Google: The Cornerstone of Clean, Green Fascism
November 28th, 2007So few people can see the big picture with regard to clean, green fascism. I’m going to make it painfully clear and simple with the juxtaposition of two of today’s stories about Google.
Story #1) Google Hopes to Undercut Coal with Cheap, Renewable Energy:
By now, everyone is familiar with Google’s corporate motto, “Don’t be evil.” In an effort to spread that message of not-being-evil, the search engine behemoth has announced a plan to develop sources of renewable energy that will be cheaper than coal. The new initiative, RE
Story #2) Google Terminates YouTube Account of Egyptian Anti-Torture Activist:
The video-sharing Web site YouTube has suspended the account of a prominent Egyptian anti-torture activist who posted videos of what he said was brutal behaviour by some Egyptian policemen, the activist said.
Wael Abbas said close to 100 images he had sent to YouTube were no longer accessible, including clips depicting purported police brutality, voting irregularities and anti-government demonstrations. YouTube, owned by search engine giant Google Inc
, did not respond to a written request for comment. A message on Abbas’s YouTube user page, http://youtube.com/user/waelabbas, read: “This account is suspended.” “They closed it (the account) and they sent me an e-mail saying that it will be suspended because there were lots of complaints about the content, especially the content of torture,” Abbas told Reuters in a telephone interview. Abbas, who won an international journalism award for his work this year, said that of the images he had posted to YouTube, 12 or 13 depicted violence in Egyptian police stations.
Abbas was a key player last year in distributing a clip of an Egyptian bus driver, his hands bound, being sodomised with a stick by a police officer — imagery that sparked an uproar in a country where rights groups say torture is commonplace.
That tape prompted an investigation that led to a rare conviction of two policemen, who were sentenced to three years in prison for torture. Egypt says it opposes torture and prosecutes police against whom it has evidence of misconduct.
I know. The allure of the touchy feely techno utopia is profound. You want to believe that the benevolent geeks are going to save us all. They’re not benevolent, and the only thing that they’re interested in saving is what’s left of the planet’s strategic resources for themselves.
Much More: Clean, Green Fascism
