FILM Kenya declares Netflix threat to morals

A clumsily sub-edited article, misleadingly fusing separate points on terrorism and moral values raised by Kenya's national film censor, but useful nonetheless.

Cinema certainly is an expression of soft power; Gramsci's theory of hegemony argued that power is maintained as much through cultural dominance as physical force. Hollywood has long been a force for cultural imperialism globally, spreading US cultural values and political ideology, and promoting the US as the world's superpower.

Kenya's film censor has been frustrated by a ruling that Netflix cannot be regulated like broadcast TV as it is TV over Internet.

There is a wider point here: there is no watershed on Netflix, Amazon Prime and the rest of the on-demand streaming services.

Kenya's film censor: Netflix a threat to 'moral values and national security' http://gu.com/p/4g2f4?CMP=Share_AndroidApp_Blogger

CHINA muzzled watchdog, foreign journos expelled

See also  Xi Jinping asks for 'absolute loyalty' from Chinese state media

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For all the very legitimate complaints about the democratic deficit that the billionaire, conglomerate private ownership of UK, US, Italian and other Western press industries creates, and the weak regulation of these corporate mouthpieces, the situation in China (and Hong Kong) is starkly worse.

The expulsion of a French journalist from China this week sparked worldwide headlines, though little real protest as the Western powers grovel for a share of Chinese trade and investment, and seek to avoid upsetting a touchy Chinese regime. The classic Fawlty Towers line of "don't mention the war" (to a German customer) becomes don't mention Tianamen ... or Tibet ... or pretty much anything that will risk upsetting the economically powerful regime.

Delve into this report and you'll find details of papers closing, punished for being too liberal, journalists quitting en masse as their freedom to report shrinks under an authoritarian new president, one jailed for 7 sarcastic tweets, Hong Kong's press seeing ownership switch to regime supporting hands, in apparent breach of the treaty with the UK ...

China's young reporters give up on journalism: 'You can't write what you want' http://gu.com/p/4ffz5?CMP=Share_AndroidApp_Blogger

FILM FRANCE Lars von Trier ban part of new censorship

TBC - The rise of film censorship in France, with the 16 rating of Antichrist removed by a French court following a campaign by a religious group making its screening illegal until it  receives a new rating - a similar system to Britain's. A lesbian drama also lost its 12 rating and is also placed in limbo.

Lars von Trier's Antichrist banned in France seven years after release http://gu.com/p/4gcym?CMP=Share_AndroidApp_Blogger

Press Distortion/Inaccuracy: Mail + Cancer scares

At some stage we'll watch Russell Howard's song about this, but here's a good, detailed article on yet another scary tale of something everyday that causes cancer from the fun-loving Mail:

Dacre, the Mail and cancer

 

NB: This contains a mild use of language at the very end