Australia Says No to Internet Censorship

Brenton Fletcher writes "A nationwide protest rally against the internet censorship filter proposed by the Australian Labor Government was held today. Over 9,000 people were slated to attend. I was fortunate enough to go to the rally on the steps of Parliament House in Adelaide, South Australia. I heard speeches from the Digital Liberty Coalition, the Green Left Weekly, and other concerned members of the public." Reader mask.of.sanity adds a link to ComputerWorld's photo-heavy coverage of the gatherings.

Comments

Re:Good

[senorpoco]

Removing the 'Passive' from passive-aggressive I see

A DINGO ATE MAH BEBEH

[SinShiva]

http://nocleanfeed.com/ - i personally have not been and likely never will go to australia, but if you are a citizen, you would be hurting the rest of the world if you didn't help fight censorship. keep on trucking, aussies.

Re:A DINGO ATE MAH BEBEH

[alienunknown]

What we really need is a filter to filter out dingo jokes.

7000 people, that is a joke!

[viiviiviivii]

I haven't been back home for almost 5 years, but it saddens me to see that only 7000 people were in protest.

Come on, there was 1/2 a million for the anti Iraq rallies, I guess since the public couldn't stop the government on that one they just can't be bothered anymore.

I never realised Australia had a problem with an over controlling government until I moved to Europe.

Something has to be done before you all just give up all of your rights!

the people who push this crap

[circletimessquare]

depend upon your defeatist attitude to make sure opposition is muted

i mean seriously, wtf: "all that has been done is to teach the politicians that they need to sneak this through the next time"

really? all of our representatives are programmed androids? they aren't people like you and me?

"Yet it takes only one passing vote to put it on the books forever"

forever? seriously?

look, your attitude is part of the problem

a legislature is a representation of the will of the people. does the people's will get warped? absolutely. does it get betrayed? absolutely. but not all the time, and not forever. if the right thing is ever going to get done, defeatist attitudes that accept bullshit, like yours, must be destroyed just as much as bad legislators need to be brought down

yeah, really: you're part of the problem

ultranegative, ultracynical attitudes are the beginning of acceptance of the crap you complain about

i don't accept this bullshit

by your words, YOU DO

change your retarded atittude, pronto

I'm prepared to offer a solution

[Mal-2]

Hey, I do have an answer for this -- sunset clauses. They should work both ways and be MANDATORY.

Propose measure X, with a sunset clause of five years. If it passes, it has to be re-passed after those five years or it goes away. On the flip side, if it makes it to a vote and is defeated, it CANNOT BE PROPOSED AGAIN for five years. This should stop legislators from trying to bite off more than they can chew. Laws confirmed to be a good idea can be given longer sunset clauses the second time around -- say up to some multiple of the original. If it can get passed a third time, then some "cap limit" such as 99 years would come into play.

But do you think the legislatures would actually want to DO this? It would require them to not only pass laws, but to examine and renew those that have already been passed... and that would be WORK!

Mal-2