Slashdot Mirror
Google Under Fire Over Racist Blogs
AcidAUS writes "Google is being accused of refusing to remove racist blogs targeting minority groups in Australia. Google, whose corporate motto is "don't be evil", says it will take the blogs in question offline only if ordered to do so by a court."
The question is which is the greater evil: racist speech or censorship? The evil of racist speech can be effectively countered with anti-racist speech, but the evil of censorship can't be easily repaired.
http://alternatives.rzero.com/
I know different countries have differing attitudes toward freedom of speech issues and the fomenting of violence (racial or otherwise).
But I have to admit, if you take out uncovered meat and place it outside, without cover, and the cats come to eat it -- then whose fault is it, the cats' or the uncovered meat's? This case is no different.
Let's have the courts sort it out and not the providersm carriers etc.
People can either decide for themselves what they want to believe or have someone else decide for them what they should read. I'd rather decide for myself and tolerate some hate blogs than have my internet censored, thank you very much.
If you don't want to read Racist blogs, don't google for them.
The best form of censorship is self-censorship.
Karma: Bad. (As in Good?)
World: "Some are racist - you're evil!"
Google: "We won't remove them unless a court tells us"
World: "You're letting them stay? You're evil!"
Google: "Okay, we'll take them down."
World: "Infringing freedom of speech like in China, eh? You're evil!"
Google: "Okay, we won't take them down."
World: "But they're racist. You're evil!"
Google: "Okay, we'll wait for a review by a court."
World: "So you're condoning racism? You're evil!"
Sometimes even I feel for corporations...
bang goes my karma... again...
They would be if they were to remove blogs just because someone finds them offensive. The only difference now is the amount of people finding the matter offensive, but that shouldn't really make a difference. Censorship should be taken very seriously, and I don't find that yelling "RACISM!!!" at the top of your lungs is really grounds for censorship.
It's true that racist blogs and propaganda do alot of harm, and in a perfect world there wouldn't be racism at all. But to take away someones free speech 'just because' is equally bad.
It's like someone once said:
"I don't like what you say, but I'll fight for your right to say it!"
Blog -
You cannot, on the one hand, take Google to task for caving to the demands for censorship by the Chinese, and on the other, for their failing to cave in to pressure to remove blogs.
While their failure to take a stand in China is questionable, their refusal to remove blogs is on much more solid ground. As has been said, racist hate speech can be countered, but censorship is just simply evil. And worse, were they to indulge in censorship in the free world, there would be no end to the reasons people would demand more of the same.
--- Bill
The price of freedom of speech is the unfortunate ability to be surrounded by stupidity.
Pretty easy to work out what they'd do in the case of China (especially given their past actions). But I'm guessing you just wanted to bash Google rather then have a serious discussion.
It's a good thing that google is not removing racist blogs. Fact is that any content, is highly subjective. If you start removing something because a certain party finds it offensive, you might as well blank the entire internet. Yeah it's a shame that such measures also include things like racism, but that is in my opinion a small price to pay for the greater value of free speech on the internet.
Exactly. According to the article, the people who want this material removed seem to be just in the preliminary stages of that process. And that's fine--there is no harm in politely asking Google to remove the content first.
If the jurisdictional issue of "Where are the Google Blogger servers?" is decided, and those people get a court order demanding the removal of the content, then and only then should Google comply.
It's about as ridiculous as hating someone for the OS they choose to run ...
You know what I think would be a good thing for Google to do? Start offering a service where I could post high-quality downloads of my favorite movies and television shows without commercials. It would be the ultimate in freedom of expression. Unfortunately, though, we have these little things called laws that, while Google is not being evil, they still have to follow. Weird as it may sound, other countries have them too, and sometimes, they're not the same as ours.
Did you not read the summary? If the Australian government orders the content to be taken down, it will be taken down. Just because Google has a corporate goal of not being evil doesn't mean that it can afford to simply disregard laws it doesn't like, any more than you or I can.
Did it ever occur to you that Google would love to publish blogs that run afoul of the Chinese government, and that as soon as it is hopefully able to do so without international legal repercussions, it probably will?
I don't consider myself particularly evil, either, but if I did business in China, I would also in no hurry to start an international incident by showing blatant disregard for China's laws. And before I get hit with the "just don't do business in China" stick, 1) that's not a practical solution, 2) it wouldn't do any good, as others would be more than happy to fill in the gap, and 3) once China does (hopefully) become a country of greater freedom, would you really want to be the one that turned your back on the country in its time of gradual change?
Instead of posting these little snipes at Google for following the laws of the lands they're working in, how about attacking the root cause of the problem, the Chinese government? How many rallies have you been to in Beijing? How many letters have you written to you Congresscritter asking for the U.S. to put more pressure on the Chinese government to allow more freedom?
As a counterpoint, not in either of the places I've lived it's not. Melbourne and a small country town. I've found neither of these places to be racist at all, and in fact when people
:P
start with the racist crap, others tend to jump on them. (re: Gary Anderson)
Ah, but then again, neither Melbourne or Kerang are anywhere near Sydney
Just like in the Faurisson affair, where Chomsky wrote the following:
Faurisson's conclusions are diametrically opposed to views I hold and have frequently expressed in print (for example, in my book Peace in the Middle East, where I describe the Holocaust as "the most fantastic outburst of collective insanity in human history"). But it is elementary that freedom of expression (including academic freedom) is not to be restricted to views of which one approves, and that it is precisely in the case of views that are almost universally despised and condemned that this right must be most vigorously defended. It is easy enough to defend those who need no defense or to join in unanimous (and often justified) condemnation of a violation of civil rights by some official enemy.
Google is right, submitter is wrong for attempting to start a flame war. 'Nuff said.
Your sig(k) has been stolen. There is a puff of smoke!
I take offence that. You're implying that the world is full of mealy-mouthed, small minded people with nothing better to do that to tell people what they can and can't say, so that they don't have to hear somethign they don't like.
Moderator: Mark parent down and ban all future submissions
Karma: Bad. (As in Good?)
The establishment is served well by ignorance...people are not educated by schooling, they are simply trained in a discipline so as that they can have a job so as that they are not poor so as that they don't rebel against the establishment.
In order for humanity to grow up, there has to be real education.
This is the Internet, not a damn kindergarten. People are going to say things you don't like, and you can't stop them. Live with it. If they show up at your front door or start harassing you, there are already laws to handle that.
I hope Google doesn't back down. I figure they'll just move the blogs to a server in the US (assuming they're in AU) if challenged in court, though.
"Google caves in to pressure in Australia, evilly censors blogs. So much for that 'don't be evil' motto, guys!"
I'm quite interested in the differing definitions of 'hate speech'. In my experience they all appear to come down, in the end, to the person's (not me, the other person's) mind-readership of the thoughts and intentions that was behind the statement, which in practice makes it impossible for me to spot hate-speech since I obviously do not have the same thought-radar.
How about this statement:
'I'm not sure what's the better description - that Lebanese are assholes, or that Lebanon is the assy country and Lebanese are the pieces of shit that sprout from it'.
Is this hate speech? You tell me.
Because if it is, then Slashdot should immediately be shut down over similar statements about Americans, which there are repeatedly. Even if you change the above to 'most Lebanese', some would still consider it hate speech, while saying 'most Americans' will completely get you off the hook.
In short, please provide a methodology for identifying hate speech that does not depend on the speech-finder's ability to astrally discern the thoughts and intentions behind the speech, but can be done on any speech sample solely based on knowledge of it and the world, i.e. with no knowledge of the speaker, that I can apply when pointing out hate-speech on Slashdot and in books and texts otherwise. Would be greatly appreciated.
It is the job of the courts to decide what is racist. I live in South-Africa and it is racist to call someone a "kaffer" but not racist to call someone a "boer". I'm offended when a black person calls me a boer since most of the time its said in a derogatory manner, but most people in South-Africa, which are black, will deny that they can even be racist because they black. Racism is subjective and Google's opinion is not nessarily that of the majority or correct.
This is my sig.
Standing up for freedom of speech. Who do they think they are? Don't they know that it is evil to give people a forum for unpopular opinions? Next thing you know, they will be refusing to hand over people's identifying data!
See the problem most people have with freedom of speech is not that it applies to them, but rather that it applies to people with ideas they dispise.
You can not limit speech to just speech you like and/or agree with and still say you have freedom of speech.
There is no "-1 offended" or "-1 you don't agree with me" mod options for a reason.
Indeed, this is an important distinction which many people today could do with learning. A worrying example of people not making this distinction is the British Government and it's religious hatred laws which seem to equate a dislike of religion, which is a choice made by individuals, and racism which is not something you have any choice in. E.g. you can choose to be a muslim, christian, whatever but you can't choose to be born either black or white. Many muslims pressure groups also seem to not understand this distinction when they equate hatred of their religious choices as being racism.
For all the non-Australians with no idea where the uncovered meat reference came from, an Australian sheikh has just managed to more or less publicly blame scantily clad women for inviting rape, causing an uproar there. Condemnation has been quick; John Major already chimed in to call the comments "preposterous."
Having said that, Google has said content would need to be illegal, e.g. spam related before they would actually remove it. Anyone else read this and hear echoes of user 606117 writing yesterday, "Don't come to Australia"?
"Real education"? Education is never free from bias. There will always be disagreement about what "real education" should include. It can't be defined in terms of results, either, because there's also no universal agreement about what humanity would be like if it were to grow.
You know, I am getting tired of people throwing the "don't be evil" phrase in their face all the time. It is old, tiring, and played out so many times in the wrong way.
I don't like racism, but in our country -and google is based in our country- our laws let people spew whatever trash they want to trash as long as it doesn't cause harm....and while racism may infuriate me, and hurt people's feelings - it does not cause actual harm (yes someone will argue it teaches young people to do stupid things, but the harm came from the young kids).
All in all, Google is correct for letting people have their free speech.
I mod down so you can mod up. Your welcome.
The problem with that argument is that they have only removed certain sites as news. It also doesn't just apply to the right like your link claims either. DailyKos was removed from Google News LONG before LGF. Do a plain Google search. Those sites show up JUST fine.
Now, I'm all for citizen journalism, but DailyKos, Michelle Malkin's rambling blog, and Little Green Footballs do not classify as news in any objective sense. The only idea they are foisting with their "censorship" is that opinion blogs do not count as news.
While the article states:
the referenced "flag" article on Google does not mention anything about "removal" of questionable blogs in the case of hate speech. The only actions Google might take are:
and
Indeed, there is a "removal" clause:
but it applies only to the activities I put in "bold". Prove that the blogs are engaged in "illegal" activities in court, not by appealing to Google, and Google surely will obey the order of the judge. The problem is of course that this is international matter, but this is a general problem for all Internet activities.
I do not believe in karma. "Funny"=-6. Do good and forbid evil. Yours, Oft-Offtopic Flamebaiting Troll.
>> Let's have the courts sort it out
The entire "west" is being turned into some godawful mixture of nanny state and police state precisely because of the influence of courts, judges, and lawyers.
The last thing we need is courts adding even more mountains of red tape and restrictions on communication.
Leave the courts to deal with actual physical events only, not with the ramblings of morons who are easily countered by reasoned argument.
Aside from the fact that I get a bit tired of the internet being blamed for social problems, whereas in reality it only makes them more visible.
I basically see two options:
- Censorship. Take offline the racist hate speech, forcing said racists to continue their business underground. However it continues to exist.
OR
- Let the racists (and everyone else) ventilate their hate speech. It only makes them more visible. Which makes the problem so much simpler to solve than if they remain underground. At some point they will say something punishable by law, at which point they can be arrested.
Google obviously once again faces a situation where it has to choose between the lesser of two evils.
I feel racism is also largely solved by educating and creating understanding between groups. I propose a third option, the opposite of censorship - Adding a warning to certain pages rather than taking them offline:
"Warning- Racist content. This page contains racist statements. Before accepting these statements, consider the primitive state that your country would be in without worldwide cooperation between countries and cultures."
Visit http://ringbreak.dnd.utwente.nl/~mrjb/growingbettersoftware to download your free copy of the book
From the evil, racist Australian blog:
"We ... hope to preserve and defend our heritage, culture, customs, traditions, morals, and values, as well as our blood itself, against hostile alien elements that are destructive to who we are and we as a race hold dear."
That was written by a white man. Had it been written by an Australian aborigine, it would be a civil rights web site.
Freedom of speech != Freedom to offend
Freedom of speech isn't worth much if one can't use offensive speech.
"Bush is an idiot", for example, might offend Bush, but can anyone really say it shouldn't be protected speech?
By that token, perhaps they should have refused the Chinese government's demand of censorship, and offered to put a "Warning: rated subversive" notice on those pages.
Censorship is telling a man he can't have a steak just because a baby can't chew it. --Mark Twain
Noam Chomsky correctly put it (paraphrasing): You are either for free speech or you are against it. There is no meaningful middle ground. Everyone is for free speech that they agree with. Even Nazi propaganda minister Joseph Goebbels agreed with that. The meaningful test is whether you are for speech that you disagree with. Blogger Brian Stokes wants to remove racist blogs. Therefore he is against free speech that he disagrees with; he is against free speech.
... giving the bloggers enough rope to hang themselves. If their opinions are so poisonous, they should be publicly aired so that everyone can see for themselves how pathetic and disgusting they truly are.
Should Google honor his wishes? Clearly they have a right and a reason not to. If you claim to be for free speech you must support their freedom to keep the blogs.
There is a simple rationale why the basic right of free speech has a public benefit in this case