Contributor
Julia Gorin
Comedian and Opinionist Julia Gorin is proprietor of www.JuliaGorin.com and
is a contributing editor to www.JewishWorldReview.com..[go to Gorin index]
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The
first comment below the post read, "Let me see, Korans
on top shelf, no Salman Rushdie books, no books on anti-Islam
or anti-Koran or anti-Muhammed. No books on Jews and Isreal
unless it's about Holocoust denial. Seems the capitalists
are determined to sell our freedoms for a few tokens of
gold."
Indeed,
it looks like we're seeing capitalism coming full circle,
as businesses place profits over principles on a very macro
scale. Another glaring, more well-known, example was Google,
MSN and Yahoo agreeing to the Chinese government's censorship
requirements in order to do business with that second-largest
Internet market. When Chinese citizens type words like "democracy", "freedom", "human
rights" (or other "profanities")
into these search engines, they get an error page. While
search engines are hardly the only ones culpable for doing
business with China, their product is information, and
they're willing to corrupt it for profits. And that's the
least of the problem.
Google
was the last of the three companies to enter the Chinese
market, and by doing so it's on a dangerous course. Yahoo
has been implicated in helping Chinese
authorities to identify at least three Internet writers
who were subsequently jailed for "subversion," and Microsoft
followed Beijing orders to shut
down the site of an outspoken blogger. So far, Google
hasn't done anything so reprehensible, but the future doesn't
look promising.
Last
month Google CEO Eric Schmidt had this to say about the
company's bowing to Chinese censorship: "It is not an option
for us to broadly make information available that is illegal,
inappropriate or immoral or what have you." (By "illegal,
inappropriate or immoral", he's referring to "democracy,
freedom, human rights," etc.)
As AFP reported then: "While
Google and the other companies have come under pressure
in the United States not to succumb to Chinese pressure,
Schmidt praised China's rulers for their Internet strategy
that has seen a huge online population develop.
"'We
look at the rise of China, the investment and the smart
people and we are in awe of what has occurred here...And
we salute the government, key leaders in the industry and
all of you who have made the rise of the Internet in China
such a tremendous accomplishment.'"
Schmidt
then declined to answer whether Google would supply personal
information about its users to Chinese authorities if requested: "'I'd
rather not answer a hypothetical question,' he said."
What
makes the Google case of putting profits over principles
particularly galling and depressing—aside from its "Don't
Be Evil" (in pursuit of corporate profits) slogan—is
that its founder, Sergei Brin, escaped with his parents
from the clutches of the Soviet regime. All so that he
could reach the height of success that American freedom
and opportunity afford and then choose to once again do
as the Communists tell him.
Worse,
while bowing to Chinese orders, the company refuses to
cooperate with our own Department of Justice in facilitating
anti-child-porn measures.
By making
the choice—in a land where he has a choice—to
do business with a place where there is no choice, Brin's
company promotes a wider world without choice. "We have
all made a commitment to the government that we will absolutely
follow the Chinese law," Schmidt added. "We don't have
any alternatives."
Precisely.
Such is the country that the Google CEO praises. Sergei
Brin's American odyssey back to Communism is what happens
when immigrants forget where it is they came from, and
why they left. CRO
This piece first appeared at JewishWorldReview.com
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