Kuwait bans DSLRs in public!

[JohnS]

http://www.kuwaittimes.net/read_news.php?newsid=Mz...

[Simpo Two]

Obviously easier to ban them than educate the population.

[Nick M]

Simpo Two said:

Obviously easier to ban them than educate the population.

Bugger, my reply to this thread appears to have gone AWOL

But your comment above is a far more succinct version of what I had typed.

Ban things through fear and ignorance rather than stopping and thinking how utterly irrational and ill-conceived it is.

[Gad-Westy]

I find that report odd. I was in Kuwait for work a couple of years ago with a SLR. Iw as mainly using it out of the city at a plant I was visiting but on the last day I was there I had a bit of time to kill and I took loads of pics around Kuwait City and Sea Front area. Nobody batted an eyelid. Seems completely at odds with the way that article portrays things.

[nick_bbb]

Gad-Westy said:

I find that report odd. I was in Kuwait for work a couple of years ago with a SLR. Iw as mainly using it out of the city at a plant I was visiting but on the last day I was there I had a bit of time to kill and I took loads of pics around Kuwait City and Sea Front area. Nobody batted an eyelid. Seems completely at odds with the way that article portrays things.

Isn't that generally how propaganda works?

[Simpo Two]

Nick M said:

Bugger, my reply to this thread appears to have gone AWOL

Typing what you really feel whilst not falling into the spiked pit called 'wacist' is indeed difficult! But then whilst Kuwait bans DSLRs, we ban free speech.

(Edited cos I put three e's in speech!)

Edited by Simpo Two on Wednesday 24th November 11:07

[Nick M]

My comments weren't at all racist, just questioning the logic that appeared to have been applied, i.e. DSLR = BAD !!, but mobile phones with cameras (or presumably compact cameras ?) = perfectly fine.

Just seemed a perverse / illogical / downright stoopid conclusion which simply doesn't stand up to scrutiny.

One could conclude that the decision is born simply out of ignorance, or as a way for the authorities to demonstrate that they have control over the population, but the net outcome is that banning DSLRs really serves no meaningful purpose.

[Gad-Westy]

nick_bbb said:

Gad-Westy said:

I find that report odd. I was in Kuwait for work a couple of years ago with a SLR. Iw as mainly using it out of the city at a plant I was visiting but on the last day I was there I had a bit of time to kill and I took loads of pics around Kuwait City and Sea Front area. Nobody batted an eyelid. Seems completely at odds with the way that article portrays things.

Isn't that generally how propaganda works?

Propaganda usually has some sort of motivation though and it's hard to see what that is in the case.

[Mr E]

I'm not understanding the thinking here?

[Simpo Two]

Perhaps the same motivation that saw British police trying to confiscate cameras from 'terrorists'?

(ie paranoia, stupidity and the feeling they ought to be seen to do something)

Edited by Simpo Two on Wednesday 24th November 11:25

[Nick M]

Mr E said:

I'm not understanding the thinking here?

Doesn't that rather assume that some thinking actually took place ??

As opposed to knee-jerk reaction to a 'problem' which doesn't exist.

[Colin RedGriff]

I'm just plain confused.

"came to the conclusion that photography should be used for journalism purposes only. This has resulted in the ban of Digital Single Lens Reflex Cameras (DSLRs) in public, on the streets and in malls"

So what do the journalists use then?

[davepoth]

It's a bit stupid really. As the article says, cameras on phones are quite good these days, and certainly good enough for what terrorists would want to photograph.

[Gad-Westy]

davepoth said:

It's a bit stupid really. As the article says, cameras on phones are quite good these days, and certainly good enough for what terrorists would want to photograph.

I got the impression that this was more a privacy issue than a terrorism one. Either way, illogical as you say.

[havoc]

I would say "unbelievable", but in that area of the world I can well believe it.

Never have the virtues of a good and (almost) unrestricted education been so apparent as when observing those countries who don't have it...