4 ms·

Stance by China to Limit Google Is Risk by Beijing

24 points by roundsquare 17y ago

dca 17y ago
The only thing scarier than the censorship and reasons for it (i.e. human rights issues, corruption, etc...), is how powerful China would be if they ever straightened up.
- grandalf 17y ago
  Not to make your high horse uncomfortable, but consider: - In the US there are millions of so-called "illegals" who can't call the police if assaulted or abused for fear of deportation. This is a major human rights issue... if it happened in another country we'd call it apartheid. - In the US there is extensive corruption. Consider Rod Blagojevich's blunder but realize that one doesn't do that sort of thing unless it's part of the status quo. - The treatment of prison inmates in the US is atrocious. Being incarcerated is a near guarantee of regular rape and assault at the hands of other inmates. Guards do not stop this behavior. This is worse than any gulag. edit: I love the US but I think it's fair to point out some of is flaws. I'm shocked that this comment gets modded down, are there a lot of Pat Buchanan acolytes on HN?
grandalf 17y ago
Puh-lease! Considering that the US Government has tried to shut down WikiLeaks and that Google censors some content (such as, for example, a depiction of two 17.5 year olds having sex), I think it's far more useful to look at China as being a bit more inclined to censor but not really much different than the US. After all, the US Government censors information about the Kennedy assassination for no good reason... it's utterly hypocritical for any Amnerican to criticize the Chinese government without first criticizing the US government for censoring the Kennedy stuff and for trying to shut down WikiLeaks. edit: I can't believe how many social conservatives appear to be downvoting this. Do you really have a problem with 17.5 year olds having consensual sex?
- poutine 17y ago
  Complete and total nonsense. While the US Government has severe issues it is not by any stretch equivalent to the Chinese Government in its repression of human rights and freedoms and censorship of the Internet.
  - grandalf 17y ago
    Censorship is censorship. It's either bad or it's not. If Google truly cares about the issue of censorship it should act consistently, not just try to find an area in which opposition to censorship is unanimous among people in the US and make a big stink about how bold it is being. This is a business decision. Try posting a video of a naked 17.5 year old person on youtube and see how long it takes before it is taken down. Try posting a video slide show of sensitive wikileaks docs and see how long the video stays up. Your argument also falls apart in terms of the humanitarian argument. Search increases freedom and thus is helpful to humanitarian goals. If Google makes a decision that results in less search, the decision results in less freedom. Similarly, if you are running late to an event and you drive 100 MPH on the highway and you get pulled over for speeding, you might actually get there later than if you'd just driven the speed limit. If you want to optimize within the law you don't speed. Google is doing the equivalent of going 100 MPH and then blaming the cop.
    - orangecat 17y ago
      The Sophisticate: "The world isn't black and white. No one does pure good or pure bad. It's all gray. Therefore, no one is better than anyone else." The Zetet: "Knowing only gray, you conclude that all grays are the same shade. You mock the simplicity of the two-color view, yet you replace it with a one-color view..." -- Marc Stiegler, David's Sling http://lesswrong.com/lw/mm/the_fallacy_of_gray/ http://lesswrong.com/lw/mm/the_fallacy_of_gray/
      - grandalf 17y ago
        I love this quote. I think most people apply the Sophisticate's error to China by supposing that since both the US and China are different shades of gray, they may then decide arbitrarily to critique China... similarly: We saw it manifested in yesterday's post - the one who believed that odds of two to the power of seven hundred and fifty millon to one, against, meant "there was still a chance". All probabilities, to him, were simply "uncertain" and that meant he was licensed to ignore them if he pleased. If you care about censorship, you are not licensed to ignore censorship in the US just because both are gray. If you care about humanitarian abuses, you are not licensed to ignore them in the US just because China may commit worse ones.

24 points by roundsquare 17y ago

dca 17y ago

The only thing scarier than the censorship and reasons for it (i.e. human rights issues, corruption, etc...), is how powerful China would be if they ever straightened up.

grandalf 17y ago
Not to make your high horse uncomfortable, but consider: - In the US there are millions of so-called "illegals" who can't call the police if assaulted or abused for fear of deportation. This is a major human rights issue... if it happened in another country we'd call it apartheid. - In the US there is extensive corruption. Consider Rod Blagojevich's blunder but realize that one doesn't do that sort of thing unless it's part of the status quo. - The treatment of prison inmates in the US is atrocious. Being incarcerated is a near guarantee of regular rape and assault at the hands of other inmates. Guards do not stop this behavior. This is worse than any gulag. edit: I love the US but I think it's fair to point out some of is flaws. I'm shocked that this comment gets modded down, are there a lot of Pat Buchanan acolytes on HN?

grandalf 17y ago

Puh-lease! Considering that the US Government has tried to shut down WikiLeaks and that Google censors some content (such as, for example, a depiction of two 17.5 year olds having sex), I think it's far more useful to look at China as being a bit more inclined to censor but not really much different than the US. After all, the US Government censors information about the Kennedy assassination for no good reason... it's utterly hypocritical for any Amnerican to criticize the Chinese government without first criticizing the US government for censoring the Kennedy stuff and for trying to shut down WikiLeaks. edit: I can't believe how many social conservatives appear to be downvoting this. Do you really have a problem with 17.5 year olds having consensual sex?

poutine 17y ago
Complete and total nonsense. While the US Government has severe issues it is not by any stretch equivalent to the Chinese Government in its repression of human rights and freedoms and censorship of the Internet.
- grandalf 17y ago
  Censorship is censorship. It's either bad or it's not. If Google truly cares about the issue of censorship it should act consistently, not just try to find an area in which opposition to censorship is unanimous among people in the US and make a big stink about how bold it is being. This is a business decision. Try posting a video of a naked 17.5 year old person on youtube and see how long it takes before it is taken down. Try posting a video slide show of sensitive wikileaks docs and see how long the video stays up. Your argument also falls apart in terms of the humanitarian argument. Search increases freedom and thus is helpful to humanitarian goals. If Google makes a decision that results in less search, the decision results in less freedom. Similarly, if you are running late to an event and you drive 100 MPH on the highway and you get pulled over for speeding, you might actually get there later than if you'd just driven the speed limit. If you want to optimize within the law you don't speed. Google is doing the equivalent of going 100 MPH and then blaming the cop.
  - orangecat 17y ago
    The Sophisticate: "The world isn't black and white. No one does pure good or pure bad. It's all gray. Therefore, no one is better than anyone else." The Zetet: "Knowing only gray, you conclude that all grays are the same shade. You mock the simplicity of the two-color view, yet you replace it with a one-color view..." -- Marc Stiegler, David's Sling http://lesswrong.com/lw/mm/the_fallacy_of_gray/ http://lesswrong.com/lw/mm/the_fallacy_of_gray/
    - grandalf 17y ago
      I love this quote. I think most people apply the Sophisticate's error to China by supposing that since both the US and China are different shades of gray, they may then decide arbitrarily to critique China... similarly: We saw it manifested in yesterday's post - the one who believed that odds of two to the power of seven hundred and fifty millon to one, against, meant "there was still a chance". All probabilities, to him, were simply "uncertain" and that meant he was licensed to ignore them if he pleased. If you care about censorship, you are not licensed to ignore censorship in the US just because both are gray. If you care about humanitarian abuses, you are not licensed to ignore them in the US just because China may commit worse ones.