Free Speech, Censorship, & Journalism

By Igor Mello

Freedom in the U.S.A.

Speech

Press

Television

Internet

•In Saudi Arabia, these freedoms are all banned, censored or filtered.

Saudi Arabian Speech Laws

Does not grant freedom of speech or freedom of assembly.

If a citizen speaks against the King, country, or religion, Islam, it can lead to corporal punishment.

Censorship of MediaIn 2008, singer Katy Perry released her album in the US with her

album cover, showing her midriff and thighs. The Saudi government censored the cover and inside pamphlet because of its

vulgarity and indecency in Saudi culture.

Blackberry Ban

On June 8, 2010, The Saudi Communication and Information Technology Commission [CITC] decided to suspend the use of Blackberry services for all of their subscribers in Saudi Arabia. This was limited to the Blackberry Messenger service (BBM) only while other services like receiving and sending e-mails and using the internet websites remained available, beginning August 6, 2010.

Blackberry Ban

As of August 6, 2010, the government had lifted the ban on BBM usage after only four hours in effect.

According to BBC UK, these other countries are threatening to block Blackberry services:

•UAE•Algeria

•Indonesia•India

(Click on photo for BBC video)

TelevisionTelevision is highly monitored for sexuality and stereotyping against

Islamic culture. One notable instance was when the American television show “American Dad!,” which regularly airs on Saudi TV

stations, banned an episode where the main character goes to Saudi Arabia and the country felt victimized by “Arab – bashing.”

Click the photos for an episode clip.

Internet First introduced in Saudi Arabia in 1994, but only made

available in 1997.

According to BBC and Internetworldstats.com, there were 9.8 million internet users in Saudi Arabia by June of 2010

Reporterswithoutborders.com stated that recently, two human right activists Twitter pages were banned because of their reference to human rights organizations. One of the pages belonged to Khaled al-Nasser, who also keeps a blog called Mashi Sah which means “That’s not true,” said his Twitter messages included references to the human rights situation and governance in Saudi Arabia and links to human rights sites.

Content Filtering

As of June 2002, the Saudi government had blocked a total of 1,353 web pages, according to cyber.law.harvard.edu/filtering/saudiarabia/

Users aren’t allowed to access any website that might pose any harm or show offensive content to the user.

Swimsuits, lingerie, modeling, and other non-pornographic human images were blocked by the government. Pages were blocked from Yahoo categories that suggest the display of images of people wearing less clothes than is typical in Saudi Arabia.

Example of a Blocked Page in KSA

Laws All Internet users in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia shall refrain

from publishing or accessing data containing some of the following:

Anything contravening a fundamental principle or legislation, or infringing the sanctity of Islam and its benevolent Shari’ah, or breaching public decency.

Anything contrary to the state or its system.

Reports or news damaging to the Saudi Arabian armed forces, without the approval of the competent authorities.

Publication of official state laws, agreements or statements before they are officially made public, unless approved by the competent authorities

.

Laws (continued) Anything damaging to the dignity of heads of states or

heads of credited diplomatic missions in the Kingdom, or harms relations with those countries.

Any false information ascribed to state officials or those of private or public domestic institutions and bodies, liable to cause them or their offices harm, or damage their integrity.

The propagation of subversive ideas or the disruption of public order or disputes among citizens.

Anything liable to promote or incite crime, or advocate violence against others in any shape or form.

Any slanderous or libelous material against individuals

Saudi Newspapers

Dailies

Al-Hayat

Asharq Al-Awsat

Saudi Gazette

al-Hayat One of the most popular Pan-Arab newspapers.

Means “Life” in Arabic

Prints in London, New York, Beirut, and in Saudi cities Jeddah, Damam and Riyadh.

Holds a circulation of 300,000.

In August 2007, the Saudi government banned al-Hayat apparently because it criticized some government departments and refused to heed the information ministry's orders.

Asharq Al-Awsat International Arabic

newspaper

Owned by Salman bin Abdulaziz Al-Saud, a member of the Saudi family

(Click on logo for online edition)

The Saudi Gazette is a private an independent English daily newspaper published in Saudi Arabia

Available in print as well as online

As of 2005, it has grew a circulation of over 15,000 copies.

(Click on the Saudi Gazette logo to see the print edition)

References

http://en.rsf.org/saudi-arabia-two-human-rights-activists-twitter-24-08-2009,34262.html

http://www.aawsat.com/english/news.asp?section=1&id=21868

http://saudigazette.com.sa

http://ksa.daralhayat.com

http://internet.gov.sa

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Censorship_in_Saudi_Arabia

The End