There's some enlightened commentary down this thread and some who don't quite get it.
The nazi/white supremacist sites to which FDB mainly object are those which are facilitating violence by publication of names, addresses, photos and phone numbers of anti-racism activists.
Neither I nor FightDemBack! are calling for censorship. 'Censorship' is something a government does. If the government demands editorial control, that's censorship. FDB would be happy if Google would simply enforce the Blogger TOS, which already prohibits the content FDB have cited. Sure, the nazis can then go reserve a domain name and pay for hosting their own racist tripe, but then they can be held personally responsible for their racist tripe rather than fobbing off responsibility to a big, free webhost.
There have been documented cases of attempted murders of anti-racism activists directly as a result of information published on related 'Redwatch' style 'hitlist' sites. There's little doubt as to their intended purpose and effect.
By refusing to moderate content, even that in violation of the Blogger TOS, Google are shifting the responsibility for the harm caused by the bad content they host on to the victims of 'hitlist' blogs, the communities they live in and eventually to the courts. This is as unjust as an irresponsible publican whose patrons trash the amenity of the neighbourhood that keeps the pub in business.
Slashdot Mirror
There's some enlightened commentary down this thread and some who don't quite get it.
The nazi/white supremacist sites to which FDB mainly object are those which are facilitating violence by publication of names, addresses, photos and phone numbers of anti-racism activists.
Neither I nor FightDemBack! are calling for censorship. 'Censorship' is something a government does. If the government demands editorial control, that's censorship. FDB would be happy if Google would simply enforce the Blogger TOS, which already prohibits the content FDB have cited. Sure, the nazis can then go reserve a domain name and pay for hosting their own racist tripe, but then they can be held personally responsible for their racist tripe rather than fobbing off responsibility to a big, free webhost.
There have been documented cases of attempted murders of anti-racism activists directly as a result of information published on related 'Redwatch' style 'hitlist' sites. There's little doubt as to their intended purpose and effect.
By refusing to moderate content, even that in violation of the Blogger TOS, Google are shifting the responsibility for the harm caused by the bad content they host on to the victims of 'hitlist' blogs, the communities they live in and eventually to the courts. This is as unjust as an irresponsible publican whose patrons trash the amenity of the neighbourhood that keeps the pub in business.
For a more complete discussion, please visit:
'Free speech for nazis?'
http://machinegunkeyboard.com/?p=344
Cheers
Brian Stokes
Sydney, Australia
http://fightdemback.org/
http://machinegunkeyboard.com/