Here at Docucopies we believe strongly in freedom of speech as established and implied by the First Amendment. It is the most important of all our amendments, as it establishes the right to speak up against the government, and the right to freedom of the press, essentially making it an invulnerable tool for political and social change. Without the First Amendment, many of the ones that followed would not have been. (This blog’s author, by the way, carries a B.A. in Journalism and is an avid defender of the Constitution.)
But freedom of the press is a double-edged sword. Inevitably, every printer must make tough choices and set policies about what they will and will not print. Sometimes these choices are based on the beliefs and views of the company’s owners. Other times they are based on the comfort and dignity of the employees who must work on the jobs.
Docucopies has to make choices, too. I remember getting a phone call from a man who wanted to print up handbooks for new members of the KKK. Obviously I rejected his job, probably more politely than I should have. In this case, it was based on both a fundamental disdain for their hateful views (we do not print hate speech) and the comfort of our employees.
From time to time, people also send us racy material, including sexual and/or pornographic material, and expect us to print them. While we as a company make no official judgment on the role these sorts of things play in society, we do have a strict policy to not print them. This is both for the comfort of our team members and the integrity of our business. From a purely legal standpoint, we could be sued by our employees for sexual harassment should we make them work on these sorts of things. (Forcing someone to view sexually offensive material as part of their job is a form of sexual harassment, something we, like all workplaces, have a very strict code on.) But more so, we are a conscious and empathic company who genuinely cares about the comfort and dignity of our employees, whether they’re on the clock or not.
The funny thing is when people assume because of the First Amendment that we are obligated to print whatever they send us. This is simply ludicrous. The First Amendment, among other laws, guarantees our right to deny service. The free market dictates it as well; if one printer will not work with a customer, there’s always another who will.
Because of our output volume, not every single file is inspected for offensive material. And inevitably, as we put out millions of copies a month, some of it might occasionally slip through without our knowledge. So in some cases customers who have had things printed with us before suddenly find that we will not print a new job. This is not reflective of a sudden change in policy. More than likely it’s because some element of the job required taking a closer look at the files, at which point offensive material was discovered. In these cases, we politely inform the customers that we will not print their job.
Obviously this can cause a backlash. Following a recent incident, dozens of posts were made on blogs and forums relating to a certain customer’s niche industry. Random and anonymous people hurled slanderous insults and accusations about our company, creating quite a fervor. Fortunately, a good chunk of these people also defended Docucopies and our policy to not print offensive material. But others clearly had a misconstrued understanding of our policy and incorrectly linked our rejection of said-job to the social and political views of our company and/or our owners, which is just silly. In almost all cases, rejection is for the comfort of our employees and is not intended to be a form of censorship.
After a couple weeks of consideration, we decided to write this blog post in response to the back-and-forth banter coursing through the forums in question.
So, to clarify where we stand:
Docucopies DOES NOT discriminate against customers or their orders on the basis of political affiliation, religion, race, ethnicity, sexual orientation, gender, age, physical disability, or any other factors pertaining to the customers’ personal views, dispositions, or lifestyles or such views as expressed in their files.
Docucopies DOES discriminate against orders which are overtly sexual or pornographic in nature, constitute hate speech, contain illegal material, infringe on copyrights, or any other orders which we reasonably believe might make ANY team member feel uncomfortable, undignified or discriminated against.
Fortunately our team members are all fairly reasonable, moderate people, so it’s rare that this sort of thing arises. But when it does, we feel it’s better to address the issue than to ignore it, as we value quality customer service.
We hope this settles our position on this issue, and we look forward to continuing to serve our customers!
Tuesday, June 16, 2009
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
Subscribe to this Blog
6 comments:
Way to go, Docucopies. I totally understand where you're coming from. It's your business and the last thing you want to do is take the risk of upsetting your employees, especially to the point where they could possibly sue the company. I guess these anime lovers are too young to understand the basics of business.
Furthermore, after looking at the photos on their websites, their whole subject matter seems a little creepy to me. All their characters seem to be of an ambiguous age group.
So then DocuCopies would refuse to print any depiction of males and females kissing in swimming attire? Have you never printed any depiction of males and females kissing?
Why did DocuCopies respond with an email calling the images "disturbing" only after being explicitly told it was two males kissing?
For the record, what they refused to print was a drawing of two topless males kissing. That is all. They weren't doing anything sexual beyond embracing each other for a kiss.
Even if one considered them to be "too young" (even though they couldn't possibly be younger than mid to late teens), such is a depiction of something that is still accepted in our society. It's true, a fringe minority would go crazy even over teens holding hands, let alone kissing, but who wants to go that route?
I should add that it's a bit disingenuous to classify it as "niche," as if to somehow discredit their reasons for drawing what they did and make them look worse. The fact that it's "niche" (manga is not really a "niche" in the U.S. anymore), although I suppose you could call portrayal of homosexual interaction "niche" so as if to put it on a lower pedestal, but why would anyone do that?
And for the record, legally speaking, the supreme court already ruled a few years back that you can put any form of sex, even full on sexual molestation of 5 year olds, in drawn or written form.
When you said "slanderous," you meant "libelous," as "libel" refers to print and "slander" refers to spoke form. It is really odd that you would characterize their speech this way, right after saying that you're all about freedom of speech, when any judge worth their salt would dismiss such a libel lawsuit immediately.
Are people critical of your organization automatically "libelous"? Because that seems to be the default reaction from companies who have been criticized, nowadays.
And I hope that you don't delete dissenting comments, given what you just said about freedom of speech.
Thanks for your comment, we appreciate the opportunity to respond.
There is no rigid definition of what always is and is not determined inappropriate. This is often decided on a case-by-case basis. Two people kissing may be perfectly acceptable, while a photo of two half nude people who look underage might not be appropriate for obvious reasons.
For the record, some of the images in question were more than just two males kissing and were suggestive of much more overtly sexual activities. Furthermore, your assessment that the characters "couldn't possibly be younger than mid to late teens" is completely subjective to your experience and understanding of the art form. To assume the average middle-aged American would draw the same conclusion is poor judgment. And by the way, sexual depictions of people in their "mid to late teens" can still very much constitute inappropriate, if not illegal, material.
The artists who draw such depictions are allowed a certain amount of flexibility within the law, as there are numerous protections for artistic freedom of expression (not all of which are clear-cut). Publishing businesses do not always share the same freedoms, and choices must be made in accordance with several criteria, including legality and the comfort of employees who must work on jobs. While many businesses adopt a "the customer is always right" mentality, we cannot afford to do this when it comes to legal pitfalls or when it affects the working environment of our employees, whose comfort and dignity we care for deeply.
Regardless of when the term "disturbing" was first used, it should be clear that the woman who used it felt that way before it was divulged that all characters were male, otherwise she would not have raised issue with the job in the first place. So to try to classify this as one person's or one business's views on society and morality is a fallacy which does not hold water. (And I'm sure it would not be hard to find homosexual people who are also uncomfortable with some of these images.)
As for your assessment of recent Supreme Court decisions and laws, you should be well aware of the recent Handley Case as it relates to the PROTECT Act of 2003. Regardless of the case's outcome, this case alone, though not initially part of the basis of Docucopies's decision, would be enough to warrant rejection of this job. Furthermore, just because the Supreme Court says something is legal does NOT make it moral or appropriate for the work place, as the hypothetical example you provided certainly would NOT be in any context.
There is some debate in legal circles over whether material posted on the Internet is technically "published," and in what context, so use of the terms "slander" alongside "libel" seems appropriate to describe many of the accusations being tossed around the forums we visited.
People critical of our business are not inherently libelous. People who immaturely lash out and call us homophobes without evidence to back it up ARE committing libel. The only sound legal defense against libel charges is to prove the "libelous" accusations are true, which is a heavy burden of proof. Fortunately we do not see this as enough of a threat to our business to consider pursuing it in court, which would be costly and pointless.
As for use of the term "niche," it was perfectly in keeping with the Random House/Dictionary.com definition as shown below:
–noun
...
2. a place or position suitable or appropriate for a person or thing: to find one's niche in the business world.
3. a distinct segment of a market.
...
–adjective
5. pertaining to or intended for a market niche; having specific appeal: niche advertising.
Thanks again for commenting back. It is not our intention to denigrate or censor anyone's artistic expression, but rather to explain our decision in relation to our policies. The beauty of a free market system is that the publisher should have no shortage of other places to print her job, though admittedly it may be hard to find another with prices as low as ours.
That's true, I hadn't thought of that case. It seems in the major cases I know like this (including Handley), they ended up forming a plea bargin for fear of what the jury would find.
However, the judge did at least rule part of it unconstitutional with respect to the 2002 SCOTUS ruling on virtual child porn, but continued the charges based on obscenity alone. If he didn't accept the plea bargin, I suspect it would eventually be overturned on appeal even if all 12 jurors ruled against him.
Whoever is in that case would probably get pro-bono support (as Handley and others in the past have), so then it's an issue of time you want to put in the case. Even in such an extreme hypothetical (it going to case for you, personally), I don't think it would consume so much time as not to be worth it, especially considering it would essentially be a free advertisement and allow your organization to go into history for setting important precedent.
I can understand your reluctance, although I think you'd be a pretty unlikely target even by an overzealous prosecutor, due to the sheer volume of manga that exists which is far more questionable by major [re-]publishers (even in published, print form) and that this is a borderline case.
I understand wanting to appease your employers, but where does one draw the line on that? If they weren't topless and were kissing? Just holding hands?
"To assume the average middle-aged American would draw the same conclusion is poor judgment."
Why are you considering what the average middle-aged American, in particular, would think?
"From time to time, people also send us racy material, including sexual and/or pornographic material, and expect us to print them"
The contract you have with your employees doesn't cover materials they may be uncomfortable with?
In any case, it is kind of subjective, but in a case like this I'd either move the job to another employee, try to divide off those few pages to be done by another employee somehow, or do it myself. If not that, I'd just tell them to tough it out, because it really isn't much and if they can't get used to that, I'm not sure I'd want them as an employee.
It is a publishing company, after all, and they have to understand that you will be publishing things they might find offensive. You've suggested you won't discriminate based on sexual orientation, so what would you do in a scenario like that where the employee didn't want to be exposed on that basis?
"People who immaturely lash out and call us homophobes without evidence to back it up ARE committing libel. The only sound legal defense against libel charges is to prove the "libelous" accusations are true, which is a heavy burden of proof."
In order to prove something is libelous, you have to prove significant financial harm to your organization as a result of the claims.
As for defenses, truth is just one of them. Statements made which are opinion (such as this) are inherently protected. Likewise, if the statement is untrue, but was made because there was a reasonable belief that it was true (i.e. a reasonable person could believe it), they are protected.
Honestly, I find it offensive that you'd even consider it as a real possibility over a simple opinion, because that's what people and organizations often jump to in our overly-litigious society, especially in light of you considering legal reasons to not publish for fear of frivolous litigation and your ostensible support for freedom of speech.
Thanks again for your comment. I can see you've put a lot of thought into this, and it's good to hear from someone who forms their argument intelligently and carefully instead of just blasting out angry, anonymous comments in forums.
As for the Handley case, it was not a serious consideration in the decision and in fact I only learned about it when reading people's reactions to our decision.
We are a small company. The same people sit down with the same people and work together every day. If we were a large, faceless corporation with drone workers, things would be different, and one person's views on what is and is not appropriate would be held in much lower regard. But it is one of the merits of being relatively small that we are able to listen to and care about one person's opinion. We certainly COULD insist by contract that our employees just bite their tongue and try to ignore objectionable content as they work on it, but we do not want to. In the long run, the strength of our company lies in our ability to keep all employees happy, not to satisfy every potential customer that comes along. As Bill Cosby said, "I don't know what the key to success is, but the key to failure is trying to please everybody."
I refer to taking the average middle-aged worker's attitude into account because most of the employees who work in publishing here fit into that demographic. Anime and related art forms are generally geared at a much younger crowd, and it's reasonable to assume older people are not accustomed to cartoon characters whose ages and genders are largely indistinguishable.
You make an assumption that the employee in question didn't want to be exposed to the material on the basis of sexual orientation. As I spelled out before, her decision was made before it was clarified that all characters were male. It was based purely on the sexually suggestive content, not the genders of said characters. I would venture to guess that her description of the images as "disturbing" were due to the ambiguous ages of the characters, in which case I agree completely.
As for the libel issue, there has been no significant financial harm to our company or our reputation. But when a bunch of people jump on a reactionary bandwagon and start calling a company bigoted -- which many in the Yaoi community did -- the potential for a serious backlash is certainly there. Had we walked outside to see thousands of people in our parking lot picketing and throwing rotten fruit at us, that would be a much different situation than a few groundless claims being thrown around in forums. But false rumors spread like wildfire on the Internet, and accusing someone or some organization of bigotry is not to be taken lightly. The potential for significant financial damage from libel is very real.
(cont'd below)
Though opinions are usually protected speech, that does not necessarily apply here, because saying someone is bigoted against a group cannot always be directly proven or disproved. Yet it can certainly create an environment which is not good for business.
Let's flip the situation just to make the point clear. Say there were dozens of people in forums saying that our employees are all homosexual. Let's say a major national newspaper picks up the story and recklessly prints it. Suddenly we start losing business from churches and individuals who do not want to support us. (Churches are a large part of our clientele, and it's logical to assume some of them would not want to give their business to a homosexual company.) It would be hard to argue the paper was simply expressing an opinion and is not guilty of libel. (Another element of libel is malicious intent, with which I'm certain many of the actual comments were done.)
At any rate, we at no time even considered legal action because, as stated, this does not seem to be a significant threat to our business, and it would be a needless waste of time and money. So please don't be offended that the idea was mentioned, as it was not intended to be taken as a threat.
Again, we appreciate the opportunity to engage with you and others on this topic, but I feel at this point we have said all there is to say about it. I don't expect to reach an understanding or agreement with everyone who is passionate about this topic, and that's the beauty of agreeing to disagree.
Post a Comment