Bye Bye Google: A Victory For Internet Censorship

Censoring Google


So Google is to leave China. But make no mistake. It is not pulling out. Instead it is being kicked out for not adhering to China’s rules on censorship. While the saying, “When in Rome, do as the Roman’s do,” may be applicable in this case. One can’t help but ask, why Rome, or in this case, Beijing does what it does. And for that matter, why Google made the decisions it did.
First, Beijing. China has always had its share of vague but very enforceable rules and regulations. Anyone familiar with the term “state secrets” knows people can get in big trouble for sharing them even though what they are has not been specifically defined. However, the hottest vague term nobody can define but everybody must adhere to is keeping “harmful” material out of society. What this means is that media of any type, be it music, movies, TV shows, advertisements, internet sites and so on can never be too violent, or too sexual because these things are deemed detrimental to a harmonious society. So what is too sexy or too violent? Well, just as a child looks for guidance as to what is good for them or not by their parents, we get similar guidance by the government who claims to know exactly what information is good and bad for us. Those that are good, we see every day, those that are bad never see the light of day.
This goes in the face of those who say it is Google who is politicizing this issue. Government censorship is, in itself, a political decision that can affect businesses involved with the media as it has with Google. By making decisions to censor the internet, a decision that it has previously denied, then rationalized, and finally defending, it is China, not Google that has politicized what we see online.
And here is where Google comes in. After a few years of blocking harmful information and profiting from doing business China’s way, it took one incident for Google to have a wakeup call. The incident of course was the hacking of human rights activist’s email accounts. The human rights part is important here because often, these people speak out against the politicizing of the internet by China. This, of course, does not make the government happy. Although after investigation it was found the hackers were not connected to the government, the fact that the targets of the attack all had something in common must have been too much for Google to keep on going as it had been. Google demanded that they stop censoring their content and Beijing said no. Saying that Google was in China so they must adhere to China’s way and that Google was being unfriendly, irresponsible and that Google would have to bear the consequences if it decided to unblock its searches. Anyways, China says, other countries censor, why can’t we?
China’s rationale that, “If other countries do it, why can’t they?” is the most important thing to pay attention to here. This is unique because when other conflicts arose in the past such as Tibet or Taiwan, we would only hear from China that these issues are “core interests” of China and that the West should stop meddling in China’s domestic affairs. On censorship, it is much different. Can you imagine hearing, “Censorship of the internet is one of China’s core beliefs.” or, “Censorship on the internet is an internal matter, butt out. “ being announced by a government spokesperson? This would never happen because it would force China to further defend censorship in the country. Something it has officially denied on numerous occasions. Google is not afraid to publicly defend what it believes in openly at the risk of losing profits in the China market. Why can’t those responsible for censorship be proud and stand up openly for what it believes in just as openly?
As Google prepares to leave China the media bias against Google will surely increase. After all, the same people who decide to censor the internet are friends with those that control the information we see every day in the news. They will flood the papers with anti-Google articles. But we know better. The truth is, after being attacked by hackers targeting human rights activists, Google’s eyes were opened. Google saw that China’s politicization of the internet through monitoring and censorship went against its core beliefs. Google forced censors, who previously could block information without accountability, to talk openly about what they do. They are not happy about this but now they have no choice. Now, it is time for censors to come out of the shadows, stop using vague terms, and learn from Google about being accountable and openly standing up for what it believes in.