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If you think R21 is the strictest classification a movie in Singapore can receive, think again. The Oscar-nominated drama The Kids Are All Right has been rated R21 and has also had an additional condition imposed on it. The Board of Film Censors (BFC) says that it can only be released on one print. This is likely to be the first time an R21 film will be screened under such a condition outside of a film festival.

Further down the news article, it was explained that the Board of Film Censors issued a letter earlier this week to the film’s distributor, Festive Films: It stated: ‘The majority of the members [of the Committee of Appeal] agreed with the board that the film normalises a homosexual family unit and has exceeded the film classification guidelines which states that ‘Films that promote or normalise a homosexual lifestyle cannot be allowed’.’ In addition, the committee said the fact that the film is allowed for release in Singapore at all was already a concession. It said: ‘Imposing a condition of one-print serves as a signal to the public at large that such alternative lifestyles should not be encouraged.’ – ibid

Firstly, can/should the civil service create additional rules at whim? Secondly, why is the idea of two gay persons raising a family considered something to be defended against?

Michael Hor noted that despite the vocal attempts to demonise gay people and paint homosexual orientation as injurious (including by some members of the ruling party) the government did not subscribe to such reasoning. Yet the government chose to keep the law.

The “key speech arguing for the retention of 377A” that Hor refers to was that made by Thio. Hor then goes on to discover that the government’s decision was bi-layered. The surface justification, going by the prime minister’s words, was that it would be symbolic — a “signpost of heterosexual orthodoxy”. Hor next asks what the motivation might be for wanting such a symbol. He examines the possibility that it could be to steer people towards heterosexual orientation, yet the government itself, from its own words, does not believe so.

As was well-known, the anti-gay movement was religiously inspired. The government however was neither dictated nor swayed by them, Hor said. In fact, the government “roundly rejected” the movement’s essential beliefs. Still, it appears that the government did not want to annoy them any further by leaving them empty-handed. That motivation alone made the government decide to retain 377A.

Ben Summerskill, chief executive of gay rights group Stonewall, said: "At Stonewall, we've all been on this app since 8am and we can assure your readers it's having absolutely no effect.

A new petition letter addressed to Steve Jobs, the Apple chief executive, posted on the Change.org site last week said: "Apple doesn't allow racist or anti-Semitic apps in its app store, yet it gives the green light to an app targeting vulnerable LGBT youth with the message that their sexual orientation is a 'sin that will make your heart sick' and a 'counterfeit'.

The technology giant is notoriously efficacious in deciding which apps it allows on to its popular iPhone and iPad handsets. Last year Apple withdrew a similar anti-gay iPhone app called Manhattan Declaration after Change.org, the online activism site, handed over an 8,000-strong petition.

Breaking the cultural code damages a person’s reputation, and perhaps one’s career. Britain’s Home Secretary Kenneth Clarke recently had to apologize for saying that some rapes were less serious than others, implying the need for legal discrimination. The parade of gaffes and subsequent groveling apologies has become a regular feature of public life. In his classic essay On Liberty, John Stuart Mill defended free speech on the ground that free inquiry was necessary to advance knowledge. Restrictions on certain areas of historical inquiry are based on the opposite premise: the truth is known, and it is impious to question it. This is absurd; every historian knows that there is no such thing as final historical truth.

It is not the task of history to defend public order or morals, but to establish what happened. Legally protected history ensures that historians will play safe. To be sure, living by Mill’s principle often requires protecting the rights of unsavory characters. David Irving writes mendacious history, but his prosecution and imprisonment in Austria for “Holocaust denial” would have horrified Mill.

the pressure for “political correctness” rests on the argument that the truth is unknowable. Statements about the human condition are essentially matters of opinion.  Because a statement of opinion by some individuals is almost certain to offend others, and since such statements make no contribution to the discovery of truth, their degree of offensiveness becomes the sole criterion for judging their admissibility. Hence the taboo on certain words, phrases, and arguments that imply that certain individuals, groups, or practices are superior or inferior, normal or abnormal; hence the search for ever more neutral ways to label social phenomena, thereby draining language of its vigor and interest.

The US Supreme Court ruled yesterday by an 8-1 vote that the bizarre anti-gay funeral picketers belonging to the Westboro Baptist Church have a First Amendment right to free speech. Rev Fred Phelps and his crew have been waving placards with messages such as “Thank God for Dead Soldiers” and “AIDS Cures Fags” at military funerals to promote their belief that God is punishing the US for accepting homosexuality.

The Supreme Court decision (see below) overruled a previous award of over $10 million (reduced on appeal to $5 million) to the family of Lance Corporal Matthew Snyder in relation to a protest at his funeral.

First, undoubtedly debate about war, its causes and casualties is important. This was “speech” in a public place on an issue of public concern, even though the particular hypothesis is ridiculous and offensive. Free speech protection can’t, however, just be for views already presumed to be true. Secondly, protestors were scrupulous about staying within the letter of the law. They knew that they had to remain 1,000 feet from the funeral, for instance, and did not shout or otherwise disrupt the service. Preventing such orderly protests on issues of importance would have been a serious attack on civil liberties, even though the protestors displayed gross insensitivity to those mourning.

Singapore’s film censors had restricted the showing of a lesbian-themed, Oscar-nominated film, in a move that shocked the local cinema scene, a media report said today

The Board of Film Censors rated The Kids Are All Right as category R21, applying to “films that may contain adult issues, themes and more explicit scenes”, and limited its release to one single print, the Straits Times newspaper reported.

The US comedy drama directed by Lisa Cholodenko about a lesbian couple that meets the man who fathered their children received four Academy Award nominations, including Best Motion Picture and Best Leading Actress for Annette Bening.According to the board’s film classification guidelines, “films should not promote or normalise a homosexual lifestyle”.

WOMEN'S advocacy group Aware's plan to distribute a set of DVDs of its dramatic extraordinary general meeting (EGM), held in May 2009, has hit a snag.

The Association of Women for Action and Research (Aware) has not been able to distribute the DVDs, as it is appealing against a requirement that it needs a government licence to do so.

The MDA has, in the meantime, given the DVD an M18 rating - meaning it should be seen only by those aged 18 and above.

John Beddington, the Chief Scientific Advisor to the UK government, has identified a need to be "grossly intolerant" of certain views that get in the way of dealing with important policy problems: We are grossly intolerant, and properly so, of racism. We are grossly intolerant, and properly so, of people who [are] anti-homosexuality... We are not—and I genuinely think we should think about how we do this—grossly intolerant of pseudo-science, the building up of what purports to be science by the cherry-picking of the facts and the failure to use scientific evidence and the failure to use scientific method. One way is to be completely intolerant of this nonsense. That we don't kind of shrug it off. We don't say: ‘oh, it's the media’ or ‘oh they would say that wouldn’t they?’ I think we really need, as a scientific community—and this is a very important scientific community—to think about how we do it.

Fortunately, Andrew Stirling, research director of the Science Policy Research Unit (which these days I think just goes by SPRU) at the University of Sussex, provides a much healthier perspective: What is this 'pseudoscience'? For Beddington, this seems to include any kind of criticism from non-scientists of new technologies like genetically modified organisms, much advocacy of the 'precautionary principle' in environmental protection, or suggestions that science itself might also legitimately be subjected to moral considerations. Who does Beddington hold to blame for this "politically or morally or religiously motivated nonsense"? For anyone who really values the central principles of science itself, the answer is quite shocking. He is targeting effectively anyone expressing "scepticism" over what he holds to be 'scientific' pronouncements—whether on GM, climate change or any other issue. Note, it is not irrational "denial" on which Beddington is calling for 'gross intolerance', but the eminently reasonable quality of "scepticism"! The alarming contradiction here is that organised, reasoned, scepticism—accepting rational argument from any quarter without favour for social status, cultural affiliations  or institutional prestige—is arguably the most precious and fundamental quality that science itself has (imperfectly) to offer. Without this enlightening aspiration, history shows how society is otherwise all-too-easily shackled by the doctrinal intolerance, intellectual blinkers and authoritarian suppression of criticism so familiar in religious, political, cultural and media institutions.

tirling concludes: [T]he basic aspirational principles of science offer the best means to challenge the ubiquitously human distorting pressures of self-serving privilege, hubris, prejudice and power. Among these principles are exactly the scepticism and tolerance against which Beddington is railing (ironically) so emotionally! Of course, scientific practices like peer review, open publication and acknowledgement of uncertainty all help reinforce the positive impacts of these underlying qualities. But, in the real world, any rational observer has to note that these practices are themselves imperfect. Although rarely achieved, it is inspirational ideals of universal, communitarian scepticism—guided by progressive principles of reasoned argument, integrity, pluralism, openness and, of course, empirical experiment—that best embody the great civilising potential of science itself. As the motto of none other than the Royal Society loosely enjoins (also sometimes somewhat ironically) "take nothing on authority". In this colourful instance of straight talking then, John Beddington is himself coming uncomfortably close to a particularly unsettling form of unscientific—even (in a deep sense) anti-scientific—'double speak'.

A recent article on Temasek Review has raised the issue of TOC’s moderation policy again. Titled ‘TOC: The overkill censor‘ the article’s main contention was that TOC practices selective censorship especially with regards to ‘Western style social issues’. Specifically, it points to the discussion on an article regarding LGBT issues as an example of how TOC tries to skew the discussion to its stance

We make no apologies on being stricter with our moderation on the LGBT issues, not only because past experiences have shown that such discussions can easily degenerate into name-callings (words like ‘fags’ are disallowed) and derogatory remarks from both sides, but also because it also touches on religion. We have taken pains to ensure that anyone’s religion is not derided simply because the person opposes LGBT rights. We have also made sure that no religious scriptures are referred to, as we feel that discussions on theology and intepretations of scriptures should best be discussed separately elsewhere.  As such we have moderated references to scriptures, be it from people who are for, or against LGBT rights.

There were other allegations made against TOC as well especially whenever we publish articles on LGBT issues: TOC is pro-gay. Actually, TOC is pro-a-lot-of-things.  TOC is a platform for the disenfranchised. And this includes gay people who’re fighting for rights – the same way those anti-death penalty folks are, or those like TWc2 and HOME are fighting for migrant rights. So, really, it is not that TOC supports the gay community per se but more that it supports what they’re fighting for. There is a difference which people who discriminate against LGBTs do not seem to understand. We understand that this may not be a popular stance. However, it would be far more hypocritical to not speak up on the LGBT issue simply for the sake of fearing a loss of readership.

Similarly, though some sites interviewed a "close friend" of Abdullah's, NPR reports that the source, Sandra Bagaria, only communicated with Abdullah via Facebook.

Bagaria also told NPR that, "Amina posted some 200 pictures [to Facebook] of someone who wasn't her." The person in question, is in fact Jelena Lecic, of London. Lecic told the BBC that she is not friends with Abdullah and has never met her. Her photo, however, has been used on several media sites to picture Abdullah.

While nobody knows the real truth, the discussion itself illustrates the many complications that can arise from Internet anonymity.

At the time of the post describing Amina's arrest, "A Gay Girl in Damascus" was generally accepted at face value. But the young woman's story began to fall apart under the scrutiny of the bloggers and journalists attempting to fact-check it and follow up. She frequently canceled interviews at the last minute. A photo that Amina sent to The Guardian turned out to be stolen from the Facebook account of a British-Croatian woman named Jelena Lecic. NPR's Andy Carvin discovered that no one—not even her Canadian girlfriend—had met Amina in person.

MacMaster confessed on the blog: Apology to readers I never expected this level of attention. While the narrative voıce may have been fictional, the facts on thıs blog are true and not mısleading as to the situation on the ground. I do not believe that I have harmed anyone — I feel that I have created an important voice for issues that I feel strongly about. I only hope that people pay as much attention to the people of the Middle East and their struggles in thıs year of revolutions. The events there are beıng shaped by the people living them on a daily basis. I have only tried to illuminate them for a western audience. This experience has sadly only confirmed my feelings regarding the often superficial coverage of the Middle East and the pervasiveness of new forms of liberal Orientalism. However, I have been deeply touched by the reactions of readers. Best, Tom MacMaster, Istanbul, Turkey July 12, 2011 The sole author of all posts on this blog

MacMaster, fighting the good fight against liberal Orientalism, hasn't harmed anyone, huh? We wonder if "Amina"'s girlfriend feels the same way.

We believe the story of Amina to be totally baseless and the doubts expressed by other observers, such as Liz Henry and Andy Carvin, to be entirely founded. We also believe that whoever is responsible for the hoax is attempting to conceal their responsibility and continues to disseminate false information. They have previously engaged in such behavior as taking photographs from the Facebook page of a totally uninvolved individual and deceptively presenting them as being images of Amina and members of her family. We believe that the person or persons responsible should end this deception which has been harmful to individuals who trusted and believed in “Amina” and more broadly has sown confusion, distraction and absorbed energy and attention at a time when real people are in danger in Syria and in other countries in the region. We are sharing the information we have gathered here not in order to level accusations, but so that others might pursue these leads to conclusive ends. The best outcome would be if the person or persons behind the hoax would take responsibility themselves to bring the matter to a close and provide all doubters with reassurance that “Amina” is not in danger because she is a fictitious character. While we believe that the information gathered here is compelling in its own right, we have managed to corroborate additional information from several independent sources that we are not publishing and that significantly increases our confidence in the information we have. We do not know the motives of the person or persons behind this hoax.

1. One cannot criticise if one has not read the articleMr Singh said that between the reporter (Ms Sim) and himself, they had received 7 email complaints, with many more criticisms online. However, he said that most of these complaints had come from people who were reacting solely to the front page without reading the article. Mr Singh said that he had expected most intelligent and educated Singaporeans to have read the article before jumping the gun to judge TNP for their article.

2. "Are Singaporeans ready for a gay MP?" was the angle TNP chose to take because they thought it was an important issue concerning votersEven though the PAP said that Dr Wijeysingha's sexual orientation was not an issue for them, TNP felt that it was an issue for Singaporean voters. They therefore went out to poll Singaporeans about whether they were ready for a gay MP. 76% of the Singaporeans polled said that they would be fine with a gay MP. This, Mr Singh said, actually helps SDP more than the PAP, and therefore he felt that it was quite "ballsy" of TNP to have taken this angle. However, TNP only polled approx. 130 (I forget the real number) people and so it would not have been statistically correct for the headline to say "Singaporeans are ready for a gay MP". (This was in response to my question about why the headline could not have reflected the poll.) He also said that TNP decided to do a poll about lowering the age of consent in Singapore because it was an issue raised in the video (albeit not by Dr Wijeysingha) and they felt that it was relevant to Singaporeans. 

3. It is only a smear campaign if what the PAP say about Vincent Wijeysingha is untrue Mr Singh said that it would only be accurate to say that the PAP has launched a "smear campaign" against Dr Wijeysingha if what they are saying is untrue. However, what the PAP has said is true, and so it cannot be labelled a "smear campaign".He said that he had asked the SDP if they had attempted to suppress the video in question, and that the SDP said yes. So the PAP hadn't been "smearing" the SDP by implying they were trying to suppress the video, because they were