Google Explains Why It Banned the App For Gab, a Right-Wing Twitter Rival (arstechnica.com) 530
AmiMoJo shares a report from Ars Technica: When right-wing trolls and outright racists get kicked off of Twitter, they often move to Gab, a right-wing Twitter competitor. Gab was founded by Andrew Torba, who says it's devoted to unfettered free expression online. The site also hosts controversial right-wing figures like Milo Yiannopoulos, Andrew 'weev' Auernheimer and Andrew Anglin, editor of the neo-Nazi site Daily Stormer. On Thursday, Gab said that Google had banned its Android app from the Google Play Store for violating Google's ban on hate speech. The app's main competitor, Twitter, hosts accounts like the American Nazi Party, the Ku Klux Klan, and the virulently anti-gay Westboro Baptist Church, yet the Twitter app is still available on the Google Play store. Apple has long had more restrictive app store policies, and it originally rejected the Gab app for allowing pornographic content to be posted on the service -- despite the fact that hardcore pornography is readily available on Twitter. In an email to Ars, Google explained its decision to remove Gab from the Play Store: "In order to be on the Play Store, social networking apps need to demonstrate a sufficient level of moderation, including for content that encourages violence and advocates hate against groups of people. This is a long-standing rule and clearly stated in our developer policies. Developers always have the opportunity to appeal a suspension and may have their apps reinstated if they've addressed the policy violations and are compliant with our Developer Program Policies."
So which one is lying then? (Score:2, Insightful)
Considering that Whatsapp and Telegram are both on the Play Store, who is lying, Whatapp/Telegram developers or Google?
Re:So which one is lying then? (Score:5, Informative)
Considering that Whatsapp and Telegram are both on the Play Store, who is lying, Whatapp/Telegram developers or Google?
Trick question, you are lying to yourself because those aren't social networking apps.
Re: So which one is lying then? (Score:3)
It is.
Reddit is just a forum, same for twitter.
Re:So which one is lying then? (Score:5, Informative)
Google. Google is lying. You can find child trafficking and child pornography rings on Candid and Twitter -- especially if you understand Arabic.
This was a political decision based on the Mass Hysteria that people are falling under this week.
Re:So which one is lying then? (Score:4)
Why lie? What do you get from it? Gab specifically allows anything as long as it follows the DOST test. [wikipedia.org] That means it allows for any permitted speech under US law and the drop point is "fighting words" are banned and actual child pornography(as defined under US law) is banned. It believes that if a person finds something offensive they should block it on their own.
The only thing you're showing is just how much you're against free speech though. What do you gain by letting a corporation be the gate keeper for your speech?
Re:So which one is lying then? (Score:5, Informative)
Google allows plenty of hate speech on their site. Just take a look over at Gazi "Black Hitler" Kodzo and his related videos. Hate speech is perfectly OK by Google and the left, as long as you target the right people with your hate.
Stanley Kubrick meets Google (Score:5, Funny)
From Dr. Strangelove:
Admiral Randolph: Try one of these Jamaican cigars, Ambassador. They're pretty good.
Ambassador de Sadesky: Thank you, no. I do not support the work of imperialist stooges.
Admiral Randolph: Oh, only commie stooges, huh?
Because they've abandoned their claimed principles (Score:5, Insightful)
They can explain all they want, but the Google that claimed "A free and open world depends on a free and open Internet." cannot without contradiction ban an app from its store for the crime of _not censoring its users sufficiently_.
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Re:Because they've abandoned their claimed princip (Score:5, Insightful)
Wait, I'm confused. Banning Nazi's is bad??
Yes, banning Nazis is bad. Everyone should have the right to express themselves. The First Amendment does not say "Congress shall make no law respecting abridging the freedom of speech unless you are a Nazi". In addition to the principle of freedom of expression, there is also the practical argument: Sunlight is a good disinfectant. It is better for extremism to be discussed and confronted openly rather than festering in the shadows.
"The trouble with fighting for human freedom is that one spends most of one's time defending scoundrels. For it is against scoundrels that oppressive laws are first aimed, and oppression must be stopped at the beginning if it is to be stopped at all." --H. L. Mencken
If you oppose what the Nazis stand for, then you should support their right to speak.
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Killing them all in a war they start is the best.
Fake news. Everybody knows that Poland shot first [wikipedia.org].
Re:Because they've abandoned their claimed princip (Score:5, Insightful)
It became bad when I started to classify everyone who does not adhere to my ideology and my moral values as a Nazi. Oh, and since I'm pretty sure you will not adhere to my ideology and my moral values, it means you are a Nazi, and therefore you should not be allowed to speak. We live in a very sad world when people like you can express their opinions.
Seriously, when did people forget that we must allow everyone to speak, including Marxists and Nazis, in order to explain to them why they are wrong (or to realize why we are wrong)? When did people forget that if people can't speak, their only solution will be to use violence?
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when did people forget that we must allow everyone to speak, including Marxists and Nazis, in order to explain to them why they are wrong (or to realize why we are wrong)?
The people in question never believed that. That stuff was just a sales pitch -- a pretend argument for use only when it was beneficial. They have power now, so shut up.
When did people forget that if people can't speak, their only solution will be to use violence?
Violence is their goal. Look what it got them this week.
Re:Because they've abandoned their claimed princip (Score:4, Informative)
Just remember that the laws you create to oppress your enemies today will be used against you tomorrow.
Just ask this guy [wikipedia.org].
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They've already kinda experienced this.
It turns out that most people don't buy the nonsense "Racism is power plus prejudice and white people have all the power, so only whites can be racist, and you can't be racist towards whites, just prejudiced, and that's ok because white people are responsible for all the evil in the world" crap that radical Alt-Leftists spout off regularly. Which means that anti-racism rules on say, Facebook, Twitter, etc have been hitting the most radical of the Alt-Left, which has b
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Wait, I'm confused. Banning Nazi's is bad?? How did that happen?
First they came for the Nazis, blah blah blah. And before anyone cries out "slippery slope fallacy!", it's not a slippery slope: banning speech because it's socially unacceptable is banning speed because it's socially unacceptable. There's no slope, just a flat level field.
I'm sure someone's also going to point out "free speech only applies to the government!" Legally, yes, Google has the ability to ban whatever it wants. The question is a moral one, not a legal one, although sometime soon there absolutely
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A "free and open Internet" means not banning for disagreement. Enjoy seeing exactly what Google allows you to see and never anything else. You didn't really want to choose for yourself anyway.
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How brave of you to label an entire platform as Nazis. Really adds weight to your babble about moral and ethical obligations
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Re: Because they've abandoned their claimed princi (Score:5, Interesting)
You are the moral successor of the killers of Socrates.
Re:Because they've abandoned their claimed princip (Score:4, Insightful)
These kids have spent too much time in their bedrooms fake shooting people to understand the moral and ethical obligation to destroy Nazism and all of its sympathizers.
I will defend to the death your right to free speech, unless I don't like you. Then I'll shoot you my own damn self and say good riddance to bad ideas.
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I will defend to the death your right to free speech, unless I don't like you. Then I'll shoot you my own damn self and say good riddance to bad ideas.
I think I may have found a new sig block...
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I will, so don't try another putsch if you don't want to end up like your hero;
I have no idea what "hero" you seem to be referring to. I made no such reference. What I did was make a clear reference to an old saying about people who support the right to free speech, just twisting it to match your own statements about destroying the people who support nazism.
It shows the dichotomy between what people use to think about free speech and what the current meme is. You feeling justified in destroying them for their thoughts is a bit extreme, I think. And it clearly leaves no room for a ra
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I am justified in killing those who are terrorists and who increase violence through radical racism and hate.
You claimed the ethical duty to destroy sympathizers. That is a very large, poorly defined group, often doing nothing more than having thoughts that you do not like. You almost certainly include me in that group simply because I question your right to kill people just because they think differently than you do.
Look up the catechism of the 5th commandment.
Ahh, a Holy Crusade. Amongst your weaponry is ... You, sir, give Catholics a bad name.
As I expected, there is no rational discussion on this matter with you. You accept the ethical duty to kill other
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> These kids have spent too much time in their bedrooms
You're the child that doesn't understand anything.
You're projecting. You're really the basement dwelling child that plays FPS games and fancies himself comparable to the greatest generation.
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I think it's a great idea to call Communists the "alt-left".
It is a great way to distinguish liberalism from the current nonsense for those of us that are liberals but not communists.
It's also a handy way to segregate those that don't really actually believe in liberal values.
You morons can stop hijacking the term now.
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morons can stop hijacking the term now.
If only they would.
Re: Because they've abandoned their claimed princ (Score:3)
Nice hysterical propaganda! Did you know capitalism has killed at least 205,000,000?
See the problem is, both these figures have a certain truth to them, even putting aside the inevitable politically inspired exaggerations. Yet both figures also have a major element of hand-wavy bullshittiness.
In both cases the overwhelming majority of the claimed casualties were not killed by gubmint bullets, but by the results of economic policies. Problem is, everyone dies eventually, and most causes of premature death a
Re: Because they've abandoned their claimed princ (Score:4, Informative)
In both cases the overwhelming majority of the claimed casualties were not killed by gubmint bullets, but by the results of economic policies.
No! Mao and Stalin's apologists certainly tried to claim that. The truth about the Holodomor got out though. Stripping the entire Ukraine of food at gunpoint to start millions is not economic policy, it's mass murder! You have noticed there is conflict between Russia and the Ukraine now, right? You seem like a Holodomor denier, don't you?
How about Mao's great leap forward? How many millions dead? When he invited public criticism and then exterminated any who spoke up? 50 million dead? What's your answer? everyone dies eventually Ah yes, compassion. And against hate speech. How... conveniently defined too.
Stalin's gulag prison death camps? The Gulag Archipelago slightly more convincing than hand waving you know.
Shrill hysteria like "Ideology X killed N people! Reeeeeee!" does nothing to advance our understanding of politics or economy.
You are a denier. I bet you're a special kind, that believes in the Nazi holocaust but not Mao's or any of Stalin's. 'Bolshevik labeled authoritarianism is good' does seem to be trendy.
Re:Because they've abandoned their claimed princip (Score:5, Informative)
It happened a couple of days ago, if you've been watching the idiotic alt-right (nazi sympathizers) on YouTube. It started when trump threw them their next meme to bounce off their echo chamber walls: "alt-left".
Yes, and now opposing right wing extremists, nazis, and white supremacists is considered to be an "alternate" viewpoint.
Meet Eric Clanton, an Antifa -- Alt Left -- icon.
He's a professor at Berkeley. He teaches ETHICS.
He tried to murder 7 people with a Bike lock during the Berkley riots. Here's a video of one of his attacks:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?... [youtube.com]
Note that there are two female Alt-Left domestic terrorists that provide a distraction and point his victim out to Eric. Note that the other ISIS cosplaying losers protect Eric by opening a hole in the wall so he can attack and then preventing anyone from restraining Eric for the police.
Eric's reasoning? The students wanted to see a Gay Jewish Immigrant speak about the dangers of Islam and a Conservative woman talk about how great America is, and he felt that they shouldn't be allowed to do that.
Fortunately, thanks to 4chan tracking him down, he's looking at a long, LONG time in jail: http://www.berkeleyside.com/20... [berkeleyside.com]
There's an Alt Left, they're way worse than the Alt Right, and the more the "enlightened left" pretends they don't exist the more people like Clanton out there feel emboldened to try to murder people in the streets.
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Meet Eric Clanton, an Antifa -- Alt Left -- icon.
Well, I guess if you invent the term alt-left, you can invent their icons too. I guess worldbuilding is a valid passtime, but I don't see why you're pretending it's reality. That whole fourth wall thing was done and dusted in the late 1700s.
He's a professor at Berkeley. He teaches ETHICS.
I don't think "East Bay Commnuity College" qualifies as Berkeley.
He tried to murder 7 people with a Bike lock during the Berkley riots. Here's a video of one of his attacks:
T
Re: Because they've abandoned their claimed princi (Score:5, Insightful)
Being a communist is every bit as bad as being a neo-nazi.
Worse, actually, given how many people Marxism has killed and how much suffering they have caused. Hitler has nothing on Marx, Stalin, or Lenin. At least Nazis don't try to indoctrinate kids and preach that "it wasn't real nazism."
The hammer and sickle should be considered every bit as offensive as the swastika, and for the same reason.
Re:Because they've abandoned their claimed princip (Score:5, Funny)
Sure it can. They aren't preventing people from using the app on their phones, they just aren't carrying it in their store.
It's like saying Barnes and Noble is against free speech because they don't stock every book in print.
Re:Because they've abandoned their claimed princip (Score:4, Insightful)
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That's because google also happens to have freedoms. In this case freedom of association.
Ahh, the "freedom ofassociation" meme again. Ok.
I have a business -- a small diner. I have freedom of association, right? I don't serve African Americans as part of the exercise of my freedom of association. You're ok with that, right?
Before you say "protected class", remember that "protected class" is a legal, not natural, definition, and it changes over time.
cause being stuff like inciting violence, which includes turning a blind eye when a significant portion of their users incite violence
Would you claim that gmail incites violence when it does nothing to monitor or filter the email of its users, and a significant (subjective term) p
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Re: Because they've abandoned their claimed princi (Score:5, Informative)
You're a retard for implying that allowing someone else free speech has become illegal.
With the current ideological environment amongst the 15-30yo demographic and people like you, I'm sure it won't be long before the first amendment is amended.
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And who gets to define what's true?
Is it me?? It's, me isn't it!?!
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" It's never about free to spew hate towards a subset of society. That's the law, that's societies view."
Son, that sure as fuck didn't stop Henry Anslinger and the Federal Government in criminalizing Cannabis. Wake the fuck up, go back to school, and pay some attention to real history.
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"I must have missed that class, are you trying to say society wants to legalize marijuana and the law is against it?"
No, I'm trying to say that plenty of hate was spewed BY THE LAW towards a subset of society, all for a political purpose. If you don't know who Harry (not Henry, derp) Anslinger is, I highly suggest you read up.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
Re: Because they've abandoned their claimed princ (Score:4, Insightful)
Wrong. There is no "hate speech" provision in the 1st amendment. To suggest otherwise shows:
1. A complete lack of understanding of American ideals.
2. A disgusting, horrifying level of illiberal authoritarianism, which makes me think you're some kind of arch Neo-Con on par with George Bush Jr or Hillary Clinton.
Like it or not, the most vile among us have the right to speak and assemble in public. This does not include having some hipster douchebags cosplaying as ISIS attacking them.
Now, you can make some argument about Google, Cloudfire, etc being private companies, but we're approaching the point where a handful of companies' decisions can have massive effects on citizen's free speech, which brings forth the idea that maybe, just maybe, the Government isn't allowed outsource censorship and oppression to corporations to do it for them -- in other words, that the 1st amendment prevents Google et all from discriminating like this.
Re: Because they've abandoned their claimed prin (Score:3)
hate speech is only illegal in certain countries.
The USA gives the strongest protection for free speech in the world, and as such has no hate speech limitations.
Re: Because they've abandoned their claimed prin (Score:3, Informative)
Re: Because they've abandoned their claimed princ (Score:4)
If I say "cats are less intelligent than humans", does that mean I hate cats? Of course not.
I hate corrupt politicians. I hate socialists. I hate communists. I hate fascists. I think I'm perfectly justified in "spewing hate" towards those "subsets of society".
Hate speech is legal in the US. Furthermore, there is no such thing as "society's view". The majority may decide something, but the majority does not get to curtail freedom of speech.
Oh, and I also hate you: I think you are a totalitarian prick.
Re: Because they've abandoned their claimed prin (Score:3)
It does.
Not knowing the law of your own country is suite concerning.
Re: Because they've abandoned their claimed princi (Score:4, Insightful)
Inaccurate and untrue speech is still protected by the First Amendment.
No, not in all cases. Yell fire in a crowded theatre or slander someone and you are not protected. Is this really news to you?
Uh, it's been known for *years* that the "fire in a crowded theater" thing is BS.
https://www.popehat.com/2012/0... [popehat.com]
Re:Because they've abandoned their claimed princip (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Because they've abandoned their claimed princip (Score:4)
"Hate speech," which is Google's complaint here, doesn't exist. It has no definition and what little definition it has shifts to mean "things I personally find offensive and that target a group I feel should not be targeted."
There is no legal definition of such and it is protected by the first amendment -- and any laws against "hate speech" would be struck down under those grounds.
The only legal liability involved is Google screwing up and surrendering their Common Carrier status due to discriminating against Youtube channels and Google Play apps. They are now liable for every single youtube video and app on the google play store -- and anything anyone does with them. If someone gets an app on Google Play that breaks Wifi passwords, Google is now liable for damage, because they gave up their Common Carrier status.
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Allowing calls for violence is not a free and open world.
The few white nationalists at the march were marching alongside a handful (I heard there was only one) of Neo Nazis, and a much larger contingent of people who were simply opposed to the idea of tearing down statues because they offend PC obsessed millennials who have declared them unIslamic. Er, sorry, politically incorrect.
They were preaching nonviolence and they were nonviolent. Know how I know?
1. There was a march the night before -- where they had all those torches -- which was completely uneventful. T
"When right-wing trolls and outright racists" (Score:3, Interesting)
Yeah, that's shitty PC Ars Technica reporting all right.
Gift of Gab (Score:2)
Sounds like the place you wanna be on a Friday night.
Fascism (Score:2, Interesting)
Fascism is characterized by "forcible suppression of opposition".
First Google fires a guy who brings up the fact that they are suppressing opposite views. Now they kill off an app for a site with opposite views.
Yup, Google is fascist.
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You are an idiot.
Check your privilege, white man, when you're talking to non-whites. You think black people are idiots. That kind of racist downtalk to me, a black man, puts you squarely in the same room as those nazis you want to shut up.
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Google should check out the twitter app for hate (Score:4, Insightful)
As long as it's hate directed towards conservatives, twitter is perfectly ok with it. Death threats, rape threats, misogyny, racism, bigotry, and so on is perfectly ok as long as it's against the "right people."
Gab does ban some content (Score:5, Insightful)
Twitter was running #AssainateTrump same day Google pulled gab. And Gab is not the dark web google pretends it is. Gab bans child porn, doxing, criminal activity,
Saying gab has "sufficient level of moderation" isn't fooling anyone, it's some of the people using Gab Google doesn't like. But those people are everywhere.
Twitter hosts ISIS and other offensive speech and that's allowed in its TOS.
Facebook has kill Isreali groups, kill Republican groups, kill police groups.
Cloudflare protecting over 40 ISIS accounts according to Anonymous.
Google youtube pushing violent TYT on its trending page and specifically demonizing FCC approved content like Louder with Crowder and restricting PragerU (and many other non-left groups)
Silicon Valley pretending one groups offensive speech is acceptable and other isn't is hypocritical. This is political.
Same goes with not calling out ALT-LEFT violence. This is an ideology war, left vs right. Silicon Valley is just picking its side.
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Facebook has kill Isreali groups, kill Republican groups, kill police groups. Has anyone actually killed Republicans or police because they were egged on by Facebook groups?
Well, there was that group of Alt-Left BLM members that livestreamed a racist kidnapping and torture of a special needs white man on Facebook.
And there are alt-left groups online that Micah Johnson were in that may have radicalized him enough to kill those 5 cops in Dallas.
But I don't know of a smoking gun as of yet, no.
But I do take issue with this:
Flying the Nazi flag at a march is "aiding and abetting" an actual enemy of the USA that millions of Americans died defeating.
No, it isn't. The original Nazis are nearly a century gone. Anyone flying the flag now is just a tryhard LARPer who is doing it to upset people. And it wasn'
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I don't think the left vs right arbitrarily split, there are some fundamental things each side thinks is important. But most people are moderates, nobody wants violent Antifa or Racists around. And pretending militia, constitutionalists, tea party and normal Republicans are all alt-right is damn well disingenuous. And neither are proud boys, 4 channers or r/the_donald meme posters.
We all know who the Alt-Right is, Spencer, Baked Alaska and the few tards who throw nazi salutes. They hang out on daily s
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Nope, you're alt-right with the rest of us. And Noam Chomsky. Everyone's alt-right now.
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But banning Nazis... THAT crosses the line? THAT is unacceptable?
I don't want to live up in the world you're projecting with your fucked-up worldview.
Given how the Alt-Left has spent the past 8 months calling everyone to the right of Stalin any bad name they think can stick, including Nazi -- to the point that Bernie Sanders supporters are "Alt Right Nazis" now for embarrassing Hillary in the primary -- yes, I find "banning Nazis" to be crossing the line.
It was the Alt-Left that has diluted every political insult they have, to the point that they're literally meaningless. Now they want to decide who gets to keep their American Civil Rights based on what
IT'S OFFICAL: Twitter is dying (Score:2)
Who cares? (Score:2)
The Freenet Project said it best (Score:2)
"I worry about my child and the Internet all the time, even though she's too young to have logged on yet. Here's what I worry about. I worry that 10 or 15 years from now, she will come to me and say 'Daddy, where were you when they took freedom of the press away from the Internet?' "
-Mike Godwin - Electronic Freedom Foundation
The above quote has been on the Freenet Project [freenetproject.org] Page since it's inception in 2000. I find it disturbing that it's starting to come true.
"Free speech" and two sides to reputation? (Score:2)
Or perhaps you prefer #PresidentTweety's "many sides"? Let me address both:
Two sides: Good versus non-good
Many sides: Good versus bad versus unknown
Now how does that apply to apps on Google Play? What unifies that application with discussions on Slashdot?
If people knew the reputation of the app, then good people would not choose to download or use apps with bad reputations. There are actually two obvious ways that this applies to Android apps. One is the personal reputation of the developers, and the other
This has to stop (Score:3)
So if I make a social media app, and KKK and Nazi members start using it, my app gets banned? How far will they take that? What if they start using MineCraft?
So first we start by blocking White Supremist groups. Then what? Will we start silencing people who want to keep the Robert E. Lee statues next? Then maybe we will go "Oh, there were lots of Christians in the south so let us silence them." This is a dangerous slope and we, as a nation, vowed not to do this. I don't like their position, but we cannot silence them. The best way to silence idiotic racist ideas is to let them be heard, and let their own words be used against them. If we force them into a dark web, they will fester there like a virus and we will only see them when they rise up against us.
I remind everyone of the words on the Holocaust memorial [wikipedia.org]:
First they came for the Socialists, and I did not speak out—
Because I was not a Socialist.
Then they came for the Trade Unionists, and I did not speak out—
Because I was not a Trade Unionist.
Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out—
Because I was not a Jew.
Then they came for me—and there was no one left to speak for me.
Re:No need to tolerate intolerance (Score:5, Insightful)
The app's main competitor, Twitter, hosts accounts like the American Nazi Party, the Ku Klux Klan, and the virulently anti-gay Westboro Baptist Church, yet the Twitter app is still available on the Google Play store. Apple has long had more restrictive app store policies, and it originally rejected the Gab app for allowing pornographic content to be posted on the service -- despite the fact that hardcore pornography is readily available on Twitter.
So Google won't tolerate intolerance, but they sure will tolerate hypocrisy. Got it.
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"In order to be on the Play Store, social networking apps need to demonstrate a sufficient level of Hypocrisy, including for content that tolerates violence from the Left and condemns it on the Right while condemning groups of people who Google doesn't like...such as Republicans and Conservative."
Fixed.
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Selective enforcement is a fancy way of saying "our rules are XY and Z but also Whatever The Fuck We Want"
Re:No need to tolerate intolerance (Score:5, Informative)
The existence of those accounts isn't indicative of selective enforcement - Twitter's moderation operates at the content level, not the account level. So you can set up an account for a white supremacist organization but the moment you post a call for genocide, you'll get banned. Do the same on Gab, and nothing will happen, other than an overwhelming response of support from other users.
Re: No need to tolerate intolerance (Score:4, Interesting)
Look at your nonsensical bigotry against Islam, for example. First you set up the straw man that someone is claiming that radical Islam doesn't exist, then you assert through sarcasm that all of Islam is inherently violent and therefore cannot be allowed to exist, against whole nations existing as proof of the opposite. Then you assert that a purely Islamic world would kill all LGBT people, cherry-picking by suggesting that any other Abrahamic faith wouldn't have the exact same inclinations for the exact same reasons at similar levels of radicalism.
I'm exposing your logical flaws. Have you changed your mind?
Re: No need to tolerate intolerance (Score:3)
Criticising one Abrahamic faith will draw applause whereas criticising another will draw condemnation.
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Re:To far (Score:5, Insightful)
By the same metric, the built in browser on mobile platforms should be banned as it allows access to such content.
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They haven't announced the new censorship in Chrome yet.
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Ok, this is a bit to far. Why does Google or Apple give a shit at all if an app has any sort of moderation?
They don't. They care if you have the 'wrong' politics.
I'm actually very curious - I thought political affiliation was a protected class. Should a political movement be created with a mission statement of "furthering the goals of white people", for example, and self-identified Nazis/KKK/etc join does it then become illegal to discriminate against them?
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“Except as provided in this code, no certification document shall be granted to any person unless and until he has subscribed to the following oath or affirmation: ‘I solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will support the Constitution of the United States of America, the Constitution of the State of California, and the laws of the United States and the State of California.’
https://www.ctc.ca.gov/d [ca.gov]
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I thought political affiliation was a protected class.
In general, it is not. In California, you can't be fired for your views on public policy, but that is not the same as political affiliation. Even in California, you can be fired for discussing politics at work if your employer has a blanket ban or such discussions.
Federal law mostly uses protected classes to protect people for what they ARE, rather than what they choose to be. You are black or caucasian. You choose to be Republican or Democrat.
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Except in California. Where Google has their headquarters.
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Private corporations are constrained by a host of regulations in the US. Furthermore, given that Google has been lobbying to impose common carrier regulations on ISPs and Google itself functions in many ways like a common carrier, it seems reasonable to discuss whether we should extend those regulations to Google.
Actually, in some states it is.
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You guys always scream that same mantra. Except when it's swung against a liberal user. Then they're scumbag nazis.
People are getting bored of your lack of an actual high ground. I wonder why you lost the election.
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I was gonna say, I thought that was tumblr, not twitter...
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Re:Privatized public square. The end of freedom (Score:5, Informative)
Corporations own everything now. I'm not against business. Hell. I'm a republican, but if we let them silence speech, no matter how vile when they control the public square, we will by default lose the right to free speech. Popular speech doesn't need protection, it's unpopular speech that needs protecting. Were it not for the first amendment the entire civil rights movement of the 50s and 60s wouldn't have happened.
An advertiser friendly world is a totalitarian hell hole whereeverything has to work as a billboard for skittles and Budweiser. Fuck that.
Here, read that again and please tell me how a simple response of 'first amendment only applies to government' isn't disingenuous.
AC is correct to assert that free speech is threatened when what now serves as the defacto public commons is completely dominated by monopolistic corporations who are now using that position to suppress any speech they dislike, and deplatform anyone they disagree with. Having a internet presence without the cooperation and approval of corporate interests really isn't an option. Actual free speech platforms being suppressed, delisted from search, removed from app stores, and genuinely made unavailable from the public should be cause for anti-trust action.
"Because Nazis" is the excuse for censorship that's used today, "Because fuck you" is the reason of tomorrow.
Re: (Score:2)
I also think it's great when Microsoft disables rival anti-virus suites and internet browsers. They're a private company, and windows is THEIR platform.
Oh... now you look like an asshole. Damn. Want to reconsider?
Re:Hypocrites? (Score:5, Insightful)
Several. The good one is Clover, which was punted from the play store for refusing to block /pol/, the politically incorrect (read: alt right and leftist tired of the alt-left) board. So people use the alternate f-droid "store" to install it. Still annoying.