Australia's Bizarre Classification System For Internet Censorship 208
stavros-59 writes "Australia's internet censorship watchdog, ACMA, uses an internet classification system originally intended for children's PC filters. ACMA has now made what must be the most amazing recent decisions of the whole bizarre censorship debate. The Register today has a story about ACMA's decision to force Apple to withdraw their ITMS gift feature from Australia on the basis that MA+ (over 15 and maybe sex) rated movies could not be given to children using the gift cards. The films are also banned on the internet but not at local video/DVD stores as detailed in this Whirlpool Forum post. At the same time, the photographic work of Robert Mapplethorpe (not for the fainthearted) has been classified as PG (Parental Guidance) by the Classification Board — which is not part of ACMA, but an agency under the Attorney General's Department."
Re:great (Score:5, Insightful)
Internet Censorship: (Score:2, Insightful)
"Not for fainthearted" is an understatement (Score:5, Insightful)
"Not for the fainthearted" doesn't quite cover that link as a warning. "(Warning: NSFW and Similar to Goatse)" would have prevented me from clicking and my retinas from being tainted with another tasteless image.
Re:great (Score:4, Insightful)
Don't be a dumbass. First, this is the Internet and there are unpleasant things here. Second, if your temperament or employer can't handle you looking at grownup stuff, then don't fucking click links labeled "not for the fainthearted". Take a little responsibility for yourself and quit blaming others when your common sense fails you.
Re:great (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Why is that the solution? (Score:4, Insightful)
So is it Apple's job to work out the rating system and age correlation for every country?
No, only the countries in which they want to do business.
Just like anything else, if you want a business presence in a country, you have to abide by that country's laws.
Re:nuke australia (Score:3, Insightful)
kill the disease before it spreads
In which case you should probably nuke the USA ahead of Australia - after all just 2 seconds of seeing Janet's naked breast was enough to traumatize the whole country
Comment removed (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Physical Media? (Score:4, Insightful)
He defined a kid as being 12 and under. Kid = 12. He wouldn't sell to kids. Thus he wouldn't sell to 12 year olds.
Shortly after 12 though their biology will start telling them they should be interested in porno.
And remember, the (English speaking) world's most famous love story / tragedy involves a 14 year old.
Re:Maplethorpe (Score:5, Insightful)
I'm not even 30 yet, and quite frankly I've grown sick of the self-assured, hipster posers who think this trash is edgy and avant-garde.
I am not going to claim that all of Mapplethorpes work is art worthy as I don't know the full extent of his catalogue and you can like or dislike his work as you see fit. However in defense of Mapplethorpe he was documenting the world around him as it happened in a subculture that few people knew about at the time. So it is of historical significance in the very least.
Images like this are not meant to make you feel good. They are meant to challenge you and make you confront your own feelings and beliefs. Would you say the same thing about documentary photos showing the atrocities of war? Or poverty or starvation? These are all subjects that other canonical photographers have sought out and created famous images from - Have you seen the classical figure of the napalmed girl running down the road in Vietnam? Or even the Farm Bureau pics of depression era USA?
Art is not all about cute kittens and puppies and flowers
Re:great (Score:5, Insightful)
First, this is the Internet and there are unpleasant things here.
Granted, but you don't expect to see goatse-like images linked directly from an article on Slashdot. You wouldn't expect to turn on 60 Minutes and see hard-core pornography, would you?
Second, if your temperament or employer can't handle you looking at grownup stuff, then don't fucking click links labeled "not for the fainthearted".
Generally speaking the employer doesn't care what you look at; they are more concerned about another prude employee seeing you look at it and filing some kind of harassment suit against them. Given all the bullshit lawsuits that go on in this country, I can't say I blame them. Also, "not for the fainthearted" is not a strong enough disclaimer; it doesn't do a good enough job describing what the imagery is. "NSFW" is tried and true.
Re:great (Score:3, Insightful)
I defined/interpreted faint hearted as NSFW and didn't click the link. Common sense failed you otherwise. Thanks for letting me know it was goatse. Now I'll definitively, send the article to my Australian friends in the office. However, it will likely be filtered.
Re:"Not for fainthearted" is an understatement (Score:3, Insightful)
He's only one of the most famous photographers in history.
He shouldn't be, I've seen a lot of amature stuff that is frankly, quite a bit better than his work.
It's a sad state of society when what amounts to a fetish porno photographer is considered a top photographer.
Why is his crap artistic? Because he shot in black and white? Seriously, there is a lot of stuff like his out there, and in color. Most people wouldn't consider it "high art". Is it the B&W that makes it art? If so, artsy people are idiots.
Re:great (Score:5, Insightful)
Granted, but you don't expect to see goatse-like images linked directly from an article on Slashdot.
That's exactly what I expect to find linked directly from an article on Slashdot. Why do you think no one reads the articles?
Seriously, though, the subject at hand is the censorship of Robert Mapplethorpe. Were you expecting pink unicorns and daffodils? Well, the pink unicorns perhaps, but only in the context of gay S&M.
Re:"Not for fainthearted" is an understatement (Score:2, Insightful)
I'm glad we degraded into offensive talk. I would very much doubt much correlation between living in mom's basement to not having seen this image before. I would expect a much higher correlation between heterosexual, of an age range when public funding for displaying his works was not in the media, and/or outside the art community and having not seen this image before. No art museum I've been to has displayed work such as this. Having said that my interests are in tech/science/engineering (thus being on /.) and not homosexual eroticism as wikipedia describes his work. I suspect my lack of exposure is likely due to my location being southeastern US and may also be impacted by me having (respectfully) no interest in homosexual eroticism.
Re:Maplethorpe (Score:1, Insightful)
In the majority of human civilization, such pictures (the ones of mutilation) would not be regarded as artistic, but rather as obscene
Big whooping deal. In a large percentage of human civilization, it is considered obscene for a woman to show her neck or ankles. In a large portion of the world, something an American or Brit would wear to the beach is considered obscene.
It's really only during the last 100 years (less actually) that the Western world has relaxed its "standards", prior to the 1900's it was considered scandalous for a woman to reveal her legs or neckline here, while not a capital offense like in many parts of the world.
In modern times, we've turned freedom of speech into a license to do wholesale degradation to beauty, truth, human sexuality, etc. to such a degree that even the most perverse things as tolerable.
In modern times? Have you ever bothered to look at the art of ancient Greece? Tribal paintings? How about the work of people like Goya during the Inquisition? You obviously have never studied any history in terms of art and culture of any civilization if you maintain such a viewpoint.
Most of your ideas of what is "proper" are a direct result of the religious doctrines of the Catholic church (and more recently its offshoots such as most Protestant branches of Christianity).
The funny part to me, is that your words are essentially the same thing that many of the Roman scholars said, complaining about youth, their low moral standards, the trash called art "these days", etc. Every generation has people like you, who simply believe that anything you don't understand is "bad".
Hey, I think I see some kids on your lawn!
Re:Don't click the last link then scroll to the en (Score:1, Insightful)
Grow up.
Re:"Not for fainthearted" is an understatement (Score:2, Insightful)
Meh, just because it is well known doesn't mean it is any good. You're arguing against personal feelings in an industry that is 100% subjective. Shit is shit, that some people are tittilated by shit isn't really any surprise, but it doesn't mean it's worth much. People buy what they want though, so more power to him.
What is backwards is the fact that a rather benign picture of a pair of breasts will be banned, while a man shoving his fist up a woman's anus is a-ok.
Do you see the disconnect there?
Re:nuke australia (Score:4, Insightful)
It didn't traumatize the whole country. It traumatized a vocal minority - and most of them probably didn't even see it themselves.
I'm opposed to intentionally displaying that sort of thing where children can see it, but I'm not going to get into an uproar about an accident.
Re:great (Score:2, Insightful)
. Violence is okay. Sex is not.
You must be american.
Re:Maplethorpe (Score:1, Insightful)
No.
"Art" like that doesn't challenge anyone or make them confront their own feelings or beliefs.
A mutilated dick doesn't challenge me. It says "I'm fucked up and I want attention".
It doesn't make me confront my feelings or beliefs, it reaffirms them. Shit be nasty, some people are fucked up.
Hell no I wouldn't say the same thing about those other subjects - those subjects are serious business to all of humanity. Some guy shoving a needle through his dick because he has daddy issues is not something that very many people will ever relate to or be affected by. It is a willful choice made by a small group of deranged individuals. Eating feces and vomit is not performance art. You can't graphically reenact the rape and murder of your child through interpretive dance and expect a full house.
It may be "art" to the artist and the subjects, but that doesn't make it so. Eye of the beholder, and all. As you can see from the posts here, most that behold this shit (3 of his much tamer photographs linked in TFS) aren't exactly giving it the thumbs up.
Much of today's art and fashion is simply weird for the sake of being weird or gross for the sake of getting attention.
You're right - the world isn't cute and fuzzy all the time.
Chopin produced his greatest works during a period of personal anguish (over not being able to support the failed revolution).
Poe was most certainly not about teh happy.
Van Gogh was insane.
But I doubt any of these guys ever shoved a nail through their dick and screamed "Look at me, I've got issues!".
Re:Maplethorpe (Score:1, Insightful)
You missed the point completely.
Their work isn't given attention or appreciated because of those facts.
(Well, there is the one self-portrait.)
No arguing (Score:3, Insightful)
If one starts arguing about where the "good" limits of censorship should be then it basically agrees with censorship as a whole.
Re:nuke australia (Score:1, Insightful)
I'm opposed to intentionally displaying that sort of thing where children can see it, but I'm not going to get into an uproar about an accident.
but why? you know what breasts are for, right?
Re:great (Score:3, Insightful)
Violent images do not get employers sued.
Re:Physical Media? (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:great (Score:2, Insightful)
the subject at hand is the censorship of Robert Mapplethorpe. Were you expecting pink unicorns and daffodils?
To expect anything one would need to know who Robert Mapplethorpe is. Not everyone is familiar with gay S&M art.