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What is going on? (Score:5, Interesting)
What is going on with anglo-saxon governments?
They used to be the vanguard of freedom and liberties! Now, they seem to be degrading into a spiral of power-hungry stupid obtuseness!!!
Is it something in the water, or the anglo-saxon culture has run it's course and is now totally decadent???
Re:What is going on? (Score:5, Insightful)
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Re:What is going on? (Score:5, Insightful)
Well there is at least ONE positive thing to come out of Australia: Abby Winters dot-com ----- Of course if the Aussies "turn on" their filter Miss Winters will probably no longer be available. :-(
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Re: (Score:3, Informative)
power hungry is about it, the governments have realised that they can do what they want, and even if everyone complains, no-one will ever actually get off thier arse and do anything about it like they used to, we are all content to be passive aggressive even though it achieves nothing and the big wigs can do what they want
I think that the last generation would get off their arse and protest and that is the big difference is almost as big a myth as that whatever music the young generation listens to is garbage. I think humans were lazy last century, are lazy this century and will be lazy next century. The difference is that the surveilance is so much more indirect, impersonal and maybe even as far as subtle. There's not the vast armies of STASI where one in fifty(!!!) citizens was an informer. You don't need the same sort of
Here is why (Score:3, Insightful)
It's called 'social democracy'.
People are taught/led to either explode or collapse with emotion at the sight or thought of suffering. Instil regret, a bad conscience and the 'humane reflex' from the age of three onwards.
Therefore, they relatively speaking become blind to all other things. Who cares about clause 4.7.4a of the tax laws? If it could help a single child, then burn every tax law!
The individual therefore only has relevance to society if the individual either 1) suffers or 2) is oblivious to suffe
Re: (Score:3)
>>>$35,000 is more than I make in a year and a half. Get over it.
You earn just over $20,000 a year? What is your job? Professional panhandler??? Or maybe you're the guy who stands on the corner and washes people's windows even though the window is already perfectly clean.
Get thee to a better job.
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
This is absolutely nothing more than the result of people buying into government as a paternal figure.
People have made it resoundingly clear that they want the government to protect them. Whether it's from alcohol, cigarettes, violent video games, firearms, drugs, sex or any number of other things which have been, or are curently threatened by, the nanny state.
This isn't bad in itself. The job of government is afterall to do the will of the people. If the majority wants smoking banned and it isn't unconstit
Re:What is going on? (Score:5, Interesting)
Fuck the Constitution. It does not really include any explicit provision for managing commons, and this is the most important job of a government. The Founding Fathers were too absorbed in their own issues to deal with the larger picture.
Smoking doesn't really damage commons, but smoking upwind of me does: that was air that I wanted to breathe, and a government absolutely does have a place in telling people that they can't destroy a public resource.
That said, it's unconstitutional, as is all regulation of pollution, federally funded education, establishment of national parks, ...
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Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
By that reasoning, the government could to confiscate your car, because your exhaust is FAR more polluting to my lungs, than a single cigarette.
Yup.
Fortunately for you, the Congress doesn't have the power to confiscate either cars or cigarettes.
Are you sure that that's fortunate for me? Do you really think that we'd be worse off if we had clean high-speed electric trains and buses and cars, and a truly bicycle-friendly civilisation, than we are now? No more global warming (depending on how we got the electricity, but clean energy is possible), no more traffic accidents (or at least many fewer), no more oil wars, no more urban sprawl, no more geriatrics' (and others') lives destroyed when they find out that they are no longer mobile because t
Re:What is going on? (Score:4, Informative)
Who would do the division and redistribution, if not the government? And, once it is divided, who would ensure that they stay that way, and not merge into a cartel to increase profits for themselves?
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Re: (Score:3)
They're not clean. They output the same amount of pollution, just that it's located at a central coal-to-electric factory instead of at the car.
As I said, clean energy is possible. And given the premise of my argument I'm surprised you ignored this fact.
Also the absolute cleanest cars in the world are the 70mpg Honda Insight and the Civic GX (and possibly the 88mpg VW Lupo 3L). Not an EV1 which is powered by 75% coal, 20% CNG, and 5% nuclear, and overall no cleaner than a Prius. Although it is better than an EV train; their frequent starts-and-stops means they only average 15mpg per person according to EPA.gov
Check out the Aptera. And, as I said, the EV1 is pretty clean to operate if you come by your energy honestly, although fuel cells are somewhat a problem to produce (they're getting better, though). And as for trains, they are not great in this country and their efficiency depends on occupancy, but I'm surprised you haven't figured out that trains can in principle start/stop much less frequently
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
The reason why governments expand in power and revenue throughout their lifetimes is simple, although not many people can bring themselves to accept it:
Government attracts the kind of person who wants to control others through force -- tell them how to behave, how to spend their money, what to value and what not to value -- not the kind of person who just wants to mind their own business and live in peace.
It is only natural for the people in this business -- the business of controlling others through force
Re:What is going on? (Score:4, Funny)
> What is going on with anglo-saxon governments?
Anglo-saxon voters.
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Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Also the belief that more voting can change an enormously corrupt system that relies on voting for its legitimacy.
Re:What is going on? (Score:5, Interesting)
Name a race (as that's what you're talking about) that isn't doing this now. The Slavs are going back to authoritarianism under Putin, China has never left it, can't think of any African or Arab countries that do either.
So, again, what's with the "anglo-saxon" tag? Are people of any ethnicity resisting this?
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Re:What is going on? (Score:5, Funny)
Is it something in the water
I doubt it. We don't have any in Australia.
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Re:What is going on? (Score:4, Informative)
Well, it began a bit more innocently than that. Over the last 5 years or so the Media in Australia has given a lot of airtime to child porn rings. The Federal Police have broken a few and when they do it s HEADLINE news across the whole country. As a result parents are getting worried that the lonesome guy next door is a pedophile (It is like a witchhunt, but this is my opinion, not the facts).
So the Howard Government (Liberal Party, Conservative) put forth all these ideas about "Protecting" the children. Tacked onto this was the issue that it is too easy to access porn on the internet, so the idea of putting up a filter to prevent children having access to these materials was floated. Now the Media has pushed forth these ideas that the Government must protect us from the big bad world and completely ignored the issues of parental interaction (again, this is filtered by my opinions)
Last year the Howard Government was defeated in the election and the Rudd Government (Labor Party, left leaning) came to power. they spent a lot of the campaign pushing for "Working Families" (Industrial relations, Tax benefits etc) and one of those platforms was keeping the kids away from "questionable" material. The government has put a lot of money into providing access to free filters for parents to access and police their children's use of the internet. Personally, I think that is a good think, the parents being involved with how their children access the internet is a good thing (Again, opinion, not facts)
Now, however, we have a problem. In it's goal to be the Family friendly government the men in power have decided that the internet needs to be filtered to keep "Questionable" material out. This is how we got to this point. and there are a few factors working towards this
1) The Family First Party
There is a relatively new party representing voters in the senate in Australia and that is "Family First" a quasi religious party pushing "Family Values" the problem is that the one senator from this party effectivly holds the balance of power in the senate (Upper house) so that if the government wants his support, they have to appease him. I am sure that this internet plan plays into this (Opinion, not fact)
2) Terrorism
Of course, Terrorists are out to get us all, and as a subset of this pedophiles are out to get our kids. this belief is a product of the media, for they are only interested in the next big shocking story, and child porn is shocking. but there are already a lot of ways to violate civil liberties in place because of the "War on Terrorism" and that has created an environment where this kind of censorship is acceptable to the public
3) The Stigma of Porn
No-One wants to come out and oppose this. MP's do not want to come out as say "No, the Australian internet should not be censored" because the media will read that as "Mr Whomever supports Porn" and that would be political suicide.
So what can we do from here, it's a good question. I know that I personally and raising the issue with everyone I know, sending letters (yes, paper letters, they are harder to ignore than email) and what-not, but there seems to be no organisation in place to fight this. so if anyone knows of one, please forward me the details. travisDOTmatheson(atSymbol)gmail.com
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Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
I've said it before, "No representation without compensation," and big business can afford a lot of representation. In this case, I'm sure someone is looking to cash in but I think ideology is driving it. Either that or a politician is trying to look tough on the 'think of the children' issue of the week.
Re:What is going on? (Score:4, Insightful)
No, analog television is already being phased out and replaced with equally free digital television. They're squabbling over what to do with the leftover frequency space.
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Re: (Score:3, Funny)
Regarding your post and your signature, IMO what's incredibly stupid is reserving enormous blocks of the spectrum for something as worthless as broadcast television instead of freeing it up for more useful activities.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
(1) >>>My answer to all of these things is: no.
Then don't watch it. That's your right, but you do NOT have a right to take-away from those of us who happen to enjoy shows like Heroes, CSI, Lost, Twenty-Four, or Supernatural. You are just one, whereas there are ~90% of americans who enjoy television and don't want to lose it. That's not just a majority; or a mere supermajority. It's a constitutional majority (over three-fourths).
(2) >>>Most of those 30 million people are watching the
They're not actually ignoring the problems... (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:They're not actually ignoring the problems... (Score:5, Insightful)
Bloody hell. This guy makes Richard Alston look competent.
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Universal Internet filter plans detailed (Score:5, Funny)
"We have buttiduously canvbutted the industry, buttessed what is available and buttembled the finest selection of private contractors for this buttignment. The filters will buttociatively clbuttify all communications and filter then, I can butture you, rebuttemble them with surpbutting exacbreastude in any quanbreasty. Consbreastuents can be rebuttured that a mulbreastude of industry compebreastors will butture quality and keep our clbuttrooms safe. EDS Capita Goatse will not embarbutt us." [today.com]
(Inspired by Daily WTF [thedailywtf.com].)
It's the LAW! (Score:3, Funny)
Please consider that people who support censorship are, usually, God-fearing Christians. And God-fearing Christians always respect the Law. As our good Lord Jesus Christ Himself obeyed the Law:
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My personal favourite is United States Consbreastution [google.com]
Network degradation the primary concern? (Score:5, Insightful)
This and no other is the root from which a tyrant springs; when he first appears he is a protector. - Plato
So the govt. is actually AGAINST net filtering? (Score:5, Interesting)
The Autrailian government is considering implementing a web filtering system - but they don't want people to know that it doesn't work.
Given that they state (in the cited article) that it will block "all illegal material", then by definition anything it allows through must therefore be legal, The only conclusion I can logically draw from this is that their government is against filtering, blocking or generally censoring the internet - but that they don't want their people to know this. Strange!
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Nope, it's simple.
The government doesn't care about illegal material in the slightest. They just want more power over what people can see and experience. This gives them more power, and they're using "illegal filtering" as the way to get it past people who might otherwise be critical.
They're certainly not against filtering illegal stuff - they simply don't care about it.
Child Porn Out of Control (Score:5, Insightful)
Instead of censoring the whole internet (which must be for some other agenda using Child Porn as an excuse to push censoring) why not focus more resources on finding and arresting the people who create child porn.
I don't mean the people who view it. Because honestly I have had child porn come up on the internet while searching for other things. I immediately close the site, but if you look at the logs I accessed the site. Also in some newsgroups there are tons of child porn pictures. If you say download all messages, even though you open a child porn and are like no and close it right away, it still says you downloaded it. Or even browsing, sometimes a message will have one title but in the end it shows someone young that maybe is 18 but maybe is not you just don't know. So anyway I close that message but I still accessed it. Should I be arrested? Probably not because I am not interested in child porn at all and I certainly don't want to go out and do anything with a child (as far as the difference between 17 and 364 days and 18 that is tougher call if you were looking at women in a bar, but if I knew they were 17 and 364 days I would wait the one day not to worry about some FBI raid
What would be better would be if there is a way for me to report these things to the government authorities easily. In the end I'm sure a lot of people come across Child Porn searching for completely unrelated things, or even searching for adult porn. It seems a waste to not have a way to report these things for investigation. The problem with that is if they just look at every ip in the logs that accessed the site and go arrest everyone, they will arrest a lot of people who came to the website by mistake or who downloaded a newsgroup message by mistake. But if there was a way to report it and they closed down the makers that would be great. At some point there would be so little child porn that people would stop coming across it by accident (mostly). Because the makers of it would take steps to make it harder to find. And the good thing is that people actively looking for it would have a harder time as well....
Also from the way this guy seems so child porn phobic you would thing he was looking at child porn and because he feels guilty he decided he should help filter the internet so he doesn't have the temptation anymore. Usually the most vocal opponents against something actually do it. I remember quite a few Republicans who were very anti Clinton for his affair who ended up having affairs of their own.....And I don't even need to mention the various ministers in the church. Maybe someone needs to investigate this government minster. He sounds awfully anti-child porn, as if he is overly familiar with the problem.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Child porn is not illegal, unless it involves actual children. If child porn involved adults who look like children, or computer-generated images (ala the vixens in DOA Volleyball), then child porn is perfectly legal in the USA.
I don't know how it is in Australia, but it should be the same. The crime is the victimization of children, NOT the faked photograph.
Re:Child Porn Out of Control (Score:4, Informative)
Australia's zero-tolerance laws regarding child pornography include fictional and drawn images.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lolicon#Australia [wikipedia.org]
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Re:Child Porn Out of Control (Score:5, Insightful)
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Child porn may just be the cover story. It's possible that some of these people are really looking to stop child porn. It's also possible that they are being paid to consult with a vendor who has a solution in search of a problem. It's also possible that they hate all porn and want to use child porn to get a foot in the door.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
1. He's gonna pay a vendor a fortune to implement the filtering. And that is the motivation.
2. Child porn is phase 1, music and movies are phase 2...you can see where that is going....warez and microsoft windows phase 3......
Re:Child Porn Out of Control (Score:5, Insightful)
>>>I'm sure a lot of people come across Child Porn searching for completely unrelated things, or even searching for adult porn. It seems a waste to not have a way to report these things
>>>
They do? I've never seen any child pornography. Never. I've seen lots of Nudist websites displaying Mom, dad, and child naked at the beach, but that is NOT porn. The human body was created by God, and what Gods creates is not sinful. A naked human is not porn.
If you want to see child porn (read: sex), you have to go into dark corners of the internet. It is well hidden. You can't just stumble upon it "by accident".
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Re: (Score:3, Informative)
If the "court" is the Supreme Court of the United States, then I'll be freed, because the justices have already affirmed (several times) that nudity is not pornography, regardless if the person in the photo is an adult, a teen, or a child. That is why nudist websites are perfectly legal within the U.S.
Is this the same Internet I know? (Score:5, Interesting)
That's weird, in the 15 years or so that I've been using the Web, I have never, ever, seen one single photograph that could be classified as "child porn".
I have seen some pictures of nude children in nudist camps and beaches, there are many beaches in Europe where whole families go totally nude. There are many so-called "teen" sites, which show nude women with small breasts and shaved pubic region, who could be of any age between 15 and 30.
But I never found one single picture of a child engaged in sex. This must be some different "internets" we are talking about. That, or people have extended the meaning of "child porn" to "any image I don't like".
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Re:Is this the same Internet I know? (Score:4, Insightful)
So what if it excites a pedophile? Was the child harmed by the photograph taking? Does he or she even knows that someone wanked to that picture?
As long as no one is harmed by the taking of the picture, no censorship should be done, doing otherwise is punishing thoughtcrimes.
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The rapid spread of another dangerous ideology ... (Score:4, Insightful)
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That's because we've never been at peace, we've always been in THE WAR ON TERROR!!!!!111111oneoneoneone!
If anyone thinks this is about child porn... (Score:5, Insightful)
If anyone thinks this is about child porn, they are simply fooling themselves. This is about control. The governments of the world want the serfs to know who their masters are and what their place in society is. The easiest way to do that---as China has found out---is to limit the information coming into the country to that which is approved by the government.
This is nothing new: Australia is simply following an ages-old script. The difference between then and now is that you think you have control because you live in a democracy. Let me assure you that democracy and liberty are two entirely different things, and often are at odds. Please see Hoppe's Democracy: The God that Failed [amazon.com] and Hayek's The Road to Serfdom [amazon.com] for more detail.
The best reaction you can have to this is to encourage yourself and others (especially your own children) to differentiate respect for others' rights from respect for artificial "law", and to show the latter none while deferring to it only enough to keep from attracting too much attention. Defy all rules that have nothing to do with protecting the rights of others, and you are a free man; obey them, and you are a slave.
Because it's a sham (Score:4, Insightful)
They ignore anything that may set them back because those within these western governments pushing this garbage really don't give a fuck about child porn, protecting the people, or anything. It is all politics; window dressing for censorship and control, a conduit to get an agenda they've wanted for a very long time rammmed through whatever sort of consitutional or other protetctions (including mass opinion) the people supposedly have against these sorts of abuses.
Another interestingly disgusting point when to comes to child porn (and other sexual behaviors that are not criminal but just as denounced by these guys) is that there have been many occasions where politicians, community leaders, priests, leaders of socially conservative movements, etc who are vocal and fervent denoucers and crusaders against such things are caught with this material or, worse, even involved in producing and distributing it.. the nebraska Franklin scandal that the Reagan/Bush whitehouse was caught up in comes to mind....
As a political issue child porn is like terrorism - it's an awful thing, but is also one of those political trump cards - and these slick bastards know it and use it as such.
Whats the solution ? (Score:4, Insightful)
Serious question. What IS the solution ??
I'm torn on this. The filtering plan is bullshit obviously and I'm also sure that someone
will post the funny "Please god.. won't someone think of the children!?" but heres the rub...
They're my children. MY kids. Not someone theoretical child somewhere that needs saving.
And after 15 years on the net, I know exactly how bad and sadistic some of the content is
out there.
My kids are of the age where they're becoming independent. I've educated them. I've
implemented my own rules of engagement when it comes to my kids accessing the internet at home.
But I can't guide them 100% of the time. They know whats ok, and whats not, but
they're still kids.
I'm lucky in that I was in Uni when the Internet went mainstream in early 90s. I could make
decisions for myself, but for kids these days, the Internet has always been ON.
Its time we stopped bagging the HOW and started thinking about the WHY.
WHY is the (insert your government here) trying to censor the internet ?
The main reason is simple - people are worried about their kids and the ease
with which they can end up in touch with seriously maladjusted, sick and sadistic
motherf**ers online.
Most parents learn that while the world can be wonderful - it can also be a nasty,
mind numbingly horrendous place at times. The internet is representation of that.
All things wonderful, all things horrible, all at the same time. You can't critisize
parents for wanting to come between their kids and the nastier elements.
This is Slashdot - one of the biggest collection of people with the talent and ideas
to find a solution to this problem in the world. SO WHAT IS IT ???
2 internets ? registered and unregistered ? make it an over 18 network ?
How do we use a technical solution to enforce a line in the sand that noone can agree
on anyway ? If the geeks can't find a solution to this dilemma, then ultimately the
politicians will - and we won't like the bonus pack I'm sure.
So, to pose the question: Dont put your head in the sand. The predators are there.
They're real. They exist. Given this, how do we protect OUR kids online ?
Re:Whats the solution ? (Score:5, Insightful)
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Re:Whats the solution ? (Score:5, Funny)
So, to pose the question: Dont put your head in the sand. The predators are there.
They're real. They exist. Given this, how do we protect OUR kids online ?
No, the real worry is how do you protect your kids when they are OFFLINE.
Your kids are vastly more likely to be molested by the baby sitter, the gym teacher, your priest, or your brother/brother-in-law, than by some stranger on the internet. If you want to keep your kids safe keep them ON the internet all the time, don't let them go to church, don't let them go to school, don't let them join the boyscouts/girlscouts, and most importantly never let any relatives into your home. Police figures show those are the REAL predator threats.
Be smart, keep your kids on the internet as much as possible. It's about the safest place for them short of padlocking them inside the fridge.
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Filters? Great, now I don't have to worry...? (Score:5, Interesting)
So, if Australia's filtering, that means I NEVER have to worry about getting in trouble for using the internet! Right?
A while ago, a place I used to work at implemented filtering. I was actually kinda happy about it! I no longer had to worry about going to an inappropriate site, because the filters would stop me from getting there. Great!
Except that, a few weeks later, the CEO sent an email to everyone stating how annoyed he was that people were trying to access the filtered sites. It didn't matter that the sites were blocked. It didn't matter that people never saw the blocked content! The mere fact that we were still adjusting to the new filters caused our CEO to chastise us about our internet usage.
And that's the ultimate insult with filtering- It doesn't matter if it works 100% perfectly. You will be expected to filter your brain as well. If the filter admins see that you're trying to access things that you cannot even access because of the filter, you WILL get in trouble.
It is all about Australian domestic politics (Score:5, Informative)
The Australian governments' proposed ISP filter system has little to do with censorship or child porn - it is all driven by Australian domestic politics.
The government requires control of the Senate to get its legislative program through. The Senate consists of 76 members, with the Government (ALP) holding 32 seats, the Opposition 37 seats, the Greens 3 seats, Family First 1 seat and one Independent senator.
The goverement requires the support of all non-Opposition memebers to get legislation passed - with Senator Steve Fielding, the Familiy First senator a vital supporter.
The Family First [wikipedia.org] party is a socially conservative political party. Senator Fielding recieved 56,000 primary votes out of a 3.3M votes cast. However, through preference distributions he gained a quota and was elected.
Senator Fielding has demanded that the government implement porn filters, with ISP filtering being his method of choice.
So, the Australian government is implementing ISP filters, no because they work for filtering porn, but because they work at meeting their political needs. Complaining about the effects of ISP filters on freedom of speech or internet performance will fall on deaf ears - the filters will be implemented because they are critical to the governments tenuous control of the Senate.
Contact details for Sen. Conroy (Score:3, Informative)
Senator the Hon. Stephen Conroy
Minister for Broadband, Communications and the Digital Economy
Suite 1B, 494 High Street
Epping Vic 3076
I'm not normally one to write to politicians on issues, but I did so for the first time regarding the filter because of the grave privacy and censorship implications. I encourage everyone else in Australia to do the same.
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
At work, one of our filters even blocked microsoft for a day or so.
WOW! It actually worked at filtering out harmful material!
Send a letter to the oz government recommending their solution.