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There are hundreds of instances of Google censoring websites, YouTube channels and plus accounts that promoted political philosophies that did not agree with th

There are hundreds of instances of Google censoring websites, YouTube channels and plus accounts that promoted political philosophies that did not agree with the company culture. I think by that metric Google is very pro censorship when it comes to their own social media platforms

mavhc 8y ago
Name 5
- trumped 8y ago
  sometimes they do a "soft" censor and just push them down the search result list so that any casual user would never see them... but they also do some hard censoring.
- dane-pgp 8y ago
  Is your point that Google haven't censored more than 5 times, or that Google mostly censors people who aren't famous/memorable and therefore it's hard to name 5? https://www.reddit.com/r/conspiracy/comments/816mzt/big_alphabetical_list_of_banned_youtube_channels/ https://www.reddit.com/r/conspiracy/comments/816mzt/big_alph... Perhaps you're saying that, if provided with a list of 5 examples, you would defend why Google chose to censor in those specific cases. Unfortunately I don't know enough about the details of all these cases to be able to pick 5 particularly controversial examples, but I still feel uneasy about the amount of power Google has to silence opinions it disagrees with.
  - agildehaus 8y ago
    Linking /r/conspiracy doesn't help your case.
    - standardcitizen 8y ago
      Is the information correct or incorrect? I’m not a massive fan boy if such kind of topics either. Often the crazy ones tell us research things that we often bypass. This is one of those times. I don’t agree with their messaging, but Alex Jones should be allowed. Again I completely whole heartily disagree with him, but we can’t be selective in this area. We’ve kind of validated him to some degree and made him much much bigger than before. There is a class of people who feel like they aren’t being heard or lied too. Yet we often use tactics to discredit them. I think this only embolden them. We can even discuss things, without doing the mental laziness of saying. I don’t wanna look at your source, because it’s x. Within universities, you can’t use one source, why would you think it’s ok now? You need supporting claims, if you disagree, than support it.. stop being mentally lazy.
      - agildehaus 8y ago
        How exactly do you find a list of YouTube channels "correct" or "incorrect"? YouTube bans thousands of channels a day. It's their right to ban whomever they please and they likely didn't even give the channel owner a reason much less me. For all I know each one of those violated very reasonable terms. Where did this list even come from? Why are these channels special enough to make it to this list? My guess is the poster agreed with their content, or found news about their banning through various conspiracy-oriented websites. There's no reason whatsoever to think this list is interesting. There is, however, plenty of reason to think where it was posted is not worth my time.
        dane-pgp 8y ago
        The discussion has gone from "There are hundreds of instances of Google censoring ... YouTube channels ..." to "Name 5" to a list of dozens, to "YouTube bans thousands of channels a day", with different commenters making subtly different points at each stage. I think the original point was that Google has a policy of censoring people based on the (perfectly legal) political views that those people have. As you say, Google has the absolute legal right to censor people because of their political views, and presumably you think it is not a problem if they do so. So I don't think the interesting question is how many of the thousands of channels a day were banned for their unpopular political speech (nor is it interesting to know how special the channels on the r/conspiracy list are), but rather we should ask whether it is good for society if an entity as powerful as Google has this much editorial control over who is exposed to which ideas.
        agildehaus 8y ago
        They have no such policy, and you have no evidence whatsoever that people are being banned for political views alone.
        dane-pgp 8y ago
        If I could show that YouTube channels are being banned from expressing certain political views, would you agree that Google has too much power and censors too much? Consider this recent example then: https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-03-21/youtube-bans-firearm-sales-and-how-to-videos-prompting-backlash https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-03-21/youtube-b... Perhaps you will say that "instructions on how to assemble firearms" is not an expression of a political view, however I would argue that preventing people from imparting legal factual information to help other people exercise a constitutional right seems like something that, if the government were to do it, would be a breach of their First Amendment rights. So as not to be seen to be taking a specific view on "gun rights", let me give a different (hypothetical, and non-equivalent) situation to clarify what we mean by "banned for political views alone" here. Suppose that Google had different politics and decided to ban channels that provided assistance to women seeking an abortion. Perhaps Google would allow channels to advocate, in the abstract, for "abortion rights", but not to give any practical advice on how to exercise them. I think that most people would agree that this would count as unconstitutional "viewpoint discrimination" if the government were to do it, so it is effectively a "ban for political views/expression" if Google do it as a private corporation.
  - sml156 8y ago
    Clicking on the first link in a Google search is no way to go threw life son.
- dzhiurgis 8y ago
  Bans Alex Jones from youtube (tbh fuck that clown) Fires the memo guy Complies to DMCA My favourite is Google officially comparing EU’s right to be forgotten law with russia’s anti gay propaganda law... cannot get lower than that.
  - IshKebab 8y ago
    So 2 then.

mavhc 8y ago

Name 5

trumped 8y ago
sometimes they do a "soft" censor and just push them down the search result list so that any casual user would never see them... but they also do some hard censoring.
dane-pgp 8y ago
Is your point that Google haven't censored more than 5 times, or that Google mostly censors people who aren't famous/memorable and therefore it's hard to name 5? https://www.reddit.com/r/conspiracy/comments/816mzt/big_alphabetical_list_of_banned_youtube_channels/ https://www.reddit.com/r/conspiracy/comments/816mzt/big_alph... Perhaps you're saying that, if provided with a list of 5 examples, you would defend why Google chose to censor in those specific cases. Unfortunately I don't know enough about the details of all these cases to be able to pick 5 particularly controversial examples, but I still feel uneasy about the amount of power Google has to silence opinions it disagrees with.
- agildehaus 8y ago
  Linking /r/conspiracy doesn't help your case.
  - standardcitizen 8y ago
    Is the information correct or incorrect? I’m not a massive fan boy if such kind of topics either. Often the crazy ones tell us research things that we often bypass. This is one of those times. I don’t agree with their messaging, but Alex Jones should be allowed. Again I completely whole heartily disagree with him, but we can’t be selective in this area. We’ve kind of validated him to some degree and made him much much bigger than before. There is a class of people who feel like they aren’t being heard or lied too. Yet we often use tactics to discredit them. I think this only embolden them. We can even discuss things, without doing the mental laziness of saying. I don’t wanna look at your source, because it’s x. Within universities, you can’t use one source, why would you think it’s ok now? You need supporting claims, if you disagree, than support it.. stop being mentally lazy.
    - agildehaus 8y ago
      How exactly do you find a list of YouTube channels "correct" or "incorrect"? YouTube bans thousands of channels a day. It's their right to ban whomever they please and they likely didn't even give the channel owner a reason much less me. For all I know each one of those violated very reasonable terms. Where did this list even come from? Why are these channels special enough to make it to this list? My guess is the poster agreed with their content, or found news about their banning through various conspiracy-oriented websites. There's no reason whatsoever to think this list is interesting. There is, however, plenty of reason to think where it was posted is not worth my time.
      - dane-pgp 8y ago
        The discussion has gone from "There are hundreds of instances of Google censoring ... YouTube channels ..." to "Name 5" to a list of dozens, to "YouTube bans thousands of channels a day", with different commenters making subtly different points at each stage. I think the original point was that Google has a policy of censoring people based on the (perfectly legal) political views that those people have. As you say, Google has the absolute legal right to censor people because of their political views, and presumably you think it is not a problem if they do so. So I don't think the interesting question is how many of the thousands of channels a day were banned for their unpopular political speech (nor is it interesting to know how special the channels on the r/conspiracy list are), but rather we should ask whether it is good for society if an entity as powerful as Google has this much editorial control over who is exposed to which ideas.
        agildehaus 8y ago
        They have no such policy, and you have no evidence whatsoever that people are being banned for political views alone.
        dane-pgp 8y ago
        If I could show that YouTube channels are being banned from expressing certain political views, would you agree that Google has too much power and censors too much? Consider this recent example then: https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-03-21/youtube-bans-firearm-sales-and-how-to-videos-prompting-backlash https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-03-21/youtube-b... Perhaps you will say that "instructions on how to assemble firearms" is not an expression of a political view, however I would argue that preventing people from imparting legal factual information to help other people exercise a constitutional right seems like something that, if the government were to do it, would be a breach of their First Amendment rights. So as not to be seen to be taking a specific view on "gun rights", let me give a different (hypothetical, and non-equivalent) situation to clarify what we mean by "banned for political views alone" here. Suppose that Google had different politics and decided to ban channels that provided assistance to women seeking an abortion. Perhaps Google would allow channels to advocate, in the abstract, for "abortion rights", but not to give any practical advice on how to exercise them. I think that most people would agree that this would count as unconstitutional "viewpoint discrimination" if the government were to do it, so it is effectively a "ban for political views/expression" if Google do it as a private corporation.
- sml156 8y ago
  Clicking on the first link in a Google search is no way to go threw life son.
dzhiurgis 8y ago
Bans Alex Jones from youtube (tbh fuck that clown) Fires the memo guy Complies to DMCA My favourite is Google officially comparing EU’s right to be forgotten law with russia’s anti gay propaganda law... cannot get lower than that.
- IshKebab 8y ago
  So 2 then.