How Google Searches Are Promoting Genocide Denial 216
merbs writes: If you use Google Turkey to search for "Ermeni Krm", which means "Armenian genocide" in Turkish, the first thing you'll see is a sponsored link to a website whose purpose is to deny there was any genocide at all. If you Google "Armenia genocide" in the U.S., you'll see the same thing. FactCheckArmenia.com may reflect Turkey's longstanding position that the Ottoman Empire's systematic effort to "relocate" and exterminate its Armenian population does not qualify as a genocide, but it certainly does not reflect the facts. The sponsored link to a credible-looking website risks confusing searchers about the true nature of the event. Worse, it threatens to poison a nascent willingness among Turkish citizens to recognize and discuss the horrors of its past.
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Re:It is an ad. (Score:5, Insightful)
Ever watch political ads sway an election or referendum? People are really stupid.
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Sure, but it's silly to blame Google for putting it there.
Japan killed 80M, Not so fast there (Score:3)
Check your facts before spouting off about the Mass Media.
According to this link http://www.nationalww2museum.o... [nationalww2museum.org] the death total for WW2 was 90M so 80M for Japan might be a tad high. Granted the totals for China are in dispute but still complaining about the Mass Media getting it wrong then putting in such a number is just wrong.
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I've no problem with compulsory voting, providing you are allowed to spoil your ballot
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You have no problem with compulsory voting, as long as you're not compelled to actually vote?
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Rephrased a bit, he's fine with being forced to express an opinion as long as "I don't care" is an allowable opinion.
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i think YOU are stupid. powerful rhetoric can lead anyone into hellish rabbit holes.
goebbels, lenin, robespierre, bush YOU NAME IT.
You are accusing George W Bush of powerful rhetoric ?
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http://politics.slashdot.org/c... [slashdot.org]
If Bush "lied" about WMD, than what did all these Democrats, including Bill Clinton do when they talked about WMD?
The WMD were found, there were plenty of chemical weapons found and destroyed in Iraq, but people like you continue to spout off about it.
Re:It is an ad. (Score:4, Insightful)
The ads aren't just false, they're often dangerous. Search for a piece of software, such as VLC and the top results are poorly differentiated ads pointing to somewhere other than the official download site. From that alternate site will be a repackaged version that, at best will have an installer bundled with crapware. Quite probably loaded down with some sort of virus or backdoor for viruses. Next theing you know supermegawindowsantivirussepreme2015 is explaining to you that 32,485 threats have been detected and that the full version for $49.99 will be able to clean them. When you get the full version, it will explain how you can get all your now-encrypted files back for the low, low price of $2,000.
Re:It is an ad. (Score:5, Interesting)
I had a script that used to I used to run whenever I found somebody trying to sell a rebadged package like Open/LibreOffice, GIMP, etc. It would simulate clicks on the offending advert via a list of proxies until that advert disappeared - generally they have a fairly low daily click allowance so that they don't get hit by large fees from google.
Re:It is an ad. (Score:5, Insightful)
This is what is wrong with advertising on the internet. It's become too automated. All that's required to get your ad up on the internet is for you to put down the money. Nobody reviews the ad to see if it's for a legitimate product. Nobody checks that false claims aren't being made. And the websites wonder why people resort to using things like Adblock Plus. If they held ads to a higher standard, then they could demand more money for ads, and they would have a much smaller likelihood of people blocking them. With the current state of ads on the internet, I avoid them as much as possible. If they were high quality, less intrusive ads, I might start paying attention more.
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I don't see the problem. It's an ad. It's obvious it's an ad. When I see an ad claiming something, my first thought is, "someone had to pay money to show this to me." If it's for a product, I can understand why you'd want to do that. If it's making a claim with no way for them to financially recoup the m
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You left something out.
Nobody reviews the ad to see if it actively delivers malware. Except, I suppose, the people who put the malware in.
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Hmmm. I wonder if there's an app or a mod (seems like greasemonkey could probably do it if I knew how) to remove the sponsored stuff from google searches :)
Re:It is an ad. (Score:5, Informative)
So Turkish nationalists are buying Google adwords. What's the problem with that? It's an exercise of free speech (for a position that I disagree with).
I have Armenian (and Greek) friends, so I know the basics. Armenians tell me about losing grandparents, aunts and uncles in 1915. This is of course the 100th anniversary. The personal tragedies are overwhelming, and if that wasn't enough, there is the further tragedy of destroying the Armenian and Greek communities and culture in Turkey, and the end of Ottoman tolerance.
I realize there's a debate over the word "genocide." The official Turkish position is, "Let the historians decide." I'm not sure what good that does them. The New York Times leans towards "genocide." http://www.nytimes.com/ref/tim... [nytimes.com] There is some symbolism here that I can't follow too well.
There is also a small, slowly growing movement among Turks to acknowledge the Armenian position. I don't know how long it will take. I'm not as optimistic as I used to be about world peace and reconciliation.
But Google isn't doing anything wrong.
Re:It is an ad. (Score:5, Informative)
the funny thing about all this is that the term "genocide" was coined precisely to describe what the ottomans did to the Armenians. no kidding, look it up. the author of the term is known.
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Re:It is an ad. (Score:4, Informative)
"Lemkin was also a close relative of genocide victims, losing 49 relatives in the Holocaust. However, his work on defining genocide as a crime dates to 1933, and it was prompted by the Simele massacre in Iraq.[5]"
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/G... [wikipedia.org]
Re:It is an ad. (Score:5, Insightful)
So Turkish nationalists are buying Google adwords. What's the problem with that? It's an exercise of free speech (for a position that I disagree with).
I have Armenian (and Greek) friends, so I know the basics. Armenians tell me about losing grandparents, aunts and uncles in 1915. This is of course the 100th anniversary. The personal tragedies are overwhelming, and if that wasn't enough, there is the further tragedy of destroying the Armenian and Greek communities and culture in Turkey, and the end of Ottoman tolerance.
I realize there's a debate over the word "genocide." The official Turkish position is, "Let the historians decide." I'm not sure what good that does them. The New York Times leans towards "genocide." http://www.nytimes.com/ref/tim... [nytimes.com] There is some symbolism here that I can't follow too well.
There is also a small, slowly growing movement among Turks to acknowledge the Armenian position. I don't know how long it will take. I'm not as optimistic as I used to be about world peace and reconciliation.
But Google isn't doing anything wrong.
Two takes from this:
Free speech, first and foremost, especially to the folks who disagree with me.
Eyes wide open, a very close second, get your important information from as many sources as possible.
Re:It is an ad. (Score:5, Informative)
The official Turkish position is, "Let the historians decide." I'm not sure what good that does them.
Is that a new position? Or does Turkey like the Armenians better than the Kurds somehow?
When Noam Chomsky wrote about the treatment of Kurdish people in Turkey, the position of the Turkish government was to prosecute [theguardian.com] Noam Chomsky's Turkish publisher.
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So Turkish nationalists are buying Google adwords. What's the problem with that? It's an exercise of free speech (for a position that I disagree with)
Free speech applies to your interactions with the government - it does not apply to a private company. If Google did not wish to publish an ad that may damage their brand and business, that would be their own decision to make. Print publications already have policies on what is acceptable advertising, and will readily reject any ads seen as offensive and racist. Ad space is always limited - there is no reason they have to publish this ad over another less offensive ad.
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Free speech applies to your interactions with the government - it does not apply to a private company.
Who says that?
Free speech applies to private universities. Private universities usually have free speech, because college teachers demanded it and organized to get it.
Free speech applies to private organizations. If I join a union, I should have free speech to criticize that union.
Free speech is a right and principle. It applies everywhere. We should have free speech everywhere. We don't always have it. You only get free speech if you fight for it.
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Free speech applies to your interactions with the government - it does not apply to a private company.
Who says that?
The first amendment says that. It prohibits the government from restraining speech or establishing a state religion ("..the government shall make no law..."). To the extent that other non-state actors are forced to respect the 1st amendment, it's usually because they are acting as agents of the government because a law delegates regulatory authority to them or because they are accepting public money to perform a service.
Free speech applies to private universities. Private universities usually have free speech, because college teachers demanded it and organized to get it.
Many if not most universities accept government subsidies, to a certain extent they ar
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but maybe we don't skewer them for [exercise of free speech]
Good call.
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What ad?
Google must have already fixed this issue because all I get is a Wikipedia page and then a few news articles talking about how various people are disappointed about how this topic is being treated by various officials.
Apples and oranges--Turkey isn't selling anything (Score:2)
The alternative is... What, exactly? (Score:5, Interesting)
Ban people with an opposing point of view? Google deciding intentionally what's "true" and "not true"? Only people with approved viewpoints get a chance to place ideas out there?
Perhaps he author might want to take some time to Google "epistemically closure," followed a little later for some basic overviews of the history of mankind.
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Ban historical revisionists from Google ads. Simple.
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Now all you have to do is provide a method to determine which ad constitutes historical revisionism.
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Obviously its such fantasies as "Armenian Genocide" and "Tianenmen Square", duh. I have it on good authority from the countries involved, they would know.
Re:The alternative is... What, exactly? (Score:5, Insightful)
"I hate Jews" is a point of view. "There was no Holocaust" is a flat-out lie. You are entitled to your own opinions and interpretations, but not your own facts. The latter makes you wilfully insane.
And frankly, Turkey is being a moron here. They could simply ignore all this, it happened 100 years ago after all. Or they could issue an official apology. They could even frame the Armenians as nasty people who had it coming, evil as such approach might be. But instead they pick the one strategy that has no chance of success whatsoever: pretending nothing ever happened. It's enough to make one question whether someone in Turkey wishes to ride a national persecution complex to power.
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It's enough to make one question whether someone in Turkey wishes to ride a national persecution complex to power.
Why not it's working fuckin great for Hamas...
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They learned from the best - Israel.
To be fair, that people has had some recent re-education...
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That is complete nonsense.
Armenians as the name implies are Arameic, that means they are Semites like Jews or other semitic tribes around the Levante.
The greek are as the name implies: greeks. Perhaps you should look on a map and see where that "country" is, funnily it never really changed its place the last 3000 years.
Now the Turkish are a conglomerate of Hunnes and other Mongolic tribes.
If you look at those Nations and their languages you easily see: there is not even the remotest connection.
The only thin
Re:The alternative is... What, exactly? (Score:5, Informative)
Some factual errors here.
"Armenians as the name implies are Aramaic" (I've corrected your spelling too)
Wrong. Armenia is the name used by non-Armenians to refer to the country. "Hayastan" as we call it, is named after Hayk, the patriarch of Armenians. Depending on your reference, you'll find that Armenia originates in reference to Hayk's descendent Aram (your mileage will vary).
You might be confusing Armenians with the Arameans (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arameans). Armenians predate (and coexisted with) the Arameans. Armenians aren't Arameans nor do they speak Aramaic. Armenian is an Indo-European language - it's predecessor is Proto-Indo-European.
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And frankly, Turkey is being a moron here.
Be glad dictators are morons, else we'd all be slaves to one or another.
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The standard for free speech can't be whether or not a person believes what they're saying, otherwise we couldn't have religion, politics, or girlfriends.
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I'm pretty shocked how quickly people jump to censoring ideas they don't agree with in this society. The irony of so many people on a public forum like Slashdot advocating for complete censorship of speech they find distasteful or wrong is thick. I would say there is a new mood to suppress opposing ideas, but I think history shows that there is nothing really new about it. Still, The Onion covered this sentiment pretty thoroughly the other day. [theonion.com]
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I don't think that censoring is what is expected here - they should be able to speak their mind on the matter. The problem is that the way Google as a platform is set up, they can buy the most prominent spot for their opinion, on top of everyone's else (unless that everyone has more money, I guess) - and that is questionable.
Yes, I understand that Google is a private company and it's up to them to decide what messages they carry and in what fashion, generally speaking. However, when 90% of the people start
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I think a great deal of the folks on slashdot could actually benefit from a class on that, is someone willing to do a seminar?
I swear, the number of times we see censoring (but only of the actually bad stuff!) being advocated here...
Not searches. Ads. (Score:3)
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I think the issue is more that people who don't know better (probably the majority of people) will assume those ads at the top of the search results are just results, since they look very similar, just with a little yellow box that says "ad" under the main link. This box is easily overlooked by inattentional blindness [youtube.com] if you're not looking to make sure you aren't looking at an ad.
It's all very well telling people to learn the difference, but most people won't, and that's not just their problem, it's everyon
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If you're worried about the bigger principle and the slippery slope, censorship is a far bigger worry than folks not telling the difference between an ad and a search.
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Unfortunately it is not irrelevant for the decedents of the killed people.
Armenians in Turkey are still suppressed. Many changed their armenian names to turkish names to "hide" at least on the surface. But as most are Christians, they obviously are not really "hidden".
They get trouble in all legal affairs, like selling/buying a house etc. Trying to get a passport etc.
The holocaust is also now 70 years ago ... do you consider it irrelevant in our times as well?
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I'm using Adblock Plus in Firefox. With it enabled or disabled, I am not seeing the sponsored ads at the top of a Google search. No ads at all.
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... and lied like a Turk when he said it. (Score:3, Interesting)
In Germany is illegal to deny the Jewish genocide... in Turkey is illegal to accept the Armenian's genocide!
Every Armenian, with Greeks (who also suffered horribly), Assyrians, Kurds (who still can't teach their language in Turkish schools or publish/broadcast it), e.t.c., honors the 100 years from the Armenian genocide (about 1,5 millions victims), not only because we dislike Turks (o.k., we even hate them), but because forgetting about it will make us again victims: Hitler once said to his officials about the Jews "but who remembers the Armenians...".
German almost torture themselves with their continues self-critic about their past because they don't want to repeat it (and even Jews accept that they have repent) - Turks... well, we Greeks know about them and take measures agaist the future they still plan for us.
They still exist Armenian people who were alive when Turks genicide their families, so some of them could accept the apology of the Turks - but i doubt if ever happens from a nation that make it illegal to even mention the Armenian genocide (warning: you will go to jail if you mention it in Turkey - actually you may be non Turk, mention it outside Turkey, never visit Turkey, and still be convicted from the Turkish "justice"!).
"... and lied like a Turk when he said it." - Mark Twain
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it seems though that you greeks have learned a lot from the turks. in terms of lying. propaganda and outright murder.
"europe" actually is a hellhole of violence, not a source of civilization.
before you ask, i am german.
Maybe, but it's one of the better hellholes on the planet.
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Maybe you slept during the history class? Byzantine as a term was coined by Germans in the 1500s in an attempt to revise history as the Holy Roman Empire wanted to paint itself as successor of Rome. (It seems to have worked suprisingly well) Both "Byzantine Empire" and "Eastern Roman Empire" are terms created after 1453 (the fall of Constantinople).
The
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An uninterrupted line of emperors since Caesar? I assume you mean Augustus, since there was definitely a gap between the death of Julius Caesar and the ascension of Octavius as Augustus, and then, after they got rid of Nero, the "line" of Emperors was based heavily on who could proclaim themselves Emperor without being laughed at, with multiple Emperors common in disputed successions.
Also, one later Emperor (Diocletian?) did split the Empire into east and west halves, each of which was supposed to have
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By the way, "propaganda and murder" IS a trait of a people - not biological, but cultural.
Uhh.. I think you better look up those words in a dictionary. No matter Greek or no all rulers tend to resort to them, some more, some less. Mapping it to some nationality traits is nonsense. The very notion of nationality is nonsense. All this is sophistry and waste of time.
Buy your own ad. (Score:2)
Dear Armenian folks: while I sympathize with the history of your people, picking a fight with an algorithm is probably not a good use of your time. Everyone knows that Google's search content reflects the views of the wider Internet, and their sponsored links reflect the views of the people who pay them. You might be better off buying your own sponsored link on Google to combat the offensive one.
Dear Turkey: (Score:2)
I don't know if you've noticed, but you have a few other things on your plate right now what with the Kurds and ISIS and the religious conservative blowhards (you know, the ones who make Texas look like a bunch of si
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You misunderstand Erdogan and his government. They are ISIS sympathizers, as are the clerics in his chorus. He's perfectly potty with killing off a bunch of Alawites in Syria because they aren't Sunni, being much closer to Shi'ites. Erdogan is a whore, and his government is interested in nothing except turning the country into a theocracy from which its religious affliction will never be uprooted.
obligatory (Score:2)
"Worse, it threatens to poison a nascent willingness"
[citation needed]
Not in the UK (Score:3)
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I get the same ad for certain keyword combinations on Dutch-language Google as well.
I could only find it for search terms "armeense genocide" and "armenie genocide".
I tried a number of other words, but these are the only hits I found for the ad in Dutch.
Atleast they don't seem to be limited just to the USA.
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So....wait... (Score:2)
Google is now supposed to 'vet' the sites they link to as far as authenticity and "proper" interpretations of highly-disputed events?
How the fuck are they supposed to do that?
(Not to mention, the minute such entities - search engines, ISPs, etc - start value-filtering content, you can kiss the moral justification for net neutrality goodbye.)
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Well, holocaust denial is illegal in some countries, and Google is both multiple entities and a single entity. So if it looks like it might be holocaust denial, Google should really refuse to carry the ad on the basis that it's illegal in some places.
This is not the same thing as not carrying a search result, although there are worrying implications. But in the end, this is a business and it's about connecting people with products. You'll still be able to get your web page about it indexed, publicize it thr
The problem is the ads don't show the sponsor (Score:5, Insightful)
The problem is not the ads themselves. Advertising is free speech. The problem is that the ads don't show the purchaser (the sponsor) so the reader has no context on potential bias.
Basically Google is enabling astroturf campaigns.
No matter how misleading a political ad is, there is always a "paid for by X" at the end of it. We should require the same of all advertising.
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Because that's worked so well for political ads? "Paid for by Citizens for Knowledge? I hate knowledge! I'm not listening to this nonsense!"
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well then i have this other pac "patriotic puppies and kittens for environmental truth" just for you :)
It is the Internet (Score:2)
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For god's sake let's not argue that because a link is offensive (to someone) it shouldn't be returned by a search.
By your way of thinking, Google should not work to remove links to kiddie porn, locations of women's shelters, snuff videos, and places to by illegal drugs or drugs illegally. I don't buy it.
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locations of women's shelters
Isn't the utility of a women's shelter in that women can find them when needed?
Google Searches are promoting Alien abduction... (Score:2)
The key is that most people quickly develop a sense that they have landed somewhere bad in a moment; just like most people have developed an internal ad-blocker for their eyeballs for that occasional ad that slips through.
"This domain is for sale." is a huge give away for instance.
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I can understand most of those, but why add this as it is clearly a scientific truth.
and that Aspartame isn't bad for you.
Numerous scientific studies have returned that Arpartame is perfectly healthy in the doses used unless you have a genetic issue with it that causes much worse issues.
Isn't this a free-speech issue? (Score:2)
Isn't this a free-speech issue? Or, even more fundamentally, freedom of opinion?
There are people in the Southern US who refer to the American Civil War "the War of Northern Aggression". From their point of view, that's what it was - slavery was just the excuse. It's not a widely held opinion, but it's theirs to hold.
Russian history books present a very different view of WWII and the aftermath, as compared to Western history books.
If the Turkish government and people believe that what happened does not quali
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Well, it is a free speech issue in the sense that the US government can't tell Google to suppress those ads. Of course, Google could do so on its own (at least under current regulations); however, it seems unwise for Google to get too much into that territory, except for cases where it is government mandated or nearly universally agreed upon (such as not running Holocaust denial ads).
Very well (Score:2)
Google certainly didn't ask for being mandated for governments. But when governments wanted to seize control of search results in name of "war against terrorism" people aplauded. Governments are in charge now, and there are just a couple information hubs they need to care about. So much for the World we've choosen to live in.
Krm (Score:5, Informative)
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It's ok, we don't know what a dotless ii sounds like anyway.
history (Score:2)
(*) Of course we're not talking about hardware reviews or celeb gossips...
Scientologists did it much bigger (Score:2, Funny)
When the secret documents of their cult appeared on the Usenet newsgroup 'alt.religion.scientology', the Internet awareness of their "galactic emperor Xenu killed the alian Thetans, and they have been reborn as all your bad thoughts" inner beliefs grew. But when they tried to censor the newsgroup, awareness *exploded*. Appalled at this and at the increasing rank of anti-scientology websites in Google, they created the largest website in the world. According to the former webmaster, Jurian Massena[sic?], the
What ads? (Score:3, Interesting)
My top 5 search results are;
1. Wikipedia
2. Google news, which hits the LA Daily News first
3. history.com
4. armenian-genocide.org
5. NY Times
Re: With AdBlocking/Hosts blocking, it's different (Score:2)
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its called casino deployment program