Hacker Newsnew | past | comments | ask | show | jobs | submitlogin

Extremism is still just a political viewpoint. It's not inherently more wrong than the others. You're saying Google should impose popular US culture and politics on the world. Including taking sides in conflicts between other countries. It's pretty arbitrary and could easily be wrong.

If you're worried about kids, better ban violent movies, video games, the news, and angry music. No, people have tried "think of the children" before but the children turned out fine.



Extremism is political, but it can't be reduced to a simple difference in viewpoints. Cultural/moral relativism, beyond being a bit of a dead end philosophically, can certainly result in an inaction that opens the doors to political degeneration, anti-social behaviour, and terrorism.

As for other forms of media, we do prevent kids from accessing age-inappropriate stuff, more or less in line with developmental psych research [see: Huesmann, Moise-Titus, Podolski, & Eron (2003)]. YouTube is the odd man out here. The handwringing apologia over the appropriateness of a child entertainer using ethnic slurs would be laughable in any other medium.

Google has famously taken a stance on not being evil. It'd somewhat undermine this goal if it were unable to determine what evil is, and isn't.


> Google has famously taken a stance on not being evil.

They changed this policy when they got into the business of telling people what to think and control opinions.


Anyone that writes code connecting a query to some media content is in "the business of telling people what to think and control opinions" whether they like it or not. The concern is doing so responsibly.


Google's motto is still "Don't be evil". You may be confusing it with Alphabet's motto, which is "Do the right thing".


Regardless, both are still failing.




Consider applying for YC's Winter 2026 batch! Applications are open till Nov 10

Guidelines | FAQ | Lists | API | Security | Legal | Apply to YC | Contact

Search: