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Facebook Censoring Images of the Prophet Muhammad In Turkey

Posted by Soulskill on from the a-picture-is-worth-a-thousand-complaints dept.

An anonymous reader writes: Immediately following the Charlie Hebdo attack, Mark Zuckerberg said, "... this is what we all need to reject — a group of extremists trying to silence the voices and opinions of everyone else around the world. I won't let that happen on Facebook. I'm committed to building a service where you can speak freely without fear of violence." Now, Facebook has begun censoring images of the prophet Muhammad in Turkey. According to the Washington post, "It's an illustration, perhaps, of how extremely complicated and nuanced issues of online speech really are. It's also conclusive proof of what many tech critics said of Zuckerberg's free-speech declaration at the time: Sweeping promises are all well and good, but Facebook's record doesn't entirely back it up." To be fair to Zuckerberg and Facebook, the company must obey the law of any country in which it operates. But it stands in stark contrast to the principles espoused by its founder.

7 of 228 comments (clear)

  1. Simple by sycodon · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Zuckerburg is a whore who doesn't want Turkey to ban Facebook.

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    When Fascism comes to America, it will call itself Anti-Fascism, and tell you to give up your guns.
    1. Re:Simple by jellomizer · · Score: 5, Insightful

      There is nothing simple about ethics with international business.
      Things that ethically right in one culture can be a huge issue in an other.
      Many European countries have laws about Hate speech.
      The US has against with Pedophilia.
      In some countries bribes are just part of doing business. In others it is quite illegal.
      Countries will tax you for things that other countries would consider as overstepping bounds.
      Some countries lets things go by without legal controls that others find monstrous.

      If you are going to be doing international business, you need to be sensitive to your own ideals, as well as the ideals of your new customer base.
      Our American Ideals of nearly full freedom of speech, vs. Turkey ideals of limited speech. Are clashing. So if Zuckerberg just said no. They will not operate in Turkey, and the users will be loss of a medium to spread the areas of free speech that they do enjoy. If Zuckerberg agrees then Facebook stays operational, and while taking heat from the culture who doesn't like to see any speech censored, is allowing the culture to have better tools to share the free speech that they are entitled too.

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      If something is so important that you feel the need to post it on the internet... It probably isn't that important.
    2. Re:Simple by circletimessquare · · Score: 4, Insightful

      it's not that simple

      if he doesn't follow the laws turkey bans facebook. a facebook clone in turkey pops up instead. now all those connections to the outside world are greatly diminished. turkey becomes a social silo that stagnates

      and so all the valuable positive subtle free speech influences that aren't live wire topics like muhammad's face are lost

      by following turkey's authoritarian freedom crushing instructions that would otherwise get facebook banned, facebook remains influential in turkey in a positive way, in more subtle ways

      you can't think of these nuanced complex issues in such blockheaded black-or-white "my way or the highway" rigid ways. that makes you something like turkey's authoritarianism actually

      --
      intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it or sabotage it
  2. No. by eldavojohn · · Score: 5, Insightful

    To be fair to Zuckerberg and Facebook, the company must obey the law of any country in which it operates.

    No. He came out in support of a universal maxim and then went back to his board who showed him X dollars of income they get by operating in Turkey. Just like the revenue lost when Google left mainland China. Instead of sacrificing that revenue to some other social network in Turkey run by cowards, he became a coward himself in the name of money. It is an affront to the deaths and memory of the Charlie Hebdo editors. His refusal could have worked as leverage for social change in Turkey but now it will not.

    So no, your statement isn't fair to Zuckerberg and his company and the platinum backscratcher he gets to keep with "TURKEY" inscribed on it. Fuck that greedy bastard and his petty meaningless lip service.

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    My work here is dung.
  3. Re:Censorship should not be tolerated. by hort_wort · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Censorship should not be tolerated. Under any circumstances

    If you went with your child into a rough neighborhood and that child started shouting racial slurs at everyone you passed, would you tell your kid to hush or would you just let him keep going on?

  4. Facebook is not new to censorship by msobkow · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Look at how they censor pictures of breasts from the whole site to pander to American "morals", when most of the world has no problem with nudity.

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    I do not fail; I succeed at finding out what does not work.
  5. First they came for... by fyngyrz · · Score: 4, Insightful

    When Facebook's TOS disallows gays from being members in places where fundamentalist Islam is dominant, will you continue to defend them? How about women? If women are forbidden to post and/or become members, is that ok?

    Where should we draw the line between "we should keep some channels open for the privileged" and "we'll not be enabling that kind of repression"?

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    I've fallen off your lawn, and I can't get up.