Google now censoring reviews into UK Schools (as headteachers demanded) - Page 1
Forum section: electronics / general

author: MrMobodies
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: April 27, 2025, 02:46:24 pm
content: When I hear incidents such as knivings at cities, towns or even schools I always out curiosity go and find out from reviews about them to see what how things maybe like there currently and previously and how that may reflect or whether it was just say a one off incident.The article is not important:https://www.aberdeenlive.news/news/aberdeen-news/what-know-far-after-stabbing-10130484QuoteBut this:QuoteI just found this:https://schoolsweek.co.uk/headteachers-demand-google-delete-school-reviews/QuoteThey are not official reviews they are opinions of experiences of parents and children. Why shouldn't they be heard?*If an institute has a bad name by reputation but they manage to improve things over the years where more good reviews start building up over the old negative ones then shouldn't that equally work in their favour and show that they had indeed improved?Regulating reviews:It reminds me of in one of Dave Jones video's where he was speaking to three camera's and he said something about a company wanting him to review their stuff but they wanted to control the review and he said no.If there is a major problem with an institute (when they fail to regulate themselves) and is not being dealt with where the parents have to pull out their children for their own safety, why shouldn't that not be heard as a warning to other parents.Makes me wonder how far will it go before Google start censoring other things at the measly requests of a few businesses or other institutes.What do you think?

author: nctnico
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: April 27, 2025, 02:50:21 pm
content: OTOH reviews can be a sh!t show. How about disgruntled parents bad mouthing a school because their kid didn't score as well in a test as the parents had hoped? There has to be some kind of way to weed the false reviews from themade upreal ones. Edit: auto correct messed up, fixed it!

author: bdunham7
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: April 27, 2025, 03:17:25 pm
content: Quote from: nctnico on April 27, 2025, 02:50:21 pmThat's the fallacy that is destroying free speech and thought in the UK and EU right now. You don't need to have any way of suppressing other people's idiotic opinions because granting such a power always has worse consequences than simply allowing idiots to speak and relying on the readers' critical thinking skills to sort out the rubbish.I do agree with the idea that there should be some sort of reply mechanism and that predatory practices by companies such as Yelp--which does filter reviews depending on whether you pay them--should be regulated.

author: Analog Kid
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: April 27, 2025, 04:58:26 pm
content: Quote from: nctnico on April 27, 2025, 02:50:21 pmAye, and there's the rub:Just like all of the other related shit regarding online speech, when people start demanding what you've just proposed--some sure-fire way to get at The Truth in what people post online--this leads only to suppression of speech, with no clarifying effect.Let me ask you: just how would you propose that the regulatory body in this case determine what's the "truth" and what isn't? Do you really think that they can arrive at any kind of objective determination here, free from political and social bias?No, of course they can't.Which is why I am pretty much an absolute free-speech advocate. Let the chips fall where they may.Instead of restricting what people can read and write, what we should be doing is improving the general level of critical thinking so that people can make up their own mind as to what's real and what isn't.Besides, the idea that people in general are so susceptible to "misinformation" that they must be protected from it at all costs is highly overblown.See my post here for aproposal for an alternative system of filtering commentsin a forum such as this one.

author: Analog Kid
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: April 27, 2025, 05:00:54 pm
content: Quote from: bdunham7 on April 27, 2025, 03:17:25 pmAbso-fucking-lutely.Yelp is still pretty much the extortionist outfit it was a decade ago.But who's going to regulate them? And how?I don't think that's in the cards.

author: shabaz
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: April 27, 2025, 05:55:04 pm
content: Quote from: MrMobodies on April 27, 2025, 02:46:24 pmI think that's quite a stretch. What's that long post really got to do with engineering if that's what you're really interested in on an engineering site?Knife stabbing events seems a very different situation to engineering or product reviews. How do you think this relates to the current mechanisms for reviewing products or customer service (for instance TrustPilot)?I don't see how you can extrapolate so far from knife-stabbing to explore with any accuracy any problems with engineering-related product or service reviews.

author: tggzzz
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: April 27, 2025, 06:00:53 pm
content: Quote from: Analog Kid on April 27, 2025, 04:58:26 pmSo you are content that an unknown person (or bot) in anothe country could fabricate (presumably) stories about you being a commie paedophile rapist, put that on some random website, and invite "lone wolves" to "do your own research" and "protect our children and way of life"?QuoteGood luck with wanting education. (Doubly so now that the US Department of Education is being targeted by DOGE.)As for misinformation, not far from here a mob set upon a children's doctor. They thought paediatrician==paedophile. It could be you or a family member next time.If you have Netflix, there's a good talking heads series "Criminal:UK". Episode 6 illustrates such a vigilante convinced they are doing good: "Asking increasingly pointed questions, the team tries to crack a zealous defence put forth by the head of an online group that unmasks sexual predators."If anything has become evident since the annus horribilis of 2016, it is that far too many people cannot distinguish facts from outrageous lies. Hells teeth, 25% of Americans think the sun goes around the earth!

author: Analog Kid
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: April 27, 2025, 06:43:17 pm
content: Quote from: tggzzz on April 27, 2025, 06:00:53 pmYes. It's the price we pay for freedom of speech.My byword is that of the late, great Molly Ivins, an extraordinary Texas political critic, who said that the only solution to the problems of free speech was more free speech. I truly believe that.Violence, which is what you're alluding to here, has its own set of solutions that have nothing whatever to do with freedom of expression. There are already laws on the books to deal with that (assuming they're investigated and enforced, which is a different problem). Which is why I'm also dead-set against laws proscribing "hate" of any type whatsoever. The idea of trying to suppress or eliminate hatred from the hue-mon species: might as well try to get rid of hurricanes, volcanoes or earthquakes. Never gonna happen.If there's speech out there that you object to, then it's your responsibility to counteract that speech with your own.

author: NE666
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: April 27, 2025, 07:05:07 pm
content: Quote from: MrMobodies on April 27, 2025, 02:46:24 pmI think: "Hell's tits, the last thing a stabbing incident at a school needs is f-ing online reviews of it. Are we now actually living in the Black Mirror universe?"

author: shabaz
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: April 27, 2025, 07:08:39 pm
content: Quote from: Analog Kid on April 27, 2025, 06:43:17 pmAnd it's completely irrelevant to nearly every product review. Good luck telling Amazon or TrustPilot or the countless other review sites, that they are not allowed to write their own rules on their own platform, provided they act legally.

author: nctnico
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: April 27, 2025, 07:13:16 pm
content: Quote from: tggzzz on April 27, 2025, 06:00:53 pmAgreed. A couple of years ago a video about how drinking glasses where cleaned in a hotel, went viral. My wife was shocked! At some point the female narrator was totally flabberghasted that they sprayed the glasses with stuff from a bottle which was labelled 'do not drink!'. My immediate reaction was: "Ofcourse you should not drink that, it is soap you idiot!"Appearantly that didn't rung a bell for all the people forwarding the video to friends. I hate to say it, but there is a significant number of people who need guidance for their thought and information processing otherwise they'll be completely lost and a danger to themselves and others. Take anti-vaxers for example. In some ways the days of organised religions telling what is what where better.

author: Analog Kid
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: April 27, 2025, 07:14:58 pm
content: Quote from: shabaz on April 27, 2025, 07:08:39 pmWell, no, there's absolutely nothing in what you wrote that I can argue with: at least here in the US, the legal concept of freedom of speech (i.e., the First Amendment to the Constitution) only says that thegovernmentshall not infringe on freedom of expression; the private sector is free to do what it pleases here. I think most of us know that.But what I can still argue with you is thatit sucks, no matter whether it's a gov't. or a private actor messing with free speech.

author: Analog Kid
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: April 27, 2025, 07:18:38 pm
content: Quote from: nctnico on April 27, 2025, 07:13:16 pmThat's true now, has always been true, and will always be true.Still not a reason to turn the whole fucking world into a gigantic Disneyland, with OSHA-approved railings everywhere and rubber-coated walls and floors so that nobody can hurt themselves even if they try.This idea of protecting people from themselves (or from others)based on what they say or writeis absurd and is absolutely inimical to any kind of civilization that considers itself free.Unless you like living in a regimented society, in which case might I suggest you stop bashing China and move there?

author: Analog Kid
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: April 27, 2025, 07:28:33 pm
content: To all the anti-free-speechers here, let me give you my example of the ultimate in virtue in this area.That is Noam Chomsky's defense of the French Holocaust denier Robert Faurisson. Faurisson published books and articles pushing his Holocaust-denialist POV and was prosecuted for it by the French government. (What is it with the censorship tendencies of all you Yurpeens?)Chomsky came to his defense, at the risk of his own standing as an academician. He was roundly condemned for that.This is what I consider the highest form of intellectual honesty.Chomsky took great pains to separate his defense of what Faurisson wrote from the actual content of his writings.Chomsky is, after all, a Jew, and the farthest thing from a Holocaust denier himself.He's also not an idiot, and knows well the history of anti-Semitism and of the actual Holocaust.Despite that, he considers freedom of expression--most importantly in the world of scholarship--to be of vital importance, and was willing to put his own reputation on the line in order to defend it.It's something that's is always at risk, and especially today: just look at what the Trump administration is doing with regard to anyone who dares defend Palestinians on campus.This whole movement towards censorship in the name of saving us from ourselves is so goddamn misguided and ultimately destructive to any free society.

author: MrMobodies
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: April 27, 2025, 07:50:58 pm
content: Quote from: shabaz on April 27, 2025, 05:55:04 pmI am sorry if I didn't explain well enough. Google censuring reviews in general which can include buying things such as electrical goods, services or even education institutes teaching engineering itself if they go down that route.The knifing article as I said in my post isn't important, that just led me to the review censoring. The long article is the fact that a group of institutes, 50 of them have managed to get Google into censoring reviews about them and for every other institute and my concern is how many more things will they censure in future including reviews into equipment, services things and even related stuff.My focus and intention is about the fact the Google, quite a big organization has bowed down to something like this and I wonder if there is a motive behind it too. Just like how Youtube removed the feedback counters in late 2021.Thank you for telling me what you think.Can we please try and keep it off the stabbing, about schools(in general), just the reviews(into them being surpressed) and discuss the possible motives behind it.Where they paid somehow maybe?If you brought an electrical item from a DIY chain, and a group of them managed to persuade Google into suppressing reviews into them and every other DIY chain claiming "Some types of places are more likely to receive posts... To prevent this, Google has turned off posting."Now woudn't that be just as suspicious?

author: Analog Kid
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: April 27, 2025, 07:56:39 pm
content: Quote from: MrMobodies on April 27, 2025, 07:50:58 pmThe motive? That's easy: they know which side their bread is buttered on. It's that simple.Why else would they have caved in to China's censorship demands?(BTW, "censure" ≠ "censor")

author: tggzzz
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: April 27, 2025, 08:04:00 pm
content: Quote from: Analog Kid on April 27, 2025, 06:43:17 pmIf people were held accountable for what they say and write, then there wouldn't be much problem. Libertarian idealists base their message on the presumption we live in such an ideal world.Unfortunately we don't live in that world. We live in a world where twisted bitter people listening in their parents basements can say anything whatsoever without having any personal responsibility for the consequences.Whenyoufindyourlife has been fucked up by irresponsible utter lies, you might have a different opinion.

author: Analog Kid
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: April 27, 2025, 08:31:04 pm
content: Quote from: tggzzz on April 27, 2025, 08:04:00 pmI might at that.But I would still defend free speech.(BTW, I'm not a starry-eyed libertarian. Well, maybe 15-20% libertarian, depending on which side of bed I get up on any given day. I consider myself a realist, to the extent that I actually know what's what.)

author: tggzzz
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: April 27, 2025, 09:02:11 pm
content: Quote from: Analog Kid on April 27, 2025, 08:31:04 pmI defend responsible free speech with accountability for the consequences.I don't defend free speech which shows women being beheaded and people skinned alive. Do you? If you don't defend it, where do you draw the line?Why those examples? Because of this report today, which refers to what free speech degenerates into in the non-ideal world.https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2025/apr/27/meta-faces-ghana-lawsuits-over-impact-of-extreme-content-on-moderatorsUnfortunately that is only one of many many examples of such behaviour. Can't ignore it.

author: SiliconWizard
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: April 27, 2025, 09:09:21 pm
content: Quote from: nctnico on April 27, 2025, 02:50:21 pmSeparate false reviews from made up ones, tough call.

author: tggzzz
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: April 27, 2025, 09:16:59 pm
content: Quote from: SiliconWizard on April 27, 2025, 09:09:21 pmNo, it is easy. My reviews are authentic and valid. Your reviews are careless and worthless. Their reviews are scurrilous nonsense that should be deleted on sight

author: Analog Kid
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: April 27, 2025, 09:31:02 pm
content: Quote from: tggzzz on April 27, 2025, 09:02:11 pm[I think you meant to write "If you defend it".]Yes, I defend even that free speech.I denounce women (or anyone) being beheaded and people skinned alive, as most any civilized person would do.I have no truck with the headchoppers.Do you see the difference?Where do I draw the line? I suppose the classic "shouting 'fire!' in a crowded theater" would be as close as I could come to that.

author: shabaz
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: April 27, 2025, 09:32:48 pm
content: Quote from: Analog Kid on April 27, 2025, 07:28:33 pmEven the Founding Fathers of the US Constitution (well, collectively anyway) didn't believe in absolute free speech. Interestingly though, the areas where they were strongly in favor of extreme free speech, namely, particularly in criticism of government, is the one area where it is now often seen as 'unpatriotic', which as you mentioned, may be occurring on campuses. Definitely unconstitutional in spirit at least.In some subject-matter, the possibility of harms are so severe, it is simply pragmatic to have limitations, and, it seems to me, as acutely recognized by@tggzzz, one very good solution is simply a better learned public that can more broadly recognize facts from lies and therefore less risk of being misled and harming themselves and others, but that's a difficult and ongoing thing, not so easy when schools are not really well funded/prioritized sadly. Very easy to get into a spiral and end up with a very distorted view of things.

author: Analog Kid
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: April 27, 2025, 09:36:37 pm
content: Quote from: shabaz on April 27, 2025, 09:32:48 pmWell, there you go: have tons of free speech, and a robust system of education which includes critical thinking (andnotpoliticized/weaponized critical thinking that's skewed towards one ideology or another, but a fostering of thinking that's both independent and rational).Without both of these things we are well and truly fucked.

author: tggzzz
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: April 27, 2025, 09:37:50 pm
content: Quote from: Analog Kid on April 27, 2025, 09:31:02 pmSo it it is OK to make and show videos of someone being slowly tortured to death by being skinned alive, but your boundary is shouting fire in a crowded theatre?Really?

author: tggzzz
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: April 27, 2025, 09:43:09 pm
content: Quote from: Analog Kid on April 27, 2025, 09:36:37 pmYes, you are well and truly fucked.Given that starting point, what are sensible/indefensible courses of action? Wishing for a different starting point is ...

author: Analog Kid
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: April 27, 2025, 09:46:43 pm
content: Quote from: tggzzz on April 27, 2025, 09:37:50 pmPretty much, yeah. As long as "no sentient creatures were harmed in the making of this video".I'm not a consumer of such videos, FWIW.

author: tggzzz
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: April 27, 2025, 09:53:40 pm
content: Quote from: Analog Kid on April 27, 2025, 09:46:43 pmSo you don't think torture might not be harm?Hint: this isn't a video game, nor a Hollywood movie. It is real.

author: nctnico
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: April 27, 2025, 10:02:25 pm
content: Quote from: SiliconWizard on April 27, 2025, 09:09:21 pmGood catch. Auto correct messed up.

author: Analog Kid
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: April 27, 2025, 10:07:34 pm
content: Quote from: tggzzz on April 27, 2025, 09:53:40 pmThat's why I said "no sentient creatures were harmed ...".The video itself--the footage, bytes of content--is OK under free speech in my book.Any harms inflicted during the making of the video, obviously (I would hope) are not. They are actionable offenses for which there are already laws prohibiting them. (Which may never be prosecuted, depending on where and how the video was made, but that's another matter.)Harming people (or animals) to make a video or photograph never falls under the heading of "free speech".I'm a little surprised at you for this.A snuff film made with "AI" or with actors would be OK.A real snuff film would definitely not be OK.

author: tggzzz
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: April 27, 2025, 10:13:20 pm
content: Quote from: Analog Kid on April 27, 2025, 10:07:34 pmThat is vile and abhorrent.Such vile material is explicitly illegal here, whether or not it is CGI. I am glad I live in a relatively civilised country.

author: shabaz
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: April 27, 2025, 10:14:29 pm
content: Quote from: Analog Kid on April 27, 2025, 10:07:34 pmHi,You have not thought this through. Hint: think about the consumers of the content, then extrapolate to other examples, that I guarantee you, most people would certainly object to knowing that people were consuming it, actors or not.

author: Analog Kid
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: April 27, 2025, 10:36:25 pm
content: Quote from: shabaz on April 27, 2025, 10:14:29 pmI have thought this through.I'm aware that there are those who would object to all kinds of content that exists.That doesn't concern me.At all.That is their problem.This is an age-old debate we're having, going back to the bluenoses and prudes who banned all kinds of books, plays, movies, etc. Including Allen Ginsburg's "Howl".Omigod, think of the ladies and children. We must save them from this indecent corruption!It just occurred to me that this is somewhat like another absurd argument, the one about drugs like marijuana being "gateways" to harmful and addictive drugs like heroin, cocaine, etc. The whole "slippery slope" theory.This has been pretty well debunked as a general principle, even if there are certain people who are susceptible to drug use of any kind and may progress from one to the other. (Not that drug use should be ignored or taken lightly either.)So with free speech and objectionable content: so far as I know, it still has not been proven that consuming any kind of visual, aural or textual content is guaranteed to result in objectionablebehavior, which I believe is the claim of those who advocate censorship of such content. Like the "violent video game" debates of the 1980s.I'm certainly not saying that I like the fact that snuff films, beheading videos or even violent video games exist.But again, it's the difference between Noam Chomsky defending the writings of a Holocaust denier and someone agreeing with and promoting those views, which Chomsky definitely was not doing.The distinction is important here.

author: shabaz
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: April 27, 2025, 11:02:14 pm
content: Quote from: Analog Kid on April 27, 2025, 10:36:25 pmWith respect, no, you have not thought this through.There are things that constitute behavior sufficient to have reached a criminal and in many cases also an abhorrent threshold that society will not tolerate you consuming, even if that thing is, either mistakenly (in the belief that it wasn't an actor) or intentionally, performed by an actor.You'd then be preaching free speech from a prison cell and no-one will help you.

author: tggzzz
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: April 27, 2025, 11:22:59 pm
content: Quote from: shabaz on April 27, 2025, 11:02:14 pmAmericans have an enduring mythology of theloneperson out on the frontier being responsible for themself and answerable to nobody. That was valid and there's still validity in more remote places. It cannot be valid in town/cities where people are not alone, but the wishful myth retains its hold. In this context "alone" isn't restricted to physical prescence; anywhere in indirect contact over the net is sufficient.They also have the ancient attitude that if something bad happens to you then you must be a bad/undeserving person, so don't deserve help. That is tempered in the more civilised citizens with a notable willingness to help strangers; a strange polarised dichotomy.

author: shabaz
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: April 28, 2025, 12:15:13 am
content: Quote from: tggzzz on April 27, 2025, 11:22:59 pmIndeed, I can also see why there was originally some reasoning behind gun rights, and why stealing a horse was a serious crime with such strict sentencing. I've also noticed some tend to have a 'wealthy = good person' mentality (and some people in other countries have a 'high social class = good person' mentality. Interesting how these things may have come to be).A book I really like (Mr Midshipman Easy) was quite interesting, because it starts with behavior built on an adherence to a credo that breaks down in practice because it impinges on others. The protagonist learns this, and becomes a good, wise leader. The 1935 movie was fun to watch too.

author: Analog Kid
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: April 28, 2025, 03:00:26 am
content: Quote from: tggzzz on April 27, 2025, 11:22:59 pmNot sure if you're accusing me personally of holding those views or all Americans generally.In my case, not so; in the latter case, generalization much? I'm sure there are plenty of Britons who also feel that way.Let me try a different angle here:How about if you tell us what you think would be the dire consequences if a near-total free-speech regime was implemented in your country. What terrible things do you think would happen? Maybe give a couple of examples.Be fairly descriptive if you would, and please be realistic and not alarmist.I'm genuinely interested.

author: shabaz
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: April 28, 2025, 05:34:51 am
content: You didn't ask me, but I'd still like to comment here.If World War II taught anything, it’s that civilization is paper-thin. That is why many countries enacted laws that criminalize certain forms of publication: this was part of the legacy left by those who lived through the war. Many survivors had to sit beside former enemies and write these safeguards to keep the horrors they had witnessed from recurring. By acting obtuse and refusing even to consider these dangers in what you try to espouse, you make a mockery of this.Looking further back, as mentioned before, the Founding Fathers themselves demonstrated that free speech has limits. I doubt you are wiser than they were.And, society has all but unanimously agreed that some things are so terrible, abhorrent, and disgusting that they will not be tolerated, even if you "just" publish, read, or view them. You'd end up behind bars, and even your own family wouldn't want to know you.

author: Analog Kid
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: April 28, 2025, 05:38:15 am
content: Quote from: shabaz on April 28, 2025, 05:34:51 amWell, since you bothered to reply, do you care to be a little more specific about what those horrendous things are that would be unleashed by excessive amounts of free speech?

author: shabaz
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: April 28, 2025, 06:13:18 am
content: Quote from: Analog Kid link=topic=459624.msg5895924#msg5895924No, I do not care to write those repellent things for you. I've actually been pretty clear.I've got a better idea. Go spend some time studying history, and see if you can find out for yourself just possibly why some of the limitations in your country might have come into being. You'll appreciate it more when you learn it for yourself.Stop being one of those people that deliberately like to act dumb. You've come up with an absolute that easily breaks down, and each time someone gently suggests an example of that, you act quite selfishly with a "no, that's a 'you' problem" response with little regard for others.

author: Analog Kid
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: April 28, 2025, 06:18:13 am
content: I think you're a hypersensitive shit, so I'm done with you.'Bye.BTW, does William Shirer'sThe Rise and Fall of the Third Reichqualify as history to you? Because I'm quite familiar with that work.So enough of the condescension and moral superiority.

author: shabaz
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: April 28, 2025, 07:05:17 am
content: Quote from: Analog Kid on April 28, 2025, 06:18:13 amWell then were you deliberately acting dumb asking for examples?The state of you: you should be ashamed for not recalling the reasons from your reading effort, making someone uncomfortable enough on a forum to explain it to you. And I did it politely as best as I could. I didn't enjoy having to state it, but it needed to be said.

author: NE666
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: April 28, 2025, 08:01:16 am
content: To return to the titled point."Cowley said the vacuum of trust in Ofsted reports meant some parents might “trust Google before Ofsted, which informs their shortlisting”."(Justin Cowley, a deputy head at Mendell Primary School in Bromborough, Wirral)And which group is it exactly that has been trying to publicly undermine and restrict Ofsted's work (the UK government's 'inspectorate of schools') because they seem to think that any grading of teacher and school performance is 'unfair'? Remove parent's access to an official, measured and structured review process by eroding their trust in that system, and they'll have to take whatever they can get, wherever they can get it.It's the height of hypocrisy that we're seeing. Headteachers claiming how unfair and stressful their own evaluation process is, whilst students get pushed through more and more relatively pointless but highly stressful grading systems e.g. SATS year on year. What example is that setting students?

author: tom66
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: April 28, 2025, 10:08:31 am
content: Quote from: Analog Kid on April 27, 2025, 07:14:58 pmWasn't it a crucial ruling, I want to say Supreme Court decided, where common carrier rules were applied and therefore the First Amendment rules -did- apply to commercial operators (in so far as long as the content wasn't illegal for them to transmit, it should be permitted on the network.)

author: MrMobodies
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: April 28, 2025, 03:55:50 pm
content: Quote from: NE666 on April 28, 2025, 08:01:16 amThere is no smoke without fire if enough people say the same thing and that's what I look at the reviews for.Told I was unteachable due to my reinstatement/disability in assessment, when I was older I was told that because I never passed or took the SATS I was incapable and have no chance of passing any GCSE but how wrong where they a couple of years later at a different school and then a late night adult college. A decade later in another place I found it was just one of the few lousy excuses they'd use with anyone they didn't want to help. I don't believe all of them are bad but this suppression into reviews undermines my confidence further in trust like they got more things to hide and no incentive in that respect to improve. I never really left any feedback and there was none to leave in those days. There was at one time Ratemyteachers which I heard complained about in the news but I just don't have the proof to report what I wanted to and time already passed.I use to hear off a few customers in the 2010's (doing laptop work where their children use to break them) about looking for secondary schools for their children. One customer was worried when a school they briefly visited and disapproved off was picked against their first choice by the authority for their special needs where they were about to start. After I told them my experience of that particular place and they manage to challenge it. I told them notice how big it is packed with so many students, mostly large class sizes, too few staff, bullying; violent and badly behaved students who smoke behind the sheds and victimize others who happen to be too near to them and they'd chase you home virtually daily if you dare report them, people with special educational plans are often put in this block most of the time that looks like something out of nursery and treated accordingly and sidelined from certain subjects and told it was because they have special needs back in the day. I told them to go back, have a thorough look around and that special needs block in the back and find out what they do there. Last I heard they looked and didn't didn't feel it was appropriate to meet their daughter's needs when they they lodged a complaint with the authority changing it back to their first placement where they knew it had the right resources to help her academically.Now that's what feedback can do for someone and get them out of trouble but this was in person.

author: Analog Kid
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: April 28, 2025, 07:30:34 pm
content: Quote from: shabaz on April 28, 2025, 07:05:17 amNo, I was not: I am genuinely interested to know what, exactly, you consider the specific dire consequences of too much free speech. Now you might consider that "dumb": I won't argue the point. But I am not trolling here: I don't know you, and cannot make assumptions about what triggers certain reactions you may have. Therefore, I am asking you to provide us with an example or three.Unless you're superstitious and are afraid that by speaking the name of the devil that you may unleash him upon the world? Surely you're more rational than that, yes? We're just having a discussion here, not organizing beer-hall putsches.So I repeat my request. Because I can think of a lot of things, but again, I don't pretend to be competent to psychoanalyze you through the medium of this forum.Answer or don't according to your inclination.

author: shabaz
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: April 28, 2025, 08:30:31 pm
content: Quote from: Analog Kid on April 28, 2025, 07:30:34 pmI gave you three clear very different examples in reply #37 of where you should look to understand the reasons behind some of the limitations that have come to exist over time.Then you claimed to have read a book on one of the topics. Yet you also mentioned the following earlier:QuoteThat written output from your mind shows that you either did not read enough, did not learn a thing of substance, or you're deliberately being obtuse and trolling and making a mockery of what needed to be done. Which is it?

author: Analog Kid
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: April 28, 2025, 08:50:17 pm
content: Quote from: shabaz on April 28, 2025, 08:30:31 pmOK, let's look at that post. Here it is, verbatim:QuoteI see no specific examples here whatsoever, just allusions to the horrors of WWII in Germany.I see two quite vague "examples""Certain forms of publication" (unspecified: what exactly was published?) to prevent "the horrors they had witnessed from recurring" (well, we know what those are).Even more vague, the statement (probably true) that "the Founding Fathers themselves demonstrated that free speech has limits". Nothing about what those limits might be (today, not then).I don't think I'm being supercilious here in asking you to please elucidate your examples a bit more. You can see that, no?Whatspecificallyare you referring to here?

author: tggzzz
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: April 28, 2025, 09:23:07 pm
content: Quote from: shabaz on April 28, 2025, 08:30:31 pmI would give up. Remember some old proverbs, e.g. "there's none so deaf as them's won't hear", "you can lead a horse to water but you can't make it drink", "you can lead a horticulture but you can't make her think". Oops; the last one is attributed to Dorothy Parker.My observations of Analog Kid's 9+ posts/day is thatsomeof them are sensible and helpful.

author: Analog Kid
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: April 28, 2025, 09:32:03 pm
content: Quote from: tggzzz on April 28, 2025, 09:23:07 pmDamn me with faint praise, willya? (Dunno which # this is; apparently you keep better track of that than I.)

author: Zero999
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: May 02, 2025, 10:13:26 pm
content: Quote from: shabaz on April 28, 2025, 05:34:51 amI would argue that a big contributory factor in WW2 was lack of free speech. That tends to be the case with genocide not the reverse.Note, that whilst I can see Analog Kid's point, I'm not a free speech absolutist: shouting fire in a crowded building, child porn, even if AI generated, don't count as free speech, since they don't involve the transfer of ideas or opinions.

author: tggzzz
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: May 02, 2025, 11:04:50 pm
content: Quote from: Zero999 on May 02, 2025, 10:13:26 pmBizarre.Are you saying that free speech would have stopped Hitler invading the Sudetenland then Poland? Or that it would have stopped the Holocaust and other atrocities?If you aren't saying that, then what would free speech have prevented?(Authorotarian) bastards will be bastards, free speech or not.QuoteSo you fully support Anjem Choudary, and think he should be free to continue radicalising Islamists and promoting jihad in the UK? After all he nevertookany action himself, it was that hismere wordsencouraged others to be violent.https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c3geqp8vx08o

author: Analog Kid
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: May 02, 2025, 11:13:12 pm
content: Quote from: tggzzz on May 02, 2025, 11:04:50 pmYou didn't ask me, but yes, I do.I also support Charlie Hebdo in their satirical anti-Muslim campaign.It'sspeech, for chrissakes. Sticks and stones and all.If you really, really hate Choudary's exhortations, then maybe you (or someone) should counteract themwith more free speech.Another aphorism that's appropriate here:I used to be a donor to the Southern Poverty Law Center's Klanwatch project. This was the brainchild of Morris Dees, one of the founders of the SPLC. He was a lawyer who went after the Ku Klux Klan in court and ended up bankrupting several Klan organizations.In one of his books he wrote (paraphrasing):Quote

author: shabaz
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: May 03, 2025, 12:35:14 am
content: Quote from: Analog Kid on May 02, 2025, 11:13:12 pmIn many countries, it is well-accepted that you do not have to be the person holding the "smoking gun” to be convicted of a crime. Some individuals would never act without the influence of others. Those influencers should not go unpunished — nor do many people believe they should — which is why countries around the world have enacted laws to ensure they receive the consequences they deserve.The fact those laws have been there since time immemorial, and are still there, is evidence your way of thinking is unsupported by most.This is why “Sticks and stones” as an argument barely merits a look. In past times you'd have equally hanged just for egging someone on with a gun if they ended up shooting someone, and you'd deserve it. It's not so different nowadays.

author: tggzzz
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: May 03, 2025, 07:05:30 am
content: Quote from: shabaz on May 03, 2025, 12:35:14 amSticks and stonesisa useful argument, but only in the school playground.People who don't recognise the difference between childrens playgrounds and the adult world should either grow up or be treated as a child.

author: NE666
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: May 03, 2025, 09:37:49 am
content: "In UK law, joint enterprise, also known as secondary liability, allows individuals to be held accountable for crimes committed by others if they aided,encouraged, or were part of a common purpose to commit a crime, even if they didn't directly participate in the act.This means a person can be convicted of a crime committed by another if they foresaw the possibility of that crime and intended to encourageor assist in its commission"And yes, we have hung people for that in that past, and continue to convict.Incitement to violence is not free speech.There is a world of difference between the freedom to satirise someone's personal beliefs, and calling for the murder of those who do so.

author: tggzzz
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: May 03, 2025, 11:07:35 am
content: Quote from: NE666 on May 03, 2025, 09:37:49 amI cannot understand the mentality of people who try to deny and/or evade that point.But then I can't understand any extreme ideology; always seems a mixture of the religious and the childish, not wanting to be an adult and recognise complexity.

author: jnk0le
author_rank: Regular Contributor
timestamp: May 03, 2025, 12:51:33 pm
content: Quote from: shabaz on May 03, 2025, 12:35:14 amCould you tell us how those laws worked out in case of this man:https://nitter.poast.org/Saul_Sadka/status/1821545657292689506#m(context: few days earlier 3 kafir children had their throats cut, more wounded.)Was his punishment at least harsher than what kafirs get for putting bacon slice on mosque handle?(Google doesn't yield anything other than his (temporary) suspension from british labour party.)

author: tggzzz
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: May 03, 2025, 12:57:21 pm
content: Quote from: jnk0le on May 03, 2025, 12:51:33 pmOooh! Politicsandreligion.Yup, laws are imperfectly applied. Is that news toanybody?Just because laws are imperfectly applied doesn't mean it would be better to have no laws. If you don't agree with that, then there are several effectively lawless parts of the world; why don't you go and live in one of them?

author: jnk0le
author_rank: Regular Contributor
timestamp: May 03, 2025, 01:50:54 pm
content: Quote from: tggzzz on May 03, 2025, 12:57:21 pmThe problem is that those laws have already been weaponized. (in the process of ideological subversion to be precise)The `murica style of free speech is not ideal, but it doesn't lead to situation where a raped woman is being put to prison for more time than her raper, because she dared to say who raped her.

author: shabaz
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: May 03, 2025, 04:14:19 pm
content: Quote from: jnk0le on May 03, 2025, 01:50:54 pmIn reality that "style" is still bound by law, so no, there's no absolute free speech in the USA either, as was discussed earlier.By the way, broadly speaking, the underlying principles that led to those bounds are almost universal, it's definitelynota US invention. For a start, the public in almost any civilized nation want there to be laws to punish those who encourage others to commit harms. You're the anomaly if you don't.Secondly, the legal system has the same origins, there's actually no surprise the underlying guiding principles that ultimately lead to curbs on speech and the written word have their similarities between the UK and then subsequently USA (and a load of other countries for that matter). Incidentally other similarities includes the right to a trial before punishment, which answers your other question you had earlier regarding the hate speech.Also, going back to your earlier comments, incidentally, I would say you should also work on your own issues if you suspect that colloquially it is a normal thing for immigrants or other dark-colored people to think those Arabic terms, or equivalents, of you and others.It's obviously nagging away at you, but it may come as a surprise, you don't need to think you're being thought of as an infidel each time you have to speak to a brown storekeeper or taxi driver.Behind your back I suspect you'd be far more likely to be assigned different vulgarities perhaps, given that sadly, Polish on occasion are not well liked either.

author: tggzzz
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: May 03, 2025, 05:07:59 pm
content: Quote from: jnk0le on May 03, 2025, 01:50:54 pmYou have been radicalised; resist such thought control.

author: Zero999
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: May 04, 2025, 12:10:40 pm
content: Quote from: tggzzz on May 02, 2025, 11:04:50 pmYes. If the Nazi party didn't clamp down on free speech, then none of that would have happened.QuoteHe shouldn't have been here. His parents shouldn't have been allowed to come here.

author: tggzzz
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: May 04, 2025, 01:03:43 pm
content: Quote from: Zero999 on May 04, 2025, 12:10:40 pmThere’s always an easy solution to every human problem—neat, plausible and wrong. HL Mencken.You have fallen into the standard fallacy trap, sometimes called "post hoc ergo propter hoc"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Post_hoc_ergo_propter_hoc(after that therefore because of that).QuoteNow address the point, rather than trying (and failing) to divert our attention with a strawman argument. (Strawman arguments always make it apparent the authorknowstheir argument is weak)Let's try it again: do you think Anjem Choudary has done no harm because heonlyused words?

author: themadhippy
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: May 04, 2025, 01:13:55 pm
content: I dont see much difference between choudary and gerry adams ,both calling for an uprising because there version of the sky fairy was the only one to believe in.The only real difference was adams views were allowed to be aired on national media but not his actual voice.

author: Zero999
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: May 04, 2025, 01:53:45 pm
content: Quote from: tggzzz on May 04, 2025, 01:03:43 pmHitler's limiting of free speech, by persecuting those who disagreed with him, directly led to the genocide. People were too scared to tell him it was a bad idea.QuoteDo you have any proof his words led to death or injury?

author: tggzzz
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: May 04, 2025, 04:32:13 pm
content: Quote from: themadhippy on May 04, 2025, 01:13:55 pmYup.Violence is violence, and the silver-tongued can use words to persuade others to hurt people.It is not for nothing that there is the phrase "the pen is mightier than the sword".

author: tggzzz
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: May 04, 2025, 04:38:23 pm
content: Quote from: Zero999 on May 04, 2025, 01:53:45 pmSigh. That reveals a lot about you. Are you or have you ever been a radio ham?The sun came up this morning and that lead directly to my shaving my face.Do you really think that the "limiting free speech.... directly lead to genocide"? Sure, itproceededit, but it didn'tcauseit.QuoteWould such proof cause you to change your mind and retract your statement? I doubt it would.

author: Buriedcode
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: May 05, 2025, 02:16:52 am
content: Reviews are for businesses, and trade - as customers can choose where to take their business, and businesses can choose who to trade with. State-run schools are not businesses, and shouldn't be run as such. They are an essential service and shouldn't be subject to the kind of "gaming" that goes on with reviews - thats why we have school inspectors. A private school on the other hand, is a business, and should be treated as such, along with taxes.Reviews can be helpful, but remember - anyone can leave a review, for whatever reason, even if they have no affiliation with the business/produc thtey are reviewing, and regulating a system to improve the reliability takes significant effort, and it genrally annoys those free speech absolutionists who want to criticise others wilst being from criticism themselves.

author: Zero999
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: May 05, 2025, 01:32:33 pm
content: Quote from: tggzzz on May 04, 2025, 04:38:23 pmThere was a direct link. Governments who allow free speech don't genocide their own citizens, certainly not on that scale, because the opposition stand up and stop it from happening. Censorship wasn't the only cause of the Holocaust, Holodomor, Tiananmen Square massacre etc. but it played a great role.QuoteYes. I would change my mind. I am capable of doing that. If you look at some of my posts from more than a few years ago, you'll find I have changed my opinion on many things, in light of new evidence.I believe in the US, in order for someone to be convicted for inciting violence, it has to be reasonable that one or more person will upon it. This is more reasonable than the law in the UK, where just posting a crass comment online results in jail time.

author: Simmed
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: May 05, 2025, 01:50:26 pm
content: Quote from: Buriedcode on May 05, 2025, 02:16:52 amreviews can be bought with $$$ these daysthey can even be found by googlingQuote