The west has fiscalised its basic power relationships through a web of contracts, loans, shareholdings, bank holdings and so on. In such an environment it is easy for speech to be "free" because a change in political will rarely leads to any change in these basic instruments. Western speech, as something that rarely has any effect on power, is, like badgers and birds, free. In states like China, there is pervasive censorship, because speech still has power and power is scared of it. We should always look at censorship as an economic signal that reveals the potential power of speech in that jurisdiction. The attacks against us by the US point to a great hope, speech powerful enough to break the fiscal blockade. -Julian Assange
Can you say anything to back up the claim that "speech still has power" in China? That seems to go against what the pro-censorship commenters are saying, which is that most people in China know all the bad stuff anyway and just don't care. If that's true, it seems like words have lost all power.
