Once they’re reviewed, I’m pretty confident they’ll be put back up. If they’re not and there’s an actual response from YouTube (to a private query or in a public way) acknowledging the censorship, then I’ll believe they’ve gone “evil” – and until then, I’m skeptical.

None of this surprises me.

So now google is so big (it’s probably worth more than all the banks in America) it can’t afford to upset all those religious nutjobs (and a few cranky big time musos). yeah right!

How can you do so much research this late at night?

They preface with:

We’re not asking for the kind of respect reserved for nuns, the elderly, and brain surgeons. We mean don’t abuse the site. Every cool new community feature on YouTube involves a certain level of trust. We trust you to be responsible, and millions of users respect that trust. Please be one of them.
Don’t Cross the Line

Then they list what they call “common-sense rules” that will help users “steer clear of trouble,” and for the most part I agree, prohibiting porn, shock stuff like accident scenes, unlawful material or copyright violations. One of the rules is this: (emphasis mine)

* We encourage free speech and defend everyone’s right to express unpopular points of view. But we don’t permit hate speech (speech which attacks or demeans a group based on race or ethnic origin, religion, disability, gender, age, veteran status, and sexual orientation/gender identity).

They conclude with this:

We Enforce These Guidelines
Okay, this one is more about us than you. YouTube staff review flagged videos 24 hours a day, seven days a week to determine whether they violate our Community Guidelines. When they do, we remove them. Sometimes a video doesn’t violate our Community Guidelines, but may not be appropriate for everyone. These videos may be age-restricted. Accounts are penalized for Community Guidelines violations and serious or repeated violations can lead to account termination. If your account is terminated, you won’t be allowed to create any new accounts. For more information about how the Community Guidelines are enforced and the consequences of violating them, please visit the Help Center.

I was unable to find any more specific criteria for these guidelines, specifically what they mean by “attack or demean.” That is so broad, vague and subjective that it allows any staff reviewer to censor entrirely by their personal agenda. “Disagree” to one person can be “attack” to another person. “Spoof” to one is “demean” to another. I found nothing about peer review for decisions to delete material. Is there staff discussion on these decisions? Once one YouTube reviewer decides something is over the line is that it? Maybe YouTube staff member Joe Truebeliever has the graveyard shift and he considers it his personal crusade to protect his creed from any and all “attacks” or “demeaning” in his opinion.