the middle of an ongoing ‘obscenity on media’ petition at the Supreme Court of Pakistan based on letters to the Chief Justice by Qazi Hussain Ahmed (then leader Jamat e Islami) and Justice (retd) Wajihuddin Ahmed. Oddly, the application was admitted, and an order passed to the Chairman PTA to block all instances of ‘Innocence of Muslims’ from ‘Youtube and all other websites’ in September 2012. PTA, not having any technical means available to make the Great One’s wish its command, and consequently quaking in its boots from fear of He who could strike down Prime Ministers, promptly proceeded to block Youtube in its entirety. The resultant farce in force ever since is that the ‘objectionable’ and allegedly blasphemous video is available everywhere on the internet, including on Youtube which is accessed using proxies and VPNs. As a result, the Ansar Abbasi and Akram Sheikh variety are happy as bunnies that Youtube remains blocked while the offending video is not. It is not only the offending video in question but an unimaginably vast quantity of other offending material that is constantly produced and made available, and remains available on the internet. But the proponents of bans remain silent on this interesting little problem. As long as they can wield power, the rest doesn’t really matter.
Posted on: Sun, 18 May 2014 09:01:49 +0000
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