p2pnet - rss feed: Did bloggers foretell China quake?
p2pnet news | Off Topic:- As the death toll caused by a massive earthquake in China’s Sichuan province rises, “broadband connections across the country are pulsing with rumours of ‘earthquake omens’ involving toads or butterflies - all allegedly ignored by the authorities”.
So says the Times Online, going on, “Some even talk of a vast pre-Olympic conspiracy.”
The quake was the worst in China since the Tangshan earthquake in the northern Hebei Province in 1976 which took 242,000 lives, says state news agency Xinhua, but did the authorities ignore warnings of this latest disaster?
And is China’s infamous information blackout preventing people from learning the nature and true extent of the earthquake, in turn encouraging the spread of rumours which only make matters worse?
A blogger from Shandong province in the east said more than a month ago, “he went to his local earthquake forecast centre several times to report that his animals had been disturbed and restless,” says Times Online, but, he wrote, “They not only ridiculed me, they accused me of making up stories.”
Others, “seized upon an as yet unsubstantiated rumour that a Chinese geologist had predicted the earthquake in advance but had been stifled by the authorities, and by fear,” says the story, going on, “On the seventh of May, a geologist predicted this [earthquake],” wrote one blogger. “But he didn’t dare make it public.”
Another posted from Beijing: “Everyone is talking about the rescue effort but they are not actually joining it. So, instead we should turn our thoughts to why [the authorities] didn’t forecast the earthquake and evacuate the people.
“Could it be that it was out of a desire for a peaceful Olympics?”
In an editorial in the Southern Metropolis Daily, established journalist and commentator Chang Ping, “cited the growing tide of rumours and speculation surrounding the earthquake as evidence of the need for greater freedom of information in China,” says Times Online, adding:
“He wrote: ‘As the phone lines went down, rumours multiplied … I understood that the vast majority of this information could not be verified and that the police regarded it as the transmission of rumours punishable by criminal detention. But as someone with relatives in the affected area, I could not stop myself from seeking whatever information I could …”
“The information was clearly unreliable, and it was difficult to tell what was true or false. Together it all spoke of a single problem, and that is the people’s fierce appetite for information when faced with a public incident.”
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Times Online - China bloggers cook up quake conspiracies, May 13, 2008
Xinhua - Many different faces in China’s fight against earthquake, May 13, 2008
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May 13th, 2008 at 1:40 pm
Oppressive government control of all things “thought and information” is contrary to the modern world. It has evolved into a swarm of “thoughts and ideas” by means of the internet.
I would really like to see governments like this one unfetter the people, and allow them the freedom of expression, and liberty. I just don’t see how it can continue to exist, on the road it’s traveling.
May 13th, 2008 at 3:36 pm
Seriously, toads and butterflies? And even if the gov. knew about the earthquake, there is no room to move people. I visited there last year, and there were ten-story buildings everywhere in Chengdu. Urbanization forced everything to be build on top of each other and there really was nothing you can really do. This is just stupid.