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But then you still have the original problem: it's illegal to say the words, but it's also illegal to tell people not to say the words? You already know that there's explicit precedent that these words are considered indicative of illegal behavior, and you're just supposed to ignore that information in your effort to comply with the law?



It's illegal to do the things that those words describe. The actions are the problem, not the words. If you stop doing the thing, you naturally won't send emails saying you're doing the thing.


>If you stop doing the thing, you naturally won't send emails saying you're doing the thing.

This is equivalent to "if you're not doing anything bad, you have nothing to hide". People speak imprecisely all the time. People also say things all the time that are correct and only describe legal behavior, but sound bad if taken out of context by a prosecutor out to get the company.


> This is equivalent to "if you're not doing anything bad, you have nothing to hide".

How is it? That's an argument about privacy, not about whether something looks illegal.

> People speak imprecisely all the time. People also say things all the time that are correct and only describe legal behavior, but sound bad if taken out of context by a prosecutor out to get the company.

Courts are aware of this and exercise judgement.


> it's illegal to say the words

No, it absolutely is not.

The words themselves are in no way whatsoever at issue here. The focus is on the context those words exist in.


They weren't used... and what context? Nobody was (legally) accusing Google of monopoly until recently, and this training has been in place forever.

This is standard practice at most any big co, as far as I'm aware




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