MySpace: No place for Atheists !

[DLSS]

MySpace: No place for Atheists !

MySpace Deletes Largest Atheist Group in the World.

Cleveland, OH.— Social networking site, MySpace.com, panders to religious intolerants by deleting atheist users, groups and content.

Early this month, MySpace again deleted the Atheist and Agnostic Group (35,000 members). This deletion, due largely to complaints from people who find atheism offensive, marks the second time MySpace has cancelled the group since November 2007.

What’s unique in this case is that the Atheist and Agnostic Group was the largest collection of organized atheists in the world. The group had its own Wikipedia entry, and in April won the Excellence in Humanist Communication Award (2007) from the Humanist Chaplaincy at Harvard University and the Secular Student Alliance.

“MySpace refuses to undelete the group, although it never violated any terms of service,” said Bryan Pesta, Ph.D., the group’s moderator. “When the largest Christian group was hacked, MySpace’s Founder, Tom Anderson, personally restored the group, and promised to protect it from future deletions.”

“It is an outrage if Rupert Murdoch’s News Corporation and the world’s largest social networking site tolerate discrimination against atheists and agnostics-- and if this situation goes unresolved I’ll have little choice but to believe they do,” said Greg Epstein, humanist chaplain of Harvard University. News Corporation, Murdoch’s global media corporation which also includes Fox News, purchased MySpace in 2005.

“My personal profile was deleted as well, and despite weeks of emails to customer service, plus a petition signed by 500 group members, MySpace won’t budge. I think these actions send a clear message to the 30 million godless people in America (and to businesses whose money was spent displaying ads on our group) that we are not welcome on MySpace,” said Pesta.

For a Wikipedia article on the now defunct atheist and agnostic group, visit

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atheist_and_Agnostic_Group.

http://www.secularstudents.org/files/atheists.and.agnostics.gif[/img]

source : http://www.secularstudents.org/node/1933

[SmoothCriminal]

what would jesus do, you ask?  He would kill all atheists (or so myspace thinks).

[BPShirase]

35,000 members sounds like a fairly good reason to break away from myspsace & go start your own thing. There's always Facebook 

[deleted]

I (being an atheist) am outraged, while they are at it, they might as well block all Pagens.

[SmoothCriminal]

If it was Scientology it would be one thing, but a true religion like atheism...*

*This is spoken with sincere sarcasm

[tabath]

Does scientology have a facebook or myspace group? Maybe we should join :P

[Shaun]

Why do they want to keep using MySpace after this anyway? It's shit anyway.

[SomeoneE1se]

Why do they want to keep using MySpace after this anyway? It's shit anyway.

if all of your * are already using THIS, you don't make them use THAT

[digip]

For them to single out any one group vs another is not only ethically wrong, but somewhere in there I think is a lawsuit waiting to happen. You can not block a group based on religious beliefs while allowing other religions to roam free on MySpace because it convenient matches what you beleive in. If your a social site whos main purpose is to allow people from all walks of life to communicate with one another, then your going against the very principle that keeps you afloat.

If your going to block one, then you have to block them all, or none at all.

A quick comparison. I hate the KKK, but they get the freedom of speech and right to protest the same as any other American. Its not necessarily a pleasant thing to witness considering the KKK wants to kill all blacks, etc, but they are still protected from being discriminated against in a court of law, by the same civil rights as any other citizen of the US. (I know MySpace is not the USA per say, but its just an analogy). MySpace is silencing one group based on their MySpace's beliefs alone. Just because someone calls to complain about a group does not mean MySpace has to remove it. It has to be a decision they make and was probably one based on their own beleifs and not on any real grounds for removal.

The athiest groups were not organised and mobilised to spread hate or attacking other religious pages. They did nothing to break the rules or TOS, so why then were they removed if not for political or religious beleifs of MySpace alone?

I am not for or against any church, nor do I harbor any ill feelings towards anyone of any religion, weather I agree with it or not. But if your going to kick out one group based on their faith(or lack of faith in any religion, hence, athiests) then you need to be fair and do the same to all other organized social groups. In essence, they would need to CLOSE MYSPACE alltogether, because it is a bunch of social groups with different beliefs. You cant force out one social group and not expect a backlash.

I hope they get sued and not only lose and have to reinstate all their pages, but are forced to pay for all their legal fees as well. It's clear that this is a form of civil discrimination based on religion.

Imagine Satan worshipers complaining about the christian groups on MySpace and getting them removed form MySpace. Wonder what would happen then?(not that it would ever happen, but what if.)

There are a lot of things I find offensive on the internet, but I also know how to close the browser and move on to another site if I do not like or agree with something I see. People complaining about athiests on MySpace is just retarded as "Anonymous" going after Scientology. You do not have to listen to Tom Cruise and his BS, but hell, he has the right to beleive whatever fanatical shit he wants to beleive in. I could care less, so long as they arent physically or verbally attacking people like these suicide bombing religious nuts. Who cares what they think. We all have the right to any faith we choose, even if we choose to beleive in nothing at all.

I could see if they were some radical group of baby killing terrorists or something, but hell, not everyone beleives in god, and vice versa. MySpace should have that chip knocked off their shoulder and be taken to court. I think MySpace would probably lose pretty big on this one. Just the bad press alone is going to be problematic for them.

[DLSS]

i completely agree with digip here ...

http://img507.imageshack.us/img507/6035/lackofrespectnw4.jpg[/img]

[VaKo]

You forget, myspace and pretty much any online service are private companies and as such can do whatever the fuck they like on the internet. They provide there services for free and withdraw them to anyone on a whim. Which is exactly how most public forums operate, for instance I could ban anyone here, delete there account and block access to the entire site for no more reason than They said something i didn't like or called me a name. (I don't do this because it means I've lost the argument, and I enjoy the debate more than the show of power)

What i think is a bigger problem than the actual deletion is the lack of whilingness people have to actually debate ideas. if you don't share someones ideas, its more fun and more intresting to argue with them, because it forces you to improve your arguments, and learn more about the oppositions stance and ideas. this goes for both sides in the atheism debate, as quite often people who class themselves as atheists are no better than the people they accuse of being intolerant with there faiths.

[digip]

You forget, myspace and pretty much any online service are private companies and as such can do whatever the fuck they like on the internet. They provide there services for free and withdraw them to anyone on a whim. Which is exactly how most public forums operate, for instance I could ban anyone here, delete there account and block access to the entire site for no more reason than They said something i didn't like or called me a name. (I don't do this because it means I've lost the argument, and I enjoy the debate more than the show of power)

What i think is a bigger problem than the actual deletion is the lack of whilingness people have to actually debate ideas. if you don't share someones ideas, its more fun and more intresting to argue with them, because it forces you to improve your arguments, and learn more about the oppositions stance and ideas. this goes for both sides in the atheism debate, as quite often people who class themselves as atheists are no better than the people they accuse of being intolerant with there faiths.

F**K MySpace to begin with, its just a site full of email phishing, sex offending pediphiles anyway, but it still offers a service to the pulic. All be it free, if I was a MySpace cell phone customer and I ran the atheist group, I would want a full refund and take their ass to court.

I agree when its a personal, self made site, you can allow who you want and dissallow who you want.

Content Posted.

MySpace.com may delete any Content that in the sole judgment of MySpace.com violates this Agreement or which may be offensive, illegal or violate the rights, harm, or threaten the safety of any person. MySpace.com assumes no responsibility for monitoring the MySpace Services for inappropriate Content or conduct.

For a commercial site that bows to advertisers and investors who run it(ever seen any christian ads on Myspace? They exist.), for the mass amount of users that give them revenue, I think that if taken to task in court they would probably lose for discrimination because even though it was solely based on the opinion of MySpace alone(it would have to because they stat that they are not obligated to remove anything if they so desire) the group did nothing to violate the terms of service(based on what was written in the news article). Especially when its a US run company and falls under the jurisdiction of US law. Hell, if google can be sued for removing sites from its search engine, I am sure 35,000 people would have some chance at a class action suit against MySpace. If anything, it would be a thorn in the sideof MySpace and its hypocritical views.

I would say the effect of removing 35,000 people from an online movment of any kind is not just because someone complained, but because MySpace personally do not agree with it and solely based on the opinions of the people at MySpace alone and not because there was any right or wrong doing on part of the Atheists. If they harrased or attacked someone or did something against the terms os service, then I could see a reason to remove them.

If at any time MySpace.com chooses, in its sole discretion, to monitor the MySpace Services, MySpace.com nonetheless assumes no responsibility for the Content, no obligation to modify or remove any inappropriate Content, and no responsibility for the conduct of the User submitting any such Content.

Again, they only remove things if they feel the need to based on their own opinions. Why then did they feel the need to remove 35,000 users who were peacefully assembling in public forum with no ill intent or harm to anyone on MySpace?

Reason, their own personal political and religious obligations to their advertisers and investors, not to the moral value of the users as a whole.

[VaKo]

Google have been sued for de-listing sites, but I cannot remember a case where the plantif actually won the case and was either re-listed or awarded damages. The same applies for MySpace, its News Corps. site and they can do whatever the fuck they want with it, however hypocritical, small minded or plain stupid that may be. Atheiesm isn't a religious group and has no legal recognition at all, so they couldn't even sue on grounds of discrimination. The TOS items you listed are purely a safeguard to protect them from legal action based on the content of a members page, nothing else. You can't win a court case for deletion based on that, because its the sole discretion of myspace as to what they allow and disallow.

People need to realize that these social networking sites are not some kinda lazifair free ground owned  by the members, there owned and controlled, top to bottom by the corporations that bought them in a reflection of there interests, not yours. If they don't want you on there site, they can kick you off, delete your account (or not) and bar you from visiting it again and there is nothing you can do about it.  If you paid them money, you *might* be able to get a refund, but even that is unlikely. Its not fair, its not just, its the price you pay for using there services. Instead of whining about the injustice of it all, go elsewhere, or start your own site up.

[digip]

Google have been sued for de-listing sites, but I cannot remember a case where the plantif actually won the case and was either re-listed or awarded damages. The same applies for MySpace, its News Corps. site and they can do whatever the fuck they want with it, however hypocritical, small minded or plain stupid that may be. Atheiesm isn't a religious group and has no legal recognition at all, so they couldn't even sue on grounds of discrimination. The TOS items you listed are purely a safeguard to protect them from legal action based on the content of a members page, nothing else. You can't win a court case for deletion based on that, because its the sole discretion of myspace as to what they allow and disallow.

People need to realize that these social networking sites are not some kinda lazifair free ground owned  by the members, there owned and controlled, top to bottom by the corporations that bought them in a reflection of there interests, not yours. If they don't want you on there site, they can kick you off, delete your account (or not) and bar you from visiting it again and there is nothing you can do about it.  If you paid them money, you *might* be able to get a refund, but even that is unlikely. Its not fair, its not just, its the price you pay for using there services. Instead of whining about the injustice of it all, go elsewhere, or start your own site up.

Agreed...

[DLSS]

about the xtian ads, i doubt it has anything to with those,...

myspace turns to where the money comes from, guess where the ad campaign for the blasphemy challenge ( by atheist organisation rrs) first launched and got popular ? and why there were so many atheists on myspace in the 1st place ?

Atheism isn't a religious group and has no legal recognition at all, so they couldn't even sue on grounds of discrimination. The TOS items you listed are purely a safeguard to protect them from legal action based on the content of a members page, nothing else.

wtf do you mean by saying it "has no legal recognition "?

anyway ,...

they couldn't even sue on grounds of discrimination.

WTF , how so ? if i wouldn't let ppl in my club or wotever cos they have lets say red hair they could sue me for discrimination. and there's no legal recognition for redheads is there ?

[VaKo]

wtf do you mean by saying it "has no legal recognition "?

Because atheism a conceptual standpoint, not a group, collective or entity.

anyway ,...

they couldn't even sue on grounds of discrimination.

WTF , how so ? if i wouldn't let ppl in my club or wotever cos they have lets say red hair they could sue me for discrimination. and there's no legal recognition for redheads is there ?

It depends on the jurisdiction, but again, we're talking about a conceptual stand point here, not a physical attribute (which, depending on your club, you may be able to get away with, ie a social club for BBW's could very well discriminate against women joining if they were size 8's). So far I don't know of a country that would recognize atheism as anything other than a lack of faith. Since they lack a faith to be discriminated against, they can't sue for discrimination because existing laws and precedents only work if you have been discriminated against *because* of your faith.

Personally I would never join an atheist group myself, for the simple reason that getting together with a large group of people who believe the same things as you with the objective of discussing and re-affirming these beliefs, and then proselytize those ideas to the masses sounds horribly familiar. I would be interested in discussing matters of faith including its absence, but I find most "Atheists" attitudes to be nothing but poorly informed rhetoric. As it stands, I think all religions are incorrect and I'm comfortable not believing in them.