lord_casek Posted January 2, 2008 Share Posted January 2, 2008 A follow up to our story December 30 on the Australian Government joining China is broadly censoring the internet. Now apparently if you believe in Free Speech you believe in Kiddie Porn, via the SMH: “Labor makes no apologies to those who argue that any regulation of the internet is like going down the Chinese road,” [Telecommunications Minister Stephen] Conroy said yesterday. “If people equate freedom of speech with watching child pornography, then the Rudd Labor Government is going to disagree.” No one equates freedom of speech with watching kiddie porn, only the Australian Government does. Whilst no one would disagree with the notion that kidde porn is abhorrent, it should be noted that the Australian Government’s censorship regime is going to be much broader than sites that show activities that are already illegal to distribute and watch across the world. Further still, as local civil libertarians have pointed out, it will not only take all of two minutes to bypass the great firewall of Australia, and worse still it will actually provide a false sense of security to parents who will wrongly believe that the internet is now a safe place for their children, when it still isn’t. At least they’ve now admitted to taking lessons from China, not that this is something to be proud of, although the Australian Government seems to think that it is. http://www.techcrunch.com/2008/01/01/australian-government-equates-freedom-of-speech-to-liking-kiddie-porn/ Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lord_casek Posted January 2, 2008 Author Share Posted January 2, 2008 http://www.efa.org.au/Issues/Censor/cens1.html Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
thecoldmidwest Posted January 2, 2008 Share Posted January 2, 2008 Don't most porn sites make you pay to use? Why don't they just go after the sick bastards who put child porn up? What a weak excuse to launch government regulated internet. If the people of Australia let this pass they deserve it for being idiots. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
.coma Posted January 2, 2008 Share Posted January 2, 2008 first post of 08 and i still gotta warn yall about this kid. the proof iz in tha puddin kidz! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
WORDISM45 Posted January 3, 2008 Share Posted January 3, 2008 sorry what does banning websites that show illegal acts being perpetrated on children have to do with free speech? would you prefer the kiddie porn websites were allowed to operate Casek? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest shai_hulud Posted January 3, 2008 Share Posted January 3, 2008 sorry what does banning websites that show illegal acts being perpetrated on children have to do with free speech? would you prefer the kiddie porn websites were allowed to operate Casek? The point casek is trying to make is that governments shouldn't legislate things like access to internet content. Child porn is going to exist whether the Australian government likes it or not, but that doesn't mean they should have the right to censor web traffic at a national level, as China does. Also, web filters are notorious for censoring sites that have nothing to do with the targeted content. They aren't as sophisticated as their vendors claim, not by a long shot. THE AUSTRALIAN GOVERNMENT made the parallel between freedom of speech and kiddie porn, NOT casek. They're the ones guilty of hyperbole, not him. I swear, you guys spend so much time knocking this guy down and calling him Chicken Little because he's trying to wake you the fuck up, and you aren't having it. The world is changing, and a lot of that change is NOT going to be in the best interests of people like us. If you had any sense, you'd find out about stuff like VPN and proxies and OpenDNS before they get filtered as well. Why? Well, what if the Australian government decides that graffiti is unacceptable content and filters 12 oz.? Think about that. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
WORDISM45 Posted January 3, 2008 Share Posted January 3, 2008 deep breaths shai hulud, Casek and I have a fine rapport thank you for your concern. If you focused your mind on what the quote from the government actually is (“If people equate freedom of speech with watching child pornography, then the Rudd Labor Government is going to disagree.”) you would realise that they are actually saying that they DISAGREE with people who equate child porn with freedom of speech. you obviously didn't read up to the second sentence of the post before you decided to reply though so thats cool... anyway I think going after the source is far better than just having some stupid filter for what its worth. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lord_casek Posted January 3, 2008 Author Share Posted January 3, 2008 anyway I think going after the source is far better than just having some stupid filter for what its worth. exactly. but the government wants to infringe upon peoples privacy. while i find child porn abhorant, i still think that our internet privacy is a huge thing to fight for. if you choose to use that time to look at, manufacture, etc child porn, you should be prepared to suffer the consequences when you do get caught. also, yumone, take a look at the document below the story. it's chock full of information. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest shai_hulud Posted January 3, 2008 Share Posted January 3, 2008 Well, I guess I misunderstood, then. I read some (not all) of the article, and I was pretty amazed that the Australian government has to resort to "Think of the children!!!" to defend filtering content. It's like...the last refuge of cowards, or something. No one in their right mind is going to go public and say, "I don't want my government to filter kiddie porn," but where does it end? I'm sure that in Australia as much as here, they are probably taking away your civil rights faster than ever...we seem to have lost habeas corpus, privacy, and free elections so far. Sorry, it's been a rough week. I've been trying to explain to my friends why Bhutto getting killed is such a big deal, but most of them were more interested in what they were going to do for New Year's Eve than hearing anything I had to say. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lord_casek Posted January 3, 2008 Author Share Posted January 3, 2008 shai: it's just crossfire. the nature of it, that is to say. it's all good. as for australia: yeah the "think of the kids" is the thing that no one wants to stand up to. and of course, most all people love kids, they want the best for them, but man...fuck big government, they want to jack our freedoms in the guise of "our best interests" Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest shai_hulud Posted January 3, 2008 Share Posted January 3, 2008 Yeah. I should remember that there's good reasons why I try to not post in here. Sorry, if I offended anyone. I try to keep this stuff to myself for the most part, but it slips out once in a while. As I said, it seems like a lot of my friends don't want to know about anything on the web besides Myspace, Facebook, and...that's about it. It's pretty sad...a lot of them used to be a lot more aware politically and socially, but when I tried to talk about the Bhutto assassination, they kept changing the subject to what they got for Xmas or their NYE plans. I feel like if the people who are running the show in the US these days are going to succeed, they need to depend on people to do exactly what my friends are doing. Just mindless consumption and diversion from the real issues, even though there's a resource for information we didn't have as kids...they just use the internet as a way to get ass and newer, faster, shinier stuff. Hence my concern. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lord_casek Posted January 3, 2008 Author Share Posted January 3, 2008 i know how you feel. sometimes when i try to talk to my neoconservative family members about the issues, they want to change the subject, most of my friends are aware of the fucked-upness of the people "running the show" but don't knwo how to do anything about it. and if they do "win" shai, we will win. people will be forced to wake up. just like if ron paul is assassinated, we win. people will know what the fuck is up and be forced to take action. viva la liberte'! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest shai_hulud Posted January 3, 2008 Share Posted January 3, 2008 By "succeed", I mean "maintain the status quo". This tangent we're drifting into is a good subject for another thread. I'll mull this over and try to organize my thoughts into something that has a beginning, middle and end. Something my ex said to me has really stuck in my mind. She said that the internet is either going to be our salvation in that it can educate us, or or downfall in that it can be used to distract us. Then I think, how many of my friends read Indymedia and international news? Obviously, not many, because they'd still be as politically active as ever. Conversely, how many of them have Myspace and Facebook pages? Seemingly ALL of them...I tell people to NOT use Myspace to contact me on the web, to simply email me directly at the address I don't make public...but, when I check my mailbox I get real mail at, it's empty 90% of the time. The address associated with my Myspace account is a different story. HUNDREDS of messages...and 80% of them are spam via Myspace. Do I want to sift through spam to find my friends messages? No, I do not. Therefore, I don't talk to these people much. Back on subject...isn't Myspace supposed to be a really good way for pedophiles to do their thing? I keep hearing about this. Does that mean that Myspace would be blocked in Australia? Oh, the horrors. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lord_casek Posted January 3, 2008 Author Share Posted January 3, 2008 dunno. myspace has taken some new actions to make teens pages more private. yeah, i don't get much at myspace, i get more on email or here via PM. i like it that way. i think that some of my friends hate me now because of my support for ron paul. it's ok. they are addicted to the same bobbles you speak of. facebook, myspace, iphones, bling. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
WORDISM45 Posted January 3, 2008 Share Posted January 3, 2008 being far more familiar with the Australian government than either of you all i have to say is that there is almost no chance they are doign this as some kind of foot in the door towards internet censorship in an attempt to better control the populace. If anything it is just some feeble attempt to make them look tough on crime etc. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest shai_hulud Posted January 3, 2008 Share Posted January 3, 2008 To casek- I always hated you, Ron Paul or not, and your disdain for iPhones has merely sealed the deal. (sarcasm) To yumone- I agree. All I know vis a vis Australian politics is that the liberals recently did pretty well in the elections. Then, I read this, and said, "Huh. How about that." In the states, the liberals are notorious for this kind of nanny-state mentality and hiding behind untouchable issues like child pornography. The neoconservatives have run roughshod over the Bill Of Rights and the Constitution, and they have used the threat of terrorism as a club to beat people about the head and shoulders. So, which one is right? I don't know. For my money, neither. Politically, I vote Green and am identified as a liberal Libertarian as far as my views go. Obviously, my views are not all that cut and dried. I'll eventually make this into a cohesive thread, but really, it's just variations on a theme. I think I fall smack dab in the middle in a lot of ways, politically...but, that's coming from someone who was a radical for most of their life. I think that the older I get, the more I tend to see things from a classically conservative point of view...which is, people make decisions which influence their actions based on their beliefs, and they should be willing to take the responsibility for having the freedom to do so. Unfortunately, most people are scared nowadays by anything remotely resembling the right to do whatever they want, whenever they want...well, that and anything that fucks with their idyllic vision of the world (kiddie porn!!!!), and simply want to have comfort and security at any price...and they are willing to give up an undetermined amount of their freedom and/or rights to keep the boogeyman out of their closet. Or something like that. Like I said, it's not cut and dried. I obviously need to sit down and sort this out. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
the_gooch Posted January 4, 2008 Share Posted January 4, 2008 first post of 08 and i still gotta warn yall about this kid. the proof iz in tha puddin kidz! Australia, NOT Austria. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
shitting Posted January 4, 2008 Share Posted January 4, 2008 Jesus christ, i hope that dude hasn't been confusing Austria and Australia his whole life. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MayorMeanBeans Posted January 5, 2008 Share Posted January 5, 2008 ^^haha casek are you australian? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
KM4RT Posted January 5, 2008 Share Posted January 5, 2008 as an Australian, i am not for this internet filter. equating freedom of speech with watching child porn is stupid and over the top. the governement would do better by spending all this time and money on preventing child abuse and finding those involved. another factor in this is that governments are relatively stupid and well behind the times in terms of technology. they think, if you type "child porn" in google you will get thousands of images. obviously not true. and they think their filter will stop this kind of content. it wont. i think we all know that child porn on the net is an 'underground' business. a lot of private chat rooms. emails, etc. they certainly do not advertise what they are doing. and in this respect the filter will certainly be a failure. a filter wont stop pedos sharing images accross private networks. it wont stop them abusing children. real police work needs to increase in this area to stop this. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
KM4RT Posted January 5, 2008 Share Posted January 5, 2008 and this also raises obvious concerns about freedom of speech, privacy, etc. and its just another step the government is taking in controlling the information we are exposed to. which sucks. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lord_casek Posted January 5, 2008 Author Share Posted January 5, 2008 ^^haha casek are you australian? kangas in teh smokey's? no. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Abracadabra Posted January 5, 2008 Share Posted January 5, 2008 this is proof that old people have no idea what the internet is or what it's used for. and how on earth would you go about "regulating" the internets anyway? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Abracadabra Posted January 5, 2008 Share Posted January 5, 2008 and trust, australia isn't america. the australian people won't let their government trample all over them in this way. there are way too many university students with way too much time on their hands to let this happen Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
.coma Posted January 5, 2008 Share Posted January 5, 2008 my bad. everyone gets one right............ RIGHT? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cracked Ass Posted January 6, 2008 Share Posted January 6, 2008 I can haz mat Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
WORDISM45 Posted January 6, 2008 Share Posted January 6, 2008 and trust, australia isn't america. the australian people won't let their government trample all over them in this way. there are way too many university students with way too much time on their hands to let this happen bullshit Australians are the most politically apathetic people in the world Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Abracadabra Posted January 6, 2008 Share Posted January 6, 2008 having lived in australia and the united states i know for a fact that that's not true Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
WORDISM45 Posted January 7, 2008 Share Posted January 7, 2008 hahaha maybe second behind the US then, either way no one is going to do shit about this government action over here in aus Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DRUNKEN-ASSHOLE-ONER Posted January 7, 2008 Share Posted January 7, 2008 bullshit Australians are the most politically apathetic people in the world You're a fucking idiot if you thing Australians are more apathetic than Americans. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts
Join the conversation
You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.