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"N-word".com Owned by NAACP
A friend of mine who works for the NAACP (and doesn't want his name used here) sent me this Wired News story about a sad but necessary move his employers have made. It seems that the NAACP, the Anti-Defamation League, and other groups that fight against racial hatred have been quietly registering as many offensive domain names they can get their hands on so that hate groups can't use them. It's sad that civil rights groups have to do this, but (sigh) I suppose it's better than having the government censor domain names.
I will admit that this title is a bit
inflamatory. But here is my 0.02 worth.
My boss is African-American, he busted
butt to get into a good school, and paid
for most of it himself. Worked the entire
time. Today he makes (I am guessing) at
least in the upper 80k's and supports his
family well.
Today he is somewhat bitter. He has said
that his kids have little respect for him
because he is not like their "role models"
that their friends hold up as examples.
He also said that he was relatively an
outcast when he was growing up because he
did not fit in with any other African-American
groups or attitudes (i.e. player, pimp, etc..).
He is extradordinarily hard on those African-
Americans he hires (he has been through 8
admins) because he will not tolerate them not
standing up to his standard.
He realises that this economy is slowly
becoming a service economy where there are
little opportunities for those not willing
to take the hard path and fears that other
members of his people will be left behind.
Its a fact, he says, and he will do anything
in his power to make sure those that will
earn it get it.
I think the NAACP is missing the point of exactly what domain names are supposed to accomplish, which is to function as a simple reminder of your server addresses. (People remember names easier than numbers.) - When you tell someone your "internet address" (whether email, web, ftp, or whathaveyou) the point is that using a word is easier to remember than four numbers. Therefore you picked something that's similar to your name (like "IBM.COM", for example.)
DNS isn't supposed to be a substitute for a search engine - so registering "every permutation of every offensive word" isn't going to solve anything (even if it was possible.)
If someone were to go looking for hate groups, are they going to type "www.n-word.com" into their browser location bar? No. They're going to go to Altavista or Yahoo (or some other search engine) and type in a search phrase.
If some white-supremacist is going to register a domain name, would they pick "n-word.com"? Probably not. Can you imagine them exchanging URL's with other idiots, and getting the reaction "Whudya pick that for? You a n*****-lover?" - As a matter of fact, white-supremacists (the ones I've ever met, or seen) are against using that word in public (watch some interviews and documentaries about it if you're interested in the mindset - it's fascinating to see such a deluded mind at work.)
By taking this action, the NAACP is doing exactly what they're trying to prevent, which is to give racists publicity and credibility.
National Association for the Advancement of Colored People. Last time I checked, "colored" was considered offensive, and the last few times I heard it used it was sure hard to take it any other way.
Perhaps the NAACP should change their name before they waste money squatting on domains. Granted, a name change would be a lot more expensive than sitting on a few domains, but anyone who really wants to read racist trash is going to find it no matter what. The name, OTOH, is kind of hard to ignore.
slashdot broke my sig
Now wait a second.. It's NOT ok for a company to squat on a name for money, but it's OK for someone else to squat on a name becouse they consider them offensive?
-- I'm the root of all that's evil, but you can call me cookie..
i'm no psychologist, so you should really listen to some-one who really knows what they are talking about and skip my post, but i do knowt that there is a certain power in appropriating the names your oppressor applies to you and those like you. when you do this, you rob your oppressor of some bit of power. the terms geek and nerd are perfect examples of this. as everyone knows, at one point, being a "geek" or "nerd" wasn't a good thing. but w/ maturitry and a little thought, we (or those before us) realized that if we appropriated those terms, they couldn't be used to harm us. now we (or I) commonly refer to ourselves as geeks or nerds w/o a second thought.
now I know that the word "nigger" is still a very hatefilled word, and still used to damage people, but it appears that in refering to each other in such a way, it's like your own private "fuck-you" to "the-man" who-ever (s)he may be.
of course, I could be totally wrong, and it may be that in using this term, african-american's are only reinforcing deeply rooted stereotypes, I don't know, and I'm not in anything related to a position of knowledge on this subject.
but like I said, I'm a computer geek, not a psychologist or sociologist.
btw, these opions are mine and are not those of
the people who sign my paychecks..blah blah blah
-Peter
It's pretty much already happened. Almost all "black" people living in America have substantial white ancestry (unfortunately mostly due to lecherous slave-owners of the last century). If you grew up in America, you don't fully realize this until you meet black people from Africa, who really are almost literally black. It just goes to show that race is a social concept, not a biological one, and that color has no causal relationship to personality or behavior.
Beer recipe: free! #Source
Cold pints: $2 #Product
First, if I were looking for hate groups I probably wouldn't look at "n-word".com (Urk. Ugly, self-conscious, orwellian phrase -- if I were sure that the companies firewall wouldn't pick up the real thing I would use it). Why not? Because I wouldn't expect to find hate groups, but some kind of inner-city rap group. Think NWA here guys.
But that's beside the point. What occurs to me is that domain names are becoming meaningless. Nowadays, when I need to locate something on the web, I don't go to "www.company.com" because it is not very semantically rich. There are too many companies on the web now for each one to try to be www.whatever.com.
I remember, when I was growing up, there was a clothing store in town called "Sears Betty & Bob". It was entirely unrelated to Sears. Apparently the owners name was "Sears", and so they had a right to use it even though it was a trademark.
But back to the hate groups. This is an unbelievable waste of money. People, when faced with the loss of semantic content in domain names, no longer just type in "www.whatever.com" -- they go to google, type a couple of keywords, hit "I'm feeling lucky" and get to the site. It's not as though you are going to keep people from finding the stuff if they really want to anyway.
If I were a contributor to one of these organizations, I'd be angry at the waste of money. Wouldn't it be better to counter these groups with facts than simply trying to suppress them?
-- Slashdot sucks.
Censorship on this basis (racial opinions) would be so outrageously unconsitutional it wouldn't even be funny. Even THIS supreme court wouldn't allow it. And the "fighting words" doctrine would probably not be applicable -- that is reserved only for those words that are EXCLUSIVELY provocative and devoid of meaning beyond their provocative nature.
Which brings up another question: I, as a Christian Libertarian, will allow you to read any kind of trash you see fit. My only request is that you don't try to slip it in under my radar by disguising it as legitimate material (see www.whitehouse.com or try searching for a lost windows serial number sometime). However, when you deliberately try to decesive me into using material that is not of any redeaming value, it seems to me very injust.
It seems to me that the NAACP and friends are stepping over the line here -- they are trying to slip in their own political philosophy by underhanded means. While I cannot endorse the political philosophies that they are trying to defeat, neither can I entirely tolerate their deliberate abuse of the domain system by registering false and/or misleading domains.
Of course, it's not really relevant -- who uses domains to find stuff anymore? But it seems to me that the ends may well NOT justify the means. At what point is it legitimate to lie to make a point, even if it is worthwhile?
-- Slashdot sucks.
As long as they don't do anything with these domain names, it's nothing more than squatting. The heck of it is, they could be putting these names to productive use. Link 'em all back to anti-hate groups, get the information out there.
You can't destroy a hate group with laws. The reason: laws don't destroy hate. It would be dangerous to even try, because the minute you stifle someone else's voice you jeopardize your own. No, laws aren't the way to combat hate groups. There is only one real way to fight them: with knowledge. Start young, demonstrating the principles of equality. The rule is simple: respect all people, no matter what.
And for crying out loud, why is it that no state has passed a law stating that indoctrinating a child with racism is child abuse? I live not even a hundred yards away from just such a family, and it's truly revolting to watch. Three little girls, the oldest one not yet ten, and already they're spewing hate speech (as far as I know they have yet to graduate to actual slurs, but I also try to avoid this family whenever possible). It's absolutely sickening. There are states which treat failure to teach a child English as child abuse, and if that is than surely planting racism into a young mind is too.
This is just like when George W Bush registered all the possible insulting domains he could think of (bushsucks.com, etc.). Everyone was pretty quick to point out that bushblowsmonkeys.com and many others that nobody ever thought of would be available. You just can't conceive of them all.
So now they say that all variations including those with hyphens are taken. Here's what register.com says:
www-nigger.com is available www-nigger.net is available www-nigger.org is available
nig-ger.com is available
nig-ger.net is available
nig-ger.org is available
Those just came from the top of my head, I'm sure others can think of more. Anyone check the international (non-USA) domains?
Brian
I have a friend who belongs to a few racist watch groups (groups that monitor the ongoings of the Aryan Nation, KKK, etc.) and at one point she said I should look on the KKK's web site, b/c apparently they have a list of "approved" and "unapproved" muzik for Good White Folk (TM) that was apparently, er, poorly researched. :-) At any rate, not having any idea where to look, I decided to just type in www.kkk.com to see what would happen. Wouldn't you know it, the NAACP web site came up! I couldn't stop laughing. Imagine a white supremecist trolling on the web, looking for the KKK's home page and finding the NAACP staring them in the face. Heh.
Sadly, they don't apparently own the kkk.com domain name any more -- it's now run by some yahoo who wants to create a KKK museum.
Personally, I don't think you can consider the buying of these domain names cybersquatting so long as the URL is redirected to something relevant. I think it's very, very smart for the NAACP and other groups to be doing this.
Of course, at some point someone I don't like will do it to someone I do -- I suppose it's entirely possible that the Republican Right will buy the domain name anarchy.com...
Eviscerati.Org: All Hail the Eviscerati
I saw the headline, so just to make sure, I tried going to www.n-word.com, and that didn't work, so then I tried www."n-word".com, and that didn't work either. Then, I did a whois lookup, and it said n-word.com wasn't registered. Then, I thought, aha - the N in NAACP stands for National, so maybe they registered national.com, but no, that's National Semiconductor, Inc. What "N-word" could they be possibly be referring to?
:-)
In all seriousness, I don't see what the big deal is. Some people have said that it's hypocritical for Slashdotters to say squatting is bad yet still let the NAACP register domains that "aren't theirs."
Well, I say hogwash. I, for one don't believe organizations have an inherent right to a domain, for reasons like they own a trademark or a copyright. I don't like domain name squatting for the most part, but do I think we should pass a law to outlaw it? No! True, it's not nice to squat a domain away from someone, but considering what other companies do with domains for profit alone, it's kind of nice to see someone squat for good, rather than evil.
Ross
Not to dispute your (quite valid) point, but an above poster alluded to the fact that the words we use on Slashdot are not *only* seen by Slashdotters. Between my browser and yours, lies a collection of corporate routers, firewalls, filters and logs, that may not take every word in context. Each staffed by a person, who may or may not do the same. Some of these people may not care, but others just might, and they just might decide to make a stink about it. Just a thought.
When does Political Correctness cross the line and become simply opinion?
It can't be a matter of the number of people holding that opinion, because here the corporates would be entitled to squat.
It can't be a matter of 'majority rules' either, because I don't remember an official poll about what 'derogatory' terms I find offensive...
Just who has the right to decide what is right and wrong in the Domain Name Game?? Eh?
And what about foreign language words? Accidental mis-spellings of possibly derogatory terms? Slang?
Last I checked, there was a country called Niger. www.niger.org can be just as valid for a nationalist web-site as www.israel.org (Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs website BTW), www.israel.com and www.israel.net - and these exist...
What about hobbies? Let's pick something semi-offensive first. Should taxidermy.com be 'reserved' by the same folks as vegan.org, just because it's offensive to them? How about model-planes.com?? Maybe we should make that unavailable because some kid somewhere died from sniffing Testors glue?
Yes, it gets ridiculous, but that's exactly the point. There is not definitive bound on 'offensive'. When we start limiting freedom in an authoritarian manner (read absolutist) then we have to do it absolutely, and reduce everything to bland oatmeal that is sure to not offent anyone - I find this alternative offensive. Nyah!
Long Live Harrison Bergeron!
-- What you do today will cost you a day of your life.
To be effective, they would have to register practically permutation of such words, otherwise there would still be combinations hate groups could use. Witness the stunning number of domains porn sites have come up with - and that without even any use of certain words.
--
grappler
Vidi, Vici, Veni
of course it is all things done in the name of Political Correctness, are acceptable in these benighted times now aren't they
use Signature::Witty;
Well yea sorta, but there is a MAJOR problem with that line of though. Because the word nigger means black quite litterly. So using the term nigger to mean a useless person (even if the person is white, and or useless) is essentially making the equation that black=nigger=useless a=b=c so a=c
which in this case is competly FALSE. but that is what your implying.
So why waste their time on DNs, when the most important thing that can be used to stifle the proliferation of hate is unity, knowledge, and that overabused four letter word called LOVE.
I agree. I also think that Seseme Street needs to stop squatting on all the letter of the alphabet and use that money to accually teach us something. But its not gonna happen. (btw Childrens Telivisions Workshop owns everysingle theletterX.com thats 26 domains $1950.00 dollars that could have been spent else where)
You know, if you mark them as Echelon keywords, and use them all in a row like that, any decent scanner will pass right over them. I mean, they would simply ignore any keywords within a few words of "echelon" after the five-hundredth unrelated post made it to human eyes.
And this string of keywords... it's like people used to do to get noticed by search engines. And now all search engines filter out blatant keywording like that.
To really fool them, post a paragraph or so talking about one of those 'forbidden' topics. Write a text generator that makes correct-sounding paragraphs out of sentence snippets, but randomized their order to prevent them filtering out known junk-text. Then rotate your sig all the time.
Only that way will you actually bug some snoop. Assuming they actually bother to keyword scan internet traffic.
There is a better way.
Rather than having a million different DNS servers with slightly different databases, trying to do that a search engine should be doing, leave it to seach engines.
To fix the domain camping problem, simply remove domain names. Or make a much easier way to find a site.
After all, if you could type "Ford motors" into a browser and get to the ford site, or at worst, have a list of matches, then what does it matter if the URL is ford.com or fordmotorswebsite.com?
By implementing something like a cross between white and yellow pages, but globally, we could remove the primary importance from DNs.
It's unfair that there can only be one books.com, like anyone getting a new account now, if they want bob@isp.com, they'll end up with bob231@isp.com. And this will only get worse. Are our children going to thank us when they get bob2.129e17@isp.com?
Mirabilis handles this properly with ICQ.
You can use any name you like, no matter how many other people use it. What distinguishes you is the unique number you get. You can give your friends this number, or they can look you up by providing your nickname and other details to narrow the list if it's too long.
The same thing should work for domain names. There should be a central repository of listings associated with each company registering on the net. They'd get to specify a few keywords, and their name, and maybe an alternate form or two. Then when you look for IBM you don't type ibm.com, or internat(...).com, you simply type "ibm computers". Or you type "computers" and then narrow the yellow-pages listing down to until you find it, etc.
Then, like phone numbers, the actual string that identifies your location becomes mostly unimportant.
Interesting that this comes out 2 days after the NAACP's website got hack ed.
Maybe they should be spending that money on someone who knows how to make their NT server secure first before someone starts broadcasting "hate speech" through their own domain.
Pork is not a verb
Golly, what could the "n-word" be?
/. Words have no more power than you give them and can not be evaluated out of context. The notion that in and of themselves words can be "good" or "bad" is entirely a creation of your own imagination.
It makes me sad to see my beloved Slashdot censoring itself so childishly and pointlessly. Certainly, I would not advocate the use of the word nigger in a derogatory context, but the notion that replacing the word nigger with "n-word" will either save you from being offensive or confuse me as to what "n-word" means is simply ridiculous.
F*ck: I wonder what that says. Fpck? Ftck? Golly, it's sure a good thing it doesn't say Fuck because *that* would be a"bad word". Sh*t.
I was under the impression that we were a bright bunch here at
Nigger is not a "bad word." Hate to burst your bubble, there's no such thing as a "bad word." If you were to call someone a nigger, then you would be a racist and ignorant piece of sh*t, but the word by itself is just the letters n-i-g-g-e-r in order. The sound of someone saying it is just a vibration in the air. Which waveforms are "wrong" again?
In Context (like, say, a headline) even "bad" words can be fine, or maybe even useful. This is why National Geographic can publish pictures of topless tribal women (and oh how the sight of nipples will scar the children anyway).
"\"N-Word\"" != "nigger"
The NAACP does not own "n-word".com, hell, " isn't even a valid character for a domain name. The NAACP does, however, own nigger.com, and if you can't just come out and say that, then may almighty g*sh will d*rn you all to h*ck.
Anthony
"I think any time you expose vulnerabilities it's a good thing." -Attorney General Janet Reno
So nerd.com is owned by the NAACP? Wow -- I just thought it was owned by some lame squatter.
Save the whales. Feed the hungry. Free the mallocs.
Most of the nigger* domains look like they're porn sites -- a few are WaReZ sites that are apparently run by bored white/Asian kids who listen to too many rap MP3's, but that's another story.
However, I was surprised to see the record Law Offices of D. Amkraut (NIGGERJOKES-DOM) in the list. The domain apparently isn't being used (yet) but I can only wonder what kind of marketing savvy can be used with it. ("Heard a racially offensive joke? Don't be subjected to that sort of language -- visit our law firm at niggerjokes.com!")
For more information, click here.
Heh. :-)
Have you seen Warren Beatty's movie Bulworth?
His suggestion: "We all gotta keep fuckin' each other until we're the same color."
We're going down, in a spiral to the ground
I think I first noticed that about 3 years ago, during a discussion about various possibly-offensive domain names I was having with someone. We did several whois queries and saw that the NAACP had done it, as well as other groups like the Anti-Defamation League.
No doubt in my mind. Whether it's right, wrong, sad or whatever, it was a good idea. They could have just stood on the sidelines, like many other people were doing three years ago, and then hooped and hollared that somebody out there had an offensive site. Instead, they were proactive and grabbed it themselves. I'm no fan of the NAACP, but that was a good idea.
RP
So what happens when they record email addresses from logs? Most people don't have any kind of proxy setup and thus it'll show that joeloser@imracist.net visited the site. Do they then donate this information to the police( there's nothing stopping you from giving the police your logs if wou want to )? If a crime is committed do the police start going through the list to interrogate people even if it was a typo( I meant to go to bigger.com )?
Don't leave your mind so open that your brain falls out. Don't close it so much that you cut off the blood.
The NAACP has just as much right to buy domain names as anyone else. If George W. Bush can buy bushsucks.com, then why can't the NAACP buy racist domains? They aren't squatting if the domains are redirected to the NAACP site. This is perfectly valid. The Internet is not public property, domain names belong to whomever wants to pay for them, and the KKK, or anyone else, has no inalienable right to own .com.
As a young black male, living in the US, to be called a "nigger" by anyone is an affront to me as a human being. I look at the NAACP, and I can see the good the hope to achieve from their actions, but as a believer in the liberty of man's conscience to choose, I am quite disturbed by their purchasing of domain names which they believe promote hate groups.
Unfortunately, this doesn't seem quite all right. I am not saying that we should all run around killing those who don't adhere to the God or gods we worship, who don't listen to the music we listen, or don't have the skin that we have, but the problem of hate cannot be stopped by buying domain names. I'm sure the NAACP knows that. So why waste their time on DNs, when the most important thing that can be used to stifle the proliferation of hate is unity, knowledge, and that overabused four letter word called LOVE. Not only love, but Brotherly Love. I hope one day, each individual will be able to completely say that they have no prejudice, no disdain, no hate for their fellow man. I'm not saying that we must agree with all things. I don't agree with racism or homosexuality religion, but I still love those who espouse ethnic racism (hopefully, they'll see that hate consumes) and my friends that are gay or bisexual.
That's all I have to say. IT might not have been the most insightful piece I've written, but out of my jumbled, hodge-podge heart, these are the feelings that are coming through
-"If your brother sins, rebuke him, and if he repents, forgive him" - Luke 17:3
"This space could've went to someone else who was academically talented enough to make it through and graduate but who was denied because some enrollment quota meant there wasn't room for him."
If you're going to complain about someone sucking up space at a University, you shouldn't use bad grammer while doing so. The space you are/were taking up could also have gone to someone more academically talented.
You aren't an english major, are you?
i see it this way. When the whites had an all baseball league, it was racist and wrong. but what then is the negro league? If they kept blacks or women out of college, then what are black colleges, and all women colleges? Am i wrong here? I am a white american male. Where is my all white male college at? What month do we dedicate to all white inventions and leaders? Here in atlanta, there is something called affirmative action, which means a company MUST have so many blacks, and women in their companies and in colleges. Until a while female was rejected from University of Georgia, and sued (and won) to get the right to goto school there, but correct me if im wrong, but isnt this racism? Im not anti-black or anti-woman by any means...but where is the justice???
Well, as much as I disagree with the groups that are being kept from obtaining the domain names, I have to say that I thoroughly disagree with the current practice of buying domain names that are anti-[insert whatever group is buy the name here]. It's as if organizations are trying to stifle any word that does not agree with the organzation. As wrong as the words may be, it still shouldn't stop them from being said. Well, I should say shouldn't stop them from being "heard." You can still "say" them, but the inability to obtain the dissident DNS entry makes it difficult for anyone to find. To put this on a mild, hypothetical scale, what if say, the GOP bought the domain name of democrats.org, or something similar? I know this can't happen because the domains are already in existance, and "democrat" is different from "republicanssuck" or something like that, but to me, this oversimplification shows the principle behind the current trend of buying the domain names that are anti-"whatever organization." In essence, this is one group sticking a sock in the mouth of another group. Despite whatever group I agree with, I cannot agree with said group silencing its opposition.
Ain't many black guys already called each other "nigga" or any variation thereof? Same thing apply for gays who call each other "fags"? Acceptable terms in this situation is relative while FUCK is already one of those 7(9?) "forbidden" words. It is easier just to grab the radio/TV list and keep it as a bible, make believe to the world that they are highly moral. I wonder if interNIC ever censor those other cuss words in other languages besdies English? What *OTHER* languages? Duh .... it is called the WORLD WIDE ....blahz... Annamite, Love to eat the forbidden fruits ;-)