dimanche 2 mai 2010

La censure nuit gravement à l'image du pays.Lettre ouverte à Monsieur le Président de la République

Monsieur le Président de la République,

Par la présente, nous avons l'honneur d'attirer votre attention sur un sujet qui préoccupe un grand nombre de tunisiens.

Depuis son indépendance l'État tunisien a toujours été porteur de progrès par ses politiques en faveur de l'éducation et la formation, par l'incitation ou encore par l'exemplarité. Le domaine de l'Internet n'a pas dérogé à la règle et depuis 1996, l'État tunisien, sous votre Présidence, a développé une politique volontariste de diffusion de l'outil Internet. La création d'une administration de d'Internet et la mise en place de mesures nécessaires ont porté leurs fruits.

En effet, les internautes tunisiens ont été des pionniers dans l'utilisation de cet outil dans différents domaines. Aujourd'hui, ils sont des centaines de milliers à en faire un usage quotidien. Or, les tunisiens sont confrontés de plus en plus à des mesures restrictives, manifestement illégales, de la part des administrations responsables du réseau national. Ces mesures privent les tunisiens d'un espace indispensable à leur épanouissement social, culturel, professionnel, paralysant ainsi l'évolution de notre pays.

Alors que l'année 2010 a été, à votre initiative, déclarée année internationale de la jeunesse, par l'Assemblée Générale des Nations Unies, une partie de la jeunesse tunisienne est aujourd'hui frustrée de ne pas pouvoir accéder à leurs sites Internet favoris. Certains internautes tunisiens qui ont fait le choix de participer au débat public, ont vu leurs espaces personnels d'expression censurés en Tunisie.

Après la multiplication inquiétante de ces décisions arbitraires, et au-delà du tort considérable qu'elle inflige à l'image de notre pays et à sa marche vers le progrès, nous souhaiterions que vous réagissiez face à cette situation; de sorte à ce qu'il n'y ait plus de sites bloqués d'une manière illégale ne reposant sur aucune décision de justice et en totale contradiction avec l'article 8 de la Constitution de notre pays et l'article 19 de la Déclaration Universelle des Droits de l'Homme.

Monsieur le Président de la République, vous avez déjà par le passé décidé la réouverture du site communautaire Facebook après son blocage. Nous vous appelons aujourd'hui à intervenir pour rendre accessible à nouveau les sites illégalement censurés.

Nous vous appelons également à exiger des responsables de l'administration d'Internet de cesser ces pratiques illégales qui paraissent aux yeux des tunisiens, aussi aléatoires qu'incompréhensibles.

Nous vous prions d'agréer, Monsieur le Président de la République, l'assurance de notre parfaite considération.

mercredi 28 avril 2010

Tsunami sur la blogosphère Tunisienne

Hier, le mardi 27 avril a été une journée noire pour la blogosphère tunisienne. Pas moins de onze blogs(ici) ont été censurés le même jour, sans parler de la série de sites déjà fermés!!
Cette dernière semaine du mois d'avril a été particulièrement dure pour les utilisateurs d'internet en Tunsie.Les Tunisiens ont tendance à penser que cela est une "mesure "préventive avant les élections municipales proches, mais quand on voit que même des sites pour téléchargements de vidéos sont censurés, on se demande si c'est vraiment la cause!!
Certes, il y a toujours un moyen de contourner la censure, et les tunisiens en usent à volonté , mais ce n'est en aucun cas une solution au problème!!
Un blog fermé est une voix qui s'éteint, un site censure est un pas en arrière,nous devons trouver des solutions!é

mercredi 14 avril 2010

Blogs go beyond traditional media to bridge divides

This post first appeared on Common Ground News Service.

By Hisham Khribchi

Paris - The way mainstream media has covered major events of the past two decades leaves much to be desired. After the 9/11 attacks, rigid, insular debates and discussions too often replaced free and open discourse, creating an environment ripe for the rise of blogs.

The prominence of a “good” versus “evil”, “us” versus “them” discourse and the “clash of civilisations” theory made famous by political scientist Samuel Huntington, which claimed that Islam and the West were headed for conflict, limited the range of views covered by traditional media. Simultaneously, facing tough financial constraints, media has been increasingly consolidated in the hands of a few.

In response, there has been an unprecedented rise in blogs and social networks on the Internet, corresponding with the emergence of new technologies. This shift gave birth to a new kind of media – “citizen media” – which has created a paradigm shift in the way information is exchanged and opinions are expressed.

Blogs allow an increasing number of Internet users from different geographic and cultural backgrounds to participate in intercultural, transnational understanding – and to discover that we aren’t so different after all.

One surprising example came about in the summer of 2005 in London. A few days after suicide attacks hit the city, Kamal Raza Butt, a 48-year-old Pakistani who had just arrived in London to visit his family, was killed by a group of youngsters who yelled racist insults before they attacked him.

Stereotypes and accusations dominated television, the radio and the press, analysing the motives of the crime and focusing on the “climate of revenge” that was taking over the country. On one side were those who blamed terrorism on the teachings of Islam, and considered the Muslim community widely responsible for the suicide attacks and subsequent climate of fear and mistrust that resulted in Raza’s murder. On the other side were those who blamed Western societies of racism and failure to integrate Muslim minorities.

The polarised debate in mainstream media left little space for the mainstream voices that were desperately looking for common ground between those on both sides.

In this context, blogs provided an unexpected opportunity. More than just information sources; they became platforms for all points of view. By commenting on articles and posts, bloggers discovered commonalities as they connected with each other. They agreed, for instance, that terrorism is in essence counter to all religions’ teachings, including Islam. During the days following the London attacks and Raza’s murder, blogs became a platform for passionate debate, rarely seen in mainstream media.

The brilliant blog “Lenin’s Tomb” constitutes a perfect example. In this left-leaning blog, secular and religious people exchanged their views via online posts and comments. Through blogs and emerging social networks, citizens exchanged their points of view and discussed thorny subjects like Islamophobia. Although exchanges were not always gentle, a dialogue emerged that spontaneously led to some common ground.

The very nature of the blogosphere allowed for Muslims (and non-Muslims for that matter) in Britain and elsewhere to challenge negative accusations, and to put the London attacks and Raza’s murder in their wider context.

For example, bloggers in England and throughout Europe initiated events to discuss issues like racism, integration and religion in person, and bloggers from all over the world joined virtual agoras, or meeting places, to discuss these topics in more depth. The positive work of associations combating racist messages came into the spotlight. Islamophobia Watch, for instance, which was founded early in 2005, rose to prominence soon after the London attacks in part due to its increasing familiarity with Internet users.

In the face of chaos, and maybe because of it, understanding between people with different points of view seemed within reach.

Some will say that hatred, slander and ignorance are prevalent on the internet. However, if extremist voices use this medium, they are no longer alone. People with alternative points of view, many of them wanting to create mutual understanding and respect, now have the right to have their say and be heard.

Blogging and social networks have allowed people with different beliefs, political views and cultures to talk about their lives, joys, sorrows and truths. And for Muslim-Western relations, the Internet constitutes an unmatched, eye-opening outlet for voices from all sides to have their say, mitigating divides and misunderstandings. We now know that at the end of day we are not as different as we first thought.

vendredi 19 mars 2010

Information, Action, Change

10 tactics for turning information into action is a 50-minute film documenting info-activism success stories from around the world. It explores how rights advocates have used digital technologies to create positive change. The film is produced by the Tactical Technology collective (TCC), an NGO that offers guides, tools, training and consultancy to human rights advocates. The film is freely available online and the organization offers to provide copies of the film and the printed toolkits that come with it to anyone who offers to organize a screening.



I had the opportunity to hold a public screening in the Moroccan city of Rabat on February 16. Faith Bosworth, TCC's Communications Coordinator asked me a couple of questions about it:

How did you first hear about it? What did you think of the 10 tactics?

I first heard about "10 tactics" in December 2009 when I attended the second Arab bloggers conference in Beirut. Watching the film and reading the invaluable guides, tools and booklets that come with it, and then listening to real life experiences from some of the most prominent Arab online activists I had the privilege to meet in Lebanon, made the experience even more compelling. I met the narrator back then in Beirut, and I learned the philosophy behind the project, how it came to life and how important it was to spread the word and share with as much people as possible.

The tactics explained in the film and toolkits, although some of which appeared evident to some of us, are an honest summing up of years of struggle and online activism, thoroughly explained and generously shared with the rest of the world. It is an impressive easy-to-understand and ready-to-use guide for grassroots activists and netizens, many of which may lack the knowledge to making their campaigns successful while protecting themselves and their sources.



Did you feel that the content speaks to activists in Morocco?



In a region of the world (the Arab region) where people suffer a great deal of lack of freedom and lack of access to information, the Internet has proved to be a blessing for the millions of persecuted and disenfranchised. It is definitely a place where the film will be having the greater impact. So when I was invited to a workshop for Maghreb bloggers in Rabat back in January, I instantly thought this was the occasion to screen "10 Tactics" and share thoughts, views and tools about online activism with fellow bloggers.

During the screening, I had the feeling people connected easily to most of the content. I think some of the tools presented, although they were appreciated, might have unsurprisingly left the audience (Moroccan that is) with the feeling that some tactics are so technically intimidating or expensive that these were not for them. In a country suffering from poverty and massive illiteracy, acquiring a laptop or even a camera is sometimes beyond reach. All in all, people felt indeed connected and some examples in particular seemed to speak to the audience: reactions to the fearturing of the "Moroccan Sniper" (a Moroccan activist who captured police corruption on camera and posted it on Youtube) were very positive. Also, there were Oh's and Boo's when the film revealed how Geobombing techniques exposed abuse of public money in Tunisia to finance private flights by the president's wife. This particular story was a revelation to most of the people in the audience, especially our Tunisian colleagues, most of whom heard about it for the first time. Youtube by the way is blocked in Tunisia ever since this story was brought to light!

Was there a discussion after the screening? What sorts of things did people say?

There wasn't a formal discussion held right after the screening since we couldn't make it before very late in the evening, but people started talking about it spontaneously. And in the following day when, coincidently, the main workshop was about using online tools for advocacy and activism, those who watched the film felt they already had a preview of the major tools available out there and their actual use on the ground. Geobombing for example was obviously something they needed no further explanations about. Some people came back to me and said: "This is impressive... this is great"... that kind of stuff. But what struck me was the one single negative reaction I got from a participant who felt there was, as he said "a hidden agenda behind these kind of campaigns, especially when free material is so generously distributed." I had a hard time trying to convince the guy that what we saw was basically ordinary people talking about their experiences to other ordinary people. Regardless of the specific examples exposed in the film or the printed toolkits and booklets, the main idea was to be able to share those experiences and make use of those wonderful tools available online. But this particular reaction wasn't really a surprise knowing how conspiracy theories tend to encrust in people's minds in this region, partly given the long and painful history of Western negative interference. But this was in no way mainstream among the audience which overwhelmingly welcomed "10 Tactics" and embraced the idea behind the project.

How do you think people will use the information they received from the film and from the other Tactical Tech materials?

The kind of reactions I got were in the sort of asking if individual participants could organize screenings of their own. One participant in particular, took great interest in the toolkits and the film itself. She is a journalist and told me she knew about NGOs in the region of Marrakesh who try to help alleviate poverty and raise awareness about problems related to illiteracy and how it affects people's welfare. She wants to screen the film for those people and see if it can be of any use to them. I also got in touch with Khalid Jamaï, active member of the Moroccan Association of Human Rights (AMDH), and veteran journalist. He was very interested in organizing a screening of the "10 Tactics" in the headquarters of the organization in Rabat.

10 tactics for turning information into action (Trailer) from Tactical Technology Collective on Vimeo.


dimanche 28 février 2010

mercredi 24 février 2010

Les cyber réfugiés en Tunisie: un contre-poids à la censure de "Ammar" sur internet

Un nouveau hashtag vient d'être créé sur Twitter. Il concerne une jeune bloggeuse tunisienne, Lina Ben Mhenni, dont le blog vient d'être censuré par les autorités. Sur Facebook, sur Twitter et dans les mails, la nouvelle court. "Ammar a encore frappé". Ammar, c'est l'homme aux ciseaux, le symbole de la censure sur internet en Tunisie, pays où des sites comme YouTube et Dailymotion sont interdits d'accès aux internautes et où l'usage des proxys va bon train.

La censure des blogs n'est pas une pratique nouvelle en Tunisie. Dès que vous dépassez les lignes rouges qui demeurent arbitraires et très floues, dès que vous osez émettre une opinion politique sur votre page, vous êtes potentiellement sur la liste des futures victimes de la censure. Solidaires contre ce fléau qui est devenu monnaie courante dans leur pays, les bloggeurs tunisiens ont opté pour le concept de "réfugié virtuel" ou "cyber réfugié" et qui consiste pour un blogger d'abriter un camarade censuré sur sa page, en le faisant aussi administrateur de l'espace et lui permettre de poster ses articles via cette nouvelle page.

La logique des internautes tunisiens est simple : si "Ammar" peut s'attaquer régulièrement à certains blogs politisés pour les censurer, il ne pourra empêcher, à ce rythme, tous les bloggers de s'exprimer sur les sujets sensibles, à moins de faire un black-out total sur la blogosphère tunisienne.

Le but de la pratique est en effet non seulement de permettre la continuité de l'information mais, aussi, de lancer un défi à la censure et à la répression sur internet en Tunisie. Il faut dire que la réputation du pays en la matière a atteint l'universalité, au point d'être citée par Hillary Clinton aux côtés de la Chine et de l'Iran dans la liste des pays "cyberliberticides".