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Australian Censorship Legislation
danny writes: "Legislation is before the New South Wales (Australia) state parliament that would make it
a criminal offense to publish material unsuitable
for children online. Other states will be passing similar laws,
as this is part of a uniform national approach. So please
help us stop this! Note: earlier Federal legislation in Australia covered Internet Service Providers, not end-users. But this law follows that in attempting to directly transfer the film censorship system to the Net - one has to wonder how many of the politicians involved actually use the Net."
its wrong because:
1. your restricting fredom of speech
2. "unsuitable for children" could have a broad meaning & used to restrict things of a political nature... or have it's meaning streched, much like the US's terrorism laws & hacking.
3. how the hell are they going to police this?
Also one interesting fact is that they say politicians don't respond or take much notice of email , so its suggested to write handwritten letters... now why would this be? maybe its because politicians have no clue when it comes to computers! so incompetent they can't even check their e-mail on a regular basis. It's a bloody outrage & i hope this bill isn't passed
You tried your best, & you failed miserably,
The lesson is:
Never Try
"[A]dult themes" include: "verbal references to and depictions associated with issues such as suicide, crime, corruption, marital problems, emotional trauma, drug and alcohol dependency, death and serious illness, racism, religious issues".
And don't just think this is to "get" people who put stuff up any old how, oh no - "[I]f you place material unsuitable for minors on a web page, even on a password protected section of your site and give the password only to your adult friends, you could be prosecuted under criminal law."
Is this for real? I thought adult content was the only content on the net that made real money?
I'm guessing we're not going to be seeing "Genuine Aussie Amatuers" on the net for much longer then. Any Australians out there who can say how likely this bill is to pass? If it happens in one place it could happen in others...
I don't think I'm very happy. I always fall asleep to the sound of my own screams.
The Labor party was in favour of the Online Services Act too. Yes, Senator Alston is still a luddite and still in power, but in reality it didn't matter who won as far as this issue is concerned.
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Not all Australians are like this, in fact a lot of us are quite ashamed of our current governments.
The Federal government, which passed the previous lwas that tried to restrict ISPs, did so, a) because they (erk, they call themselves the Liberals) are quite a conservative party to begin with, b) because they were trying to win the vote of an even more conservative member of parliament, and c) because it was easy and popular to do.
The reason for this new law is less clearcut; the party in power in NSW (Labor) is the supposedly more Left-leaning of the two biggest parties. I suspect that it purely a populist move. Politicians in Australia seem to be determined to prove that they can be even more conservative and out of touch than Americans, obvously.
Read a little further in Article 19....
Article 19
1. Everyone shall have the right to hold opinions without interference.
2. Everyone shall have the right to freedom of expression; this right shall
include freedom to seek, receive and impart information and ideas of all
kinds, regardless of frontiers, either orally, in writing or in print, in the
form of art, or through any other media of his choice.
3. The exercise of the rights provided for in paragraph 2 of this article
carries with it special duties and responsibilities. It may therefore be
subject to certain restrictions, but these shall only be such as are provided
by law and are necessary:
(a) For respect of the rights or reputations of others;
(b) For the protection of national security or of public order (ordre
public), or of public health or morals.
3.b appears to be a loophole which can be used to permit arbitrary censorship in the name of morals.