Slashdot Mirror
Australian Gov't Claims Internet Filter Legislation Still In Play
Dracophile writes "Contrary to yesterday's article about The Australian's report that the Australian government had put on the back burner plans to introduce Internet filter legislation before the next election, The Sydney Morning Herald reports that the government rejected claims that it had abandoned such plans, and that 'a spokeswoman for Communications Minister Stephen Conroy said the government remained committed to the policy.' Unless the Australian Labor Party abandons the plan altogether, will the timing make any difference to voters?"
Ok i've marked your words. if liberals win, we won't have a national filter. the last liberal government had a filtering program - free software to install on your pc. seems pretty fair and cheap to me.
If you mod me down, I will become more powerful than you can imagine....
I'm not at all sure the greens won't sell us out for environmental causes - but given both major parties want this "so stupid it's indistinguishable from evil" filter, and labour is already selling us out to the fundies while the liberals seem to be running around with their heads alternately chopped off or buried in the sand... I'm thinking it's one of those situations where we're better off with the devil we don't know.
I normally vote labour, unless this gets scrapped by labour they won't get my vote. I'll probably move to the US with my partner if this ever comes in over here. Add to that the reluctance for the Australian government, liberal and labour, to adopt a bill of rights or constitution and it looks like my home is becoming somewhere I don't want to call home or raise my family.
War is the statesman's game, the priest's delight, the lawyer's jest, the hired assassin's trade.- Shelley
No vote for any government that supports censorship - whether they put it on the back burner or not. This just shows how dim and gullible they think the Australian public are. Unfortunately they are correct. The majority of Australians have no idea what 'the thin end of the wedge' means, and will just let this lithping fool stick the fat end right up there. Basically they have already lost my vote by supporting this conroy rubbish for years now with as little discussion as possible, and regardless of all points of view against it. In fact I find it despicable that the Prime Minister will not even stand up and support this censorship policy openly. He doesn't want to be tarred with the brush and instead just tacitly supports conroy. At this stage, the only way for them to win my vote back is by promising to completely scrap this censorship and to also denounce the attorney general M Atkinson for his deplorable efforts to restrict free speech. No doubt (in my opinion) he was just doing their dirty work anyway. So, no, the timing doesn't matter at all.
I think the main reason they never wanted a bill of rights is that it would immediately come in to play to point out violations of Illegal Immigrants rights who have been unlawfully detained. By not having a bill of rights they can just ignore the problem.
Cheers, Chris