Tag: censorship

eBay says it will let governments automatically remove listings

In a move that observers fear may represent a setback for fair moderation of product listings – and of content in general – ecommerce giant eBay has announced that it is proceeding with a project aimed at allowing government regulators to remove items they see as “dangerous listings” directly from the site, with no need to consult the company.

eBay is also letting regulators – from some 50 countries around the world – decide that there is enough evidence that a listing might pose a risk to consumers, and once eBay declares these offices as “trusted authorities” their powers to remove items from the site will be unlimited. The company has not yet revealed the criteria that will guide this selection of state authorities it trusts to be making decisions in its place.

The company said the aim is to speed up and streamline the process of removal of listings, while the ones designated as dangerous will be considered either illegal or unsafe, and authorities will be able to delete them without further interacting with eBay.

eBay is talking up the project to wash its hands off responsibility for this type of online “moderation” as something that others in the industry will adopt as well, describing at the same time collaboration with authorities as “vital.”

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Google Docs gets social justice update, autocorrecting to gender neutral and politically correct language

Google announced on Tuesday, during its I/O developer conference, that editing capabilities of Google Docs have been expanded to police text and monitor a writer’s level of inclusivity.

Thus an update to the app means that Google Docs will start suggesting changing words like “mailman” to “mail carrier” and “chairman” to “chairperson,” it has been revealed.

Users will also be prompted to avoid using passive voice or what Google determines to be offensive language. It’s unclear from reports if the new feature will be opt-in or out, or hard-coded in the app, that is, impossible to avoid using.

This user-facing change comes after Google’s style guide for developers already seeking to “tidy up” language according to the sensitivities the giant is pandering to. For example, developers are instructed to replace “crazy” with “baffling,” “dummy variable” with “placeholder variable,” and “final sanity-check” with “final check for completeness and clarity.”

As early as 2018, Google got rid of gender pronouns from predictive text on Gmail for fear of offending somebody on that front, as well as of racial slurs, expletives, and mentions of business rivals.

CEO Sundar Pichai is said to have made implementing social justice tenets a priority for the whole of Google.

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The “Bonkers” Interview Of Bonny Prince Harry: Why The Attack On The First Amendment Should Concern All Americans

The media went into a frenzy this weekend when the bonny Prince Harry gave a huge Hurrumpf to the First Amendment. On a show appropriately called “the Armchair Expert,” Harry declared the First Amendment “bonkers” and expressed frustration of how it protects the media in its “feeding frenzy” over his life. Harry’s criticism of the First Amendment can be dismissed as the unfamiliarity of a royal refugee. However, it is actually far more serious than that. Harry and his American wife Meghan Markle have attacked media rights in England and succeeded under the laws of the United Kingdom. They are now joining a growing anti-free speech and free press movement in the United States.

It was not a surprise for many to hear Harry lash out at the First Amendment. After all, Harry and Meghan are so woke, they are virtual insomniacs.

However, that is the point. The First Amendment no longer holds the inviolate position it once did with the left.

Indeed, the First Amendment is now often treated as a danger than a guarantee to a fair and just society. Experts have explained how to evade its limitations to silence others. They have found precisely what Harry discussed in the interview when he noted “you can find a loophole in anything.”

Democratic leaders now openly call for corporate censorship and banning of books and authors. Academics now join in the cancelling of colleagues who express dissenting views of subjects ranging from climate change to gender identification to racial justice. Thus, it is not as risky for the Harry to declare “I’ve got so much I want to say about the First Amendment as I sort of understand it, but it is bonkers.” Rather, millions are likely to wait in rapt anticipation to hear more of what Prince Harry will say about correcting our Constitution.

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Biden Revokes Trump Order Protecting Users From Censorship on Social Media

President Joe Biden this week revoked an order from the previous Trump administration that sought to protect users from unfair or deceptive content restriction practices by Big Tech companies.

The effect of the revocation would require the Director of the Office of Management and Budget and the heads of executive departments to take steps to rescind any regulations or policies that enforced former President Donald Trump’s executive order entitled “Preventing Online Censorship,” which was signed in May last year.

Trump’s order sought to prevent social media companies such as Twitter, Facebook, and YouTube from moderating users’ content in what his administration said was being done in an unbalanced and inconsistent way. The order cited examples from Twitter that added “fact-checking labels” to certain tweets in a manner that the administration said clearly reflects political bias.

Twitter added a “fact-checking” label on two of Trump’s tweets two days before the president issued his executive order. Trump accused Twitter of “selectively applying” its warning labels, arguing such action amounted to political activism.

Biden’s order also seeks to roll back liability protections under Section 230 of the 1996 Communications Decency Act. That law largely exempts online platforms from liability for content posted by their users, although they can be held liable for content that violates anti-sex trafficking or intellectual property laws.

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Biden Secretary of Defense adviser pick once said online misinformation is a digital “plague”

In an op-ed from 2018, Biden’s pick for senior adviser to the Secretary of Defense, Bishop Garrison, described free speech as a “digital black plague.”

In the 2018 op-ed, resurfaced by Revolver News, Garrison described alleged disinformation, which to others is free speech, as a “digital black plague,” which if allowed to “spread further,” soon “the shining city on the hill will undoubtedly find itself alone in the darkness for years to come.”

Garrison also said that technology was responsible for the spread of disinformation, which to some, is any information they don’t like.

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Facebook, Social Media Giants Admit to Silencing Palestinian Voices Online

Activists reported that social media companies have been removing their content, stating it violated community guidelines or deeming it “hate speech.” Reports also included suspended and deactivated accounts and text-only content labeled “sensitive,” a designation usually reserved for photos and videos containing violence, gore or derogatory images. The “Save Sheikh Jarrah” Facebook group was also deactivated, according to Mohammed El-Kurd.

Reports were largely centered on Instagram and Twitter, with some restrictive behaviors conducted by Facebook and even TikTok.

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Neuroscience Professor Removed From APA Discussion After Saying There Are Only Two Genders

Aneuroscience professor was ousted from the American Psychological Association’s (APA) email discussion group by vote after suggesting that there are only two genders as well as past concerns over his posts, the College Fix reported Friday.

Psychology and neuroscience professor John Staddon at Duke University was removed from the APA’s Society for Behavioral Neuroscience and Comparative Psychology (SBNCP) Division 6 listserv and was notified via email by the group’s presidential trio who said use of the forum was a “privilege,” in the statements republished by the National Association of Scholars (NAS) on April 30.

“It is sad that an audience of supposed scientists is unable to take any dissenting view, such as the suggestion that there really are only two sexes,” Staddon said in reply to the notification of his removal from the division’s group before allowing NAS to publish the email exchange. “Incredible! I don’t mind having one less distraction, but I think you should really be concerned at Div 6’s unwillingness to tolerate divergent views.”

His post that “tipped the scale,” according to Staddon, was titled “Hmm… Binary view of sex false? What is the evidence? Is there a Z chromosome?” Staddon told Newsweek he created the post on April 15.

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Reporters have to get quotes approved by White House before publishing

White House reporters are ​seething over a policy that requires them to submit quotes from interviews with Biden administration officials to the communications team for approval, editing or veto, according to a report on Tuesday.  ​

The White House is demanding that reporters who conduct interviews with administration officials do so under conditions known as “background with ​quote approval,” Politico reported. ​

The information from the interview can be used in a story, but for a reporter to be able to attach a name to the quote, ​the reporter must transcribe the comments and send them to the communications team, the report said. ​

At that point, the White House can approve them, edit them or veto their use.

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