FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
NH: Censorship attempt launched against video that depicts censorship attempt
What is probably one of New Hampshire's top five most popular YouTube vids...faces attempted suppression. My million-hit clip shows a pro-Medicaid-expansion activist on a public Concord sidewalk, reporting her political opponents to police because they "have signs here" and "aren't with us." I've just received an e-mail, apparently from YouTube, which claims that someone has complained to them asking the vid be taken down. I have declined to do so. Presumably Google administrators will make the final decision whether to suppress it. Here's the clip:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TM-JbIOUmTo"Cop corrects liberal snitch who reported her political opponents (Concord, NH)"
Here is the playlist, covering the incident and event in more depth:
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLGeF52rAuBvXqxq6D8Jla0FFdbbQ3aMAsHere's a provisional backup copy of the vid in case the original disappears:
https://youtu.be/5qeO5FdN3UEIf you're a supporter of press freedom in New Hampshire, please take one of the following actions:
1) Inform the public of this vid and the attempt to censor it...show the authoritarians how a Barbara Streisand Effect works.
2) Provide the public with the information you have, or are able to collect, regarding the names and positions of the political activists and politicians depicted in this video. We do have Zandra Rice Hawkins' name obviously; she appears later in the series of videos from this scene. Then there is the "report-sign-wavers" activist who apparently responds to the name "Jill." We don't have her last name.
3) Contact YouTube politely expressing your support for maintaining the video and others like it. It's no shock YouTube comes under political pressure to suppress political videos. While they have the "property right" to do this, it would be good if they came under pressure to maintain such clips. Here's how to contact them:
http://forum.freestateproject.org/index.php?topic=28583.msg298789#new4) Respect the human rights of all your enemies...don't be like the free speech foes caught on tape in this video.
My suspicion is that some of the nastier (not so welcome) comments probably sparked this more than anything else... Other possibilities include the simple fact that it has a million views and depicts one or more political activists engaging in questionable behavior which someone may wish to cover up. If someone posted someone's home address in the comment section or something, I'd probably be willing to delete that...but I haven't yet found such a comment after looking.
In terms of the comments that are nasty in one way or another...well that's, nasty! But I'm reluctant to censor comments of almost any kind, even spam. There are reasons for this:
) Free staters are perceived as making the claim that we would be better or at least more lenient at governing than the current governments are. That means we should at least *try* to set an example of tolerance toward speech we disapprove of. And believe me, I disapprove of any threatening comments that might be posted against the political activists I filmed.
) Censorship of comments could at least theoretically interfere with efforts which law enforcement might undertake against actual bad guys who post excessively threatening comments. Removing such comments, or this video, would amount to actively and directly interfering with this process, if such a process is underway. Whatever concerns we might have about cops' overall policies or funding mechanism, we should not actively stand in the way of a possible investigation of pubic data that could be used to gather information about an excessively violent criminal.
Publicly available details and updates on this situation will appear at:
http://forum.freestateproject.org/index.php?topic=28583.msg298789#msg298789Dave Ridley
http://RidleyReport.comNew Hampshire's #2 YouTube Channel
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Here are screen shots of the email I received:
http://nhunderground.com/forum/index.php?topic=27708.msg360775#msg360775Here is a text copy of it:
(From): support@support.youtube.com
Reply|
To:
(redacted)@pages.plusgoogle.com; 1:12 PM
"Dear RidleyReport,
This is to notify you that we have received a privacy complaint from an
individual regarding your content:
-------------------------------------------------------------
Video URLs:
http://youtube.com/watch?v=MM-ksa3nU7Uhttp://youtube.com/watch?v=TM-JbIOUmToThe information reported as violating privacy is at 0_27-0_44
-------------------------------------------------------------
We would like to give you an opportunity to review the content in question
and remove any personal information that may be used to uniquely identify
or contact the complainant.
You have 48 hours to take action on the complaint. If you remove the
alleged violation from the site within the 48 hours, the complaint filed
will then be closed. If the potential privacy violation remains on the site
after 48 hours, the complaint will be reviewed by the YouTube Team and may
be removed pursuant to our Privacy Guidelines
(
http://www.youtube.com/t/privacy_guidelines). For content to be considered
for removal, an individual must be uniquely identifiable by image, voice,
full name, Social Security number, bank account number or contact
information (e.g., home address, email address). Examples that would not
violate our privacy guidelines include gamer tags, avatar names, and
address information in which the individual is not named. We also take
public interest, newsworthiness, and consent into account when determining
if content should be removed for a privacy violation.
If the alleged violation is located within the video itself, you may have
to remove the video completely. If someone's full name or other personal
information is listed within the title, description, or tags of your video,
you can edit this by going to My Videos and clicking the Edit button on the
reported video. Making a video private is not an appropriate method of
editing, as the status can be changed from private to public at any time.
Because they can be turned off at any time, annotations are also not
considered an acceptable solution.
We're committed to protecting our users and hope you understand the
importance of respecting others' privacy. When uploading videos in the
future, please remember not to post someone else's image or personal
information without their consent. For more information, please review our
Privacy Guidelines
http://www.youtube.com/t/privacy_guidelines."
Author
Topic: Attempted censorship of your favorite Ridley vid (Read 6402 times)