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Thats the lowkey Orwellian message that greets visitors to the website of Perspective, Googles new AI system for detecting (and potentially deleting, hiding, or burying) toxic comments on the web.

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Perspective is still in early days of development, but in the future, you may have to adjust your speech in order to satisfy the lofty standards of Google. Otherwise, the companys faceless AI might just have to improve you. Wheres Sarah Connor when you need her?

The good news is that, for now at least, Perspective is about as effective as C-3PO with a lisp. Software engineer and columnist David Auerbach has found the program woefully inept at sorting toxic comments from ordinary ones. Because the AI currently focuses on words rather than meanings, inoffensive comments like, Rape is a horrible crime, or, few Muslims are a terrorist threat, were assigned toxicity ratings of over 75 percent.

Of course, even if Perspective could successfully sort toxic comments from innocuous ones, that doesnt necessarily mean theyre going to be deleted or buried. According to the projects homepage, the systemperforms no function other than detection.

But statements from the projects developers make it clear that censorship is the end goal. Indeed, the system seems to have been developed to augment the lefts ongoing war on comments sections.The software was initially made available just to organizations that are part of Googles Digital News Initiative, including the BBC, The Financial Times, andThe Guardian,whichpromptly began testing the software to moderate their comments sections.

News organizations want to encourage engagement and discussion around their content, but find that sorting through millions of comments to find those that are trolling or abusive takes a lot of money, labour and time, says Jared Cohen, president of Jigsaw, the Google social incubator that built the tool. As a result, many sites have shut down comments altogether. But they tell us that isnt the solution they want.

Google couldnt be clearer: its a censorship bot. And just because its currently limited to news sites and comments sections doesnt mean it wont be rolled out to social networks and the rest of the web. Twitter, which just introduced yet another system to punish users whohurt celebrities feelings,would probably love to get their hands on a working version of Perspective.

Twitter already has a tremendous depth of data on its users, including gender, location, and personal interests. Imagine that data, combined with an AI tool designed to pinpoint inconvenient content, in the hands of a CEO who has done little to conceal his political biases.

The idea of an all-powerful Google robot watching over us all, making sure our speech is improved, has greatly excited mainstream media. Google, says the BBC, is going to make talk less toxic. According to WIRED, Perspective will put a stop to abusive comments that silence vulnerable voices. New York magazine portrays Perspsective as a friendly a robot, a kind of Clippy for the comments section.Our robot overlords are certainly getting a warm welcome

The left are likely to be disappointed though. If Auerbachs early research on Perspective is any guide, the system is designed to filter out impoliteness, not political disagreement. Googles censorbot might turn the comments section and perhaps the web into a grey, sanitized dystopia scrubbed of strong emotions and trollish humor, but it wont get rid of facts.

In other words, myths about gender wage gaps, police racism, and moderate Islam are still going to get debunked. Even Skynet cant keep some things quiet.

You can follow Allum Bokhari on Twitterandadd him on Facebook.Email tips and suggestions to abokhari@breitbart.com.

Continue reading here:
War on Comments: Google Built an AI To Censor The Web, And The Media Is Celebrating - Breitbart News

Well, not quite. The assumption that students share the political views of their officers forgets that SUs and their overlord - the NUS - are entirely unrepresentative of the people they claim to represent. In UCLs union elections last year, only 12% of the study body bothered to vote. In 2015 at the University of Manchester, turnout reached a national record of around 25%. Hardly a resounding victory for democracy.

Indeed, contrary to the claim that students spend their time printing off topless calendars of Jeremy Corbyn, research carried out by the Universities of Southampton and Sheffield revealed that todays young people are more right-wing and authoritarian than any generation in recent history.

And even if students did support their student unions, the increasingly warped regard for genuine left-wing politics by union officers makes it hard to label their cause as truly left-wing. In an attempt to demonstrate their leftie credentials, working class officers have been created at Manchester, Soas, King's College London, and St Hildas, Oxford to ensure working class students dont feel marginalised.

This demonstrates just how far todays student Left has wandered from the barricades manned by its predecessors. Back in Paris in 1968, student activists took to the streets in a genuine attempt to overthrow capitalism. Todays self-labelled lefties are more concerned with fighting for Meat Free Mondays. Rather than uphold the power of the proletariat, student union officers view their working class peers as vulnerable creatures who need protecting. Marxs claim that workingmen have nothing to lose but their chains no longer resonates. Todays campus warriors just want to make the chains are a bit more comfortable.

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We can't just blame the Left for student censorship every side is at it now - Telegraph.co.uk

Another day, another leftist attempt at censorship. The target is, once again, University of Toronto professor and psychologist Jordan Peterson.

It should come as no surprise given the myriad prior attempts by left-wing activists to prevent Peterson from speaking about gender pronouns or free speech itself. But this time, theyre trying to stop him from giving a lecture about the psychology of creativity, his actual field of research.

Peterson is recognized internationally on the subject, hence the invitation by the National Gallery of Canada on March 9.

Cara Tierney, a former gallery employee who demands people refer to her as they, said to CBC, Peterson shouldnt be allowed to speak on his research because of his views on gender.

If there was a known anti-Semite who also perhaps had something interesting to say about psychology or creativity, I dont imagine that we would be inviting this individual to come and talk, Tierney said.

Another Ottawa activist said that Peterson threatens the reality that art itself has always been, historically, a safe space.

The comment is laughably tone deaf, given that art has always been the bastion of controversyartists just want that controversy on their terms, rather than anyone elses.

No one who has attempted to block Peterson from speaking at the gallery has disputed his credentials, nor his message. This is why the censorship efforts are so chilling: because he disagrees with them on something else, he shouldnt be entitled to speak about anything, in their view.

The goal is nothing short of 100 per cent conformity, lest you find yourself on the receiving end of boycotts.

The National Gallery is a public institution, which means cancelling this event would be an effort by government to block certain viewpoints. So far, theyre holding the line.

Lets hope it stays that way.

See original here:
Left's demands for National Gallery to ban Prof Peterson cross dangerous censorship line - The Rebel

Books, newspapers, magazines, broadcast media and Internet access are censored in Saudi Arabia.

In 2014, Reporters Without Borders describes the government as "relentless in its censorship of the Saudi media and the Internet",[1] and ranked Saudi Arabia 164th out of 180 countries for freedom of the press.[2]

The Royal Decree On Press and Publications (1982) set up the initial government regulation of Saudi books, newspapers and magazines, as well as all foreign publications sold in the kingdom. In addition to obtaining government permission, the Saudi citizen creating and distributing the content, had to ensure that it did not cause sectarian tension among citizens, or insult the royal family or Islamic values.

In 1992 the "Basic Law of Governance" was enacted as an informal Constitution. Article 39 of the kingdom's "Basic Law of Governance" states that

Mass media and all other vehicles of expression shall employ civil and polite language, contribute towards the education of the nation and strengthen unity. It is prohibited to commit acts leading to disorder and division, affecting the security of the state and its public relations, or undermining human dignity and rights. Details shall be specified in the Law.[3]

The Ministry of Interior has "responsibility for all the Saudi media and other channels of information".[4] The ministry has been called the "main agent of censorship" in the kingdom.[4] It is charged with the `purification` of culture prior to it being permitted circulation to the public. A special unit, the Management of Publications department, "analyzes all publications and issues directives to newspapers and magazines" stating that way in which a given topic must be treated.[4]

According to the Encyclopedia of Censorship

There is no precensorship of publications but if any material goes against a directive, or more generally qualifies as `impure`, the department will check it and notify the minister of information, who decides in what way and to what extent the publication and its employees are to be punished. The main effect of this system has been to impose on journalists rigorous self- censorship.[4]

Saudi Arabia directs all international Internet traffic through a proxy farm located in King Abdulaziz City for Science & Technology. A content filter is implemented there, based on software by Secure Computing.[5] Since October 2006, the Communications and Information Technology Commission (CITC) has been handling the DNS structure and filtering in Saudi Arabia in the place of KACST. Additionally, a number of sites are blocked according to two lists maintained by the Internet Services Unit (ISU):[6] one containing "immoral" (mostly pornographic or supportive of LGBT-rights) sites and sites promoting Shia Ideology, the others based on directions from a security committee run by the Ministry of Interior (including sites critical of the Saudi government). An interesting feature of this system is that citizens are encouraged to actively report "immoral" sites (mostly adult and pornographic) for blocking, using a provided web form, available on the government's website.

The initial legal basis for content filtering is the resolution by Council of Ministers dated 12 February 2001.[7] According to a study carried out in 2004 by the Open Net Initiative "the most aggressive censorship focused on pornography, drug use, gambling, religious conversion of Muslims, and filtering circumvention tools."[5]

This resolution was subsequently modified and expanded into The Anti-Cyber Crime Law (2007). Article 6 of this royal decree makes it a crime to produce, possess, distribute, transmit or store Internet content or a computer program that involves gambling, human trafficking, pornography or anything deemed to be against Islam, public morals or public order.

On 11 July 2006 the Saudi government blocked access to Wikipedia and Google Translate, which was being used to bypass the filters on the blocked sites by translating them.[8][9]

In 2011, the Saudi government introduced new Internet rules and regulations that require all online newspapers and bloggers to obtain a special license from the Ministry of Culture and Information.[10] The Communications and Information Technology Commission (CITC) is responsible for regulating the Internet and for hosting a firewall which blocks access to thousands of websites, mainly due to sexual and political content. Many articles from the English and Arabic Wikipedia projects are censored in Saudi Arabia with no given explanation.

As of 2014, Saudi Arabia has plans to regulate local companies producing input for YouTube. The General Authority for Audiovisual Media, a recently formed watchdog, will issue a public declaration to regulate the work of YouTube channels. They plan to censor material that is "terrorist" in nature which according to the proposed rule will be any content that "disturbs public order, shakes the security of society, or subjects its national unity to danger, or obstructs the primary system of rule or harms the reputation of the state".[11][12][13]

Any speech or public demonstration that is deemed to be immoral or critical of the government, especially the royal family, can lead to imprisonment or corporal punishment.

Saudi and foreign newspapers and magazines, including advertising, are strictly controlled by censorship officials to remove content that is offensive. Newspapers and magazines must not offend or criticize the Wahabi Muslims and especially The Royal family, Wahabi government officials or government version of Islamic morality.

Censorship of foreign newspapers and magazines tends to focus on content of sexual nature.[14] Nudity and pornography are illegal in the kingdom and this can extend to inking out public displays or affection like hugging and kissing, the uncovered arms and legs of women and men or anything deemed to be promoting "sexual immorality", such as adultery, fornication, sodomy or homosexuality. Even advertising for driving classes for women is banned, in keep with the ban in the kingdom.

In 1994, all Saudi women magazines were banned by the Ministry of Information. This move was considered to be related to the pressures of the religious establishment or ulema. After this ban, nineteen of twenty-four magazines closed down since their major revenue was advertisement earnings paid by the Saudi companies.[15]

Public cinemas have been illegal since the 1980s when conservative clerics deemed cinemas to be a waste of time and a corrupting influence.

In 2007, permission was granted to two hotels to screen American children's films, to celebrate the end of Ramadan. That following year the first Saudi film festival took place.[16]

Television and radio news, educational and entertainment programming is subjected to government censorship and control. Live television broadcasting on government-owned national TV stations was briefly suspended in 2008 after disgruntled callers on a live show on Al-Ikhbariya news channel displayed discontent with the latest governmental salary increases and made critical remarks of some Saudi officials. The minister of Culture and Information then fired the network's director, Muhammad Al-Tunsy, and replaced him with one of his personal assistants. The minister also formed a censorship committee of which the approval would be required prior to airing any program or inviting any guests on national television stations. The legal status of satellite receivers is in something of a grey area.[17]

In 1994, the government banned ownership of satellite television receivers but throughout the 1990s, an increasingly large percentage of the population bought a satellite receiver and subscribed to various programming packages. Despite the ban, the Saudi government was, generally, willing to tolerate satellite television as long as the programming content was not pornographic, critical of the Saudi government or Islam.[17]

In the 2000s, the Saudi government launched its own satellite stations and expressed a desire to work with other governments in the region to develop common censorship guidelines and restrictions.[18]

In 2005, the two-part episode of American Dad! named "Stan of Arabia" was banned by the Saudi government. The English daily ArabNews published an article that accused the series of "a particularly brutal portrayal of Saudis and Saudi Arabia"; although some of what was being shown, such as intolerance of homosexuality as well as the ban of alcohol, was true. As a result, the two-part episode was banned in Saudi Arabia, although the rest of the TV series itself can still be seen.[19]

Read more:
Censorship in Saudi Arabia - Wikipedia

Photo from Womens March on Washington

Following the Womens March on Washington and its sister marches around the world, Chinese women were noticeably absent from the international media spotlights. This is because street protests and demonstrations that promote falsehoods are illegal in China, and the Chinese government has a history of cracking down and retaliating against public events and figures that bring light to gender inequality.

While the Chinese governments restriction of public protests and demonstrations is nothing new, over the past few years, China has been slowly increasing its censorship of feminist media and publications. For example, in 2015, the imprisonment by the government of the Feminist Five, a group of vocal Chinese womens rights activists, made headlines and led to an international outcry, leading to their subsequent release. The members of the group had been detained for distributing pamphlets about sexual harassment on March 8, International Womens Day.

This event from last year also mirrors a recent attack on feminist press. Just last week, a Chinese feminist social media account run on Weibo, a Twitter-like platform, was suspended for a month after it re-posted news about a strike taking place in the United States to honor International Womens Day. The account, Feminist Voices, which is one of the most popular in the nation with 80,000 followers, has temporarily moved to a different name. Citizens reacted with anger and fear on social media, warning of the threat to general civil liberties and to womens groups who want to remain outspoken against U.S. President Donald Trump and on gender equality issues.

However, besides high-profile cases such as this, the more insidious censorship and oppression of female artists and writers in China who dedicate their lives to the production of pieces that will inform and illuminate a worldwide audience has remained less publicized throughout the last year.

Consider the film Hooligan Sparrow, which was on this years short list for the Oscars category of feature length documentary. The director, Nanfu Wang, captured the story of Ye Haiyan, one of the most prominent womens rights activists in China. Ye and seven other activists risked arrest for publicly protesting against the outcome of a child rape case in Hainan involving a government official. Wang filmed undercover and smuggled the footage out of the country. The documentary was also nominated for the Grand Jury Prize at the 2016 Sundance Film Festival.

Before the announcements of the final Oscar nominees, local authorities shut off all of Yes utilities and Internet from her apartment on the outskirts of Beijing. The film was not ultimately included in the nominee list; if it had been, Ye would have had an extremely difficult time remaining in China and most likely would have had to leave the country somehow, though the government confiscated her passport in 2014. Ye is now facing eviction, and her daughter is not allowed to enroll in school because of Yes political activities.

The film is strictly prohibited from being shown within China but has garnered international acclaim. Wang and Chinese organizations have worked to plan underground screenings of the film domestically, risking government backlash.

Though the Chinese government supposedly supports the promotion of gender equality, it views any press or publicity that reveals a less-than-stellar status quo of womens rights as a threat to its order and stability. Working in these unfavorable conditions, Chinese feminists have increased efforts and are looking to forge alliances with other womens rights activists in the United States and beyond in order to foster international awareness. Journalists and activists such as Lu Pin, who is New York-based, have founded organizations such as the Chinese Feminism Collective that promotes the communication of Chinese feminism to Western nations.

See original here:
Chinese Censorship of Feminism - Daily Trojan Online