Internet search engine giant Google came under fire from the gay community for its translator tool's inclusion of insulting homophobic slang.
However, within hours of the launching of a petition that has gathered over 52,000 signatures, Google apologized, took steps to correct the problem and caused a gay activist to happily declare, "We won!"
Forbes reports that if the word "homosexual" was entered into Google's translation tool, a variety of slurs popped up, triggering the controversy.
Andre Banks of the
LGBT group All Out launched the protest, and when Google responded quickly, wrote on the group's website, "We won! Thanks to our mobilization, Google implemented a fix on Friday to take out anti-gay slurs from its translation tool. Google even apologized.
"Imagine learning English and being taught to say hateful insults instead of neutral language for 'gay.' Google Translate, used by over 500 million people every month, was suggesting slurs as synonyms for the word 'gay.'
"Thousands of us signed the urgent petition and Google heard us. This is how powerful we are when we stand together."
Google, which boasts an excellent anti-homophobic record — Forbes notes that website Glassdoor.com rated the company as the third best workplace for gays — responded quickly, with a Google spokesman commenting, "As soon as we were informed that some of our translations for certain terms were serving inappropriate results, we immediately began working to fix the issue.
"We apologize for any offence this has caused people.
"Our systems produce translations automatically based on existing translations on the web, so we appreciate when users point out issues such as this," the
Daily Mail reported.
Google, based in Mountain View, California, has over 47,000 employees and is listed as the
world's third most valuable brand by Forbes, with nearly $60 billion in sales.
"It’s important Google is able to provide an accurate translation of these words that describe so many people," Banks told
ABC News. "We were really glad to see this change happen in hours, not weeks and months."
Daily Tech noted that Google "is very progressive" on LGBT rights, with a 2012 campaign "Legalize Love" to support gay marriage and granting equal benefits to gay employees, who jokingly refer to themselves as "gayglers."
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