20 ms·

For those defending this practice, consider carefully the implications of what you are advocating. On one hand you have a government deciding who can and canno

For those defending this practice, consider carefully the implications of what you are advocating. On one hand you have a government deciding who can and cannot refer to themselves as adherents of a particular religion (by declaring that Ahamadis cannot call themselves Muslim). On another hand you have Google and Apple, yet again, being the complicit chokepoints of “free speech”, with regard to app developers. These may seem fair to you, but that may be because these practices have not negatively affected you...yet. But consider: Would it be fair if England declared Catholics “unChristian” and banned their use if the term? Or what if the USA declared hasidic jews “Unjewish” and banned their use of the term. Or what if Apple caved to pressure theoretical from Israel to ban Jehovah’s Witnesses from using the term “Jehovah”? What next? Government declaring who is and is not “white”? Oh wait......

RcouF1uZ4gsC 6y ago
If we got to that situation, that would be the result of far greater problems than having or not having a particular app.
jariel 6y ago
"These may seem fair to you" I don't see 'seeming fair' to most people. This is just yet another example of Google and Apple's monopoly preferences being leveraged by entities that have more leverage than them. It has to stop. Free The Apps.
- kmeisthax 6y ago
  The PTA isn't stopping at walled-garden App Stores; Google and Apple are just one of the few countries large enough to have a physical presence Pakistan can threaten. They also threatened a handful of US-based web hosts who are basically prohibited from seeing their families until they censor this sect. (And yes, I'm using the word 'censor' here. It is entirely appropriate under even the narrowest definitions of the word, as the decision to remove content was made with the force of law. The US has similar provisions known as the 'state actors doctrine'.)
- bluejekyll 6y ago
  It took me a second to get this argument, but it’s a good one. If there were thousands of marketplaces on iOS and Android, then Pakistan would have to negotiate the removal on all of this platforms, as opposed to only two. Spelling it out clearly like that, it makes me wonder if there are many governments that prefer to have monopolies to deal with, rather than many companies. It certainly makes regulation simpler.
  - username90 6y ago
    You can look at how many governments have managed to keep websites they don't like down. Thepiratebay and tons of other illegal sites are still available today in most places of the world even where they are illegal. If we didn't have the free open web and instead just had appstore like gatekeepers none of those sites would be allowed to exist.
  - jariel 6y ago
    I personally worked for a large tech company and was involved with 'content filtering discussions' with questionable regimes. HN doesn't like such arguments, it's not an argument, just an experience. It's common. Pragmatically speaking, it's much harder for Pakistan to filter the entire web, than control international conglomerates which they generally can do. We need diversity in search, and absolutely need to have 'many app stores' and 'direct downloads'. The arguments for 'security' are rubbish, and the plebes supporting Apple's monopoly I don't think understand what's happening. In US anti-trust cases, generally there has be evidence of 'harm to consumers' - well - these 'bans' absolutely represent harm. Bans of Apps (even unsavoury things like Parler) and unquestionably arbitrary controls on choice that harm consumers. Moreover, Apple's 30% cut is a pretty obvious harm once you do the economic calculation. So Apple should be more like Google - and - just as the EU has proposed with search wherein you get to choose your vendor, not defaults negotiated behind the scenes - the same goes with app stores. Once the regulatory action is taken - we will still have secure apps, and there will be greater opportunity. In hindsight it will seem obvious and actually kind of simple.
    - zepto 6y ago
      > Apple's 30% cut is a pretty obvious harm once you do the economic calculation. Not really. You have to compare it to a counter-factual, and those are generally made up to support whatever position you already hold. Also, it’s not 30%. It’s 15% for almost all developers.
u801e 6y ago
The fundamental issue with the argument you're presenting is that Pakistan is not a secular country, unlike England or the USA. An example of a country that bases their government on a particular religion allowing citizens to freely declare whether they're adherents of that religion even if their practice differs significantly compared to established orthodoxy would significantly strengthen this assertion.
- Veen 6y ago
  > Pakistan is not a secular country, unlike England or the USA It's a minor quibble, but England does have an established national Church, so it's not entirely secular in the way the US is. 26 CofE Bishops sit in the House of Lords, the Lords Spiritual. The head of state is also the head of the Church.
  - imbnwa 6y ago
    It is so fascinating how fascinated all these Germanic kingdoms in Western Europe were with emulating the Romans
    - danans 6y ago
      Until Henry VIII's divorce of Catherine of Aragon, England had the same church as Rome.
    - thaumasiotes 6y ago
      Why? Rome was vastly richer and more powerful than they were, and the only model of success they ever knew.
  - username90 6y ago
    Yet England feel way more secular than USA in practice, given how much Christianity seems to matter in US politics.
    - DigiDigiorno 6y ago
umvi 6y ago
> Would it be fair if England declared Catholics "unChristian" and banned their use if the term? I think it's slightly more nuanced than that. For example, England should be able to declare whether a given group of people are members of the Church of England (organization). Wherever a centralized authority exists, that authority should have the power to declare whether or not someone is a member of the organization. The Catholic church should absolutely be able to declare some rogue sect that claims to be Catholic "unCatholic". However, you are absolutely right, where no centralized authority exists no one should be able to classify others' high level beliefs. Whether someone is Jewish, Christian, Islam, Atheist, etc. is not up to anyone but the individual adherent. If you believe in Jesus Christ and believe you are following his teachings, you are a Christian and no government or conglomerate of sects should be able to say otherwise. If you believe in Mohammed and the tenets of Islam, no government or conglomerate of sects should be able to say you are not a Muslim.
- vorpalhex 6y ago
  Not everyone agrees with any given central authority. In religion especially this is often over relatively complex reasons that outsiders probably aren't in a position to try and navigate. You need only to refer to religious history and it's many wars to see this: the tri-part nature of Christ, the exact date of Easter, the shaving of heads in early English history, etc. Nor should we start allowing the Church of England to press Google into service putting it's agenda forward. We recognize that dissent is an important part of free speech!
- CivBase 6y ago
  > England should be able to declare whether a given group of people are members of the Church of England (organization). Wherever a centralized authority exists, that authority should have the power to declare whether or not someone is a member of the organization. The Catholic church should absolutely be able to declare some rogue sect that claims to be Catholic "unCatholic". They should have the power to declare whether or not they consider someone to be a member of an organization. Nothing more. This goes beyond simply declaring whether or not they consider Ahmadis to be Muslims. The Pakistani government is using "anti-blasphemy" laws to silence anyone who objects to their declaration.
gadders 6y ago
This isn't censorship, this is just a private company deciding who is and isn't allowed on their platform. All Ahmadiyya muslims have to do is start their own company to make mobile phones and probably their own search engine as well.
- deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]
- commandlinefan 6y ago
  And, increasingly, their own banking and internet routing infrastructure as well.
  - deleted 6y ago
    [deleted]
  - baybal2 6y ago
    FYI, Pakistan's biggest banks are owned by Ahmadis. Quite a number in India too.
    - selimthegrim 6y ago
      Citation? You'd think they'd be being boycotted like Shezan was then. And the claim about India is even more out there. Are you sure you're not thinking about Memons like Adamjee?
- deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]
- triceratops 6y ago
  > this is just a private company deciding who is and isn't allowed on their platform. No, this actually is censorship because a government ordered that it be done.
- jshevek 6y ago
  > This isn't censorship, this is just a private company deciding who is and isn't allowed on their platform This fits the definition of censorship. Maybe you meant to say this isn't governmental censorship? Edit: Poe's law
SpicyLemonZest 6y ago
I wouldn’t say that I’m defending the practice. It’s a bad decision and I wish Pakistan wouldn’t censor these apps. But it really does seem like the responsibility lies with Pakistan here. The article suggests Google’s trying hard to keep these apps up, and has indeed kept some up despite government pressure. At the end of the day, their options to resist legal demands are limited, and it’s hard for me to see an argument that this relatively small instance of censorship is so important they should shut down operations in Pakistan over it.
- LeifCarrotson 6y ago
  > At the end of the day, their options to resist legal demands are limited They're really not. Google is not based in Pakistan, and they don't have offices or datacenters in Pakistan. Why should they take _global_ action against developers who are _located in the US_ on the request of someone who does not have jurisdiction over them? It's interesting how this plays out in reverse to the typical copyright fights - people violating US intellectual property law in Pakistan (or wherever) are often litigated under those US laws; here they're litigating against Americans based on Pakistani laws.
  - selimthegrim 6y ago
    Indeed, in the final appeal that failed in Pakistan against these laws (Zaheeruddin v. State) the Supreme Court bench cited the Coca-Cola trademark as an example
  - Dma54rhs 6y ago
    Im sure they do sell ads in Pakistan and want in the future? An independent state could strangle that business in many easy ways if that is their mission, therefor Google will eventually do whatever it takes to stay in the market.
  - SpicyLemonZest 6y ago
    They shouldn't and haven't taken global action against the developers. The apps remain available outside of Pakistan - you can find them if you search for "ahmadiyya muslim community quran".
jmull 6y ago
The (rather massive) flaw in your reasoning is the idea that Google and Apple are the solution to the problem. If you live in a society without religious freedom, that's a big problem, but Apple and Google can't fix it. If you care about the problem, it's important to understand this. If you succeed in getting people to focus on symptom of the problem and not the cause, you will help prevent it from being addressed.
- username90 6y ago
  Apple and Google put themselves in a position where they became a part of the problem. If they ran open platforms where they don't have to power to ban apps this would never have happened.
  - shadowgovt 6y ago
    Those open platforms exist. Can the apps in question be downloaded in Pakistan via F-Droid?
    - fakedang 6y ago
      What about the iOS users? AFAIK, it's more likely the Ahmadiyyas have iPhones since they are a relatively well-off community compared to the rest of Pakistan (or the Muslim world in general).
      - shadowgovt 6y ago
        Very good point. I had my viewpoint focused on Android and forgot that the side-loading question on Apple is very different.
        selimthegrim 6y ago
        I can tell you none of my cousins over there who belong to that community had an iPhone last time I saw them, they were busy making fun of an old iPhone I had brought to sell compared to their Androids
vmception 6y ago
Pakistan has a constitution. Appstores operate in Pakistan and comply with their government. There is no free speech analogy to countries with a different constitution.
- jshevek 6y ago
  > There is no free speech analogy to countries with a different constitution You use the phrase "free speech" as if it referred only to a legal requirement, and not also an ethical principle.
  - shadowgovt 6y ago
    People disagree on the ethical principle of free speech, and arguing that Google or Apple have a duty to that ethical principle begs the question of the ethical principle itself.
    - jshevek 6y ago
      Begging the question is a specific logical fallacy which does not apply in this case.
      - jfk13 6y ago
        And to insist that "begging the question" refers to a specific logical fallacy is to ignore well-established present-day vernacular usage. In everyday discussion, pedantry rarely helps. In this case, it was pretty obvious what was meant. https://www.merriam-webster.com/words-at-play/beg-the-question https://www.merriam-webster.com/words-at-play/beg-the-questi...
  - vmception 6y ago
    Astute observation. Try not to shoehorn something that has no consensus into every legal issue. The entire discussion to me is as simple as I stated.
    - 6y ago
d1zzy 6y ago
> On another hand you have Google and Apple, yet again, being the complicit chokepoints of “free speech”, with regard to app developers. And how is that detail is pertinent to this discussion? If it wasn't Google or Apple it would be other companies. Even if it wasn't large companies it would be 100 smaller companies and all those 100 smaller companies would have to comply (even more so because they have fewer resources to fight a government deciding things in their own country).
- AlexandrB 6y ago
  Smaller companies might not have as much commercial exposure in Pakistan - i.e. if they have no formal business presence there, what would be the consequences for them not complying? For example, if these "apps" were traditional Windows executables instead who would the government on Pakistan lean on to get them blocked? The best they could do is attempt a "great firewall of China" style block on internet traffic itself.
djrogers 6y ago
You make a great argument for Governments that support religious freedom. Not sure I follow your logic to a conclusion that makes Apple and Google the villains here though. A&G have a binary choice - serve users in (Oppressive Country X) or not. There is no choice that involves serving those users but not following the oppressive laws of said country.
- Siira 6y ago
  VPNs are a thing.
- andrewnicolalde 6y ago
  By following this oppressive law to "serve those users," Apple and Google appear to be partaking in the oppression of those users.
  - pas 6y ago
    Is oppression additive/cumulative/composable/transitive? When someone has the power to do "fix" things but chooses not to, then that someone is partially responsible. Can A or G (or together) fix this?
    - snoshy 6y ago
      It sure seems additive in this case. Google & Apple can choose not to do business in regulatory regimes that are oppressive in nature. That obviously comes at a direct cost of lost revenue from abstinence. It is a deliberate choice to do business anywhere at all. The simple fix here as you say, would be to stop doing business when forced to enact business practices that further oppression. Make no mistake, it is monetary greed that drives the choice to assent to this.
      - pas 6y ago
        If they choose not to do business will that fix the problem? Will that make these oppressive regimes go away? Monetary greed might be good or bad, they might or might not be doing business there for greed, but it's not the question. The question is how does oppression algebra works. An oppressive regime is oppressive, by definition, nomen es omen. In this instance we likely agree that forcing private companies to selectively deny service to a minority/vulnerable group of the population is textbook oppression. How withdrawing from that country/jurisdiction decreases sum-total-oppression? (I mean the usual argument is that a trade embargo helps people realize that things are bad! Plus it prepares the economy for war, so no one will be surprised when their supplier/distributor/buyers become unavailable due to blockade/bombardment/etc. In case of selling weapons and surveillance systems the math seems to be simple. But it seems in that case the oppression is again in the name of the game. Rarely oppressed people buy tanks to stand up to that same oppression. So if a service provider is coerced to provide data about vulnerable/minority groups, that again seems a very textbook case. In this case maybe the analogy is that Apple/Google is supplying water - for money - but this oppressive regime uses it to waterboard people. Does shutting down the service helps?)
w0mbat 6y ago
>"Would it be fair if England declared Catholics “unChristian” and banned their use if the term?" I assume you know that happened all the time during the Reformation period with Henry the Eighth starting it, with a contrasting bit in the middle where Bloody Mary persecuted non-Catholics instead. They were bored and the internet hadn't been invented yet. Once kings and queens weren't in charge, things got a lot more relaxed in that area.
tenebrisalietum 6y ago
This is why separation of religion and state is a good idea, but not all state-level entities do this for various reasons. Anyway ... if - a home entity is operating in a foreign realm, - obeys the laws of the foreign realm, - brings back money to the home realm, - doesn't try to turn the home realm into the foreign realm. what is the problem? Just because a company operates in a foreign realm under their laws doesn't mean it's trying to turn its home realm into the foreign realm. Now, if the entity is partially owned by the foreign realm ... then we can question motives, of course.
- loveistheanswer 6y ago
  Here's some historical precedent of how that can be a problem: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/IBM_and_the_Holocaust https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/IBM_and_the_Holocaust
kamel3d 6y ago
Seems you have no understanding what Ahmadiyya standing for, let's clarify something first, one morning an Orange start calling herself Apple, should we start calling this Orange apple? should to Orange get offended if we still call it Apple? well we have to call the Orange Orange based on our well established understanding of the characteristics of a na orange and what makes it different, Ahmadiyya is widely considered non longer muslims amount the islamic world and islamic scholars, same fore Durouz in Lebanon for example, Ahmadiyya is against one of the main pillars of islam that prophet Mohamed is the last one but this movement founder declared himself a prophet and that god talks to him in english, this was established in 1889 during the British colonialism to India, islam consider people from other religions as infidel and it dose not seem to be an issue to christians or Jews how they are being seen by islam, and same thing goes to Christianity it dose not consider muslims as christians and I am sure muslims are happy not getting offended by not being Christians so I don't get it why this definitions are an issue while it comes to Ahmadyya, also I don't get your point of free speech while Ahmadyya are free to call themselves what they want and Muslims are also free to describe Ahmadyya the way they considered it right
- nethunters 6y ago
  Funnily enough the Ahamdis don't consider normal Muslims to be Muslims too! Statements of Mirza Basheer-ud-Din, Ghulam Ahmad’s son and successor, including what he wrote in his book Ayena-e-Sadaaqat (p.35): “Verily, every Muslim who does not pledge allegiance to the Promised Messiah (Mirza Ghulam Ahmad), whether he heard of his name or not, is a disbeliever and outside the fold of Islam!” He is also quoted in the Qadiani periodical, Al-Fazl (30th July 1931) as reporting from his father, Ghulam Ahmad himself that he said: “We disagree with the Muslims in everything: concerning God, the Messenger, the Qur’aan, prayer, fasting, hajj and zakaah. There is a fundamental difference of opinion between us in all of these things!” https://www.masjidattaqwa.co.nz/ahmadiyya/ https://www.masjidattaqwa.co.nz/ahmadiyya/
  - selimthegrim 6y ago
    Like Jinnah, Mirza Basheer said a lot of things at one time and a lot of diametrically opposite things at another. Punishing people who aren't dead for something someone who is dead said is a bad idea, so is predicating citizenship rights. Do you think I asked for who my parents were? Do you think it's fair they couldn't even register their marriage in Pak and could only give Nikahnama to American embassy on the way out?

RcouF1uZ4gsC 6y ago

If we got to that situation, that would be the result of far greater problems than having or not having a particular app.

jariel 6y ago

"These may seem fair to you" I don't see 'seeming fair' to most people. This is just yet another example of Google and Apple's monopoly preferences being leveraged by entities that have more leverage than them. It has to stop. Free The Apps.

kmeisthax 6y ago
The PTA isn't stopping at walled-garden App Stores; Google and Apple are just one of the few countries large enough to have a physical presence Pakistan can threaten. They also threatened a handful of US-based web hosts who are basically prohibited from seeing their families until they censor this sect. (And yes, I'm using the word 'censor' here. It is entirely appropriate under even the narrowest definitions of the word, as the decision to remove content was made with the force of law. The US has similar provisions known as the 'state actors doctrine'.)
bluejekyll 6y ago
It took me a second to get this argument, but it’s a good one. If there were thousands of marketplaces on iOS and Android, then Pakistan would have to negotiate the removal on all of this platforms, as opposed to only two. Spelling it out clearly like that, it makes me wonder if there are many governments that prefer to have monopolies to deal with, rather than many companies. It certainly makes regulation simpler.
- username90 6y ago
  You can look at how many governments have managed to keep websites they don't like down. Thepiratebay and tons of other illegal sites are still available today in most places of the world even where they are illegal. If we didn't have the free open web and instead just had appstore like gatekeepers none of those sites would be allowed to exist.
- jariel 6y ago
  I personally worked for a large tech company and was involved with 'content filtering discussions' with questionable regimes. HN doesn't like such arguments, it's not an argument, just an experience. It's common. Pragmatically speaking, it's much harder for Pakistan to filter the entire web, than control international conglomerates which they generally can do. We need diversity in search, and absolutely need to have 'many app stores' and 'direct downloads'. The arguments for 'security' are rubbish, and the plebes supporting Apple's monopoly I don't think understand what's happening. In US anti-trust cases, generally there has be evidence of 'harm to consumers' - well - these 'bans' absolutely represent harm. Bans of Apps (even unsavoury things like Parler) and unquestionably arbitrary controls on choice that harm consumers. Moreover, Apple's 30% cut is a pretty obvious harm once you do the economic calculation. So Apple should be more like Google - and - just as the EU has proposed with search wherein you get to choose your vendor, not defaults negotiated behind the scenes - the same goes with app stores. Once the regulatory action is taken - we will still have secure apps, and there will be greater opportunity. In hindsight it will seem obvious and actually kind of simple.
  - zepto 6y ago
    > Apple's 30% cut is a pretty obvious harm once you do the economic calculation. Not really. You have to compare it to a counter-factual, and those are generally made up to support whatever position you already hold. Also, it’s not 30%. It’s 15% for almost all developers.

u801e 6y ago

The fundamental issue with the argument you're presenting is that Pakistan is not a secular country, unlike England or the USA. An example of a country that bases their government on a particular religion allowing citizens to freely declare whether they're adherents of that religion even if their practice differs significantly compared to established orthodoxy would significantly strengthen this assertion.

Veen 6y ago
> Pakistan is not a secular country, unlike England or the USA It's a minor quibble, but England does have an established national Church, so it's not entirely secular in the way the US is. 26 CofE Bishops sit in the House of Lords, the Lords Spiritual. The head of state is also the head of the Church.
- imbnwa 6y ago
  It is so fascinating how fascinated all these Germanic kingdoms in Western Europe were with emulating the Romans
  - danans 6y ago
    Until Henry VIII's divorce of Catherine of Aragon, England had the same church as Rome.
  - thaumasiotes 6y ago
    Why? Rome was vastly richer and more powerful than they were, and the only model of success they ever knew.
- username90 6y ago
  Yet England feel way more secular than USA in practice, given how much Christianity seems to matter in US politics.
  - DigiDigiorno 6y ago

umvi 6y ago

> Would it be fair if England declared Catholics "unChristian" and banned their use if the term? I think it's slightly more nuanced than that. For example, England should be able to declare whether a given group of people are members of the Church of England (organization). Wherever a centralized authority exists, that authority should have the power to declare whether or not someone is a member of the organization. The Catholic church should absolutely be able to declare some rogue sect that claims to be Catholic "unCatholic". However, you are absolutely right, where no centralized authority exists no one should be able to classify others' high level beliefs. Whether someone is Jewish, Christian, Islam, Atheist, etc. is not up to anyone but the individual adherent. If you believe in Jesus Christ and believe you are following his teachings, you are a Christian and no government or conglomerate of sects should be able to say otherwise. If you believe in Mohammed and the tenets of Islam, no government or conglomerate of sects should be able to say you are not a Muslim.

vorpalhex 6y ago
Not everyone agrees with any given central authority. In religion especially this is often over relatively complex reasons that outsiders probably aren't in a position to try and navigate. You need only to refer to religious history and it's many wars to see this: the tri-part nature of Christ, the exact date of Easter, the shaving of heads in early English history, etc. Nor should we start allowing the Church of England to press Google into service putting it's agenda forward. We recognize that dissent is an important part of free speech!
CivBase 6y ago
> England should be able to declare whether a given group of people are members of the Church of England (organization). Wherever a centralized authority exists, that authority should have the power to declare whether or not someone is a member of the organization. The Catholic church should absolutely be able to declare some rogue sect that claims to be Catholic "unCatholic". They should have the power to declare whether or not they consider someone to be a member of an organization. Nothing more. This goes beyond simply declaring whether or not they consider Ahmadis to be Muslims. The Pakistani government is using "anti-blasphemy" laws to silence anyone who objects to their declaration.

gadders 6y ago

This isn't censorship, this is just a private company deciding who is and isn't allowed on their platform. All Ahmadiyya muslims have to do is start their own company to make mobile phones and probably their own search engine as well.

deleted 6y ago
[deleted]
commandlinefan 6y ago
And, increasingly, their own banking and internet routing infrastructure as well.
- deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]
- baybal2 6y ago
  FYI, Pakistan's biggest banks are owned by Ahmadis. Quite a number in India too.
  - selimthegrim 6y ago
    Citation? You'd think they'd be being boycotted like Shezan was then. And the claim about India is even more out there. Are you sure you're not thinking about Memons like Adamjee?
deleted 6y ago
[deleted]
triceratops 6y ago
> this is just a private company deciding who is and isn't allowed on their platform. No, this actually is censorship because a government ordered that it be done.
jshevek 6y ago
> This isn't censorship, this is just a private company deciding who is and isn't allowed on their platform This fits the definition of censorship. Maybe you meant to say this isn't governmental censorship? Edit: Poe's law

SpicyLemonZest 6y ago

I wouldn’t say that I’m defending the practice. It’s a bad decision and I wish Pakistan wouldn’t censor these apps. But it really does seem like the responsibility lies with Pakistan here. The article suggests Google’s trying hard to keep these apps up, and has indeed kept some up despite government pressure. At the end of the day, their options to resist legal demands are limited, and it’s hard for me to see an argument that this relatively small instance of censorship is so important they should shut down operations in Pakistan over it.

LeifCarrotson 6y ago
> At the end of the day, their options to resist legal demands are limited They're really not. Google is not based in Pakistan, and they don't have offices or datacenters in Pakistan. Why should they take _global_ action against developers who are _located in the US_ on the request of someone who does not have jurisdiction over them? It's interesting how this plays out in reverse to the typical copyright fights - people violating US intellectual property law in Pakistan (or wherever) are often litigated under those US laws; here they're litigating against Americans based on Pakistani laws.
- selimthegrim 6y ago
  Indeed, in the final appeal that failed in Pakistan against these laws (Zaheeruddin v. State) the Supreme Court bench cited the Coca-Cola trademark as an example
- Dma54rhs 6y ago
  Im sure they do sell ads in Pakistan and want in the future? An independent state could strangle that business in many easy ways if that is their mission, therefor Google will eventually do whatever it takes to stay in the market.
- SpicyLemonZest 6y ago
  They shouldn't and haven't taken global action against the developers. The apps remain available outside of Pakistan - you can find them if you search for "ahmadiyya muslim community quran".

jmull 6y ago

The (rather massive) flaw in your reasoning is the idea that Google and Apple are the solution to the problem. If you live in a society without religious freedom, that's a big problem, but Apple and Google can't fix it. If you care about the problem, it's important to understand this. If you succeed in getting people to focus on symptom of the problem and not the cause, you will help prevent it from being addressed.

username90 6y ago
Apple and Google put themselves in a position where they became a part of the problem. If they ran open platforms where they don't have to power to ban apps this would never have happened.
- shadowgovt 6y ago
  Those open platforms exist. Can the apps in question be downloaded in Pakistan via F-Droid?
  - fakedang 6y ago
    What about the iOS users? AFAIK, it's more likely the Ahmadiyyas have iPhones since they are a relatively well-off community compared to the rest of Pakistan (or the Muslim world in general).
    - shadowgovt 6y ago
      Very good point. I had my viewpoint focused on Android and forgot that the side-loading question on Apple is very different.
      - selimthegrim 6y ago
        I can tell you none of my cousins over there who belong to that community had an iPhone last time I saw them, they were busy making fun of an old iPhone I had brought to sell compared to their Androids

vmception 6y ago

Pakistan has a constitution. Appstores operate in Pakistan and comply with their government. There is no free speech analogy to countries with a different constitution.

jshevek 6y ago
> There is no free speech analogy to countries with a different constitution You use the phrase "free speech" as if it referred only to a legal requirement, and not also an ethical principle.
- shadowgovt 6y ago
  People disagree on the ethical principle of free speech, and arguing that Google or Apple have a duty to that ethical principle begs the question of the ethical principle itself.
  - jshevek 6y ago
    Begging the question is a specific logical fallacy which does not apply in this case.
    - jfk13 6y ago
      And to insist that "begging the question" refers to a specific logical fallacy is to ignore well-established present-day vernacular usage. In everyday discussion, pedantry rarely helps. In this case, it was pretty obvious what was meant. https://www.merriam-webster.com/words-at-play/beg-the-question https://www.merriam-webster.com/words-at-play/beg-the-questi...
- vmception 6y ago
  Astute observation. Try not to shoehorn something that has no consensus into every legal issue. The entire discussion to me is as simple as I stated.
  - 6y ago

d1zzy 6y ago

> On another hand you have Google and Apple, yet again, being the complicit chokepoints of “free speech”, with regard to app developers. And how is that detail is pertinent to this discussion? If it wasn't Google or Apple it would be other companies. Even if it wasn't large companies it would be 100 smaller companies and all those 100 smaller companies would have to comply (even more so because they have fewer resources to fight a government deciding things in their own country).

AlexandrB 6y ago
Smaller companies might not have as much commercial exposure in Pakistan - i.e. if they have no formal business presence there, what would be the consequences for them not complying? For example, if these "apps" were traditional Windows executables instead who would the government on Pakistan lean on to get them blocked? The best they could do is attempt a "great firewall of China" style block on internet traffic itself.

djrogers 6y ago

You make a great argument for Governments that support religious freedom. Not sure I follow your logic to a conclusion that makes Apple and Google the villains here though. A&G have a binary choice - serve users in (Oppressive Country X) or not. There is no choice that involves serving those users but not following the oppressive laws of said country.

Siira 6y ago
VPNs are a thing.
andrewnicolalde 6y ago
By following this oppressive law to "serve those users," Apple and Google appear to be partaking in the oppression of those users.
- pas 6y ago
  Is oppression additive/cumulative/composable/transitive? When someone has the power to do "fix" things but chooses not to, then that someone is partially responsible. Can A or G (or together) fix this?
  - snoshy 6y ago
    It sure seems additive in this case. Google & Apple can choose not to do business in regulatory regimes that are oppressive in nature. That obviously comes at a direct cost of lost revenue from abstinence. It is a deliberate choice to do business anywhere at all. The simple fix here as you say, would be to stop doing business when forced to enact business practices that further oppression. Make no mistake, it is monetary greed that drives the choice to assent to this.
    - pas 6y ago
      If they choose not to do business will that fix the problem? Will that make these oppressive regimes go away? Monetary greed might be good or bad, they might or might not be doing business there for greed, but it's not the question. The question is how does oppression algebra works. An oppressive regime is oppressive, by definition, nomen es omen. In this instance we likely agree that forcing private companies to selectively deny service to a minority/vulnerable group of the population is textbook oppression. How withdrawing from that country/jurisdiction decreases sum-total-oppression? (I mean the usual argument is that a trade embargo helps people realize that things are bad! Plus it prepares the economy for war, so no one will be surprised when their supplier/distributor/buyers become unavailable due to blockade/bombardment/etc. In case of selling weapons and surveillance systems the math seems to be simple. But it seems in that case the oppression is again in the name of the game. Rarely oppressed people buy tanks to stand up to that same oppression. So if a service provider is coerced to provide data about vulnerable/minority groups, that again seems a very textbook case. In this case maybe the analogy is that Apple/Google is supplying water - for money - but this oppressive regime uses it to waterboard people. Does shutting down the service helps?)

w0mbat 6y ago

>"Would it be fair if England declared Catholics “unChristian” and banned their use if the term?" I assume you know that happened all the time during the Reformation period with Henry the Eighth starting it, with a contrasting bit in the middle where Bloody Mary persecuted non-Catholics instead. They were bored and the internet hadn't been invented yet. Once kings and queens weren't in charge, things got a lot more relaxed in that area.

tenebrisalietum 6y ago

This is why separation of religion and state is a good idea, but not all state-level entities do this for various reasons. Anyway ... if - a home entity is operating in a foreign realm, - obeys the laws of the foreign realm, - brings back money to the home realm, - doesn't try to turn the home realm into the foreign realm. what is the problem? Just because a company operates in a foreign realm under their laws doesn't mean it's trying to turn its home realm into the foreign realm. Now, if the entity is partially owned by the foreign realm ... then we can question motives, of course.

loveistheanswer 6y ago
Here's some historical precedent of how that can be a problem: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/IBM_and_the_Holocaust https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/IBM_and_the_Holocaust

kamel3d 6y ago

Seems you have no understanding what Ahmadiyya standing for, let's clarify something first, one morning an Orange start calling herself Apple, should we start calling this Orange apple? should to Orange get offended if we still call it Apple? well we have to call the Orange Orange based on our well established understanding of the characteristics of a na orange and what makes it different, Ahmadiyya is widely considered non longer muslims amount the islamic world and islamic scholars, same fore Durouz in Lebanon for example, Ahmadiyya is against one of the main pillars of islam that prophet Mohamed is the last one but this movement founder declared himself a prophet and that god talks to him in english, this was established in 1889 during the British colonialism to India, islam consider people from other religions as infidel and it dose not seem to be an issue to christians or Jews how they are being seen by islam, and same thing goes to Christianity it dose not consider muslims as christians and I am sure muslims are happy not getting offended by not being Christians so I don't get it why this definitions are an issue while it comes to Ahmadyya, also I don't get your point of free speech while Ahmadyya are free to call themselves what they want and Muslims are also free to describe Ahmadyya the way they considered it right

nethunters 6y ago
Funnily enough the Ahamdis don't consider normal Muslims to be Muslims too! Statements of Mirza Basheer-ud-Din, Ghulam Ahmad’s son and successor, including what he wrote in his book Ayena-e-Sadaaqat (p.35): “Verily, every Muslim who does not pledge allegiance to the Promised Messiah (Mirza Ghulam Ahmad), whether he heard of his name or not, is a disbeliever and outside the fold of Islam!” He is also quoted in the Qadiani periodical, Al-Fazl (30th July 1931) as reporting from his father, Ghulam Ahmad himself that he said: “We disagree with the Muslims in everything: concerning God, the Messenger, the Qur’aan, prayer, fasting, hajj and zakaah. There is a fundamental difference of opinion between us in all of these things!” https://www.masjidattaqwa.co.nz/ahmadiyya/ https://www.masjidattaqwa.co.nz/ahmadiyya/
- selimthegrim 6y ago
  Like Jinnah, Mirza Basheer said a lot of things at one time and a lot of diametrically opposite things at another. Punishing people who aren't dead for something someone who is dead said is a bad idea, so is predicating citizenship rights. Do you think I asked for who my parents were? Do you think it's fair they couldn't even register their marriage in Pak and could only give Nikahnama to American embassy on the way out?