Content Monitoring

On Fridays in the summer term, we have no classes and therefore a bit more time to read the news and think. Here's what I found this morning about recent (and frankly, not at all surprising though of course disappointing) censorship in a recent Pearl Jam concert in Chicago. An article by Martyn Warwick titled "AT&T moves from carrier to censor" (possibly European judging by the spelling and date system) which reveals that AT&T have admitted to cutting some lyrics critical of President Bush. Minutes before this, I was just telling a student about Loewen's Lies My Teacher Told Me, so reports of whitewashing of events are nothing new. Just think of the Potemkin villages, which Wikipedia says were largely fiction. Whitewash and eyewash - ever the strategy to put a good face on the facts.