-By Warner Todd Huston
Google has had a bit of its arrogance forced from it today. In the face of a costly lawsuit the on-line giant has made a reversal of its standing rule saying that it now will allow anti-abortion ads to run in its advertisement services.
Until now, Google has imposed its own political agenda by disallowing any ad to be taken out by anti-abortion advocates while allowing all ads for abortion pushers to go through without question. Google has, however, reversed that decision in the face of a legal challenge that its policy breached the Equalities Act of 2006 in the USA.
Google spokesmen said that they reconsidered this policy to create “a level playing field” and to enable “religious associations to place ads on abortion in a factual way.”
But, let me warn that this is not a victory signed, sealed and delivered for free political speech just yet. Google did not outline what this new policy of determining what presenting abortion “in a factual way” would mean. We will have to wait and find out to see how Google will use this new tactic to silence abortion advocates, if they indeed do so.
At this point, Google could easily continue to reject anti-abortion ads using this ill defined claim that the ads would somehow violate this new policy of “factuality.”
However, even this admission from the Internet giant that they were being grossly unfair is a hopeful sign that the moral position against abortion will get a fair hearing from among the advertisement viewing public. Abortion agencies have had a monopoly on readers on Google until now, but this new policy might do what Google is claiming they are suddenly interested in, “leveling the playing field.”
Let’s all hope that Google is being truthful and not just looking for a new sly way to continue to push its own political agenda on an unsuspecting public.
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Warner Todd Huston is a Chicago based freelance writer, has been writing opinion editorials and social criticism since early 2001 and is featured on many websites such as newsbusters.org, townhall.com, New Media Journal, Men’s News Daily and the New Media Alliance among many, many others. Additionally, he has been a frequent guest on talk-radio programs to discuss his opinion editorials and current events. He has also written for several history magazines and appears in the new book “Americans on Politics, Policy and Pop Culture” which can be purchased on amazon.com. He is also the owner and operator of publiusforum.com. Feel free to contact him with any comments or questions : EMAIL Warner Todd Huston