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> Google could in principle make its results insanely left-leaning and the first amendment should protect them. Are we going to let the government choose which
by rdtsc 8y ago
> Google could in principle make its results insanely left-leaning and the first amendment should protect them. Are we going to let the government choose which results get suppressed to suit its own needs?
That's the part that confuses me. Why not embrace the bias. Those who think that Google is biased are not going to be convinced by the a PR statement saying "we are impartial, etc". They've already made up their mind.
It's like with the leaked video we discussed recently. Was anyone surprised by the reaction? Not me, it was exactly what I expected. But their PR response to the leak is what bothered me:
> Nothing was said at that meeting, or any other meeting, to suggest that any political bias ever influences the way we build or operate our products.
Why not just be brave and come out and say "we support these values and not those values, we are not a neutral platform, please move on to another service if you don't agree".
- gkoberger 8y agoYou'll never find a conservative banned on Google or Twitter or Facebook for saying they believe in trickle-down economics, or that they want a smaller government. Google/etc have policies on hate speech and false content, and for some reason banning those things is now considered a political bias.
- komali2 8y agoI'm with you, I've yet to see actual evidence of political bias in a Google product. I.e. search, etc. I've heard conservatives say they're uncomfortable working there because "everyone" is liberal, but they also live in San Francisco California, where "everyone" is liberal, so that's hardly Google's fault.
- stcredzero 8y agoThe way in which YouTube commenters are demonetized is very pointedly politically biased.
- komali2 8y agoThe only evidence I've seen of this is where hate-speech automatically triggers filters that causes videos to be demonetized, and after the uploader makes the case that no, this was (for example) a report on hate speech usage and therefore should be allowed, the video is re-monetized. For example: https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2018/03/youtube-removes-the-atlantics-hail-trump-video-from-search/555941/ https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2018/03/youtu... I have yet to see evidence of actual enforced liberal bias by youtube.
- stcredzero 8y agoI have yet to see evidence of actual enforced liberal bias by youtube. It depends on who you watch. If you get away from the left-leaning bubble on YouTube, it's rampant. Phillip DeFranco often gets demonetized, often because he gets lurid, but at times it's apparently because he's "too neutral" from a Far Left point of view. Dave Rubin gets demonetized all the time, though he almost never covers anything lurid, and his entire channel basically consists of people talking about things. Computing Forever gets demonetized all of the time, though he's basically just a talking head coming from a conservative point of view. Independent Man: same.
- komali2 8y agoI follow Phillip DeFranco. My understanding is all his videos where he gets demonetized are, just like you said, because they were "lurid." I've never seen evidence that Phillip DeFranco or Dave Rubin got demonetized specifically because of the political leaning of their video. Alex Jones got demonetized because he claimed shooting victims were crisis actors, which is an acceptable form of "bias" to me. I actually blame his blow-up as the origin of the "Youtube censors conservatives" meme. I think this polygon article does a generally fair analysis: https://www.polygon.com/2018/3/9/17101166/youtube-purge-robert-kyncl https://www.polygon.com/2018/3/9/17101166/youtube-purge-robe... though it doens't talk about Rubin or DeFranco. The most thrown around quote is this: "As we work to hire rapidly and ramp up our policy enforcement teams throughout 2018, newer members may misapply some of our policies resulting in mistaken removals," Which, yea, hire a bunch of moderators out of San Francisco (I assume) and that can happen. But, the company rectified the issue. The fact that videos lost out on money is due to YouTube's dumb method of content moderation (demonetization immediately and invalidating all those views), not because the company itself has a bias. If the company had a bias, it would not train employees to not remove pro-gun videos merely for being pro-gun, or reinstate banned pro-gun videos. But, you seem to have the greatest handle on this - do you have any articles or analyses across multiple conservative accounts facing demonetization on a regular basis? That kind of evidence would indicate a trend and would finally fulfill my desire for actual evidence of anti-conservative bias by Google.
- jonathankoren 8y agoI haven’t seen a lot of evidence for this bias at all. The whole thing feels like just an update “liberal media bias”. Which was always a useful myth. As GOP Chairman Rich Bond said,"There is some strategy to it [bashing the 'liberal' media...] If you watch any great coach, what they try to do is 'work the refs.' Maybe the ref will cut you a little slack on the next one." [0] https://www.nytimes.com/2003/03/16/books/chapters/what-liberal-media.html https://www.nytimes.com/2003/03/16/books/chapters/what-liber...
- bcheung 8y agoCompanies have a responsibility to ensure the workplace is not a hostile environment that discriminates, no matter the political leaning of the locality. Enforcement in Silicon Valley tends to let bad actors from the left have lots of leeway while immediately censoring or disciplining for expressing mainstream conservative views.
- komali2 8y agoRight, as someone that grew up liberal in South Carolina, I get it. But when I got bullied for it, I'd go to the principal (a man who once told me Harry Potter was written by Satan himself) and he'd mete punishment regardless, because thems the rules. What examples are there of a company in silicon valley censoring or disciplining conservative employees for conservative views?
- bcheung 8y agohttps://gizmodo.com/exclusive-heres-the-full-10-page-anti-diversity-screed-1797564320 https://gizmodo.com/exclusive-heres-the-full-10-page-anti-di... https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2014/apr/03/mozilla-ceo-brendan-eich-resigns-prop-8 https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2014/apr/03/mozilla-c... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y0duqM-6Tbg https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y0duqM-6Tbg
- komali2 8y agoThank you, this is exactly what I wanted to read up on. Oh, the Google thing. That's easy to sum up in my opinion. From his tldr: >Differences in distributions of traits between men and women may in part explain why we don’t have 50% representation of women in tech and leadership. Discrimination to reach equal representation is unfair, divisive, and bad for business. He failed to demonstrate a difference in traits between men and women correlating to engineering interest and ability. Therefore, equal representation is fair. Therefore, it is an attack on an underrepresented gender to argue otherwise. If he wants to go and research whether or not there are actual trait differences he's more than welcome to, but he shouldn't be surprised if Google doesn't want to fund that effort. By the way, it seems you're suggesting "belief that women are biologically predisposed to not be interested in / good at engineering" is a conservative value. I'd agree that it's a value many people that are conservatives hold, but I also know many fiscal conservatives who'd be quite insulted by this conflation. Brendan Eich opposed a bill giving equal rights to a certain group of humans based on born traits. Is "not wanting to give equal rights to a certain group of humans" a conservative value? That's a shame, because that kind of thing is typically illegal at the Constitutional level. If someone feels bad that they argue that gays shouldn't have equal rights, and then tbeh get fired over it, I have about as much sympathy for that person as I do for a racist. In any case, racism, sexism, hate against gays are not political opinions, and shouldn't be protected. For the CNN video, which was most interesting as I haven't seen it before, so thank you for turning it up: The first guy says "if I suggest we have more border security am I gonna get fired?" I'm not allowed to talk about politics at work, why should he? If there's an environment he's in where people are talking about this stuff, and he doesn't get to, that's definitely an issue! Same for maga hat guy. If someone holds unpopular opinions and is getting pushback about it, that's life in the big city. Every big city, actually. They're all full of liberals. I've yet to hear of people suffering actual consequences for expressing non-hateful aspects of their personal philosophy. Tldr I don't care that sexists, racists, or homophobes get fired for their beliefs. I don't care that a maga hat guy can't wear his hat to work because I can't put a Bernie sticker on my laptop and fair's fair. If a trump supporter doesn't have any friends in San Francisco, I am unsympathetic. If they get fired over it, though, I will be mad.
- stcredzero 8y agoYou'll never find a conservative banned on Google or Twitter or Facebook for saying they believe in trickle-down economics, or that they want a smaller government. Fact: You will find such people subjected to strikes and bans on YouTube and Twitter who are simply ideologically opposed to the goals of Intersectionality and Feminism on the basis of philosophy rooted in "smaller government."
- kevinh 8y agoI don't see what intersectionality or feminism have to do with smaller government.
- stcredzero 8y agoEnforcing Equality of Outcome requires increased government infringement.
- bduerst 8y agoSo is enforcing Child Pornography laws. Is that a bad thing too?
- stcredzero 8y agoNo. So you are saying that you'll only support child pornography laws if you get all the rest of your political agenda? You mean that's a good thing too?
- bduerst 8y agoThat's a straw man. I was just pointing out the flaw in your logic about laws being government infringement.
- stcredzero 8y agoI was just pointing out the flaw in your logic about laws being government infringement. Really? I was parodying your lack of logic. Why is it that you can't enforce child pornography, but still refrain from other kinds of government infringement. Please explain the reasons you so carefully gave above before you started to poison the well by invoking child porn. Provide quotes. Or is there a hole in your logic there?
- x220 8y agoGoogle is less likely to be allowed to operate in China if they let on that they are operating on American liberal values.
- StreamBright 8y agoImplying that Google is operating on American liberal values. I guess this depends on the definition of liberal values a lot.
- murderfs 8y ago> Why not just be brave and come out and say "we support these values and not those values, we are not a neutral platform, please move on to another service if you don't agree". Presumably because telling half of your users to fuck off is a terrible financial decision?
- rdtsc 8y agoI don't know if it'd be half, I think less. And also where would they go? Most will still be "Googling" things, driving with Google maps and have an Android phone with location turned on at all times. On the other hand it will make their most devout users, including the majority of their employees quite proud and even more more dedicated. Here executives were crying on camera saying "we lost". I don't think many believe they are then going to turn around wipe their tears, sit down at their desks and be impartial when deciding which news to filter, which videos to demonetize, which charities to support. I don't think they will be, and they shouldn't. They should be more brave and stand up for what they believe. It will make them seem more honest and they might even recover some of the PR image they lost recently.
- jonathankoren 8y agoBecause it legitimizes a false narrative.