Aren't we lucky, here in the art world, to have as qualified a moral barometer as Lulama "Lulu" Xingwana, (minister of arts and culture, formerly of agriculture and land affairs) to let us know when we have become bad people. Even more valuably, and ...
The interwebs were buzzing angrily yesterday because of something Bono* said. Bono, remember him? He's the frontman for that famous Irish rock band U2. In a recent op-ed piece for the New York Times, he suggested that the net should be policed to a c...
Recently, about five-thirty in the afternoon when everybody was stuck in traffic, 5FM exposed its listeners to the following lyrics:
Kom hier, kaffir, kom hier! Hoekom het jy nie my kar
skoongemaak nie…Bliksem! (white male).
Baas, don’t ca...
We were living in China when Tom Cruise arrived to do some scenes for Mission Impossible 3. One of the scenes showed the endless trails of laundry hanging out on the rails of apartment buildings. The Chinese censors delayed releasing the film and de...
In George Orwell’s 1984, one of Winston Smith’s depressing jobs at the Ministry of Truth is to rewrite historical documents to make them fit with party orthodoxy. He destroys evidence of problematic past events, amends newspaper articles and dele...
Just got home after attending a debate on freedom of expression at the University of Johannesburg (it's 9.20pm GMT +2 -- we journos like accuracy, see).
The debate, sponsored by The Weekender newspaper, was chaired by Prof. Adam Habib and feature...
Forgive me for being so presumptuous, but I suspect that even the well informed are unaware of some of the most remarkable international news in recent weeks. Now if this supposition is correct then ask yourself, dear reader, for we will surely agree...
Later today, history will be made when, for the first time, a South African journalist will be punished for blogging. A hearing is due to be held at Avusa (formerly Johnnic Communications) at 3pm today (Thursday) to decide the fate of a Sowetan sub-e...
Today, Business Report, which is inserted in a number of Independent Newspapers daily publications across the country, carries a censored advert on its back page from the End Occupation Campaign (EOC). The ad was censored by the newspaper company.
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After 1994, many people thought South African media would be free at last, following many years of censorship under apartheid regime.
But that did not happen as we thought it would. In 1996, former president Nelson Mandela castigated black journa...
