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Google Explains Why It Banned the App For Gab, a Right-Wing Twitter Rival (arstechnica.com)
AmiMoJo shares a report from Ars Technica: When right-wing trolls and outright racists get kicked off of Twitter, they often move to Gab, a right-wing Twitter competitor. Gab was founded by Andrew Torba, who says it's devoted to unfettered free expression online. The site also hosts controversial right-wing figures like Milo Yiannopoulos, Andrew 'weev' Auernheimer and Andrew Anglin, editor of the neo-Nazi site Daily Stormer. On Thursday, Gab said that Google had banned its Android app from the Google Play Store for violating Google's ban on hate speech. The app's main competitor, Twitter, hosts accounts like the American Nazi Party, the Ku Klux Klan, and the virulently anti-gay Westboro Baptist Church, yet the Twitter app is still available on the Google Play store. Apple has long had more restrictive app store policies, and it originally rejected the Gab app for allowing pornographic content to be posted on the service -- despite the fact that hardcore pornography is readily available on Twitter. In an email to Ars, Google explained its decision to remove Gab from the Play Store: "In order to be on the Play Store, social networking apps need to demonstrate a sufficient level of moderation, including for content that encourages violence and advocates hate against groups of people. This is a long-standing rule and clearly stated in our developer policies. Developers always have the opportunity to appeal a suspension and may have their apps reinstated if they've addressed the policy violations and are compliant with our Developer Program Policies."
The app's main competitor, Twitter, hosts accounts like the American Nazi Party, the Ku Klux Klan, and the virulently anti-gay Westboro Baptist Church, yet the Twitter app is still available on the Google Play store. Apple has long had more restrictive app store policies, and it originally rejected the Gab app for allowing pornographic content to be posted on the service -- despite the fact that hardcore pornography is readily available on Twitter.
So Google won't tolerate intolerance, but they sure will tolerate hypocrisy. Got it.
From Dr. Strangelove:
Admiral Randolph: Try one of these Jamaican cigars, Ambassador. They're pretty good.
Ambassador de Sadesky: Thank you, no. I do not support the work of imperialist stooges.
Admiral Randolph: Oh, only commie stooges, huh?
"The average reporter we talk to is 27 years old......They literally know nothing." - Ben Rhodes
They can explain all they want, but the Google that claimed "A free and open world depends on a free and open Internet." cannot without contradiction ban an app from its store for the crime of _not censoring its users sufficiently_.
Considering that Whatsapp and Telegram are both on the Play Store, who is lying, Whatapp/Telegram developers or Google?
Trick question, you are lying to yourself because those aren't social networking apps.
Anons need not reply. Questions end with a question mark.
By the same metric, the built in browser on mobile platforms should be banned as it allows access to such content.
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As long as it's hate directed towards conservatives, twitter is perfectly ok with it. Death threats, rape threats, misogyny, racism, bigotry, and so on is perfectly ok as long as it's against the "right people."
Twitter was running #AssainateTrump same day Google pulled gab. And Gab is not the dark web google pretends it is. Gab bans child porn, doxing, criminal activity,
Saying gab has "sufficient level of moderation" isn't fooling anyone, it's some of the people using Gab Google doesn't like. But those people are everywhere.
Twitter hosts ISIS and other offensive speech and that's allowed in its TOS.
Facebook has kill Isreali groups, kill Republican groups, kill police groups.
Cloudflare protecting over 40 ISIS accounts according to Anonymous.
Google youtube pushing violent TYT on its trending page and specifically demonizing FCC approved content like Louder with Crowder and restricting PragerU (and many other non-left groups)
Silicon Valley pretending one groups offensive speech is acceptable and other isn't is hypocritical. This is political.
Same goes with not calling out ALT-LEFT violence. This is an ideology war, left vs right. Silicon Valley is just picking its side.
You're a retard for implying that allowing someone else free speech has become illegal.
With the current ideological environment amongst the 15-30yo demographic and people like you, I'm sure it won't be long before the first amendment is amended.
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Wait, I'm confused. Banning Nazi's is bad??
Yes, banning Nazis is bad. Everyone should have the right to express themselves. The First Amendment does not say "Congress shall make no law respecting abridging the freedom of speech unless you are a Nazi". In addition to the principle of freedom of expression, there is also the practical argument: Sunlight is a good disinfectant. It is better for extremism to be discussed and confronted openly rather than festering in the shadows.
"The trouble with fighting for human freedom is that one spends most of one's time defending scoundrels. For it is against scoundrels that oppressive laws are first aimed, and oppression must be stopped at the beginning if it is to be stopped at all." --H. L. Mencken
If you oppose what the Nazis stand for, then you should support their right to speak.
It became bad when I started to classify everyone who does not adhere to my ideology and my moral values as a Nazi. Oh, and since I'm pretty sure you will not adhere to my ideology and my moral values, it means you are a Nazi, and therefore you should not be allowed to speak. We live in a very sad world when people like you can express their opinions.
Seriously, when did people forget that we must allow everyone to speak, including Marxists and Nazis, in order to explain to them why they are wrong (or to realize why we are wrong)? When did people forget that if people can't speak, their only solution will be to use violence?
Sure it can. They aren't preventing people from using the app on their phones, they just aren't carrying it in their store.
It's like saying Barnes and Noble is against free speech because they don't stock every book in print.
Post may contain irony: discontinue use if experiencing mood swings, nausea or elevated blood pressure.
Corporations own everything now. I'm not against business. Hell. I'm a republican, but if we let them silence speech, no matter how vile when they control the public square, we will by default lose the right to free speech. Popular speech doesn't need protection, it's unpopular speech that needs protecting. Were it not for the first amendment the entire civil rights movement of the 50s and 60s wouldn't have happened.
An advertiser friendly world is a totalitarian hell hole whereeverything has to work as a billboard for skittles and Budweiser. Fuck that.
Here, read that again and please tell me how a simple response of 'first amendment only applies to government' isn't disingenuous.
AC is correct to assert that free speech is threatened when what now serves as the defacto public commons is completely dominated by monopolistic corporations who are now using that position to suppress any speech they dislike, and deplatform anyone they disagree with. Having a internet presence without the cooperation and approval of corporate interests really isn't an option. Actual free speech platforms being suppressed, delisted from search, removed from app stores, and genuinely made unavailable from the public should be cause for anti-trust action.
"Because Nazis" is the excuse for censorship that's used today, "Because fuck you" is the reason of tomorrow.
And by banning certain sites, Google abandons any claim to be a common carrier and can now be held liable for ANY infringing sites.
You are the moral successor of the killers of Socrates.
Several. The good one is Clover, which was punted from the play store for refusing to block /pol/, the politically incorrect (read: alt right and leftist tired of the alt-left) board. So people use the alternate f-droid "store" to install it. Still annoying.
Google. Google is lying. You can find child trafficking and child pornography rings on Candid and Twitter -- especially if you understand Arabic.
This was a political decision based on the Mass Hysteria that people are falling under this week.
Wrong. There is no "hate speech" provision in the 1st amendment. To suggest otherwise shows:
1. A complete lack of understanding of American ideals.
2. A disgusting, horrifying level of illiberal authoritarianism, which makes me think you're some kind of arch Neo-Con on par with George Bush Jr or Hillary Clinton.
Like it or not, the most vile among us have the right to speak and assemble in public. This does not include having some hipster douchebags cosplaying as ISIS attacking them.
Now, you can make some argument about Google, Cloudfire, etc being private companies, but we're approaching the point where a handful of companies' decisions can have massive effects on citizen's free speech, which brings forth the idea that maybe, just maybe, the Government isn't allowed outsource censorship and oppression to corporations to do it for them -- in other words, that the 1st amendment prevents Google et all from discriminating like this.
It happened a couple of days ago, if you've been watching the idiotic alt-right (nazi sympathizers) on YouTube. It started when trump threw them their next meme to bounce off their echo chamber walls: "alt-left".
Yes, and now opposing right wing extremists, nazis, and white supremacists is considered to be an "alternate" viewpoint.
Meet Eric Clanton, an Antifa -- Alt Left -- icon.
He's a professor at Berkeley. He teaches ETHICS.
He tried to murder 7 people with a Bike lock during the Berkley riots. Here's a video of one of his attacks:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?...
Note that there are two female Alt-Left domestic terrorists that provide a distraction and point his victim out to Eric. Note that the other ISIS cosplaying losers protect Eric by opening a hole in the wall so he can attack and then preventing anyone from restraining Eric for the police.
Eric's reasoning? The students wanted to see a Gay Jewish Immigrant speak about the dangers of Islam and a Conservative woman talk about how great America is, and he felt that they shouldn't be allowed to do that.
Fortunately, thanks to 4chan tracking him down, he's looking at a long, LONG time in jail: http://www.berkeleyside.com/20...
There's an Alt Left, they're way worse than the Alt Right, and the more the "enlightened left" pretends they don't exist the more people like Clanton out there feel emboldened to try to murder people in the streets.
Being a communist is every bit as bad as being a neo-nazi.
Worse, actually, given how many people Marxism has killed and how much suffering they have caused. Hitler has nothing on Marx, Stalin, or Lenin. At least Nazis don't try to indoctrinate kids and preach that "it wasn't real nazism."
The hammer and sickle should be considered every bit as offensive as the swastika, and for the same reason.
If I say "cats are less intelligent than humans", does that mean I hate cats? Of course not.
I hate corrupt politicians. I hate socialists. I hate communists. I hate fascists. I think I'm perfectly justified in "spewing hate" towards those "subsets of society".
Hate speech is legal in the US. Furthermore, there is no such thing as "society's view". The majority may decide something, but the majority does not get to curtail freedom of speech.
Oh, and I also hate you: I think you are a totalitarian prick.
The existence of those accounts isn't indicative of selective enforcement - Twitter's moderation operates at the content level, not the account level. So you can set up an account for a white supremacist organization but the moment you post a call for genocide, you'll get banned. Do the same on Gab, and nothing will happen, other than an overwhelming response of support from other users.
"When information is power, privacy is freedom" - Jah-Wren Ryel
Google allows plenty of hate speech on their site. Just take a look over at Gazi "Black Hitler" Kodzo and his related videos. Hate speech is perfectly OK by Google and the left, as long as you target the right people with your hate.