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Google Apologizes For "Michelle Obama" Results
theodp writes "CNN reports that for most of the past week, when someone did a Google image search for 'Michelle Obama,' one of the first images that came up was a picture of the First Lady altered to resemble a monkey. After being hit with a firestorm of criticism over the episode, Google first banned the site that posted the photo, saying it could spread malware. Then, when the image appeared on another site, Google displayed the photo in its search results, but displayed an apologetic Google ad above it. On Wednesday morning, the racially offensive image appeared to have been removed from any Google Image searches for 'Michelle Obama.' Google officials could not immediately be reached for comment."
Update — 15:38 GMT by SS: A reader pointed out that this article from the Guardian says the image was de-listed simply because it was removed from the blog where it was hosted rather than by any "deliberate" action from Google.
At the moment it suggests searching for "Michelle Obama monkey" when you search for "Michelle Obama"
http://CryoLANparty.com/ A lan I'm staff on!
No one complained when Bush was made to look a monkey
They never did that for the "Bush chimp" pictures.
Why does anyone give a shit? Some moron happened to put a stupid picture up and it turned up on google. WOWZERZ. Fuck whoever thought this was worth writing about and fuck whoever made google take the image down.
Though not terribly surprising, I suppose.
Google did not act when there were images of the prophet in its search results, or offensive images from shock sites, or when Bush was made to look like a chimp. Bowing to pressure like this only re-inforces the belief that "new" media, as well as "old" media, has a liberal bias.
Many leaders and famous people are portrayed in a funny cartoon or distorted picture. Why should she be special? Just becuase her husband got a noble peace prize for NOTHING. That prize is worth nothing now....humm same as Obama.
Since when is Google responsible for the content on the Internet?? I thought it just showed what was there, no matter what.
I searched for "George Bush" and first result is George Bush eating a kitten.
http://www.flystylelife.com/wp-content/uploads/2008/09/michelle-obama-ape.jpg There ya go.
"In Soviet America, Google censors you." If only it were a joke.
I'm not sure what bothers me more, that we're following China's lead or that one company gets final say on what is or is not acceptable for the world to see.
People post dumb shit on the internet. Other people complain. Welcome to the 21st century. How is this remotely news? To me it seems more like pandering to the slobbering teabaggers, it's basically saying "look, teh googles controls your free speach!!!"
Google pulls shit from search results all the time for a wide variety of reasons, in this case because it's fucking offensive. You wanna be a racist prick that's your business, you can still find the picture it's just not the top result for a search of "Michelle Obama". If you can't deal with that you can go use Bing like the dumbfuck you are.
eWeek has a screenshot of the apology.
... that Google is now being held accountable to what is available on the internet. That should take them down a peg or two.
THE HONOUR OF THE KNIGHTS - CC Licensed Sci-Fi Novel
Google *should* just index what it finds, and thats what originally happened here...
There are thousands of sites out there hosting insulting pictures of george bush, some where he looks like a monkey or is compared to one and some where he's likened to adolf hitler... If you're going to do something that makes you famous, then you will attract a huge amount of attention and inevitably some of it will be bad. That is well known up front and you can't go crying about it when it happens. Noone forced obama to stand, and now that he's won there will be a lot of attention given to him and his family, if he doesn't like that he should have thought about it before.
Incidentally, when i woke up this morning i had no plans whatsoever to look for pictures of michelle obama on the internet, but having read this story i went looking for the picture in question and i'm sure a lot of other people will do the same. Had i stumbled across such pictures by accident without having read this story i probably wouldn't have thought anything of it because there are countless other derogatory pictures of famous people out there.
http://spamdecoy.net - free throwaway anonymous email - avoid spam!
When Google said that it wouldn't remove the picture I was quite annoyed with them, but then it suddenly dawned on me that if they removed that picture, the very next thing that would happen is that some bright spark would speak up and say "Great, now take this one down too, because it's just as bad" and before you know it, the whole situation's lost control.
It wasn't particularly fair on Google and they had to make a tough decision and I think in this instance they made the right one.
Summation 2
why is that picture "racially offensive"?
because the portrayed person is black?
what if it was made by a black person?
do we know it wasn't made by a black person?
would it be racially offensive it it portrayed a white person and was made by a black person?
if we want to reach REAL equality between all races, this also means we mustn't go nuts about an insult to a person from one race while not caring about the same insult to a person from another race (remember the bush/chimpanzee pictures?)
The MAFIAA is a bunch of mindless jerks who will be the first up against the wall when the revolution comes
and frightening.
If you care about freedom of speech you have to be willing (and you should be proud) to let people say stuff you don't agree with.
That includes racist bullshit too. Even if it is directed at the world's favorite US president's wife.
Christ on a stick you guys are fail.
How we know is more important than what we know.
I think they should allow the picture to be shown. It accurately catalogues one of the varied opinions that humans have of one another. It doesn't matter that it's offensive. That's a judgement call that one has to make for ones' self. Who's to judge what is correct or not. It kinda gets scary when someone or some entity becomes the sole arbiter of what is right and moral.
In this case, I really think it's uncalled for and, frankly, more damaging to the poster than to the one posted about but it's the poseter's choice to express his opinion no matter how much of a fool he might seem because of the opinion he has expressed.
The site showing the image has removed it. Google don't appear to have 'removed' it from their index, just promptly re-indexed the offending site.
However, I don't remember Google (/youtube) being this proactive when offensive Thai royalty videos appeared. Or the 'Bush chimp' images (although those were funny*)
*IRONY
They have not censored this image, or blocked it from their search. They just removed it from the top pick when you do an image search of her name. One of their suggested searches points you directly to the image. If you google Michelle Obama Monkey it comes up.
The image, and site that hosts it, are still in Google search, you just have to actively search for "Michelle Obama Monkey" for it to come up now, and not just a basic search of her name.
Don't let that stop playtime in fantasy land, though.
Oh god. How stupid of them. They just illustrated that they do take responsibility for the entire content of the web. Congratulations Google, you just lost a lot of credibility on the internet for me. Anyone know of a search engine which doesn't censor such things?
I wonder if it is possible that search is working as it should.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2009/nov/25/michelle-obama-google-images-removed
As according to that Guardian article above, the image in question, has been removed from its original linked location.
I wonder if the level of searches for Michelle Obama has increased since this story was released? Also, how many people have seen the image now, that wouldnt have before?
Lots of people were offended that it was the top picture that came up when you looked up her name, and submitted it with Google's "Report Offensive Image" button on the bottom of every Google image search page.
It still comes up if you Google her name and monkey, but that narrows the result to only people wanting to find pictures of her photoshopped to look like one...
In theory they can list or not list any results they like, whatever combination is most profitable.
qntm.org
Come on.. this is the just the Zeitgeist. There are more people searching for the picture in question rather than just her name. That would put the suggestion higher in the list (I'm guessing that's how the autocomplete algorithm works).
Google isn't really to blame.. and them removing this item can be seen as censorship.
http://dilemma.gulecha.org - My philospohical short film.
google staff these days are going downhill - they should have just made it less relevant showing up in page 100 or something
at least all these Michelle Obama monkey phrases showing up in the index will overcompensate.
I think the Google apology link was a good idea, since it explained to the uninitiated how Google works, rather than making Google responsible for everything on the Internet.
Further, I agree with this statement: "Racism won't be truly a thing of the past until we can make fun of black and white politicians alike."
However, this is not "alike". We make fun of white politicians--and their wives, at times--without reference to their race. That's not the same as dehumanizing Michelle Obama for being black.
It's rare that you're presented with a knob whose only two positions are Make History and Flee Your Glorious Destiny.
When I run that exact search. The top Bush image comes up, but the rest of the results, are of either of the Obamas, with the 3rd pick on page 1, being the image this whole story was about.
Google is a business, and, in particular, an American business.
The only "morals" are to maximize shareholder profits.
If that means caving in to public outcry or government pressure, they will do that.
If it means subverting elections (Exxon, in Chile), bribing government officials (Boeing, in the tanker deal), or blowing up villages in India (Union Carbide, in Bhopal), they will do that, too. As long as it doesn't cost the shareholders more than it saves or gains, it is "the right thing to do".
If enough of their users click on the "Report Offensive Image" button, they're going to act on it sooner or later. That's why they put it there, and it's on the bottom of every Google image page.
Voting on the basis of skin color is quite acceptable by today's moral standard.
No. This is the "he hit first"-argument, and it doesn't work in kindergarten either.
(Actually, it's the "he said some bad things back after I killed his brother and tortured him, so it's ok that I say bad things too"...)
It is not OK to vote racist. No matter who you are. Voting based on skin colour is undermining the entire idea of egalitarianism and democracy - we cannot outlaw it, but we can definitely cry foul. So I find your post informative and interesting, but I do not agree with your conclusion (or was it just a provocation?)
IAIFARSIJDPOOTV - I Am In Fact A Reality Star; I Just Don't Play One On TV
African-Americans have voted in a much larger percentage for the Democratic party since the civil rights era. That whole time they were voting for white politicians.
Frankly, your entire premise here is ignorant bullshit. Going by your logic every white person is a racist, if they've only voted for white politicians like John Sidney McCain.
It's their website so they can do whatever they want with it. If they want to ban gays,fine... If they want to ban pictures fine. There's no reason why they shouldn't be allowed to control the content on their own site. If people don't like the content of Google then they can easily direct their browsers elsewhere. Google have a right to freedom of expression too.
Mods: please read the link first before you dub this off-topic.
There was a fascinating article on the BBC website about this; read
Hitler Moustache about a comedian, Richard Herring, who wanted to reclaim the right to make it socially acceptable to wear a "toothbrush moustache" like the famous.... Charlie Chaplin.
.. if that's what it thinks people WANTS to see when searching for Michelle Obama.
Redesign your algorithm please to be more useful.
She sure looks like a chimp in this picture:
If pictures are conclusive proof, then W proves that white people are chimps as well.
Didn't blacks evolve BEFORE whites? Didn't whites evolve FROM blacks?
That's not how evolution works. All humans alive today have a common ancestor. Similarly, all humans alive today have evolved for the same period of time. In other words, today's white people did not evolve from today's black people.
It is not OK to vote racist. No matter who you are. Voting based on skin colour is undermining the entire idea of egalitarianism and democracy - we cannot outlaw it, but we can definitely cry foul.
The last I checked, neither egalitarianism or democracy is mentioned in our constitution. And how I vote and why I vote is none of your goddamned business.
How many times are you going to copy/paste this swill?
Humans are one species of ape, so of course there are clear similarities in appearance (and differences also, chiefly that humans are nearly bald over most of their bodies). For instance, we can recognize a wide range of facial expressions in apes, and associate them with comparable expressions in humans. These similarities are stronger or weaker depending on the moment, but exist for any human individual. Exploiting the similarity to parody a public figure as an ape or monkey is commonplace, and should be considered just another form of fair comment. This is not a race-specific issue - it applies equally across the board.
Google's conduct in cowing to politically motivated whiners is reprehensible. It is apparently acceptable to compare George W Bush or Steve Ballmer to monkeys (or chimps, or whatever) in words or pictures as social or political comment. Tony Blair mostly got poodle comparisons, but there's probably a few monkey ones around also. RMS would be fair game as an ape, too, although he typically gets cave-man or neanderthal comparisons. The US cannot consider itself color-blind or non-racist until the same gamut of insults can be levelled at any public figure without fear of censorship or witch-hunting.
Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities. - Voltaire
Is part of a "popular people morphed into monkeys" series, which has been around for a long time, and includes wide assortment of people of all races. There is no evidence of racial subtext or any other message beside, well "popular people morphed into monkeys".
;)
What this shows is that people in US aren't a lot better when it comes to being disproportionately offended by some innocent image in the media. Good thing Google has reacted quickly in the face of, to quote CNN, "the firestorm of criticism", before people started turning cars upside down and burning Google logo flags, huh
I just did a Google vs Bing comparison on image search for michelle+obama+monkey.
First comment: the images were displayed really slowly on Bing; many never appeared at all.
Second comment: of the images displayed, Google's had more with a monkey theme of some sort.
Third comment: neither search produced anything I'd refer to as offensive.
Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities. - Voltaire
What would a CIA linked 'google' do with a Watergate, Iran contra ect. ?
Show some more Iraqi museum images?
Domestic spying is now "Benign Information Gathering"
The logic is failed if the non-black minority votes 65% and whites vote 55% you have a 10% over 65% of racism. then over the total you will have 15% of racist white voters. and a 95%-65%
=30% racist black voters. that is if you are sure that the non-black minory is not racist at all.
with all this censoring going on and all, perhaps it's time for a distributed peer-to-peer open-source search engine...
interesting, I just found this project: http://www.majestic12.co.uk/
If Pandora's box is destined to be opened, *I* want to be the one to open it.
He's talking about Muhammad, the Prophet of Islam.
There was a great deal of controversy about images of him recently because political cartoons lampooned the prophet, and slandered his followers as violent terrorists, resulting in massive backlash from the Islamic community (and, ironically, various violent attacks on embassies which might be considered terrorism). These cartoons were, and remain, easily found on Google.
Also, just like Jesus in old-school movies, I am reasonably certain that Muhammad is not meant to have his face depicted in images/movies. Instead, he is depicted with his head on fire. The fire represents enlightenment, I believe.
You can only take it.
Say what you want about the Right (and being an equal opportunity center-of-the-aisle kind of snark, I've said a lot...), they have much thicker skins than the Left, I've noticed. Every joke made about the current administration can never really be just a joke about the current administration, it's either borne of "racism" or a "disturbing indication of a growing violence and unrest." The recent SNL stuff is making my leftie friends apoplectic; when the same show skewered Bush and Cheney, my rightie friends were, like, "SNL? Is that still on?"
Sure, it's all anecdotal, but you know I'm correct.
I think that righties don't mind being un-hip. Many even carry it as a "badge of honor." (I am reminded here of bowtie-wearing Conservative pundit Tucker Carlson.) The lefties are mortified that they might somehow be un-cool, and that the Stewarts/Colberts/SNLs/Lettermans will turn on them. They need to be "in" on the joke, and not the butt of it, and if they ARE the butt of it, well, it can't really be a joke then, can it? It must be sedition and racism...
If I do a GIS for "Laura Bush" on the very first page is a photoshopped picture of her naked. If I do a GIS for "George Bush" on the very first page is a picture of him eating a kitten, three pictures of him giving the finger, one picture making him look like a monkey, one picture making him look like some kind of ogre and one picture of a bush impersonator being spanked on his bare bottom. I think some are being overly sensitive here. Michelle Obama is an intelligent and successful woman, I think she can handle a corny picture on the internet.
How everyone votes is, by definition, everyones business - without discussion of what is the right thing to vote, it becomes an excercise in futility (free press is more important than the voting booth, and all that).
And the constitution is entirely about democracy, and is written based on egalitarian/liberal ideals. And I think I am feeding a troll...
It is morally reprehensible to vote racist. It is also against the basic idea of voting at all - voting would not make sense unless we presume all are equal. If you are a racist, then you cannot, by definition, be a democrat - but you can use the voting booths as a weapon against your skin colour of choice. It would be more honest to burn down voting booths in select areas, though.
IAIFARSIJDPOOTV - I Am In Fact A Reality Star; I Just Don't Play One On TV
And the constitution is entirely about democracy
Really? Show me where the word is mentioned. I'm sure it must be in there somewhere.
Progressivism: Parasites helping parasites to help themselves - to other people's stuff.
Streisand effect.
Looking at US politics from the outside, one thing I simply can't understand is this.
You have an entire group of people who were brought to the country as slaves and even after slavery was abolished were terribly discriminated against (eg kept under control by lynching) within living memory. Even after reform you still have serious discrimination going on into the present day.
Then you act surprised that they vote as a block for one of their own to be head of state the first time they have a real chance! Seriously what the fuck did you expect? That isn't racism, its human nature.
This sig all sigs devours
Those of you who are saying that it was a correct decision to remove the image, you are missing the point. There are two different questions to be addressed, which are distinctly different. 1) Is the image objectionable? 2) Is it right to remove the image from search results? The answer to 1) is probably in most people's eyes 'yes'. The answer to 2) is that Google should just act as information carrier. Its search engine should rank images (and other media) based on their relevance to the search query at hand. Google may filter images based on a generic filter, such as SafeSearch. given that there is a demand for it and that the filter can be turned off easily. Google should however not interfer with individual results. (Exception: when the law requires them to do so, however in that case the search result should clearly inform the user about this circumstance) The fact that the image made it to the top position, or at least the first page, is a sign that many people have linked to it and in turn increased its rank. Thus it is relevant in some sense. IF it is believed that the image was ranked so highly because of an error in the algorithm, it's the algorithm that should be fixed, not the individual search result. There is a preceding case that was handled by this principle, back when you got George Dubya's page as the top result when searching for "catastrophic failure". What they did then was to modify the algorithm to make so called "Google bombing" more difficult. --- Rant about principles ends here --- --- Personal opinion starts here --- And it is also my opinion that people need to be less sensitive about politically incorrect commentary. If you dislike something go ahead and criticize it. Discuss it. Or ignore it. But don't censor it. (Or call for it to be censored) It's not your damn right to go through life without ever feeling insulted. And remember, no matter how much you dislike the Michelle Obama image, or any other objectionable image, be aware that if you call for it to be censored, your opinion will be the next to be censored.
How many republicans are against Obama's plans because they don't believe in them and how many because he is black? Like the "you lie" outcry that has not been done to any white president, this case is still to sensitive.
The movie "white man can't jump" could also have been titled "black men can't shoot without trying to look good even it means missing", a point made in the movie itself. Both are racial slurs and yet... there is a difference.
In a movie, writers typically show a bad guy is truly evil by having him kill an unarmed woman who is totally defenseless. Yet in "Apocalypse Now" the "hero" does exactly this while he is not treated as truly evil by either the writers or the audience for the rest of the movie. Because asian women are not truly human perhaps? American-japaense were interred during WW2, American-Italian and American-german were not. There were no neutralized japanese civilian spies. There were PLENTY of neutralized german and italian spies. So why was the loyal group rounded up?
Racism exist, and might never be truly eliminated. Until that it does, we need to be careful claiming that all should be treated equal when this isn't happening.
I don't know if this was unique to holland but there was a racism awareness event that tried to show how stupid racism was by claiming blue-eyed people were less intelligent. Fake docu's showing blue-eyed people being rounded up and put in special accommodations where there lower intelligence could be accounted for. Why blue-eyed? Because bigger noses or dark skin would not be clearly as idiotic perhaps?
Think about it for second. If you had to come up with such a campaign and select a body characteristic that was clearly not linked with someones social value yet obvious to everyone, what would you pick? I would stick with a white characteristic. Else people MIGHT just believe your campaign. Same as people believed Archie Bunker and the actor who played him were for real, while his character was supposed to be a parody and the actor was a well known anti-racist (just played a racist on tv and a movie)
MMO Quests are like orgasms:
You may solo them, I prefer them in a group.
but... my teacher said...
It is morally reprehensible to vote racist.
But, clearly, not reprehensible in the United States of America to campaign on a platform of your ethnicity as was evidenced in the last major presidential election?
If you are a racist, then you cannot, by definition, be a democrat
Clearly your definition of racism is different from mine. I view racism as any act that distinguishes somebody on their race. By that definition I would say nearly all democrats are "racist" as they use race as one of their election platforms (a truly non-racist party would not need to promote equality legislation that distinguishes race as a factor). Neither would they feel the need to denigrate anyone in opposition to their candidate as "morally reprehensible racists". The fact is that if both Republicans and Democrats put up candidates of identical race there would still be votes for both. It is clear that Democrats, therefore, are an extremely racist party by any definition.
As a foreign viewer of the American presidential race I was astounded to the extent that self-promotion based on race was a factor.
The source for this image is a now defunct site called celebrityapes.com (misspelled on at least one referring site). I visited the site 2 days ago after correcting the spelling and before it went down. It had pictures of dozens of celebrities, most not black, done to look like apes. Check the Internet Archive for this site and you will see it includes Bill and Hilary Clinton, Katie Holmes, Martin Scorsese and Mariah Carey.
He was burned at the stake for heresy. You tell me of a priest who speaks about the dangers of questioning the bible, and I will do my best to censor him. Fuck freedom of speech. People need to care about other people, not about stupid ideals. In case you're wondering, I'm white.
new sig
Really? Show me where the word is mentioned. I'm sure it must be in there somewhere.
Are you actually arguing that the constitution is not about democracy? Seriously?
Thw world does not work like that. Not every text is tagged correctly or contains in it the word which best describes it.
Try finding "christianity" in the bible. Try finding "bible"...
IAIFARSIJDPOOTV - I Am In Fact A Reality Star; I Just Don't Play One On TV
That isn't racism, its human nature.
You have no sense of irony, do you?
Maybe they are facing 'serious discrimination' due to the thug-loving image often presented in the media. I'm sure if they all acted like Will Smith then wouldn't get such bad fame.
Touché.
I stand by my point however.
This sig all sigs devours
That isn't racism, its human nature.
Just because something is part of human nature, does not mean it's not racist.. in fact it's the natural human "us/them" mentality that causes racism, sports related violence, religious wars and all that good stuff :/ I suppose it also drives things like capitalism.
Basically we are social animals, and need to feel we belong. On top of that, a lot of people like to believe that what they belong to is better than everything else.
It will be nice when everyone can think of "us" as the whole of humanity. Until we as a species have a more natural enemy (whether real or imagined) than other humans, things will probably continue to suck.
which is totally what she said
It is morally reprehensible to vote racist.
But, clearly, not reprehensible in the United States of America to campaign on a platform of your ethnicity as was evidenced in the last major presidential election?
I have no clue why you are bringing this up. Of course that was problematic. Does that make it OK to be racist for everyone else, or what are you arguing here?
If you are a racist, then you cannot, by definition, be a democrat
...It is clear that Democrats, therefore, are an extremely racist party by any definition.
Sorry if this was unclear - I am not talking about being a party "Democrat" (note caps) but being part of a democracy. My argument is about racism vs democracy.
I am from Denmark, and I find the ways race is used in the US problematic too. Also by Obama and the tendency to "select the right race for the right district" you mention. But that is not my point - my point is that voting as a racist is against the entire idea of voting.
IAIFARSIJDPOOTV - I Am In Fact A Reality Star; I Just Don't Play One On TV
I thought America was *SUPPOSED* to be a free country?
http://nathanlindsell.blogspot.com/
http://bilia.files.wordpress.com/2009/08/george-bush-eats-a-kitten.jpg?w=400&h=344
And on that same page of image results:
http://totallylookslike.files.wordpress.com/2008/07/9george-bush.jpg
Calling Michelle Obama a monkey is more offensive than calling George Bush a monkey because in her case it is because of her race, not because of her person. In Bush's case it is a personal insult because of certain people's perception of him, personally, being clumsy and lacking intelligence.
There is a difference
Are you actually arguing that the constitution is not about democracy? Seriously?
Yes, dead seriously. Try reading it some time, because anyone who would say such an idiotic thing obviously hasn't.
Progressivism: Parasites helping parasites to help themselves - to other people's stuff.
No matter what your opinion of obama or the picture it falls under the freedom of speech clause of the Constitution. I may have to read and listen to liberal global warming BS, but i do not complain about their right to open their out and spew it, just about the junk science. I read tons of post about censorship in China well where are those same voices now?
Now, how many times has /.done the same without us even knowing?? Back when /. first started I thought it was completely above board in the past several year you do see a distinct left sided view being promoted.
We've heard the argument before: "we are just a search engine, we arent responsible for child porn, warez, illegal mp3s or anythign like that that show up in our results"... unless its a picture of Michelle Obama... If you can flush that you have proved you can flush the other things as well. So whats next?
Thanks to file sharing, I purchase more CDs
Thanks to the RIAA, I buy them used...
I don't know what is Where was this response when the 'bush monkey' pictures were all the rage? Oh, that's right, he's white.
---- Booth was a patriot ----
... still does the trick. Ugly picture, though.
One remark:
> That includes racist bullshit too. Even if it is directed at the world's favorite US president's wife.
racism is very close to fascism, and that's not an opinion, it's a crime. But it's still not worth censoring the internet, in the opposite: you must be able to see "shit" if you want to fight it. If it's just unnoticed, it's still there. Like that hiding game you play with childs: closing your eyes really does not make yourself disappear - or the bad things existing in our world, for that matter.
Just trying to be prepared for when Tiananmen happens in the U.S.
As you can't just make up your own definition of a word, your definition is not the acepted one.
A white person saying that a black person is a monkey (to stay on topic) is racist. A white person saying that black people have darker skin pigmentation is not racist.
To have a right to do a thing is not at all the same as to be right in doing it
I presume this means that Google will be removing the images - or at least apologizing for the images - that show Bush and Clinton as a monkey (e.g. among others http://doctorbulldog.files.wordpress.com/2009/02/8130george-w-bush-monkey-posters.jpg, http://www.buttmonkeycentral.com/album/Funny%20Stuff/images/90576096af1be680a4643139f000e6db_11439207240/image.jpg), Bush as hitler etc.
Someone should apologize to the Monkey - what an insult!
Today, we have home theater instead of cinema. Maybe someday when home computing power increases enough we'll have home-based web indexing, and we won't have to put up with censorship.
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Do you want the email on the professor I read it with? Just so you can notify him personally that the laying out of branches of government, establishing the election process, citizen rights, free speech and all that has nothing to do with democracy. He'll be so surprised.
Pray tell, what makes a country democratic, if not free speech, free elections, oversight of government, balances to prevent accumulation of power, basic rights of all citizens, habeas corpus?
IAIFARSIJDPOOTV - I Am In Fact A Reality Star; I Just Don't Play One On TV
It absolutely /is/ racism. It's /the/ definition of racism. Regardless of whether or not you consider it human nature.
I agree. If we as a society are ever to overcome racial biases and discrimination, this is the attitude we need to have. A race-neutral attitude... Is that really so hard?
Someone please explain to me how this is in any way a "racial slur". As far as I can tell, it's a political statement, and people are pulling the race card because they don't want to see the first lady criticized.
The other comments all suggest that a monkey is somehow a racial slur, but I have never, ever heard it as a racial slur before today, so if it has been one in the past, it sure hasn't been very common. So yeah, someone please explain to me on what grounds people are calling this a racial slur, because it isn't and never has been as far as I've ever been aware.
"16MB (fuck off, MiB fascists)" - The Mighty Buzzard
I just spent several hours reviewing various axiomatic treatments of probability theory and then ... this. Major train derailment. Stick accordion self-compacted for hundreds of yards. Tragic loss of brain function for all involved. Luria weeps at the carnage.
What people self-report on exit polls proves bupkus all. Most people suck at preference reporting (ask any economist). This nut case is thinking that if a person self-reports incorporating "is black" in their preference determination, that Michael Vick would have prevailed over Abraham Lincoln on every one of these ballots.
The sad fact of life in America is that a man who is regarded as a black man experiences life differently--and usually not better. Would it were not the case that Obama had a longer row to hoe to get where he is now. And I'm not even counting overcoming negative precedent: that no black had yet accomplished this feat. Could it be that most black people in America have a stronger sense of Obama rose above, having faced it themselves? Empathy considered harmful. What next?
Likely many of these people voted for Obama because he rose above his blackness, and made it a non-issue, which would be hard to accomplish (the rising above part) if he wasn't *black* in the first place. (Zeno's unknown paradox of non-issue making.)
I'm sure the average exit poll carefully distinguishes this sentiment from the depiction in the word salad above. And then this nameless worm goes on to complain that the major media didn't smoke his troll weed.
I'm never given a rat's ass about the Turing test, but I sure would like to code a reliable troll detector, one that isn't fooled by sarcasm or wit, because we sure need more of that and less of this.
Voting on the basis of skin color is quite acceptable by today's moral standard.
Concluding sentence: slime-factor bonus +5
"on the basis of skin color" => via mental processes too unseemly to state clearly; to the exclusion of all other factors
"quite acceptable" => passive-aggressive fang-baring under cover of triteness
"today's moral standard" => we're all going to hell in a hand-basket
Surely these are easily detected memes? The indirection isn't terribly clever.
From transcript gloss for Ayres on Super Crunchers and the Power of Data
Russ Roberts made a rebuttal to this guy's claims in a following podcast, but I think statistics goes a long way, applied appropriately. What I would like to correlate are the predictable trappings of the sleaze module when forced to intertwine emotion and logic in certain styles of pathological prose.
We've spent too much time trying to understand the logic of language, when often there isn't any. Why aren't we studying instead the pragmatics of sleaze?
Do you want the email on the professor I read it with? Just so you can notify him personally that the laying out of branches of government, establishing the election process, citizen rights, free speech and all that has nothing to do with democracy. He'll be so surprised.
If he is surprised, then he's an idiot, too. I repeat, read it yourself.
Pray tell, what makes a country democratic, if not free speech, free elections, oversight of government, balances to prevent accumulation of power, basic rights of all citizens, habeas corpus?
What makes a country a democracy is majority rule, it has nothing to do with any of those other things at all.
I take back the part about reading the constitution. Maybe you should start with a dictionary.
Progressivism: Parasites helping parasites to help themselves - to other people's stuff.
I found this on Google after searching in vain for the Obama pic. This one spreads it around and pokes at everyone equally. I may not sleep for weeks:
http://www.anorak.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/monkey-palin-obama-clinton-putin-biden.png
1. You can't forbid anybody to vote based on skin color. It may be undermining egalitarianism, but democracy can only be undermined by people manipulating other people's votes. Democracy isn't right vs. wrong, it's majority vs. minority.
2. I think you misread the GP as promoting voting based on skin color instead of criticism on today's moral standards, which is how it was probably intended.
3. If the guy is blue as a smurf, I'm gonna vote for the human-colored guy. If he's green as the hulk though, he gets my vote!
Slashdot social media options: AIM, ICQ, Yahoo, Jabber and Mobile Text. Why no MySpace?
I believe in Act:9-12 talks about where followers of Jesus were first called "Christians".
You mad
That argument works, in court, it's called self-defense. Kindergarten presupposes that if you do get hit first, you should run to the nearby authority figure, a solution that isn't always timely or practical in real life.
Why is Google trying to censor its results? Presumably results are returned in page rank order, and sticking their fingers into this mess is going to open up a whole can of censorship/regulation woes.
Higher Logics: where programming meets science.
As I said, I already read it.
Majority rule? Only? Really?
Have you read any of the letters sent among the political theorists who drafted, wrote, signed and criticized the constitution? They specifically mention the problems of majority rule, which is called a simple democracy (presumably also a pun, on "simple as in stupid").
Here's a few quick quote/lesson:
"A simple democracy is the devil's own government."
- Dr. Jedediah Morse
I guess the discussion ends here - your conception of democracy might conceivably have been accepted as valid in ancient Athens (if people had not heard about Plato). Today, and at the time of the framing of the constitution, it is and was ludicrous.
PS: Since we're exchanging links: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tyranny_of_the_majority
IAIFARSIJDPOOTV - I Am In Fact A Reality Star; I Just Don't Play One On TV
What you are refering to is the "he would have done worse to me had I not hit him"-argument.
I am talking about they "since he is doing it, it is OK for me to do it too".
And we do have authority systems to "run to" in civilized countries - the police and the courts. When they are not timely or practical, you get to stop a crime from happening - but not to exact revenge or break the law.
IAIFARSIJDPOOTV - I Am In Fact A Reality Star; I Just Don't Play One On TV
that Slashdot shold apologize with Natalie Portman.
It's Act 11-25 (one of three hits on "christian".
The example was "christianity", because it is parallel to "democracy" - the institution the texts are the basis for.
Democracy means the people rule, and the people are most definitely mentioned in the Constitution - quite early on, I believe...
IAIFARSIJDPOOTV - I Am In Fact A Reality Star; I Just Don't Play One On TV
I certainly hope they don't let you vote in Denmark! In all the years I've been reading Slashdot, I've never seen such a bloody moron!
1 - Agree completely. But it is still wrong, and against the basic idea of democracy.
2 - Possibly. I couldn't tell if it was a rhetorical provocation or not...
3 - If there was a "blue as a smurf"-person, then human-coloured would include being blue as a smurf :-) But all else being equal, the Hulk-guy gets my vote too!
IAIFARSIJDPOOTV - I Am In Fact A Reality Star; I Just Don't Play One On TV
Why is this offensive? Because certain viewers attach a negative connotation to it? Give me a break. Ask my 6yo son what the image 'means' and he will just think it is funny. The only reason this is offensive is because the race baiters of the world in concert with the criminal liberal media continue to educate the uneducated that an image of a monkey is (more correctly was) racist - at one time. Get over it and quit propagating your own hate and blaming others for it.
Politics aside, I am against Google altering search results for most any reason. If it is a result and relevant, display it.
On the other side, if the site was using a clever google bomb to bait malware - then he!! yeah shut em down!
Monkey? No... Klingon? Yes.
I have it for you.
http://taophoenix.cwahi.net/Freedom/michelle-obama-ape.jpg
My first Journal Entry ever, in 8 years! http://slashdot.org/journal/365947/aphelion-scifi-fantasy-horror-poetry-webzine
I remember that I saw some pics resebling former President Bush to a monkey, even in the New Yorker Magazine!... Any actions then?
Dear
Oh, just stop it. Obama was by far the best candidate, and should have gotten 70% of the total vote if the election was based on merit. The fact that so many white people preferred to vote for a decrepit corrupt old fool, part of a mafia that had already ruined the country and broken the middle class... out of fear for a "black" president? that is racism.
Obama, to remind the fools here, is mixed blood, like everyone else on the planet. Race is a theory based on a lie. Skin color is a cosmetic.
Maybe the idea that African Americans just voted more sensibly is so shocking that you have to turn this into "racism"?
Go. Away.
Everyone knows you can only do tasteless jokes about a black woman or man when they are a conservative.
Remember Condoleezza Rice?
http://images.google.com/images?gbv=1&sa=1&q=condoleezza+rice+monkey&btnG=Search+images
Remember Michael Steele?
http://images.google.com/images?gbv=1&hl=en&safe=off&sa=1&q=michael+steele+blackface&btnG=Search+images
I'm astounded that folks think your bullshit argument about racism is insightful. I've heard this attempt to twist the meaning of racism into a counter-attack before. It's really just your standard method of trying to use the definitions of words rather than the actual issues involved. At best, it's a misguided case of ignorance, at worst? It's an attempt to obfuscate somebody's own racism with a smokescreen.
So yeah, stop trying to sell that crap.
Apparently you forgot to read the liberal playbook. Anything that shows a conservative (which Bush wasn't by the way) in a bad light is good. Anything that shows a liberal in a bad light is bad. I quit using google over a year ago. You can't blame them "technically" though. Look where they are headquartered...San Fran...the heart of liberal~socialism. Hey, it's their product. If they want to be like that, doesn't bother me...it's a 1st amendment thing with me, but, I also have the choice to search elsewhere. They aren't the only search engine in the world, just the most known/popular.
>No, obviously not. Likening Michelle Obama to a monkey is insulting her because she is black, and is therefore racist. Likening Bush to a monkey is not insulting him because he is white, and so is not racist.
Amazing that one of the dumbest things I've ever read in my life get +5 insightful!!!!!
So, acording to you, if a black person calls me "monkey" and I reply "you are the monkey", I am committing a hate crime and he is just insulting me. Is that so? Good Lord!
Dear
This headline has been running EVERYWHERE but its not true. Google didn't apologize. Nowhere do you see ANYONE from Google saying "Gee, sorry we put that image up." What they SAID was "Look guys, we're organizing the world's information. Some of that information is racist and dumb, and probably should be taken off the internet. But until it is, we're going to index it." That's not an apology, that's a very smart stance in this hyper-politicized age. This is just the media trying to make Google seem week, or that it is somehow cowed to the Obama Administration. Now that MSFT is in bed with Murdoch (and owns 18% of MSNBC) I expect to see plenty of Google smear campaigns soon. Fox runs stories about Google's socialist cloud computer and "free" software, while MSNBC cries anti-trust and paints Google as Big Brother. In the end, Google will survive if they continue to stay on track with thier message and not bow to external pressures (China notwithstanding, though I suspect Google has a trick up its sleeve there...)
Or at least viral memes. Very cyberpunk solution.
Racism is in YOUR head. The people making this picture have been making it for ALL public figures, white or black.
Maybe it's bad taste, not funny. But perhaps some people even find it funny. It's not racism though, that is only your projection (which if you read the article, but this is /. after all ;-), you wouldn't make this mistake.
Racism dies the day you decide it isn't real (and you can still fight for equal rights and opportunities for ALL people in society).
http://www.debunkingskeptics.com/
I'm surprised that their view of history is so skewed. Wasn't it other blacks who sold them into slavery to begin with? Isn't it black leaders in Africa who are oppressing and mistreating entire nations of black people today? Aren't blacks the mayors of cities with the highest crime in the country?
My question is why in the world they think, given the history of black leadership, that it's any better for blacks than for white leadership? Not colorblind -- blinded by color.
Sadly, there is many of them in Denmark, and they do have voting rights :(
Google left the "miserable failure" link to Bush's official bio at whitehouse.gov intact for years. When Obama took office they realized the link pointed to the new president's bio. After years of it being okay to link to Bush the google bomb was disabled within a matter of days.
This shouldn't come as a surprise considering Eric Schmidt is a big supporter of Obama.
So don't be surprised now when a fake picture of Michelle Obama is taken down within days, but fake pictures of Sarah Palin still make the top of the list.
Google seems to have simply removed the picture from Blogspot (no different from someone removing a picture from a website they own), which is where the top-ranked pic was hosted. It still shows up on other sites, just ranked way down. I wouldn't call this Google censoring their search results. The image was hosted on their servers, so all they had to do was take it down.
The US constitution is based on "The Republic" as it was mentioned in the Roman Republic. It means the good of the common (not the common good though), and is a principle that people comes before the ruler, and therefore people occupy the government.
It is probably the closest you can get to anarchy and still have government (though very corruptible through amendments, and that is why you are blinded by the progressive movement's newspeak about "democracy as saviour to humanity").
(yes this can be compared with sex)
Right now, searching for Michelle Obama results in google saying:
"Related searches: Michelle Obama Monkey"
Appears to me the cure was worse than the disease.
A glitch a day keeps the bugs away.
The truth of the matter is that the media -- and media aggregators like Google -- has been giving preferential treatment to Barack Hussein Obama because he is the first Kenyan-American to be President.
Bullshit! Look up Barack Obama on google images. You will be hard pressed to find an image of him that is not a monkey. There is no uproar or censoring about that. The issue here is that the first lady is being attacked. Look up Laura Bush and tell me how many photoshopped images you see. You just wanted a reason to bitch about black people and cry "reverse-racism" without actually looking up the facts related to this story.
You have no idea what you're talking about.
Racism: "a belief or doctrine that inherent differences among the various human races determine cultural or individual achievement, usually involving the idea that one's own race is superior and has the right to rule others."
"hatred or intolerance of another race or other races."
Any discrimination based on differences in race (which is kind of a silly concept anyways IMHO) is racism. Period.
There are two kinds of fool One says 'This is old therefore good' Another says 'This is new therefore better'- Dean Ing
Racism vs. free speech... Dave, my mind is going... I can feel it... I can feel it...
So racism is dead in America right?
If racism were dead, Google would not be removing images based solely on the race of an individual targeted.
I find the image offensive but I will defend to the death the right of those that created it to display it, and fight censorship where I find it.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
No more than campaigning on a platform of religious belief.
Getting rid of racism?
Are you serious?
You will NEVER get rid of it as long as people come in different shades.
Every race is racist. Asians look the same to me but they are racists betwen themselves.
Blacks are racist towards lighter skinned blacks or mullatos.
Jews would rather cut off their heads than let their daughter marry a black man or an arab..
And on and on and on....
Go TO ANY country on the planet and you will find racism.
Getting rid of it is a pipe dream of someone who has never walked out of their house.
Ask Colin Powell how funny it was when he visited Venezuela a few years ago and the private media there where doing their regular "Chavez is a monkey" analogies because you see Chavez is brown and comes from an inferior caste. The same media the US always props up are some of the filthiest racists you have ever seen.
Imagine if CBS ran a cartoon of Obama as a monkey to criticize him and you would get the difference between the racism we have here and elsewhere.
Sure, blacks were full fledged humans until about 40 years ago but racism around the planet is doing very well thank you.
Oh, and having spent time in India, I could write 10 books on racism there.
Getting rid of racism?
Yeah, ok...go back to the drugs now hippie.
But, clearly, not reprehensible in the United States of America to campaign on a platform of your ethnicity as was evidenced in the last major presidential election?
[..]
As a foreign viewer of the American presidential race I was astounded to the extent that self-promotion based on race was a factor.
Examples? Obama did everything possible to downplay ethnicity during the campaign and only brought it up when opponents tried to use his race/ethnicity (usually vis-à-vis his associations) to make political hay. There's a reason why "post-racial" was such a buzzword here last year.
African Americans have voted overwhelmingly for Democratic presidential candidates in the last few decades (usually 90% or more) regardless of the color of their skin. The difference between historical numbers and the 2008 election is marginal.
I don't know what is Where was this response when the 'bush monkey' pictures were all the rage? Oh, that's right, he's white.
And a monkey!
[UID-HeinzIntel]
Until we as a species have a more natural enemy (whether real or imagined) than other humans, things will probably continue to suck
IDK, after seeing Terminator: Salvation and Independence Day, it seems that whatever threatens us enough to unite us as a species, and set aside our clannish/tribal tendencies, will make life suck a lot more than our mostly tame (in terms of massive losses of human life) modern-day racism. Granted there are still some particularly nasty instances, like Darfur, Rwanda, Boznia - but it's not the norm, anymore, to wage wars based on racial prejudices.
Now that I think about it, I'm pretty sure everything I just said is completely wrong.
Until we as a species have a more natural enemy (whether real or imagined)
Like Global Warming?
Mod me into oblivion, I don't care anymore.
I can post images of child pornography on Google images, and it would not be their fault.
Especially if the title is like Obama and the monkey....how are they supposed to know to filter that
image out as being a bad image
I heard they use a filter on names, tags, and also skin tones as well as size to check for child porn...
how can they know that changing the image to a money but naming the image Obama is a no,no.
Seriously, this is not Google's fault, it should be the fault of the person who put it there.
Even then, what happened to free speech?
If someone painted a mustache over my lips and drew little horns, and posted my image on the web...
would they be doing something illegal, but because of who the person is, they should be off limits to criticism
or jokes???
Please look up the difference between a democracy and a republic. If you claim there is no difference then explain this; link.
Yeah I'd actually written down a couple of ideas like: alien invasion, global warming, land dwelling sharks, but I decided to try and keep things simple. Plus, I didn't want to start people ranting on about global warming again, but you might just have gone and done it!
which is totally what she said
That's not exactly what republic means, and "republic" says very little about a form of government in itself.
I agree that the US system is an attempt to "get as close to anarchy without having anarchy", or at least it was.
It is also democratic, in that it tries to be a government ruled by the people, protecting the rights of the people, and answerable to the people.
IAIFARSIJDPOOTV - I Am In Fact A Reality Star; I Just Don't Play One On TV
Google is just too sloppy with thier algorithms. But
the much much bigger problem is the existence of all the
rasist sites.
I'm no legal expert. But is rasism _LEGAL_ in the US??!
(assuming some of the sites are from US or made by white americans)
To solve this problem, you americans, must create some proper laws ffs.
I assume you have laws against other illegal contents. I mean in those
instances you've managed to lessen Free Speech within reason.
I'm confused.
Sue google for illegal algorithms? I'm serious. Try doing something
to fix this!
Make a law that say: black-human image + monkey image + rasism context = illegal.
it's not the norm, anymore, to wage wars based on racial prejudices.
Maybe not many full blown wars, but there's still a whole lot of prejudice and the "war on terror" creating a climate of unnecessary fear and negative stereotypes.
which is totally what she said
I am not claiming there is no difference, why would you think that?
I know the US is a republic. So was the Roman state at one time. The Roman state, however, was not democratic. The US is (or at least tries to be - if nothing else, then in the intent of its constitution).
"Republic" means very little as a specific political term. Mainly that there is a head of state, and that he or she is elected. This is not inherently democratic (in the modern sense) - if only a select few can vote, it can still be a republic without being democratic.
In the US, "republic" has further connotations - for instance of "democratic" for the simple reason that USA is a democratic republic.
I am not arguing that they are the same at all. While the US constitution speaks of a republic (they had just gotten rid of a king, they were rather keen on the whole "No king, No king, nah nah nah nah nah nah!"-issue), what it sets out to create is a (non-simple) democracy/democratic republic.
IAIFARSIJDPOOTV - I Am In Fact A Reality Star; I Just Don't Play One On TV
Let me post this disclaimer that I am as Democrat as they come. I somehow don't see the difference between this and depicting George W. as a chimp. Must be the whole "race" thing, or something. C'mon people! Stop feeding the flames! If you're going to put this kind of energy into something so trivial as a human-less web image search aggregator, you're only going to make it worse. The Google juggernaut is only doing it's job, which is to crawl the web, and give you, based on mathematic algorithms, what -it- deems to be the most relevant results. Racism is a human condition, not a mathematical model. Google even tried to fix it, but the humans figured a way around it. Incidently, do a Google Image search for "George Bush". I guarantee that you will see at least one comparing him to a chimp. I never heard someone put up a stink about Google displaying these on the first result page.
Spork.
P.S. Spork.
A republic (in the modern sense) is just a state without a monarch as head of state. There is nothing special about a republic, and you can have perfectly democratic and/or representative monarchies (ie. monarchies with powers bound by a constitution such as Great Britain) with a high amount of liberty for most citizens, and yet have have quite oppressive republics with little liberty for most citizens.
What the US constitution (and others like it) really espouses is Liberty. Liberty is closely tied to Rights and how Rights are structured as to permit an individual to do anything according to his will as long as it does not infringe on the Rights of others. This idea is also related to the "pursuit of happiness", but be aware that Liberty is not to maximise happiness, but to enable its pursuit.
Britain, instead of rejecting the Monarchy, bound the Crown by setting up, using legal and political means, a structure (the unwritten constitution) that enabled representation for the aristocracy and gentry through Parliament. This was gradually expanded to universal suffrage in the 20th century and correspondingly the power of the Crown gradually contracted to the ceremonial role it plays today.
The reason I point this out is because in your post, you seem to have some sort of implicit admiration for anarchy. This I feel is misguided. Order is important in a society as it establishes what is acceptable and what is not (and how this is enforced). This threshold, however, is dynamic and multi-dimensional and there are many factors at play in any given society.
Without order and a power structure, society will break down, and new forms of authority will fill the power vacuum and the cycle repeats ad infinitum. Most humans need order, whether because of genetics, social conditioning or individual experience. They need a society that can give them the framework for security and production as these are linked directly to the most primal human instinct - survival.
The nature of power (in the human sense) is neither good or evil, it is just the measure of adherence of the Many to the will of the Few. A fundamental idea of the US constitution is the "balance of power" which was actually heavily influenced by the ideas of a Frenchman (Montesquieu) who admired the British system of checks on the power of the Crown through a legal framework and a body of elected representatives.
In short, the balance of power is not to limit the amount of power, yet that may be a side effect that brings many benefits; the essence of the idea is to prevent the corruption of power through institutional vigilance within government. As such, it is not about big government or small government, it is about good government.
:. Ultimate Control Dedicated/VM Servers
Well, here's another possible solution...
It doesn't involve killing quite everyone...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AqhcPgg_YUQ
Because, you know, the African people were the only ones that were treated badly. (See Native Americans)
I'm starting to think GNU is the problem with "GNU/Linux" these days.
In support of the level-headed poster who also responded to this:
Kerry in 2004 got 88% of the black vote. Source
Gore in 2000 got 90% of the black vote. Source
Clinton in 1996 got 84% of the black vote. Source
Clinton in 1992 got 83% of the black vote. Source
Dukakis in 1988 got 89% of the black vote. Source
Mondale in 1984 got 91% of the black vote. Source
Carter in 1980 got 83% of the black vote. Source
I'm not sure if the OP is sincere, but I guarantee there are people who see the 95% and immediately are sure it's all based on race. A small proportion surely was, but 95% does not massively deviate from the expected outcome.
Please... you Scandinavians with your do-goodie morals... What has racism got to do with voting? Or better, what has xenophobia got to do with voting? Because most of what is called racism is just xenophobia. And it's quite natural if you ask me. You get suspicious of strangers. There probably was a selection advantage in our ancestors behaving like that and it's not hard to see.
Now, we've come a long way since those times and many of us have learned that there's no need to be like that anymore. But some people have more trouble understanding that. Maybe because they had a bad experience with someone from a different culture or maybe they are just stupid or maybe they see something no one else sees. The point is, if you go and accuse those people, you segregate them, they are not going to understand. They'll go bitter and aggressive. Besides, you'll be treating them like you don't want them to treat outsiders. And putting everything in the racism bag doesn't help either....
Until we stop facing these politically incorrect themes with the usual ingenuity like - OMG dats racism!!!111!! Let's lynch him! - and then perfectly allow that to happen when it's a - supposed - minority like people have been referring, and don't start talking about things rationally, getting to the bottom of things it's only going to get worse. And the current "democratic dictatorship" also doesn't help. I mean it's all good in democracy, everyone's free and all BUT you can't be racist, you can't be anti-semitic, you can't be machoist AND then you can assume all muslims are terrorists, Iran want's to destroy the world, and be feminist and have women-only all kinds of things.... In the end, it's democracy to everyone, because everyone HAS to have it. But OUR kind of democracy. Not the other eeevil kind.
Come on, give us a break. I vote for whoever I want. And I'm racist. So what? Now I'm against the entire idea of voting? I don't like blue people, therefore I'm against voting. Crystal clear logic no doubt. What if I kill dolphins barbarically? I'm I against voting too?
How the hell is this photo racist? In G.W. Bush's last term I must've seen 20 photos of him being compared to a chimp, either superimposed (which he did resemble) or side-by-side .. was that racist as well? I can't stand these double standards.
Is this the picture:
http://www.flystylelife.com/wp-content/uploads/2008/09/michelle-obama-ape.jpg
it's not the norm, anymore, to wage wars based on racial prejudices.
Maybe not many full blown wars, but there's still a whole lot of prejudice and the "war on terror" creating a climate of unnecessary fear and negative stereotypes.
While accepting that racial/cultural prejudices are still responsible for the destruction of many lives, as well as reducing the happiness and progress of our species, it seems that when comparing it to the other ills of society like disease, poverty, and political oppression, et al, these prejudices rank pretty far down the list in terms of their overall impact.
Again, I'm not denying that millions (hundreds of millions, even) of people have their life, liberty, and pursuit of happiness threatened by racial/cultural prejudice - it just appears to me that when I compare that suffering to the suffering caused by the aforementioned human-controlled evils, both in scope and severity, prejudice doesn't hit as high on my evil-meter. And I definitely think that anything that would unite us all enough to effectively purge/set-aside these prejudices would do so only because it was a greater threat to our health and happiness than anything we currently face.
Now that I think about it, I'm pretty sure everything I just said is completely wrong.
It is morally reprehensible to vote racist.
What then do you have to say about the percentage of black voters who voted for Obama?
If white voters had sided with McCain to the degree that black voters sided with Obama, I hesitate to even imagine the shitstorm that would have ensued.
Alexander Peter Kristopeit bought his basement from his mommy for one dollar.
Michelle Obama did look like very much an ugly and angry monkey early in the campaign.
They went to Michale Jackson, who wasn't dead then, for advice, and transformed her into more woman like.
Humans consistent? What EVER made you think that? Besides, if you think connecting BLACK people to apes is no different than white people -- well-- I'm glad you are so clueless; it shows that we are making some progress in regards to race.
For the ignorant: Racism is still fading out in the USA, sure, it'll never die off (just like the creationists...) Only a generation ago there were HUGE race issues going on; the majority were alive during those times. Worse than ANY swear word-- racism and minority slurs carry a TON of taboo and irrational behavior. Its in fashion to attack, censor, and persecute racists and many think its their turn for equity in addition to people being "hip" and doing their part to try to stamp out racism; its easy self-righteous behavior in a society with very few majority shared positions that strongly held (and popular.)
I oppose any censorship; however, I can understand the herd behavior; especially in the USA. Private censorship is constitutional... Idealistic goals are just that-- goals; one never completely achieves them. Its reasonable to argue for some exceptions; that is, breaking of the ideal as opposed to completely legitimizing exceptions.
Expecting old dogs to learn new tricks when the major changes occurred during the last generation is expecting too much.
I've seen many primate looking humans in my days but the Obamas are far from it. Bush on the other hand actually fit so well that many people besides myself made the connection before seeing somebody else do so (; Bush being a nitwit probably helped as well.)
Democracy Now! - uncensored, anti-establishment news
Unsurprisingly
FTFY.
Alexander Peter Kristopeit bought his basement from his mommy for one dollar.
That image should be a non story, the only reason people feign outrage over it is as a preemptive measure to avoid the stigma of being called "racist".
I'm always amazed by how conservative the slashdot crowd really is. Every single 'Bush was a monkey' post was modded up, and every single poster has chosen to ignore the obviously racist subtones in the image. The freedom of speech argument is valid, but you can't deny that the image is offensive. MUCH more offensive then similar pictures of Bush. The way Slashdot folk talk about race is pretty childish in general, essentially it's just encouraging everyone to feign ignorance with arguments like, 'if it's okay for black people to say n***** then it's okay for white people to say it too!"
I can see this being a ploy by Microsoft to undermine google's credibility. Pay someone to click on the link enough to kick it to the top, google goes down as a racist company.
I am so tired of all this racial crap. People complain when Michelle gets compared to a monkey, but no one complained when Bush did? People complain about black face, but has anyone here ever dated a darker skinned girl? Half of them use skin whiteners. Most models will lighten their face before a shoot to make themselves look young. Yet, thats not racist?
Racism has nothing to do with intent or whether something is negative or positive. It has to do with treating people differently on the basis of race. The most racist group I have seen in the last decade are the supposedly anti-racist people.
It seems slashdot is now the website for right wing wackos. How did crap like this get modded up?
Oh my god! Do you expect any person to take you seriously after such a statement?
You'll have to explain this one. Perhaps if you just provide a link to said platform? I thought not.
Only if you live in a country where racism is not a problem would you not need to promote equality legislation.
By any definition? You are an idiot, as well as the assholes who modded you up. The Democrats acknowledge racism exists and attempt to counteract it. I think a definition of racism that excludes acknowledging societal racial differences and trying to correct them would be a definition under which the Democrats are not racist.
Self-promotion? Please reference. There was plenty of discussion of race in the MSM. There was talk of race by promoters and detractors. It became an issue so it needed to be addressed. But please provide a reference to this self-promotion.
This web site disgusts me more every day. I expect to read garbage on sites like this, but to have high moderation for such poorly thought out, uninformative, racist crap is revolting.
If you search for Laura Bush with safe search off under Google images on the first page you get a picture of her standing next to George with her pants off.
Double standard?
Clearly your definition of racism is different from mine. I view racism as any act that distinguishes somebody on their race.
Yes, it is different.
Racism == *denigrating* someone based on their race.
Portraying Bush as an Ape == denigrating Bush because he was perceived as a moron.
Portraying Michelle Obama as an Ape == denigrating her based on her race.
Conversely, note that your average liberal doesn't yell "RACIST!" when someone refers to how smart and dedicated Japanese students supposedly are.
Get it now?
Wow, you didn't even read the fucking definition, did you? Here, let me help:
Get it now? See how the definition inherently includes the idea of *hatred and superiority*? *That* is racism.
Again, you can change the definition to suit what you want to believe, but that doesn't make your views any less absurd.
I think the non-technical world at large is unable to understand the real issue from the CNN article, since it sort of seems like it is *Google* that is making the picture available to people. Of course everyone here knows that Google is just providing a link to something that is already there, and that it is a cold, emotionless and apolitical machine deciding that this link is popular enough to be highly rated. Without that background knowledge, which many people don't have and which the CNN article doesn't explain too well, any sort of opinion on this issue will be misguided.
It goes further than that, since this has NOTHING to do with free speech, unlike what many comments here suggest. The US right to free speech is about how the government cannot prevent your speech, and since Google isn't the government, free speech has no bearing on what Google does. Furthermore, since e.g. making child porn available is illegal in most places, including the US, it is just completely bogus that free speech means that you have a right to distribute any kind of information you want. On top of that, even if Google was the government, it would not have an obligation to make this link available. Free speech has nothing to do with this.
Google can't take down links to images like this just due to public outcry, because then it would never stop with people trying to get Google to take all sorts of things down. That is the essence of Google's involvement here.
Page 1 has "George Bush looks like a monkey," and Bush eating a kitten and giving the finger.
Only 9 of the 21 results are regular photos, the rest being meant to criticize or make fun of Bush.
And Google takes action over one Michelle Obama photo?
Talk about double standards.
The 15th and 19th and 24th and 26th amendments make exactly no sense without democracy being assumed.
What then do you have to say about the percentage of black voters who voted for Obama?
Not much, since it's about the same percentage that voted for Kerry in 2004. Blacks tend to vote Democrat.
If white voters had sided with McCain to the degree that black voters sided with Obama, I hesitate to even imagine the shitstorm that would have ensued.
Meaningless hypothetical is meaningless.
Don't we live in a Republic?
What day is it? Could you please tell me?
I vote for whoever I want. And I'm racist. So what? Now I'm against the entire idea of voting?
Yup. Well, only the idea of voting as everyone else means it, a way to decide on something. For you it'd just be another way to stab at darky.
If you're not voting on the issue at hand (in this case, who'd make a better president) you're not playing the same game as anyone else. And if you supported your actions, you'd be doing so against the entire idea of voting.
No, you have no idea.
Any discrimination based on differences in race (which is kind of a silly concept anyways IMHO) is racism.
Right-o. But you apparently can't read.
A white person saying that black people have darker skin pigmentation is not racist.
You see, a simple factual observation isn't racist.
Even offering different levels of sunscreen isn't racism, anymore than offering big tall people more food is sizeist.
it's not the norm, anymore, to wage wars based on racial prejudices.
It's not the norm to sell the war with racist propaganda pictures maybe, but it sure is the norm to fight people of a dissimilar race. Not by color necessarily, but by association.
How long would an embargo on Britain or Australia have lasted, with friends and family of the US citizens dying? But an embargo on Iraq where nobody knows anyone from...
Similarly, who knows (many) people from Afghanistan? No wonder the MOAB was used there.
You must be new here. And to be fair, slashdot has wackos of most every political flavour.
This is to congratulate everyone who is spreading righteous anger over the picture in question, here and elsewhere, no matter what your race and persuasion are:
Great job, guys!
You have done immensely well to make it so that everyone knows (or is reminded) that comparing Blacks - and only and specifically Blacks - to apes is very, very bad thing to do, probably about as bad as, say, saying "fuck" to other people. I'm sure kids in America and all over the world will take that to heart, and will never, ever call any Black person an ape from now on for the fun of it, especially if they haven't previously thought of that idea, or didn't find it particularly funny to concentrate specifically on Blacks.
Once again, congratulations! I wish you best of luck in your endeavor of exterminating racism!
Well but what if, in my opinion (erroneous as it may be), I think that red people don't make good presidents, just because they are red? I would still be voting at issue at hand by today's standards. My point is that you vote for whatever reason you want. And voting based on racism is not much different than voting based on religion, for example. And yet, it's considered natural to vote based on religion and abject to vote based on race.
That said, I agree on this
And if you supported your actions, you'd be doing so against the entire idea of voting.
though you'll have to agree that most democracies are flawed because of this. Democracy only works if the majority proves to be right. Just because the majority thinks in a way, it doesn't make it right, obviously. If the majority is racist, then racist policies will ensue. As far as the typical democracy goes it's fair and square. You can't stop people for voting anyway they want to. Unless you factor in the majority proves right thing. But then you'd have to have a educated, responsible majority to ensure that in a democratic way... But that's not what most democracies have. They just assume that they have it. That's the problem as I see it.
getting back on-topic, I think voting is a decision making process independent from what criteria people apply in expressing their vote. You are against voting if you think voting is not a valid decision making process. Thinking football team A is better than B because it's your home team wouldn't make you against voting.
Don't feed the trolls. More and more of them have mod points every day. We all know that the preamble starts with "We the people" to emphasize that this is a government of the people, by the people, and for the people, the very definition of American Democracy.
I think soon Slashdot will be overrun, if it has not already fallen and we're standing partaking in the ashes believing that we eat the finest fruit.
Surely you aren't suggesting that avoidance of the word "democracy" means that the constitution isn't all about establishing a democratic government. Nobody could be so retarded, so I will assume you must mean something else.
But if you insist on the most clear example, here it is: "The United States shall guarantee to every state in this union a republican form of government". A republican government is a democratic government.
Shown.
Blacks tend to vote Democrat.
ZOMG Free stuff!
Welfare
Food stamps
Etc.
Etc.
Etc.
Now gtfo.
Holy crapola. I hate to wade into your craziness, but I can't help but be curious what you think the constitution is about?
95% of black Americans always vote for the Democrat. 19 out of 20 black Americans voted for John Kerry. That's not a racial issue directly, it's more of a racial issue indirectly, because Dems like to make government programs that help black people. In that way, it is really a simple matter of voting for the policies out of self interest.
Moreover, affinity groups always gravitate toward their own representatives: Catholics liked Kennedy; Jews like Liberman. Considering this, it's surprising that more blacks didn't vote for Obama; but also, it's hard to improve on a base of 95%.
Finally, despite you being wrong about all your facts, I think you are right about your conclusion: you can vote for or against candidates any way you want, even for racial reasons. If your conscience says that black people are in some way bad, then you should not vote for black people. The grand effort of a liberal society should be to convince racists, bigots, haters, and the ignorant to change their ways; and if that's not possible, to convince their children to be different, and wait for the bigots to die. So as much as I hate to do it, I give you my personal blessing to continue voting your conscience, even as I vainly encourage you to stop being a bigot.
Okay, let's say that your interlocutor has the childish understanding of 'democracy' as simple majority rule, because he never got beyond kindergarten. Still, the constitution sets up, among other things, a system of majority rule -- with exceptions and limits. So even his dumb understanding of the concept is still covered by the Constitution, so I really can't figure out what he's trying to get at. He may be a simple troll, or he may have a completely batshit crazy world view, or he might be an actual retard, in the medical sense of the word. It's hard to tell from just his internet posts.
Policies only need to mention race if the policies are intended to solve racial problems; and they are; so they do. That's pretty clear.
I just looked up 'racism' and found this first definition, which is better than I thought it would be. The belief that all members of each race possess characteristics or abilities specific to that race, esp. so as to distinguish it as inferior or superior to another race or races. You might be using a different definition, but using this one, it is clear that legislation that would (let's say) gives preference in hiring to blacks is not racist, because it doesn't espouse that blacks possess certain abilities, it merely espouses that there is an existing anti-black prejudice that can be remedied through legislation. You might disagree about that (and I might, too), but it's still not racist.
Some racists defend themselves by saying that anyone who mentions race in any way is a racist, so nobody is different than they are. That is nonsense. You should be careful not to do that, lest you out yourself.
If you are a racist, then you cannot, by definition, be a democrat
I assume you used the little "d" democrat on purpose (an advocate of democracy), considering that big "D" Democrats (members of the party) tend to be fairly racist both historically and today.
I think it's funny because she looks like a monkey.
"In the absence of the ability to establish the attribute of truth they tried to establish the noble attributes."
Yes, but voting is a democratic item. You can have a republic without the people voting easily enough (well by the definition of the term before the US redefined it to mean representative democracy).
No shit, genius. They didn't vote for him because he's black, they voted for him because he's a liberal.
Just turn off SafeSearch, and enter in the term: michelle obama monkey image
Get your free Dropbox account with 2 GB Free storage!
If you believe some people are inherently worth more than others, then the idea of giving everyone a vote does not make sense.
This is not ethics, it's simple logic.
You do not seem to have clue about who I am, what I believe or why - but I am not going to educate on this. You should be able to keep quiet about stuff you do not know about on your own.
IAIFARSIJDPOOTV - I Am In Fact A Reality Star; I Just Don't Play One On TV
Easy. It is wrong for anyone, including blacks, to vote for a guy based on his skin colour, including black.
(It is quite another thing if Obama, for instance, is the only guy you trust to concern himself with black issues - this is of course a valid reason to vote for him, as long as your belief is rational and not based solely on "I like the guy because he is the same colour as me").
I am not concerned with shitstorms, nor how accepted a given practise is - only whether it is right and whether it is consistent (here, with the basic ideas of democracy).
IAIFARSIJDPOOTV - I Am In Fact A Reality Star; I Just Don't Play One On TV
Well it depends on what you consider inherently. In a way that's exactly what makes voting work. Whether or not race is a good factor is a different question.
I like to talk about cultures rather than races. Because cultures are better defined. Now say, imagine your country needs to establish a military command in another continent. Say Africa, for example. Who, all other traits being equal, would be better suited for the job of leading the command? A all-european cultural background man or someone with an African background? Well your distinguishing based on culture, even race. You can submit this to a voting process. Now, the African background guy is inherently better than the other guy. Just because he has an African culture background.
Now, I really don't give a fuck about who you are. I assumed you were Danish because you said so. Still, you didn't answer my question about the dolphins...
... [Democrats] use race as one of their election platforms."
That's quite a claim. Can you back up your claim with any substantial evidence? I don't recall Obama EVER saying that you should vote for him because of his race.
I do, however, know of scads of republicans who think Obama should be cast out of office for being "not of this country.". THAT, sir, is racism.
If I do a GIS for "Laura Bush" on the very first page is a photoshopped picture of her naked.
My groin thanks you for the suggestion, mister!
Just because something is part of human nature, does not mean it's not racist.
Don't racial implicit association tests pretty much prove that racism is indeed human nature?
I totally agree with your focus on culture, and that there can be situations where it makes sense to consider race a factor. Black people (or anyone else, of course) are justified in believing that Obama will, if nothing else, then have to, focus on the problems of race. And voting for him need not even be self-serving, in that case - healing the wounds of racism in America is a worthwhile and important goal. Voting for a black guy because he will put it on the agenda by his skin colour alone, might be better suited, and will be forced to do something about the issue, simply because of his own skin, is justified and fine.
Voting for him because you think blacks are better than whites is not.
A parallel argument could be made regarding Hillary Clinton and feminism.
Your question about dolphins is irrelevant, but I can answer it easily anyway. Of course you are not necessarily against voting because of how you treat dolphins. They have no relevance to the concept of democracy/voting. Other human beings do.
But if you do not believe all people are basically equal, then giving everyone an equal vote cannot make sense:
"I believe that guy is not truly human, because he is black/blue/whatever; but I want him to have a say in how to run our country" - doesn't work, does it?
(If, and that is a pretty insane if, we assume that eg. people from Denmark are truly not really human at all, then of course you should not give them the vote, and this would be consistent with being for voting. But that argument hinges on having already proven that your least favourtite race/culture are not really human.)
IAIFARSIJDPOOTV - I Am In Fact A Reality Star; I Just Don't Play One On TV
ah but there is your/most people mistake! You see, that is why I think culture works better than race. Most people tend to think of racists as people who think other race's people are somehow less than human or whatever... As in, either you're not racist and love everyone OR you're racist and hate everyone of different race. This makes no sense. You can't hate something you don't know. Most racists - I prefer xenophobes, it's a much better definition - don't hate different people. They feel suspicious of them. Which in turn makes them blame those different people for things they may not be to blame. Which in turn leads to hate. Mutual hate.
Now I think being a xenophobe is a natural thing. We all are in some degree... And the people that say they're not are either lying or they don't know. Imagine someone tells you that from now on, chimpanzees are going to have the right to vote. Chimps are pretty intelligent and they can communicate (with humans, by sign language) too. Imagine we find out they actually are almost as intelligent as humans are. I would like to see what many anti-racists would say then: when true racism emerged.
What is needed is that we acknowledge this and instead of marginalizing this natural distrust of strangers and making it seem unnatural, we need to build something positive out of it. Change the focus to culture, and understand what kind of cultural aspects don't go with each other. Because there are cultural practices that people don't want in the West. The people in Africa don't like other practices we have in Europe. The same goes for Asia. Find what is incompatible and retain what's compatible. Pretending everything is compatible is just stupid and won't end the problem. It's like pretending we are all heterosexuals. Face it as an inter-cultural problem and you might get something positive out of it. But no one is doing that. Racism is an empty word thrown out by politicians and other people with their own agenda with the intent of getting support for their own agenda.
I'll conclude with an example that racism is an mostly an invention. You have Barack Obama, president of the USA right? The first black president they have. From Kenyan origin. Like you said, one would expect Obama to, at least, try to make something better for his race and ancestor land right? Wrong. Right now there's a US military command in each continent, and the last one was set up in Africa last year. Heard about Sudan and Darfur right? Well it's about oil. They find oil in Africa and problems ensue. Suddenly, terrorists from Al-Qaeda are popping up everywhere oil is fond in Africa, even in the middle of the Saara desert! Now this is great because the US can go there and fight terror while securing more oil supplies than would instead go to China. Now, Obama knows this. And he doesn't give a fuck. Why? Because he's not black. He's not Kenyan. He is American. His culture is American. He cares for America and the American culture. You see why I say it's all about culture?
PS: about the dolphins, you completely missed where I was trying to go but that's ok. You should check about killing dolphins there in Denmark. Sick shit man.
Sorry, but I do not agree that one can equate racism with cultural preferences with "empty word" with...
I agree with half you're saying, and the other half seems completely nonssensical. Racism is not an invention. I am not against multiculturalism because I am against racism. Etc.
I am afraid I don't find your theories all that fascinating, nor well-presented or -argued.
So I am going to bow out of this discussion.
PS: It's the Faroe Islands that have been in the media for killing Dolphins, not Denmark. And they are 100% irrelevant regardless.
IAIFARSIJDPOOTV - I Am In Fact A Reality Star; I Just Don't Play One On TV
To finalize and really make myself clear.
Racism exists indeed in that some people dislike other people because they are of a different race. This is clear.
The invention I am talking about is when media and politicians tag xenophobia - as in someone who is suspicious of another person because that person is different, or a stranger, or not part of the group, in other words: an alien - as racism.
I think that while commonly used interchangeably, the two concepts are different. One is stupid because I'm not even sure a concept such as race can be defined scientifically. The other is a natural reaction of almost all living beings I can remember. Mixing the two does not, in my opinion, wield good results. It only makes people confused because while they feel they're entitled to distrust strangers because they are strangers, they don't like to be labeled racists because they're not.
Racism is the by-product of pseudo-scientific victorian anthropology made by arrogant 19th century imperialists and can't really exist if people are really scientifically educated. Xenophobia is a natural defense reaction that can gradually be lowered by mutual demonstrations of trust and good intentions by both host and guest.
This is what I meant. I am sorry if I failed to present my arguments in a compelling way but I can't stop myself from thinking if the same thing I'm trying to expose - the taboo about facing both concepts and differentiate between them - isn't the very thing that was stopping you from actually getting to see my point in the first place.
As for the dolphins, it was indeed irrelevant and was meant as a personal attack which clearly failed to deliver. Serves me right for trusting what the tv says. I apologize.
OK, this is clearer to me. I can see your point regarding racism vs. xenophobia - and I agree we should differentiate, even if I do not agree completely on your definitions.
I still maintain that racism, your or my definition, is not compatible with the mindset of "all people's opinion are, all else being equal, equally important and relevant" - which is the basis for voting at all...
Xenophobia, or distrust of strangers, might be - it is the belief that "the others" are inherently worth less than you, which is incompatible with an egalitarian democracy.
IAIFARSIJDPOOTV - I Am In Fact A Reality Star; I Just Don't Play One On TV
But others have already put to rest why your point of view is completely worthless...
IANAL but write like a drunk one.