Strange goings on at Politics.ie

national | arts and media | other press Tuesday January 29, 2008 09:04 by Mariella Froster

Mutinous posters protest at censorship

Posters on politics.ie will be familiar with the vitriol directed at Indymedia. Accusations of stasi style censorship are routine. For some time now, however, the fact that censorhip on politics.ie is more frequent, arbitrary and subjective than anything seen on many other sites has become pretty obvious.

Resentment erupted last weekend when long term poster and former site moderator 'DOD' posted a thread entitled 'Fcek this censorhip. I'm off'. It was a protest , in what was the last straw for DOD, at the banning of yet another poster 'Armchair Activist' - this time for making a joke. It was subsequently explained by a mod that the banning had been temporary but longterm posters had in the meantime flocked to the thread to express their support in an unusal display of impertinence, for p.ie posters that is. Truth be told, as stasi style censorhip goes, politics.ie would be hard to beat . For the main part, if you want to get along with the mods on p.ie, you must exhibit a cringe-making deference to the site's owner, David Cochrane and his team. To see grown men and women debase themselves like this with such frequency is not a pretty sight.

But is there something more sinister afoot? I've been visiting p.ie regularly now for several months on a sort of media activist's mission to express some alternative reality over there. As Chomsky says, you never know the difference even one person might make. There are several others who are obviously similarly motivated. The site is alleged to be frequented by local and national political representatives and at least one senator contributes from time to time, to my certain knowledge.

Among the topics I've focused on have been Bertie Ahern's shameful evidence to the Mahon Tribunal, (most recently, 'Sindo admits 'Bertie must seize chance to reform'!!!) and Israel's role in Palestine. One of the regular posters to the latter topic whenever it comes up is said to have admitted to being a former member of Mossad ('L'Chaim'). There may be some truth in it given the virulently anti Palestinaian and pro Israeli nature of what he says - and the level of knowledge he displays about Israel's political and military activity. Any thread that tackles the subject of Israeli conduct in Palestine will see L'Chaim sitting on it all day every day for days on end if necessary - anything so long as he ensures he gets the last word. He was particularly angry with me on Sunday.

Another subject I've paid particular attention to has been the atrocious nature of the Fianna Fail party, its corruption and its arrogance in everything from Harney and her privatising mission at health to the ignorance and viciousness of what is being done at Tara, Shannon and elsewhere. None of this goes down at all well. DC is a darling of the political establishment who has won awards for his site and it certainly is not because of the contributions of posters like me or a few others I could mention.

Inexplicably, and under a different moniker, my access to the site was cut off just before Christmas. No explanation, no breach of editorial guidelines - just a lot of posts that were getting up certain noses over there. My last exchange on the site under that other incarnation was with a mod who disagreed with what I was saying about GW Bush having awarded himself the discretion to seize hold of power unilaterally - that is over every organ of government and state - in the event of any 'terrorist disaster' - defined in such broad terms that a person merely picking their nose in Butan could be used as justification, arguably. (US imperialism has been another favourite topic and again something Ive been giving them a hard time about over there - along with other lefty folk. All of these sites (Indymedia included) are routinely watched by the intelligence services. So having a go at the US on a big public site like p.ie does not go down well either. Neither is it without other significance: the site has a huge number of regular users and it draws major advedrtising revenue from some big names. Lefties are neither wanted nor welcomed - we are not the demographic that DC relies on to draw advertising revenue, Im pretty certain. At any rate, I wouldn't be candidate for one of the General Electric loans currently being advertised on a pair of tits on a headline banner with boring regularity. Nor am I likely to take up the offer of a chance to date any of the Chinese women desperately advertising themselves via a Google ad in the hope of finding love and marriage with a western man.

Despite a few emails to the moderators asking why I was banned beofre Christmas, no reply was forthcoming. So, reverting to the Mariella Froster persona, I straightened up and carried on. Yesterday, however the same thing happened. Call me paranoid, but I can't help wondering if my banishment has anything to with having posted a particularly sarcastic piece about the Sunday Independent's coverage of the Ahern tribunal. (BTW Im convinced at least one of the well known protagonists in that saga is posting on p.ie.) Then again I did say that a couple of the mods were a bit dim on that rebellion thread I mentioned earlier. In my defence, I have tolerated heaps of virulent abuse about my political orientation without so much as a murmur. Democracy it aint over there.

So, banished again. Again, no explanation -just summary justice - a virtual police state. Account deactivated, etc etc. Having attempted to re-register under yet another identity, my access to the site is restricted - suggesting that this time, they've decided to go one step further and track my IP. While messages tell me that there are 'errors' whenever I try to post or interact with the site, other users are clearly having no difficulty at all. I can look but I cannot touch - not even to bring you the links that are relevant to what I say above. I'm wondering if any others have had similar treatment. I wonder if any p.ie poster would dare to link the relevant threads to this site.

This is not about personal pique - it's about free speech. What's happening on that site is the same as is happening in the traditional mainstream media. The rationale used to justify much of the censorhip on p.ie is frequently 'it's 'Dave's' site, he can do with he likes with it. ' Yeah, sure, just like Tony O' Reilly does with his 'Indpendent' newspapers.