Until recently, I was under the impression that George Soros, investor and philanthtropist, was engaged in a global effort to promote freedom of speech, democracy, and an open society.
Well, maybe- when he's not actively funding censorship against several hundred million Chinese netizens. I noticed last quarter Soros purchased 139,700 shares in Baidu, which censors billions of web searches every month on behalf of the Chinese Communist government. This is not the first time he invested in the company (he made a profit on earlier investments at Baidu).
139,700 ways to spell hypocrisy?
Though the Chinese government censors the Internet directly by choking international pipelines, it couldn't do so as effectively were it not for the assistance of corporate enablers like Baidu and Sina, who monitor search results, screen out images, step in to block words, etc. (Microsoft Bing has also been complicit).
As a near-monopoly provider with 75 percent of the Chinese search engine market (rising since Google's withdrawal), Baidu is arguably the Chinese web censorship bureau's single biggest enabler.
A list of community forum topics blocked by Baidu can be found here. The post topics of discussions that have been blocked by Baidu include: "Communist Party, "Evil Party," "Fifty Cents Party," "Mao Zedong," "Hu Jintao," "internet blocking," "Falun Gong," "freedom," "democracy," "despotism," "news," "constitution," "Cultural Revolution," Sichuan Earthquake," "1989," "Taiwan," "Japan," "USA," "Xinjiang," "Tibet," "Tiananmen," "sex," and "Baidu trash," according to China Digital Times. You can read portions of a leaked Baidu censorship directive published by CDT here (English word list at bottom), here and here (in Chinese).
From the lead paragraph on GeorgeSoros.com: "GEORGE SOROS has been a prominent international supporter of democratic ideals and causes for more than 30 years. His philanthropic organization, the Open Society Foundations, supports democracy and human rights in over 70 countries."
Ahem.
Comments