Tarek Fahmy: Cultural Critic

It came to my attention through an overseas friend that when you do an image search for Michelle Obama using google Germany <www.google.de> a very offensive image of our beautiful first lady appears number one in the image search. When you do the same search using google.com (US version) that image does not appear at all.

Right away, we did google searches using other countries codes like:

• http://www.google.co.uk/ (England)
• www.google.fr (France)
• www.google.cn (China)
• http://www.google.com.eg/ (Egypt)
• http://www.google.co.il/ (Israel)

In all google searches the offensive Michelle Obama image appears first (except for France; it appears second). When you use the American based google search engine the image is censored completely!

What ever happened to freedom of speech? While this image is totally offensive it belongs on google; especially the US based google service. Other countries that we always blame for censorship have that image readily available on their google search engines.

I love the irony in this world. The American google is censoring images just like other ‘googles’ worldwide. This is probably politically influenced and not only a google thing. Meaning this image was probably censored and removed form the US google because of political pressures from up top.

Is this so called freedom of speech that we Americans always proudly boast of a thing of the past? If this blatant violation of freedom of speech is happening then what else is ‘the state’ censoring? What other supposed promised freedoms are they trampling on?

I value my supposed freedoms in this great country of ours but when I notice censorship I start to think about freedom as an illusion; as smoke in mirrors and not really an actual reality. Concerning censorship, is this any different from the Chinese? They outwardly censor the internet for their citizens. If the Obama image is censored in the US, then what else is censored on google and the Internet in general?

Here are snapshots from different googles worldwide:

- GOOGLE USA:

- GOOGLE CHINA:

- GOOGLE FRANCE:

- GOOGLE UK:

- GOOGLE EGYPT:

- GOOGLE ISRAEL: