<story><title>Google, Apple cave to Pakistan pressure to take down apps by Ahmadiyya Muslims</title><url>https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/meghara/pakistan-forced-down-ahmadiyya-apps</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>username90</author><text>Apple and Google put themselves in a position where they became a part of the problem. If they ran open platforms where they don&amp;#x27;t have to power to ban apps this would never have happened.</text></item><item><author>jmull</author><text>The (rather massive) flaw in your reasoning is the idea that Google and Apple are the solution to the problem.&lt;p&gt;If you live in a society without religious freedom, that&amp;#x27;s a big problem, but Apple and Google &lt;i&gt;can&amp;#x27;t&lt;/i&gt; fix it.&lt;p&gt;If you care about the problem, it&amp;#x27;s important to understand this. If you succeed in getting people to focus on symptom of the problem and not the cause, you will help prevent it from being addressed.</text></item><item><author>zupreme</author><text>For those defending this practice, consider carefully the implications of what you are advocating.&lt;p&gt;On one hand you have a government deciding who can and cannot refer to themselves as adherents of a particular religion (by declaring that Ahamadis cannot call themselves Muslim).&lt;p&gt;On another hand you have Google and Apple, yet again, being the complicit chokepoints of “free speech”, with regard to app developers.&lt;p&gt;These may seem fair to you, but that may be because these practices have not negatively affected you...yet.&lt;p&gt;But consider: Would it be fair if England declared Catholics “unChristian” and banned their use if the term?  Or what if the USA declared hasidic jews “Unjewish” and banned their use of the term. Or what if Apple caved to pressure theoretical from Israel to ban Jehovah’s Witnesses from using the term “Jehovah”?&lt;p&gt;What next?  Government declaring who is and is not “white”?&lt;p&gt;Oh wait......</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>passivate</author><text>&amp;gt;Apple and Google put themselves in a position where they became a part of the problem. If they ran open platforms where they don&amp;#x27;t have to power to ban apps this would never have happened.&lt;p&gt;In this particular case, what problem would open platforms solve? The laws in Pakistan still exist and the social problem is not addressed. Or are you implying that Apple and Google should be on the hook for solving religious problems in other countries? If so, I think wanting companies to engineer social behavior in other countries is a dangerous path bordering on the unethical (IMO).&lt;p&gt;But having said all that, whats stopping a country from simply blocking their hosting servers? Ultimately, the app has to be downloaded from somewhere. Okay, so then you move to a P2P system, so then the get their ISPs to block that,etc ,etc. It&amp;#x27;s just whack-a-mole.</text></comment>
<story><title>Google, Apple cave to Pakistan pressure to take down apps by Ahmadiyya Muslims</title><url>https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/meghara/pakistan-forced-down-ahmadiyya-apps</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>username90</author><text>Apple and Google put themselves in a position where they became a part of the problem. If they ran open platforms where they don&amp;#x27;t have to power to ban apps this would never have happened.</text></item><item><author>jmull</author><text>The (rather massive) flaw in your reasoning is the idea that Google and Apple are the solution to the problem.&lt;p&gt;If you live in a society without religious freedom, that&amp;#x27;s a big problem, but Apple and Google &lt;i&gt;can&amp;#x27;t&lt;/i&gt; fix it.&lt;p&gt;If you care about the problem, it&amp;#x27;s important to understand this. If you succeed in getting people to focus on symptom of the problem and not the cause, you will help prevent it from being addressed.</text></item><item><author>zupreme</author><text>For those defending this practice, consider carefully the implications of what you are advocating.&lt;p&gt;On one hand you have a government deciding who can and cannot refer to themselves as adherents of a particular religion (by declaring that Ahamadis cannot call themselves Muslim).&lt;p&gt;On another hand you have Google and Apple, yet again, being the complicit chokepoints of “free speech”, with regard to app developers.&lt;p&gt;These may seem fair to you, but that may be because these practices have not negatively affected you...yet.&lt;p&gt;But consider: Would it be fair if England declared Catholics “unChristian” and banned their use if the term?  Or what if the USA declared hasidic jews “Unjewish” and banned their use of the term. Or what if Apple caved to pressure theoretical from Israel to ban Jehovah’s Witnesses from using the term “Jehovah”?&lt;p&gt;What next?  Government declaring who is and is not “white”?&lt;p&gt;Oh wait......</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>sk5t</author><text>Just as we have laws that prevent US organizations from giving or taking bribes even in countries where bribes are legal (FCPA), and US laws prevent US individuals from overseas sex tourism which would be illegal on US soil, what prevents us from requiring US organizations not to participate in religious oppression, child exploitation, and other such acts?</text></comment>