Becky, the libertarian lesbian lawyer and mother who blogged at Just a Girl in Short Shorts Talking About Whatever, declares today that she is ending her blog due to censorship imposed by Google last week, which has caused her traffic of 150,000 hits per month to crash. She tweeted this morning:
The time has come to say good-bye to the blog—and au revoir to my readers—I’ll be back somewhere, sometime, somehow.
I did a fair amount of work behind-the-scenes both to rally support for Becky and to encourage her to switch to a self-hosted WordPress blog with her own domain name. I haven’t heard back from her personally, but obviously from her last post this kind of help seemed to her to be part of the problem, which is that Google has acquired the power and wealth of a nation and is now using it like a despot to oppress. Advice that she should just move to a different platform appears to have been a galling symptom that we have knuckled under without a proper fight. And Becky is a fighter and her cause is just:
I do not believe that the federal government should regulate how Google exercises its power—they would only make things worse, and it would result in greater infringements of individual freedom. But that in no way lessens my disgust and disdain for a company that on a small scale will wipe me out with a key stoke, and on a large scale partner with Communist Party thugs in censoring the Chinese people.
These days most of the censorship is not the work of the federal government—it is the Titans of Silicon Valley , who also strive to know every single fact about every single living thing in the Universe, that scare the beejeebees out of me.
Becky is right. One of the scariest aspects of the Obama campaign from 2007-present, since they haven’t really stopped, was their observation that they could corrupt the online public forums and make opposing viewpoints disappear before people wised up that the owners of the forums were playing favorites when allowing merchants into the marketplace of ideas. And the owners of Google were among those corrupted, so, for example, HillBuzz has reported that Hillary’s supporters got lousy page ranks in Google, and their Blogger blogs and YouTube videos would vanish. (Remember that Google owners Blogger and YouTube.)
I am comforted that Becky’s tweet this morning and her last post both say “Au revoir” — “until we see each other again” — instead of “adieu” — “good-bye until we meet in heaven,” is how I translate “adieu.” I am going to trust her resourcefulness and faith in the value of her point of view to bring her back into the marketplace of ideas. She has an important contribution to make. I look forward to cheering her return.
I am dismayed as to the amount of censorship there is in a country where it’s citizenry has the right to free speech; that said, the right of free enterprise is something authors need to take into consideration while they publish.
We have the right to free speech and free enterprise has the right to justify their product to their consumer. This can be a very thin line between what writers publish and what is read.
I will miss Becky as she has had many poignant topics that should be addressed and has provided me with some insight to things that never occurred to me.
My personal recommendation to Becky is to; one: continue to post blogs where ever she will find an enterprise that will be comfortable with her writing, and two: publish books, because I believe she is a gifted writer and she has much insight to offer a reading public.
A.R.
.-= A.R.Eatough´s last blog ..And by His Works We Will Know Him =-.
He who pays the piper, calls the tune.
Google doesn’t charge you for their services, but that doesn’t mean they’re free.
Thankfully I’m too small to attract the attention of the powers that be over there. So my political diatribes go unnoticed, camouflaged by grandbaby and Pug pictures.
.-= Peter´s last blog ..Bacon And Prewash For The Dishwasher =-.
This may sound harsh, and I wish Becky nothing but the best, but if someone says “sure, go ahead and write on this wall I provided to you for free, but I may wipe it clean if I feel like it” and they wipe it…
It’s not censorship. Google isn’t doing anything that their Terms of Service says they can’t (you look close enough, there’s a “we reserve the right to yadda yadda yadda erase your crap at will” clause. There always is).
It sucks, and it’s not fair.
Fairness was never promised when you click that “I accept” under the TOS.
Paid hosting is the ONLY way to go if you unless you’re blog is complete vanilla. Even then, when buying, read the small print.
Twice.
.-= Graumagus´s last blog ..So THIS is how they planned on paying for that health care bill =-.
Speaking of Hillbuzz, what has happened to the boyz??? Cynthia, don’t you have contact with Sebastian Gray? He needs to be writing for someone, he is excellent!!
Does anyone know if they just abandoned their site or if something terrible happened?
Colorado Mom,
I haven’t written to Sebastian to ask why HillBuzz is standing pat on the June 18 post praising persistence in the fight against David Letterman. My assumption is that that is the point he wants to make. Also, HillBuzz has been promising to change to a self-hosted platform with various bells and whistles. Sebastian, et al., don’t make their living from HillBuzz, so if they are busy with that, then they are not putting time into the current HillBuzz.
Another possibility is that their friend, Lionel, is now dying and Sebastian and the others are caring for him.
I am sending them positive thoughts and just waiting patiently for their return. It doesn’t seem like them to leave without saying good-bye.
Cynthia
Cynthia,
Thanks for the heads up on Becky and HB. I should post here more, I’m here nearly every day, but I tend to just lurk.
Kei,
You’re welcome. Thanks for being a regular, it will be a pleasure to hear more from you.
Cynthia
Total bummer about Becky. She should continue writing. I should offer her website space under my domain that I’m not currently using. She’ll likely get her own thing going. Do keep us posted, Cynthia.
apodoca,
Becky has promised to return on her own terms, and I’m glad to see you have faith in her. Yes, when Becky returns I’ll post about it as soon as I know.
Cynthia
Thanks Cynthia for the HB input. I truly hope they haven’t abandoned the site and are busy with other things. I certainly hope it isn’t Lionel and that he is fine.
I do find it interesting that with all that has gone on they haven’t made a peep but I am hoping they come back.
I also tend to mostly lurk but I check in several times a day to read up!
Colorado Mom,
When Sebastian and the other HillBuzzers commit to someone or something, they’ve demonstrated that they do it with everything they’ve got. The image I have in my mind is that Sebastian is busy with the mailings he described and he will persist until Letterman is fired. If that’s the case, he’s leaving the post on persistence up so people will keep reading it until it clicks with them. Whatever is going on, I’m sure they all will benefit from our patience, love, support and gratitude. I’m thinking positive and that if anything were wrong, the PUMAsphere would find out and leave a message at HillBuzz in the comments or tweet about it. But let’s think positive.
Cynthia
Thank you for talking me up. I’m leaving the site up for posterity–a troll and a few people still stop by. Twitter for now–not sure what or where I will reappear on a more extensive basis.
I have made this argument so many times I am sick of it, but I would like to explain to Graumagus that this is not an ordinary property rights argument. I am more sensitive than most anyone to the importance of property rights.
A long time ago in the development of the law it was felt that certain types of industries, because of their nature, have obligations that are different than ordinary businesses. It first arose in the category of common carriers–the types of industries that tend to be monopolistic.
Google is angargantuan Internet company with more money and power than most nations. They also differ from most companies in that they are actually more into implementing their creepy vision of a new world as much as they are profits–and that is always a recipe for disaster.
With that kind of power and ubiquitous presence I fail to see how it makes any difference whether it is a private industry or a governmental agency that is violating fundamental rights. There is no bill of rights to restrain Google.
Not only did Google slap an “inappropriate content” spash page on my blog–they scrubbed the blog from their search engine–and the splash page had the effect of doing the same thing on non-Google search engines as well. The fact that they had an illusory contract (the TOS– illusorty because it essentially lets them define what is objectionable content) means nothing–illusory contracts are not considered contracts at all.
I am not the only person who has been treated this way by Google because they object to the ideas expressed. I mention on my blog a group MassResistance–a homophobic bunch I can not stand–and have actually done battle with. As much as I object to their ideas on the treatment of gays and lesbians–it really wrong for Google to marginalize them by labeling it Offensive content. It was not “hate speech” or per the TOS they would have been tossed–its just that a bunch of gay activists and liberals felt that they shouldn’t have the right to speak, notified Google and they were happy to oblige.
I do not advocate government actions to curb Google–that would only make things worse. But that does not diminish by disgust and disdain for them.
~Becky
Becky,
You’re welcome. Please let me know when you are ready to launch your new blog and I will talk that up, too. Thank you for stopping by and clarifying your position. I want to remind my gentle readers regarding Becky’s comments on the law that she is an attorney.
For my readers who would like to follow Becky on Twitter, which I highly recommend, click on this link: http://twitter.com/beckychr007. Becky, my favorite recent tweet from you is “Daily Kos disses Cheney on gay rights http://bit.ly/AzXDO do not realize Cheney more gay rights friendly than Obama http://bit.ly/2Ojf2M.”
Becky, you are loved, respected and needed in the blogosphere. You make a valuable contribution to libertarian and conservative thought. I look forward to your creating a new blog when you are ready. In the meantime, if you have essays you want to share, please accept my invitation to guest blog here. Those of us who are members of the minorities duped and held in thrall by liberalism have a special duty to speak out, both to educate conservatives about our humanity and rights to equality and to teach our brothers and sisters trapped in liberalism what liberty both offers and requires of every person who wants to achieve their full potential and be truly free.
Cynthia
Moe Lane links this post and writes at moelane.com and Redstate (I looked for the links and can’t find them — sorry):
As for videos, though: Heritage New Media Partners offers a free hosting service. Keep that in mind if YouTube decides to play “Oops, we lost your campaign video” games again next year.