To anyone who has ever met either myself or fellow blogger Y Cneifiwr, 'militant and extremist' are probably the last words to spring to mind; 'anoraks' being far more likely. The blogs, whether you like them or not are hardly the stuff of guerilla cyber-warfare by any stretch of the imagination.
I was reminded by Cneifiwr's recent post about councillors' access to certain blogs being blocked, of a Freedom of Information request I made in April 2011. I had heard similar reports that, as usual, councillors were having great difficulty in reading any opinion which varied to that of the Department of Spin. At the time, if the plucky Member managed to get past the sirens and warnings that visiting the blog may impair their minds and corrupt their souls, their visit would be logged and monitored for posterity. There is clearly still a problem.
The Council sent me a list of categories under which headings, sites are blocked by council policy. By a process of elimination, and as neither blogger is a 'botnet', a 'phisher', an illegal arms trader, nor a distributor of pornography, there is only one category left;
"Militancy and Extremist - Sites that offer information about or promote or are sponsored by
groups advocating antigovernment beliefs or action."
Anti-government? Of course this is perfectly in line with the frequently trotted out sentiment, from the highest level, that critics of Carmarthenshire Council are somehow opposed to the whole concept of local government. I suppose that notorious organ of anarchy, the South Wales Guardian now comes under the same category......
The truth is, of course, that the criticism is about the way it's being run, again at the highest level. Yesterday's post said it all.
(Link to the 2011 request here)
I was reminded by Cneifiwr's recent post about councillors' access to certain blogs being blocked, of a Freedom of Information request I made in April 2011. I had heard similar reports that, as usual, councillors were having great difficulty in reading any opinion which varied to that of the Department of Spin. At the time, if the plucky Member managed to get past the sirens and warnings that visiting the blog may impair their minds and corrupt their souls, their visit would be logged and monitored for posterity. There is clearly still a problem.
The Council sent me a list of categories under which headings, sites are blocked by council policy. By a process of elimination, and as neither blogger is a 'botnet', a 'phisher', an illegal arms trader, nor a distributor of pornography, there is only one category left;
"Militancy and Extremist - Sites that offer information about or promote or are sponsored by
groups advocating antigovernment beliefs or action."
Anti-government? Of course this is perfectly in line with the frequently trotted out sentiment, from the highest level, that critics of Carmarthenshire Council are somehow opposed to the whole concept of local government. I suppose that notorious organ of anarchy, the South Wales Guardian now comes under the same category......
The truth is, of course, that the criticism is about the way it's being run, again at the highest level. Yesterday's post said it all.
(Link to the 2011 request here)
