Censorship is coming, a war on information has been declared.
If one closely observes what the snake of a Minister K Shanmugam has been saying in recent years, States Times Review will be the first website to be taken out by the new censorship law. Reading between the lines is my forte after all.
From the green paper, Committee of Selection, Select Committee, public consultations, proposed bills, President’s approval to coming out with various excuses to justify censorship, one must really applaud the sheer amount of effort taken to make the dictatorship look democratic. These are many ceremonial processes but we Singaporeans know how the PAP works: there will be no fairness.
Despite being openly labelled a “fake news” by the highest-ranking official, the esteemed Law Minister K Shanmugam himself in April 2017, States Times Review’s readership had since doubled. More Singaporeans are reading what “fake news” STR is producing, thanks to K Shanmugam’s “recommendation”. Even Facebook did not bother to close down States Times Review Facebook page as they did for the Russian pages spreading fake news. The end result only goes to show how little credibility the foolish minister possess.
In any case, we can count on Law Minister K Shanmugam to make good his promise. Long story short, the upcoming censorship laws will achieve two definite outcomes:
1) An official ban of States Times Review. Starhub and Singtel will readily cut off access to the website.
2) Criminalise editor Alex Tan. The dictatorship needs to put up a chicken for sacrifice to warn the monkeys.
States Times Review prides itself for it’s analytical content, and putting my neck on the chopping board is never an option. The key to countering censorship laws is actually pretty easy: de-centralisation. Pocket-sized news article one can read on Whatsapp, Wechat and Line. The STR website and it’s Facebook page can be shut down but STR content will continue to spread. (Ironically, this idea came from the usual dissemination methods of fake news.) It would be interesting to turn news delivery of States Times Review from a legitimate news website to a fake news network topology.
There are of course many ideas to circumvent censorship, like having a phone application, creating a new website under another name or simply pick the good old guerrilla warfare route of hit-and-run. News delivery is never an issue at all, the government will realise they are only making themselves look stupid with all the new laws banning this and that.
The countermeasure plan is to make their plan look stupid, and it is only a matter of time the dictatorship realise they are fighting not falsehoods but air.
Alex Tan
STR Editor