A Ph.D. student at Michigan State University said his mother was arrested in Bangladesh after he criticized the country’s government in a Facebook post.

  • OtterEnglish
    46•1 year ago

    This is specific to journalists, but it’s relevant:

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Freedom_of_the_press_in_Bangladesh#Assault_and_harassment_of_relatives_of_journalists

    Pulled one example:

    In March, 2023, Awami League’s armed cadres, loyal to Sheikh Hasina beaten the brother of Al-Jazeera I-Unit journalist Zulkarnain Saer Khan in front of his home in Dhaka. The attacker, while attacking, said, “Your brother writes against the prime minister, against the government? He’s a journalist? Now you’ll see.”[19] Zulkarnain Saer Khan exposed the corruption of Bangladesh Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina in the Al-Jazeera documentary All the Prime Minister’s Men in 2022 and led an investigation against Sheikh Hasina’s close aide Abdus Sobhan Golap’s corruption who secretly bought nine properties of 4 million USD in the New York.

    I remember this from when I was looking up a few places that surprised me when going through the Press Freedom Index. It might just be because I’m not familiar with these places, and it speaks to the assumptions we might make, but I was surprised to see a few countries so far down the list / below other ones.

        • @[email protected]English
          9•1 year ago

          Cuz “not European” is inherently disadvantageous for some. Aka the soft bigotry of low expectations.

          • NixEnglish
            10•1 year ago

            France is one of the main reasons Latin American and African countries are in the positions they’re in… I don’t see how France could be the “country of human rights”

          • @[email protected]English
            9•1 year ago

            Namibia consistently ranks as the top country in Africa regarding press freedom and has been a stable democracy ever since being freed from colonial rule by South Africa.

            (South Africa had a mandate over Namibia I mean, the Apartheid fucks attempted to implement Apartheid there, not free the country).

            There’s still issues with women’s rights and those of sexual minorities, as well as various indigenous groups being marginalised and having poor socio-economic status (notably San) but overall that’s more of a function of where the country came from, and not where it’s going.

            You should be exactly as ashamed of being behind Namibia in press freedom as you’re ashamed of being behind Germany. Also, that your former colonies fare much, much worse. Git gud. And you can find solace in the fact that the UK ranks below you.

          • @2ncsEnglish
            5•1 year ago

            Costa Rica is in Central America.

          • @[email protected]English
            4•1 year ago

            France is the “country of human rights”

            There has literally never been a single moment in history when this was even remotely true. France has done more harm to humanity than nearly any other civilization in recorded history.