Thread: France bans citizen journalists from reporting violence

By Peter Sayer, IDG News Service

The French Constitutional Council has approved a law that criminalizes the filming or broadcasting of acts of violence by people other than professional journalists. The law could lead to the imprisonment of eyewitnesses who film acts of police violence, or operators of Web sites publishing the images, one French civil liberties group warned on Tuesday.

The council chose an unfortunate anniversary to publish its decision approving the law, which came exactly 16 years after Los Angeles police officers beating Rodney King were filmed by amateur videographer George Holliday on the night of March 3, 1991. The officers’ acquittal at the end on April 29, 1992 sparked riots in Los Angeles.

If Holliday were to film a similar scene of violence in France today, he could end up in prison as a result of the new law, said Pascal Cohet, a spokesman for French online civil liberties group Odebi. And anyone publishing such images could face up to five years in prison and a fine of €75,000 (US$98,537), potentially a harsher sentence than that for committing the violent act.

Senators and members of the National Assembly had asked the council to rule on the constitutionality of six articles of the Law relating to the prevention of delinquency. The articles dealt with information sharing by social workers, and reduced sentences for minors. The council recommended one minor change, to reconcile conflicting amendments voted in parliament. The law, proposed by Minister of the Interior Nicolas Sarkozy, is intended to clamp down on a wide range of public order offenses. During parliamentary debate of the law, government representatives said the offense of filming or distributing films of acts of violence targets the practice of “happy slapping,” in which a violent attack is filmed by an accomplice, typically with a camera phone, for the amusement of the attacker’s friends.

The broad drafting of the law so as to criminalize the activities of citizen journalists unrelated to the perpetrators of violent acts is no accident, but rather a deliberate decision by the authorities, said Cohet. He is concerned that the law, and others still being debated, will lead to the creation of a parallel judicial system controlling the publication of information on the Internet.

The government has also proposed a certification system for Web sites, blog hosters, mobile-phone operators and Internet service providers, identifying them as government-approved sources of information if they adhere to certain rules. The journalists’ organization Reporters Without Borders, which campaigns for a free press, has warned that such a system could lead to excessive self censorship as organizations worried about losing their certification suppress certain stories.

http://www.macworld.com/news/2007/03/06 ... /index.php

NEWSPEAK IS ALIVE AND WELL AND LIVING IN PARIS...

Big Brother is alive and well in France. The thought police don't want you to help apprehend or report crime!

This is the test case. Coming to a country near you soon in some form or fashion if this isn't disobeyed and stopped. I hope they have many folks with the fortitude to say screw you!

stay tuned film at 11

Originally Posted by AlturaCt

This is the test case. Coming to a country near you soon in some form or fashion if this isn't disobeyed and stopped. I hope they have many folks with the fortitude to say screw you!

Now ALTURA

although I definitely agree with you about this being a TEST CASE -

the 'screw you' by the Pfrench is pretty much moot!

After all, when they're born, the infant is given a case of WHITE FLAGS by the government. It's part of their socialist entitlement programs.

I hear ya sis but don't forget the French resistance during WWII.

Originally Posted by AlturaCt

I hear ya sis but don't forget the French resistance during WWII.

I think they either were mutants or had some special gene that was on the extinct list.

They were superb, Altura. But they were few and far between.
While their countrymen WALKED THE NAZIS DOWN THE STREETS OF PARIS.

A lost gene..........I'm certain.
It was replaced with that case of white flags