I’m Offended that Google is Offended by Art Nudes

Michael Barnes runs one of the best blogs for nude photography I’ve found on the net. He and his team search the net far and wide for artistic nudes, and again and again manage to find some of the best work being done today in that genre. They then post samples of the work on their blog, which is appropriately named, Art Nudes.

I’ve never once come across any lewd, indecent, or sexually shocking photos on their site.

If you are fascinated by the human form, the site is for you. If you don’t know whether you’re fascinated or not, but want to find out, the site is for you. But if you are looking for porn, the site will bore you.

So, it’s only natural some prude objected to the site’s content. I say “prude” because one would need to be a full blown, pathological prude to object to the non-pornographic nudity found on the Art Nudes site. One would need to be in march step with moral insanity. That is, one would need to be the sort of person most people have the sense not to listen to.

Unfortunately, Google appears to lend a deeply sympathetic ear to the morally insane among us. Google owns Blogger, which provides the blog platform that Michael uses to post his excellent finds. And Google has a system that allows anyone — regardless of whether they are morally sane or not — to flag one of its blogs for objectionable content.

Here’s how Google describes the process:

We track the number of times a blog has been flagged as objectionable and use this information to determine what action is needed. This feature allows the blogging community as a whole to identify content they deem objectionable. Have you read The Wisdom of Crowds? It’s sort of like that.

When a blog has been flagged a certain number of times, Google takes action. The action they take seems to range from unlisting the blog (search engines are instructed to ignore it) to placing an interdict page in front of the blog.

Although, Google wisely did not unlist Michael’s site, you can see what an interdict page is by clicking here on Art Nudes. An interdict page has been placed in front of Michael’s blog, and in my opinion it very misleadingly makes the blog look like an especially shocking porn site.

Google’s system for “allowing the blogging community as a whole to identify content they deem objectionable” has some merit. I suspect Google’s heart is in the right place. They are at least trying to keep out of the censorship business themselves and instead leave it up to the people to decide what’s offensive or not. But it’s a flawed system nonetheless.

In the first place, it’s flawed because it only collects one side of the story. It collects the votes of people who find the site offensive, but not the votes of people who find the site inoffensive. That is, “the blogging community as a whole” is not actually represented in the vote count — just that fraction of the blogging community who dislike the site are represented.

Second, it’s flawed because there are people — pathological prudes — who have banded together to abuse Google’s system. They find innocent, inoffensive sites like Michael’s and then swamp Google with flags. I suspect, but cannot prove, it was one of those bands that found Michael’s site.

Last, it’s a flawed system because there does not seem to be an appeals process in place at Google for people whose sites have been wrongly labeled. Google is a good company, but it has very shaky and uncertain customer service. Finding a real human to talk with at Google is like finding brains in the White House these days. Surprisingly tough.

The interdict placed on Michael’s site is not the grossest injustice ever perpetrated by morally insane prudes and then condoned by a large corporation. Yet, it is a clear instance of the morally insane outrageously inflicting their values on the rest of us. If they don’t like the nudity on Michael’s site, I suggest they simply don’t look at it.

Indeed, Art Nudes was not flagged because some innocent folk stumbled across it while looking for an internet Bible studies class. The name of the blog, Art Nudes, is enough that any honest person who didn’t want to see art nudes would know not to click on it.

Art Nudes was in all likelihood flagged because some group of prudes wanted to hamper or prevent people from viewing stuff that they — the prudes — do not think people should be viewing. That is, it was most likely flagged because some small group of jerks think they should have more control over what the rest of us see than we ourselves should have. And that attitude is far more offensive to me, and perhaps to many other people, than any art nude could ever be.

Google should not condone the attempt of a small band of morally insane jerks to control what the rest of us see. It should remove the interdict from Michael’s site.

Photo credit: Dennis Chotenovsky: Levitation