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The Implications of Google Restricting Access To Anti-Islam Film
ideonexus writes "While the decision has been a footnote in most news stories, the Washington Post is raising the question of what it means that Google can shut down access to the anti-Islam film in countries where that film has sparked riots, something the American government cannot do thanks to our First Amendment. A popular meme in the Information Age is that the Internet spreads democracy by enabling citizens to organize and speak out, but we forget that much of that speech is now hosted by third parties who are under no obligation to protect it."
First Amendment is BS. Read up on the Tarek Mehanna case .
Exactly four years ago this month I was finishing my work shift at a
local hospital. As I was walking to my car I was approached by two
federal agents. They said that I had a choice to make: I could do
things the easy way, or I could do them the hard way. The “easy “ way,
as they explained, was that I would become an informant for the
government, and if I did so I would never see the inside of a
courtroom or a prison cell. As for the hard way, this is it. Here I
am, having spent the majority of the four years since then in a
solitary cell the size of a small closet, in which I am locked down
for 23 hours each day. The FBI and these prosecutors worked very
hard—and the government spent millions of tax dollars – to put me in
that cell, keep me there, put me on trial, and finally to have me
stand here before you today to be sentenced to even more time in a
cell.
In the weeks leading up to this moment, many people have offered
suggestions as to what I should say to you. Some said I should plead
for mercy in hopes of a light sentence, while others suggested I would
be hit hard either way. But what I want to do is just talk about
myself for a few minutes.
When I refused to become an informant, the government responded by
charging me with the “crime” of supporting the mujahideen fighting the
occupation of Muslim countries around the world. Or as they like to
call them, “terrorists.” I wasn’t born in a Muslim country, though. I
was born and raised right here in America and this angers many people:
how is it that I can be an American and believe the things I believe,
take the positions I take? Everything a man is exposed to in his
environment becomes an ingredient that shapes his outlook, and I’m no
different. So, in more ways than one, it’s because of America that I
am who I am.
When I was six, I began putting together a massive collection of comic
books. Batman implanted a concept in my mind, introduced me to a
paradigm as to how the world is set up: that there are oppressors,
there are the oppressed, and there are those who step up to defend the
oppressed. This resonated with me so much that throughout the rest of
my childhood, I gravitated towards any book that reflected that
paradigm – Uncle Tom’s Cabin, The Autobiography of Malcolm X, and I
even saw an ethical dimension to The Catcher in the Rye.
By the time I began high school and took a real history class, I was
learning just how real that paradigm is in the world. I learned about
the Native Americans and what befell them at the hands of European
settlers. I learned about how the descendents of those European
settlers were in turn oppressed under the tyranny of King George III.
I read about Paul Revere, Tom Paine, and how Americans began an armed
insurgency against British forces – an insurgency we now celebrate as
the American revolutionary war. As a kid I even went on school field
trips just blocks away from where we sit now. I learned about Harriet
Tubman, Nat Turner, John Brown, and the fight against slavery in this
country. I learned about Emma Goldman, Eugene Debs, and the struggles
of the labor unions, working class, and poor. I learned about Anne
Frank, the Nazis, and how they persecuted minorities and imprisoned
dissidents. I learned about Rosa Parks, Malcolm X, Martin Luther King,
and the civil rights struggle. I learned about Ho Chi Minh, and how
the Vietnamese fought for decades to liberate themselves from one
invader after another. I learned about Nelson Mandela and the fight
against apartheid in South Africa. Everything I learned in those years
confirmed what I was beginning to learn when I was six: that
throughout history, there has been a constant struggle between the
oppressed and their oppressors. With each struggle I learned
Quite possible. Look at it from the perspective of someone in the religious right: They see the world divided, with the forces of Islam threatening to destroy western civilisation - a violent barbarian horde, willing to kill all who oppose them. Even worse, the rest of western society seems blinded to this - unable to see through their political correctness and fear of being seen as racist that there is a culture war on. This must be quite terrifying for those right-wing Christians - it's as if Hitler was marching across Europe, and Chamberlain just wants to sit down with him for tea and crumpets. So, they ask, how can they convince the leaders of the free world that Islam poses a threat so serious that action must be taken? The answer seems obvious: Let the fanatics be their own undoing. Goad them into acts of violence so great that they can no longer be ignored, and so prove to everyone that there can be no possibility of a peaceful coexistance.
It's a good plan, too, because it really does prove their point. If even just making an obscure film insulting the religion is enough to spark off riots and murders around the world, then it does start to look like the multicultural dream isn't realistic. When the foundational ideals of one culture are an intolerable evil to another, how can they occupy the same space without conflict?
Rubbish. A movie can not have the intent to offend since a movie can not offend. The only person who decides who is offended is the person who gets offended at stuff. I can say whatever I want to you, if you get offended by it that is your problem, not mine. You can chose not to be offended by it. Adults generally do when children say offensive things. When retards say offensive things too.
In this case the "offender" and the "offendee" are equally retarded, and boom, you have a boom.
People supporting free speech should sponsor one such movie a week, hitting every major and minor religious figure in history, until these retards stops electing to be offended by something that is not offensive.
No One Murdered Because Of This Image
It's called the inquisition. A time when people where routinely tortured to death for a wrong word. Burned at the stake for espousing un-Godly ideas. You want it back, then let the fundamentalists religionists shut down free expression with threats of violence. If idiots want to tear down their own countries be being goaded by trolls then more power to the trolls.
There is only one way to react to this religious violence, troll the shit out of the idiots until the fellow citizens learn it is smarter to lock up violent religious reactionaries then people who express challenging ideas.
I refuse to be silenced by religious whack jobs. I refuse to allow the rebirth of the religious inquisition in my time. I honestly was largely indifferent to pro or anti-Muslim sentiment until now. The greater the violent reaction to the spread of anti-Muslim ideas then, the more I am for the spread of those anti-Muslim ideas and absolutely no different for any other violent repression of ideas by any other religion, Christian, Hindu etc.
This is exactly why free speech was instituted as law, to protect people from persecution by religious freaks, by those who abuse religion for personal gain, by those who claim superiority through religion. Free speech has it's roots in the resistance against religion, it was the weapon used to tackle the inquisition http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inquisition and prevent it from recurring. Based upon the way Muhammad is depicted in the Koran he comes off as a paedophile and a misogynist, a person who created a religion for his own personal benefit.
Chaos - everything, everywhere, everywhen