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Headlines : Human RightsYoutube shuts down Egyptian anti-torture activist's acount
It’s fair enough that hardcore pornography and snuff films aren’t allowed to be broadcast from the internet video-sharing website Youtube. That is not the issue here, however.
Meet Wael Abbas, Egyptian anti-torture activist. He’s trying to get the word out to the streets of the world about police brutality in Egypt. Or at least he was until Youtube (owned by global search-engine Google) shut down his account and blocked all access to all footage showing what the Egyptian police are capable of.
[Posted By faelnarr]Republished from The Age (Australia)
The video-sharing website 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, did not respond to a written request for comment. A message on Abbas’s YouTube user page, reads: “This account is suspended.”
“They closed it (the account) and they sent me an email 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…
Posted by faelnarr
So, this begs the question: will Youtube/Google begin to censor such police violence inside American borders when it is posted? Think…
In fact, don’t just think…ask!
Let’s pressure Google on this situation. Do they have an agreement with Egyptian gov’t officials? Do they have an internal policy? Is there a process for determining the validity of a posting?
This is not dissimilar to other human rights issues tied to media access through large western corporations across the globe…
huh… after all the ‘Watch Saddam Get Offed’ copies that people favorited on YouTube, I thought they were made of sterner stuff…
I love it when people complain about content they actively have to search for…
what’s the best way to ask google in a public way?
Just had a look at Youtube’s Press Room and while it’s up-to-date wouldn’t you know it? No mention of Wael Abbas or this incident!
EDIT: There’s less graphic videos you can still view, such as this one.
omnicentric just asked a really good question:
what’s the best way to ask google in a public way?
I am pondering this…thoughts, anyone?
E-mail them, then make the reply public? Though it’ll probably be a “We thank you for showing interest in Youtube, unfortunately we cannot show explicit images to our general audience” kind of thing.
The best way to get the message in is to create a www.stumbleupon.com (Google community) account and start a blog about their censorship.
try:
http://www.google.com/support/youtube/bin/answer.py?answer=77402&hl=en-US
This, if I have the right link, is their “policy abuse” page. The reason I brought this up is because, they may be manipulating their own protocol.
Responding to complaints, if done in ways infringing on legitimate speech, only exacerbate existing problems.
OK, I`m preaching…..but this is just an idea.
CNN made big news of this.