The increasingly undemocratic actions of the ANC must be exposed before we become a totalitarian state.
censorship
Posted inMedia, News/Politics
News media should decolonise
Journalists Adrian Basson and Mohammed Jameel Abdulla offer important insights into the difficulty of working as a journalist in volatile contexts where protesters, private security and the police may harass, threaten or assault journalists. Abdulla speaks to key themes we touch on in our Media Studies lectures at UCT. I think that his account of […]
Posted inMedia, News/Politics
Zapiro, monkeys and red herrings
Editorial cartooning must be one of the most difficult jobs out there. Not only must the cartoonist be technically adept when it comes to caricature, he or she also has to find the humour in situations that often, on the surface, aren’t especially funny. Day in and day out, cartoonists have to generate ideas and […]
Posted inGender violence, General
Why Baleka Mbete is wrong on ‘rape not part of any culture’
Like many people, Baleka Mbete was shocked by Judge Mabel Jansen’s online comments about black people, and responded by saying that rape is not part of any culture. As a person in the forefront of South Africa’s leadership, her public statements ought to be taken seriously. However, here she is entirely wrong. Rape is part […]
Posted inGeneral, Media
Accusation and failure: The JM Coetzee – Paul Auster correspondence
In the correspondence between the writers JM Coetzee and Paul Auster in Here and Now (Letters: 2008-2011) we encounter a Coetzee largely unfamiliar to readers. Coetzee converses, even chats, in letters with another writer arguably of the same stature (certainly in Europe) in a manner sometimes bordering on the confessional. Coetzee is famous for his […]
Posted inMedia, News/Politics
US journalists are self-censoring their work
By Brendon Bosworth This year, in the wake of Edward Snowden’s leaking of classified documents about digital spying, we’ve come to learn that big brother is definitely watching. As revelations about the National Security Agency and the US’s massive digital spying regime continue to surface it’s become increasingly clear that the majority of digital communications […]
Posted inMedia
Age of Truth…revolution betrayed?
Many hip-hop fans from the current generation may not know much about Prophets of da City (POC). Largely credited by academics for getting Cape Afrikaans hip-hop off the ground and paving the way for Spaza rappers, POC also put their heads on a block for their political principles … literally. The banned video “Understand Where […]
Posted inGeneral
Ben Ngubane and Piekniek by Dingaan
Ben Ngubane – till recently the chairperson of the perpetually dysfunctional SABC board – was appointed as the first minister of arts, culture, science and technology after the historic 1994 elections. It was a euphoric time for the arts sector. The right to freedom of creative expression was guaranteed in the interim Constitution. Apartheid’s censorship […]
Posted inBusiness
Commercial news media, like the SABC, also answer to his master’s voice
Everyone’s favourite whipping boy, the SABC, has done it again. Unspoken commands from the outside have barged in and, at the last minute, dictated an editorial policy. Either both the Metro FM show’s producer and host neglected to acquaint themselves with the said policy, or the policy did not exist until five minutes before the […]
Posted inGeneral, News/Politics
Nothing unusual about SABC…er, censorship
Since the ANC took political power and governance from white minority rule 18 years ago, the SABC has been a highly contested terrain. What I have noticed is that the wise guys in the so-called private-owned media and their networks have the same predictable attitude to attack its integrity at every opportunity, even for the […]
Posted inNews/Politics
Blasphemy should be censored
In the latest outburst of Muslim rage at offences to Islam’s prophet, the actions of some protesters exceeded acceptable limits and should be condemned. In fact, controlling anger is one of the teachings of the prophet they defend. Attacking embassies and killing diplomatic staff, or anyone for that matter, in the course of a protest […]
Posted inMedia, News/Politics
The Spear: SA will not overcome fear by giving into it
Brett Murray’s defaced The Spear stands as a monument to intolerance. After thousands of ANC supporters marched to the Goodman Gallery where it had once been on display, the gallery has agreed it will not be displayed publicly again. While representations of the painting now enjoy the ubiquity of the web, what price have we […]