Cheers, Google

I want to join everyone, including our hometown newspaper, who is praising Google for standing up to China. I am aware of those, like the testy Chinese business professor I heard on NPR the other day, who say their move is purely pragmatic. I do not see the sense in this argument. Yes, their Chinese competitors had a greater market share behind the Great Firewall, and will certainly benefit from Google's withdraw, but simply walking out on a billion upwardly-mobile customers does not seem like a good business strategy to me. Maybe it is possible for corporate executives to make real moral stands.

As a customer of both Gmail and Blogger, I am particularly gratified that they pulled out in response to state-sponsored threats to their users' privacy. As a reward, I will stay with blogger and not switch Un Till to Wordpress (something I had honestly been mulling over).

I understand the desire of a harmonious, controlled society. It can create grand things, as demonstrated by the Beijing Olympics. It can prevent bad things. Among the victims of Chinese censorship are things I find morally reprehensible, like pornography. But the idea that this produces a world and culture that spins in rhythm like a Victorian ballroom is fantasy. It is not worth the crushed lives of those who think, speak, look or feel something other than the dominant rhythm. I am thankful that I live in a society where I can think for myself, where I can choose not to join the dance, where, whenever someone who thinks differently is elected to office, I do not need to fear for my voice.

Cheers, Google.