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Rantings of a Sandmonkey

Be forewarned: The writer of this blog is an extremely cynical, snarky, pro-US, secular, libertarian, disgruntled sandmonkey. If this is your cup of tea, please enjoy your stay here. If not, please sod off

Tuesday, January 18, 2005

Al-Azhar TV!

According to the Egyptian Minister of Information, there is a serious threat that needs to be dealt with and that is Egyptian television series. He has decided that something needs to be done to stop those evil immoral TV writers and directors. What is his plan to deal with this scourge? Having Al-Azhar Islamic clerics screen the TV shows and decide which shows qualify as acceptable wholesome family entertainment and should be aired and which are nothing but dangerous immoral filth-flarn-filth that should be burned alongside with its creators! He said that under the new rules, only shows that are "responsible" and "respect the values and traditions of Egyptian society" will be allowed to hit the airwaves. "The media cannot be transformed into instruments to distill poison under the pretext of artistic license," he said. Certain programs will now be presented to the clerics of Al-Azhar, the world's highest Sunni Islam authority, and the small but powerful Christian church before being broadcast, Beltagi said. This decision of his didn't come out of nowhere it seems: The man seems to have a huge affinity for censoring TV shows for religious and political purposes! The minister has already axed a television miniseries called "A Girl from Shubra," a tale of the relationship between a Christian woman and a Muslim man during the Egyptian struggle for independence in the 1940s. The ban sparked a deluge of criticism from writers but Beltagi defended the move saying the program "deals with relations between Christians and Muslims in a way that undermines national unity". The funny thing is, no one watches the egyptian state-run television in egypt anymore! Everybody- and i mean everybody- has Satellite dishes in egypt and they all watch TV channels broadcasted from other Middle-East countries like LBC or Dubai. Hell, that TV show he cancelled, it was broadcasted on the Kuwaiti Channel Al-Ray and everyone in egypt was able to view it. That man is not only an idiot, he is also out of touch with reality, and he is the freakin Information Minister. Sigh....

3 Comments:

At 1/18/2005 05:53:00 PM, Blogger Kat said...

dude, the FCC can be just as bad here sometimes. all that hoopla about Janet Jackson's breast on public TV (like we haven't seen people with more showing in their bikinis and speedos in public or on TV) and then trying to take down Howard Stern. I mean, I don't really care for the guy, but who says we have to protect the public from this? Let them protect themselves. It's called "turning the channel". morons

 
At 1/19/2005 02:07:00 AM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

You are not alone

http://www.commondreams.org/headlines05/0118-11.htm

 
At 1/19/2005 03:58:00 AM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

Stateside> my slant would be>> It depends, For me I'll watch what I want too. Plays/Nudes, Porn. whatever but I think it's very reasonable to restrict access for children...so the Super Bowl kerfuffle didn't bother me personaly, but if you've had children you might not want to expose them, even to that light weight exposure.

Ricardo

 

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