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Google Rejects Australian Censorship Proposal
Xiroth writes "Google has rejected overtures from the Australian government to censor YouTube clips that had been given an RC rating by Australian classification authority, the OFLC. According to a Google spokesperson: 'YouTube has clear policies about what content is not allowed, for example hate speech and pornography, and we enforce these, but we can't give any assurances that we would voluntarily remove all Refused Classification content from YouTube.
The scope of RC is simply too broad and can raise genuine questions about restrictions on access to information. RC includes the grey realms of material instructing in any crime from [painting] graffiti to politically controversial crimes such as euthanasia, and exposing these topics to public debate is vital for democracy.'"
Australia, just like China.
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Yes. Clearly the internet is lacking in pornography because of Google's efforts. There's just wave after wave of nothing out there.
Personally, I wouldn't mind uncensored content in a walled off room of YouTube. But I understand that would be a hard sell for investors. And quite frankly, vomiting up a video of racist, homophobic, sexist viewpoints to a private server is pretty cheap and easy to do these days. It just isn't needed.
In this case, I applaud Google's efforts. Australia's BS Refused Classification status is a complete cop-out that everyone in the creative industries has been dealing with for years. Either man up to banning stuff that you don't like, or let it in an accept that 15 year olds will need to sort out on their own which holes the pointy bits go into.
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According to Yahtzee of Zero Punctuation, the Australian government passes it off as "not censorship" because all they're doing is "refusing classification." Unfortunately, anything without a classification cannot be sold in Australia. So, they're not banning it, technically, they're simply making it impossible to sell in a legal manner.
It's a shit politicians' trick, and it's worked for a while. Fortunately, much of the citizenship there seems to finally be waking up, if the repeal of the law that made it illegal to anonymously comment on politics due to public outcry is anything to go on.
Canada: The US's more awesome sibling.
Back in 07 when Australia was deciding between our two primary parties, the current government (Labor) used a policy of an opt-in filter system. This system was going to replace the method used by the old government, which didn't work at all (computer-side filters) because people could bypass them fairly easily. Not as easily as this though. Moving on about 1 yeah from when they were elected in, their policy suddenly changed. No longer was it an opt-in system, it was now compulsory for -everyone- to be filtered. And there would be a secondary opt-in filter that would block all porn. From that, they've continued on their censoring rampage. Unfortunately, the current government doesn't seem to listen to its people at all. And a lot of Australians are ignorant and blind. As long as someone says "it's to block child porn" they agree with it. When explained properly, almost everyone says it's stupid. Our government is up for election again soon, I can only hope that people will wake up and see what's happening... But I'm not holding my breath. Both governments are terrible.
In the US, anyway, it is closely related to "hate crimes" which are structured in a way such that the only victims are non-whites and the only perpetrators are white males.
You are downright wrong about this. Of the 9,691 recorded hate crime victims in the US in 2008, only about half were targeted for their race. Of the racial victims, 16.8% were singled out because they were white. source
So, exactly, how gullible are the Australian people and/or how stupid are their politicians for anyone to think these two things are different from each other?
Of course they're different. You can give it away free. You can import it yourself. Posession isn't an offence. All three of these would be illegal if it were actually banned.
Congratulations, you only get partial credit, because you've never bothered to look up even rudimentary details about Australian politics.
In Australia, voting is compulsory in both State and Federal elections (we vote for people, not on issues for the most part, so the ticket isn't gigantic, except for the occasional senate ticket, which you can avoid by going for 'party' instead of 'people')
A) in your example simply doesn't apply.
What's really happened here is that we voted a party in, and then they changed their minds and have gone on a giant censorship rampage for no reason.
Unless you live in Western Australia, where mere possession is illegal as well since 2008.