Have you ever needed to Google “Michelle Obama” for any particular reason?  Perhaps you were searching in Google’s “image search.”  You may have noticed a not-so flaterring picture of the First Lady Depicted as a monkey appear pretty high in the search rankings.  Well as it turns out most recently that picture has been ranking number 1 in Google’s image search and has infuriated many visitors to the search engine.

In fact, the technology giant themselves was offended by the ranking enough to purchased online ads in an effort to explain why the image appears there. The Google ad, titled “Offensive Search Results,” appears directly over the very first image location which currently occupied by the Michelle Obama monkey face.  The advertisement reads, “Sometimes our search results can be offensive. We agree.” Its there…check it out for yourself.

If you click on the text based ad, Google takes you to another page with this longer explanation of why certain search results appear, and why they may be highly ranked.

An explanation of our search results.

Sometimes Google search results from the Internet can include disturbing content, even from innocuous queries. We assure you that the views expressed by such sites are not in any way endorsed by Google.

Search engines are a reflection of the content and information that is available on the Internet. A site’s ranking in Google’s search results relies heavily on computer algorithms using thousands of factors to calculate a page’s relevance to a given query.

The beliefs and preferences of those who work at Google, as well as the opinions of the general public, do not determine or impact our search results. Individual citizens and public interest groups do periodically urge us to remove particular links or otherwise adjust search results. Although Google reserves the right to address such requests individually, Google views the integrity of our search results as an extremely important priority. Accordingly, we do not remove a page from our search results simply because its content is unpopular or because we receive complaints concerning it. We will, however, remove pages from our results if we believe the page (or its site) violates our Webmaster Guidelines, if we believe we are required to do so by law, or at the request of the webmaster who is responsible for the page.

We apologize if you’ve had an upsetting experience using Google. We hope you understand our position regarding offensive results.

Sincerely,
The Google Team

As of my writing this blog post, it appears the image has in fact been removed!  I guess enough pressure from the powers that be led Google to believe the content indeed “violated the Webmaster Guidelines.”   Funny how that happens.  So what do you think?  With Free Speech and Expression considered an right in the United States should Google be or have been forced to remove the image.  I’ve always believed as a society we’re far to sensitive.  The same type of images were frequent in the George Bush administration.  Perhaps not of racist undertone but offensive none the less.  Should we be more accepting of such images or censure them all?  Interesting Debate.