Should we all have the right to be forgotten?  To be able to contact a website or news source and demand that they remove mention of you?  Say your house was foreclosed on years ago.  Or years ago you were accused of a crime.  A crime you were later cleared of but anytime anyone googles your legal name it shows up first and jobs are steering clear of you.  Or one that shows up and stops you from being able to get a date.

I think not. I think the loss here of public information, outweighs the prospective date not liking your personality or past actions.

I would argue, tid bits here and there in the local media, have aided in journalists and investigators solving crimes. Whether it’s linking individuals to other individuals, or placing them in a certain time and place. Foreclosure of your home, or a drunken fight isn’t going to make headlines around the world, and if it did pop up in the paper, it would take some incredible effort to find years later.

A gentleman I knew years ago, was accused of rape. It was in the local paper. Fucked if I’ve ever been able to find it since.

Yes.

What a paradox.

The effort taken to be forgotten while alive leaves a footprint in and of itself and hence leaves additional evidence that you are or were there, that you exist or existed in some capacity.

And if you want to be forgotten, your memory is only held in the minds of people. And if you don't want people to know you, so much so that you want to be totally forgotten... then your best recourse seems to be simply go truly off the grid. Disconnect.

You can't control what people will think or say or do, so who cares what they think or say or do when you're not there. It's like being dead.

In fact, if you want to be forgotten that bad, death seems like an option.

Eventually we are all forgotten once dead. The percentage of people remembered of all those who've lived must surely be less than 0.01%, even with all the documentation that exists. And even then, it's more the concept or caricature that are remembered. Not the person. Jesus. Lincoln. Hitler. Einstein. Etc.

And truly, you have no rights. Especially once dead. Just whatever privilege the living might arbitrarily feel obliged to extend to their memory of you.

And if all else fails, just remember: all we all are is nothing but dust.

I think if you have been cleared of a crime and you feel the reporting of that accusation is harming you now you kind of have a case to tell that news source to take it off.

It is more gray than black and white for someone who has committed a crime and served their time and turned their life around.

Nov 4, 2019 22:26:56 GMT theend said:

I think if you have been cleared of a crime and you feel the reporting of that accusation is harming you now you kind of have a case to tell that news source to take it off.

It is more gray than black and white for someone who has committed a crime and served their time and turned their life around.

For sure a consequence of the accusation culture we now live in, and the guilty until proven innocent public trials via media (and then whoops too bad, move on once proven innocent).

I also think it speaks to the change in tech that we have. Google is readily accessible. In the old days you would have to find something on microfiche.

I'm in two minds about this, I think everyone deserves a second chance, but a third and fourth?
Seems like people just want a life free from repercussions.

I saw on the news the guys that run the porn website girlsdoporn got arrested.
They basically lied to the girls about how the videos will be used.
They told them that it would only be by DVD's being shipped to people in Australia or something.
Then they posted them online and pretty much ignored the girls protests and blocked their numbers.
It makes them Class-A pieces of human garbage no doubt... But I struggle to have sympathy for someone who is outraged when a porn video becomes available to the mass market when they thought it was just going to be a single country.
I really don't get this craze with girls thinking they can do one or two scenes in college for quick cash and getting on with their lives, I mean if you are going to do one scene you might as well do a thousand scenes, no difference to your exposure.
The day is nearly here that you will apply for a job and they will run your photo through a computer and AI facial recognition will uncover every single photos or video that has ever been posted of you online.
I say this will be here inside 5 years and is going to make for some super-awkward PTA meetings.