Daily newspaper Today sacks blogger “mr brown” after government criticism
From Reporters Without Borders
Blogger Lee Kin Mun, alias mr brown, has had his weekly column axed in the daily Today, after a member of the government criticised the blogger in the newspaper.
“This incident confirms in every way the fears we have about the government stranglehold on the media,” the press freedom organisation said. “The outspokenness of mr brown will be sadly missed in the Singaporean press”.
The newspaper, part of the state-owned Mediacorp Press group, had given the blogger a column to try to attract a younger readership. Despite the 6 July 2006 decision to oust him from the paper, Lee Kin Mun continues to run his blog www.mrbrown.com, one of the most popular in the country.
13 comments:
think he was suspended...
A Bully
PM Lee recently criticised Australia and New Zealand's liberal democratic practices during his June 2006 visit claiming his single party rule is better.
While visiting as a guest, it was unnecessary and impolite to criticise others' political systems but the hosts' generosity prevailed and there was no tit for tat.
mrbrown's commentry on the Household Survey however was not tolerated. The facts are that the cost of living has gone up and the income gap between rich and poor has widened in Singapore. Why can't mrbrown have an honest opinion on what he considers the causes might be?
I cannot see any of the bad things imputed by Ms Bhavani anywhere in mrbrown's article. It does not require a rocket scientist to fatham the causes and effect of mrbrown's suspension stem from Ms Bhavani's attitude in her role as a hired gun fronting for a faceless bureaucracy.
Hijacking the moral high ground, Ms Bhavani challenged anonynous writers to identify themselves. mrbrown was identified and the sniper took aim.
In our school days when someone bigger and stronger lets fly at you, pushing, kicking, threatening, taking away your things and making you fear in order to control you, it was called bullying.
Bureaucratic bullying in Singapore appears alive and well, only more insidious - same aim, create fear, take control.
Some bureaucrat might just conclude I have gone OB criticising Singapore's democratic practice.
I am just taking a leaf from PM Lee who criticised my country's democratic process - so there!
As for the trouble manufactured by Ms Bhavani for mrbrown, there is an old saying "trouble shared is trouble halved. Thousands are sharing it with mrbrown.
why do people keep looking for officially accepted critics? they were hoping Catherine Lim, Lee Han She, Ngiam Tong Dow, Mr Brown, etc, would keep pumping out critical comments without crossing the OB markers
this is impossible since nobody knows where the OB markers are, so it is only a matter of time the poor guy would cross it; Ngiam the senior civil servant obviously understood this, and stopped commenting after just a couple of times
Now is the time for Singaporeans to wake up and see the unfair treatment they are subjected to day in day out.
Whatever LHL said during the ND Rally about his govt opening up and more transparent is purely just rhetoric. While countries in the region like Indonesia, Taiwan and S Korea are becoming more democratic, we are still run the same way as we were in the 60s & 70s. Everything is still tightly controlled and regulated including citizens' honest opinions.
I personally am blind to these stupid OB markers.
WTF is that? A fuzzy-boundaried edict from a statist turkey who presumes to treat the citizens like children: "you may say this, you may not say that"
Before you folks get your knickers in too much of a twist: any employer is entitled to hire or fire any employee as they so choose for whatever reason.
Similarly any wage earner is free to leave his employer and seek employment elsewhere, for whatever reason.
In other words, human beings are free to associate with one another.
TODAY, IMO, did nothing "wrong".
of course; they had no choice; unlike you, they are not blind to OB markers
Well, history is repeating itself after elections and after elections. Those believed in freedom of speech got their names blacklisted.
Will you please remove that inane, irresponsible headline? Brown's has been indefinitely suspended; as far as anyone knows - including brown himself - Brown has not been sacked from Today.
akikonomu
according to RSF that is the headline they are going for. Something tells me that a professional journalist will have checked his or her facts before using such a title.
So NO I will not remove the title. What if I changed it to 'retrenched', would you be happy then?
> sgfreedom said...
Sad. Government don't allow criticism or even comment. <
Sadder still, people just obey. It is insane to even imagine that a citizen has to ask permission to speak or express his opinion.
The state serves the people, not the other way around.
Apparently the general public haven't internalised this simple idea yet.
Please suspend all the Pro PAP Journalists as well for being partisan and politicised.
There are train loads of them. Everyday churning out Pro PAP news until like PAP is God.
They paint Opposition like demons so they are partisan as well.
Please be fair in implementing laws(if any) and policy.
I can name some for you: Chua sisters, Loh Chee Kong, Aaron Low, Nicholas Fang etc.
Please suspend all of them as well.
mrbrown was suspended without any indication of the possibility of return or that this is only a temporary suspension. He has been suspended indefinitely. If you ask me, "sacked" is an appropriate word. PS this comes from inside info.
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