Search for "Blonde", Get Fired...

Searching for "Blonde" with Google in 2011

Robert Zellner was fired from his Cedarburg School District job as biology teacher for searching for the word "Blonde" in Google on his computer at work.  Zellner, an employee of the district for eleven years, was also the president of the teachers union for the Cedarburg school district (full ruling here.)

Apparently over the course of time a contentious relationship developed between Mr. Zellner and the school board.  That issue aside, however, Zellner signed an "Employee Access to Networked Information Resources" policy in 2005 that indicated he was responsible for the use of his computer, the information he searched for on that computer, and would be held accountable should that computer be used in such a way as to violate the policy.  The policy also indicated that the computer and its use were not private, that viewing pornography was strictly forbidden and would be a violation of the policy, and that the his computer usage may be monitored by a supervisor at any time.

Now Zellner, probably in an attempt to cause friction because of his union affiliation and for other related reasons, explicitly searched with Google for "blonde" - apparently with "safe search" disabled - about a year later.  That search revealed 20 or so Google thumbnails of what I would suppose were naked blonds.  He then clicked on one of the links which brought him to another site, www.ardentes.free.frblonde.com, according to the complaint.

Total time Googling - 67 seconds.

(Now according to the ruling Zellner also had pictures of students in bikini's from a biology trip to Hawaii.  The court acknowledges that none of these images "inappropriate" and that they had been subsequently deleted from his computer.)

In any case, Zellner was fired for "violating policy".

While I don't see a problem with Zellner being fired for this reason I am troubled by some other aspects of this.

Certainly searching for "blonde" (which I did with Google Image above) does not guarantee the display of pornography (as the image above shows - the only out-of-place image being Bob Dylan - can you find him (Waldo)?).  This search was performed with a "Moderate Search" - whatever that is.  There is a place to turn change this.  Doing so does not yield significantly different results (though some images are inappropriate).

So Zellner was really playing roulette - pulling the Google search lever and seeing what comes up.  Perhaps a set of images worth losing your job over - perhaps not.  Nor is Google deterministic - the same search conducted seconds or minutes later might yield completely different results because of how Google's search algorithms work.

In no case are these images as bad as the unsolicited spam I periodically find in my inbox.  Should I or would I be fired for receiving spam?  I have to select the email (though not explicitly open it) to delete it - which reveals some of the content - with the Apple Mail program.  Is that an offense worth being fired over?

Now Google, as far as I can see, does not even own these images nor do they have copyrights to them (though some use by Google is considered fair use and some is not - depending on where you live, etc.).

Google simply takes them, makes thumbnails out of them, and display them without concern over copyright or ownership (though they are left open to potential liability if they could have done a better job with the "fair use"part if they don't "thumbnailize" them appropriately...)

Does this make Google an accomplice to Zellner - display the copywritten pornographic images of others on his behalf?

Too me this is reminiscent of the "drug laws," "vice laws," "gambling laws" and so on...

Basically the model with the "drug laws" is: A) drugs are illegal, B) the government does nothing to stop the free and widely availability of drugs, C) if you are dumb enough to get caught its all your fault.

Similarly with porn (and specifically in the case of Zellner): A) its illegal on his computer/at his workplace, B) the school district, Google, and everyone else does nothing to stop its free, easy and wide availability, C) its Zellner's fault if he's caught.

So in fact one might generalize the government model as:

1. X is illegal (a firing offense, etc.)
2. We do nothing to stop, control, or limit X or its impact on your life or your children's lives.
3. Its all your fault if you somehow become involved in X and we catch you.

In the case where a government is actually involved in X to some extent, let's say in gambling, then they simply create a "license" for X and require those with a license to display a small notice that says "if X is ruining your life call 1-800-X for help."

Similarly for cigarettes.

Now apparently Zellner having pictures of bikini-clad underage girls from his class (he was a biology teacher and presumably on the very same trip to Hawaii) does not represent a problem to the court - how ironic.

At the end of the day Zellner was done in by his own arrogance and/or poor judgement.

But the law is taking a  complicated and troubling turn here...

For example, should someone spam the entire US Government with child porn images what would be the result?

Would everyone be fired and arrested?  After all, there would be child porn on all of their hard drives.  The employees couldn't make the argument that its not "theirs" because the law sees it on their employers hard drive as their responsibility (but that doesn't hold water for true child pornographers).

No, I am sure a "special case" would be made of it - oh, these workers weren't responsible - it was done maliciously, etc.  They would be treated specially because they are part of the "elite".

But this is the slow and insidious Orwellian transformation of our society into the "ALL ANIMALS ARE EQUAL BUT SOME ANIMALS ARE MORE EQUAL THAN OTHERS" of Animal Farm.

If you are someone important, work the government, etc. then the laws which apply to the "common man" do not apply to you.  My guess is that someone like Zellner foolishly (for him) got on the wrong side of the "authorities" with his union antics.  This ultimately caused a "rift" between him and his superiors.

Had this not happened I am sure that he, his boss, and the school board would have had many happy hours of enjoyment with the bikini-clad pictures of their under age charges...