Australia Chooses Education Over Filtering 244
riprjak writes "The Australian federal government has rejected a call for Internet filtering to 'protect' Australians from child pornography and has opted instead to undertake an education and information campaign to teach parents about the perils of the Internet."
State of Shock (Score:5, Funny)
I want to to move there!
Oh, wait... I already did.
Re:State of Shock (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:State of Shock (Score:4, Informative)
Re:State of Shock (Score:4, Funny)
I mean, not that I'd know or anything.
Re:State of Shock (Score:2, Informative)
Very responsible I thought.
Re:State of Shock (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:State of Shock (Score:4, Interesting)
You can be right about one thing and wrong about a great many others.
For example, the US also does not filter the internet. But nevertheless, it is notorious throughout the world as a liar [slashdot.org] and a rogue nation, [slashdot.org] lacking basic freedom of the press, [slashdot.org] and basic democratic principles. [slashdot.org]
Or at least, that's what I hear on slashdot.
Re:State of Shock (Score:5, Insightful)
Trying to plug the hole that is child Internet porn would be an ongoing battle swallowing much time and resource better spent elsewhere. Sure the majority don't want to see it and have no interest in it spreading, but trying to stop it is like trying to stop the use of drugs. If people want it, they'll get it. I'd rather my tax dollars went into dealing with it at the source.
It also means the Government won't be submerged in requests of other anti- groups to stop whatever else they decide doesn't take their fancy.
Re:State of Shock (Score:2)
The fundamental difference being that drug using and selling between adults is clearly an act of voluntary consent -- there is no aggressor, and there is no victim -- while child porn is clearly an act of aggression, because a child is too young to make such a decision.
Selling drugs to minors should be interpreted as an act of aggression, however, for the same reason child porn is interpreted as an act of aggression. The minor is simply too young
Re:State of Shock (Score:2)
Drug prohibition, on the other hand, is bound to fail because the act of drug using/selling is naturally percieved by normal people as non-criminal. (However, this can be a difficult leap for people
Re:State of Shock (Score:2)
The term "narcotic" refers to a specific catagory of drugs. Some of which are legal, others of which are illegal.
The vast majority of 'drugs' are useful tools helping people to live their lives and recover from ill health.
This use has nothing to do with a drug's legal status.
Re:State of Shock (Score:2)
Makes sense...I've heard people say "alcohol is a drug"...so, I'll help recover my mental health at the end of the day after work, with a nice martini.
Re:State of Shock (Score:2)
How about "child internet porn" and "plug the hole"?
Finally some sense... (Score:3, Funny)
Re:Finally some sense... (Score:2, Insightful)
Off topic? Just cause you yank's don't speak Australian, doesn't make it off topic
AUSSIE AUSSIE AUSSIE.... (Score:4, Funny)
If you're not Australian, and don't know, then don't even try to understand
Re:AUSSIE AUSSIE AUSSIE.... (Score:2)
And anyway, mostly Americans here it seems. No-one can break it
And whaddaya know? It's a month already!!!
Re:MOD PARENT DOWN -- BIGOTRY (Score:2)
In the spirit of Fark.com threads... (Score:3, Insightful)
What are the mod's smoking? (Score:3)
Re:What are the mod's smoking? (Score:2)
As for
In the spirit of people who don't visit Fark.com (Score:5, Funny)
In the spirit of somethingawful.com bannination (Score:2)
Re:In the spirit of people who don't visit Fark.co (Score:2)
The 'hero' tag is the closest one that fit, I thought, since these days governments tend to put their heads in the sand, don't trust their constituents, and over-regulate everything.
And you didn't p
It's been cencored for a while .. (Score:5, Informative)
Re:It's been cencored for a while .. (Score:2)
Re:It's been cencored for a while .. (Score:2, Informative)
Re:It's been cencored for a while .. (Score:2)
Re:It's been cencored for a while .. (Score:2)
They have also blocked google image search. What they haven't really thought about though is: WHY would I want to look at porn at school? At home, yes. But over the DSL line where I have trouble getting directory listings of my home directory over FTP, how can it be possible?
Re:It's been cencored for a while .. (Score:2)
Re:It's been cencored for a while .. (Score:2)
From an Australian school student's perspective (Score:2, Informative)
Web filtering might sound good in theory, but in practice too many sites with educational benefit are blocked.
However, web filtering is not just an inconvenience.
There is an alterior motive at work. The state is censoring information that might allow impressionable youths to form opinions that might be critical of the government.
I am a Year 12 student of a high school in NSW. Sites that have been blocked by the proxy that I have noticed include: *.mozilla.org; *.sourceforge.*; *.sf.net; etc, et
Re:From an Australian school student's perspective (Score:2, Informative)
I have worked for three years as a network administrator at a highschool, and to the people that say their is filtering already on a state or national scale is slightly wrong. It is true that there is filtering already in place but thats only if you have a contract with a company that provides filtering, which many schools have, at least public schools in South Australia. I can not say that this is what its like in other states but I would assume it is the same
Re:From an Australian school student's perspective (Score:3, Informative)
I used to (well, still do on a part-time basis) work as a network admin for a secondary school in Victoria. Previously, until about 2 years ago, all government schools were mandated to use a state-government-selected ISP (Fuck you, Edunet!) which had a DEET-approved filtering system ( N2H2 [n2h2.com]). Given that they were working within the constraints of the VicOne WAN [vicone.net.au], they did an acceptable job, but outsourcing the filtering w
Re:From an Australian school student's perspective (Score:2)
Slashdot was unblocked the day after he left!
In 2003 I believe the charging system was changed and you were quota'd. Then they let you use
CGTalk [cgtalk.com] was also banned, which was a PITA.
My god... (Score:4, Funny)
...the Howard government doing something intelligent?!
::looks outside to see if the sky is falling::
Re:My god... (Score:2)
It's a step (Score:5, Interesting)
I'm not sure any government (save, maybe, South Korea's, which is its current form as a direct result of the internet) realizes just how much the internet is changing the world. Protecting your citizens' bodies is one thing--hunt those child-kidnappers down!--but it's too late for their minds...
and that's a good thing.
In Australia... (Score:2, Funny)
pr0n.au is my next investment.
Re:In Australia... (Score:2, Insightful)
However, an awful lot of stupid people voted for the Howard government. Go figure...
Re:In Australia... (Score:2)
This seems really smart (Score:3, Insightful)
It's like those billboards that tell you that "God is Protecting You". It only reaches those who want to be reached.
Re:This seems really smart (Score:2)
maybe it's still good to tell them that you shouldn't stick a knife up your anus just because you saw a picture of someone doing that on the internet...
Re:This seems really smart (Score:5, Insightful)
a) the children who are the subject of child-porn are the main victims.
b) banning such content from viewing in Australia does nothing for the poor children photographed oversees in the first place (the proposal was to filter out kid porn from outside Aust).
c) "what about the children viewing the porn?" Yes indeed. And what about the other offensive things they view, like adult porn, or bestiality, or planes flying into tall buildings, or.... where is the line drawn?
Filtering is not an answer. Education, while only reaching those who's mind-share you already have, is probably the only sensible solution, and it only addresses item c. Unforturnately nothing can be done about a or b. Directly. In fact by filtering it out, you lose the opportunity to catch the adult consumers of the content, and hense lose a lead back to the perpetrators of a...
I think that lead is worth keeping.
Re:This seems really smart (Score:2, Insightful)
I hope I'm not getting too philosophical here, but that's a good point: What about the children viewing the porn? Now, I understand that minors are not supposed to be looking at any porn, and I understand that quite a lot of the child porn out there is a result of gross exploitation of children
Re:This seems really smart (Score:2)
Not only can I make one, but it's actually easy as the anti-pornography (read: anti-interesting-sex) lobby has provided us so much ammunition. Mind you, I do think that "child porn" is wrong when it involves anyone other than the minor, and that this is a gray area, but it is reasonable to construct an argument around the idea that our social construction of attractiveness and desirability has essentially forced these girls to put n
Re:This seems really smart (Score:2)
Actually, there are many indications that the founding fathers meant for us to take a torch to the constitution when we could come up with something better. Unfortunately true statesmen usually are killed or at least discredited which in political circles is actually worse in some ways, as it prevents even your progeny from succeeding. Instead we are saddled with career politicians. We the people are to blame, though, for allowing politicians to make elections into circuses.
It would be interesting to se
Re:This seems really smart (Score:5, Insightful)
We've go a saying for this : a child who tumble inadvertantly over porn is not enough overlooked by the adult in charge of him, and that's the adult responsability ; a child who finds porn after looking for it is not a child anymore.
Just FYI (Score:2)
I wholeheartedly agree with what you're saying, but as an aside, here's an English note:
Overlooked means "forgotten about," which isn't what you meant.
You want to say overseen, which means guided and watched; exactly the opposite of overlooked.
Yes, there are all kinds of English jokes playing on overlook versus oversee. It's a funny language. :-)
Re:This seems really smart (Score:2)
Your point being?
Who cares if kids,(and of course were talking about pubesent teenagers here), go looking for porn. It's not going to turn them into drooling, trenchcoated Ken Keniffs, hungry for porn day and night. This will only happen to those destined for that path anyway.
Internet porn today is exactly the same as porn mags in the fifties.
Again I say, if you want t
Re:This seems really smart (Score:2)
First of all, children are always going to have access to pornography. That has always been true as long as pornography has been readily available - you can just shoplift something pornographic. Or, barring that, I guess you could get together with some other kids and make your own child porn for children. It would be interesting to see how a
educating the public (Score:2, Funny)
Excuse my ignorance but (Score:5, Interesting)
including a British-style national internet filtering system but rejected it.
I wasn't aware that the UK has a national internet filtering system. Can anyone elaborate?
Re:Excuse my ignorance but (Score:5, Informative)
British Telecom's ISP blocks certain underage porn sites which are found on an IWF black list, however this is not a legal requirement by any means and AFAIK they are the only British ISP currently to do such a thing.
Re:Excuse my ignorance but (Score:2)
For those that didn't RTFA... (Score:2, Funny)
Awesome job, Aussies (Score:2)
kids are afraid (Score:4, Interesting)
I recently cleaned a friend-of-the-family's PC of a major spy ware infestation, brought on by their 7 yo son going on a porn site, egged on by his mates (as mates do). when the subsequent torrent of pop ups occurred a few days later, he was petrified that the cops were going to come and lock him up, as has happened to all the other people we have been hearing about on the radio/TV/papers.
Although it wont have a lasting effect (IMHO, if pron is there, it will get assessed), but not for a while he will stay away. the poor kid was so terrified, so conscious of what he had done, he will need some serious hormones to get up the courage.
Re:kids are afraid (Score:2)
Re:kids are afraid (Score:2)
Out of character... (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Out of character... (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Out of character... (Score:2)
Bloody good news is great stuff.
Fellow Aussies, don't worry... (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Fellow Aussies, don't worry... (Score:2)
Our beloved Vegemite is owned by a cigarette company.
I think we have Telstra just by a nose.
Next goes the railways!
Privatisation has taught us one thing, consumers are never considered first....
Re:Fellow Aussies, don't worry... (Score:2)
And I believe both coopers and boag's are still aussie owned... Shame about CUB and Castlemaine tho
Re:Fellow Aussies, don't worry... (Score:2)
I have a carton of Coopers in my fridge and had a few 'red' coopers longies last nite
Boags is also kick ass.....
Not a real fan of XXXX - you must be a qlder
Re:Fellow Aussies, don't worry... (Score:2)
Re:Fellow Aussies, don't worry... (Score:2)
As for my voice... I have voted for him twice before, but I didn't in the most recent election due to a stupid (imho) thing he did (sending troops to Iraq). I am not against him or for him to the extreme that he may as well ignore me, I am a swing voter - exactly the type of voter politicians try to win over!
Re:Fellow Aussies, don't worry... (Score:2)
I still maintain that when someone does something applaudable, a better recourse is to in fact applaud them, rather than insult them. When insult someone, they get defensive, and it becomes very difficult to persuade them. That is my experience, anyway.
Re:Fellow Aussies, don't worry... (Score:2)
Yeah, that's stupid alright.
Re:Fellow Aussies, don't worry... (Score:2)
Don't beleive me? Take a look at the
Re:Fellow Aussies, don't worry... (Score:2)
So in 20-30 years, I guess we'll have to bomb Iraq back into the biblical ages again too.
What about filtering in public venues? (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:What about filtering in public venues? (Score:2, Informative)
Re:What about filtering in public venues? (Score:2, Interesting)
Whilst looking through a website of a large clothing company the governments efficient little filter booted us off because we clicked on a link that said "girls fashions"
meanwhile thanks to the crude keywo
Re:What about filtering in public venues? (Score:2)
No, it has a new set of drawbacks that imperfect filters stop people getting information on, say, health issues, or places with names like Middlesex.
A large problem with filters is how badly they work.
Re:What about filtering in public venues? (Score:2)
And god help you if you live in Scunthorpe...
Well Good For Them (Score:2)
Did I make a difference? (Score:5, Interesting)
I doubt very much at the end of the day my words directly had much to do with it, but some part of me really hopes it did. If only one minister sat and thought twice about what I'd written to them and it somehow swayed them to the more sensible course of action, I think I can be a little bit prouder of my country.
I'm sure I wasn't the only person making their voices heard over this issue, thanks to everybody else who stood up and let them know what we thought. We've done well this time.
When I saw the story title ... (Score:2, Interesting)
The biggest threat (Score:5, Insightful)
I know I for one never appreciated being lied to and manipulated, both of which largely define the relationship between the young and old.
One of the questions we commonly hear asked is what advice we would give to someone younger than us, what do we know now that we wished we'd known growing up.
Well my advice for the children of the world is this: Don't believe what people tell you, especially your parents. Keep your own counsel and take everything with a grain of salt. Just because someone loves you don't mean they won't lie to you, and it most definitely doesn't preclude their being crazy, stupid, ignorant, or some combination of all three.
Re:The biggest threat (Score:2)
Examples: Santa Claus, Easter Bunny, Tooth Fairy.
Re:The biggest threat (Score:2)
Which just proves (Score:5, Insightful)
Those crazy uneducated parents? (Score:2)
All this really means that they will produce 15 color brochures, and 5 very short commercials that will air off prime "cheaper" and no one will ever see either.
Why do they think filtering would cost so very much? Squid + Dansguardian is very cheap "less than $500". Almost every ISP already uses proxy servers to save bandwi
Redirection of resources (Score:4, Funny)
This is not just commonsense, it will also free up for resources for fighting the TRUE dangers to our children here in sunny Oz:
If the dingoes don't get our babies, Steve Irwin will feed them to a crocodile!
Protect whom? (Score:2)
So... some or all australians are endangered by the possiblity they could view child pornography... right? And they need to be protected... right?
So government decides to pass over the responsiblity to parents and educate them how to do it... right? So parents are to protect whom from the child pornography...? Children it seems?
Why do they assume it's children wh
Wrong education target... (Score:2)
next time 'round (Score:2)
What's this "information campaign" going to look like, eh? FCP, that's what. Fear, Certainty, and Panic. And after $30MM has been spent scaring the populace, what do you suppose the legislature will vote for the next time 'round?
Child porn sent to schools by NSW police! (Score:2)
The New South Wales Police went one better recently, and actually sent child pornography [news.com.au] images to thousands of state schools.
The irony and sad thing here is that it's illegal to have child porn on your computer, yet the police can obviously have it and they sent it out to others as well. Imagine inadvertently getting it in your email and then getting busted by the cops for it. Imagine now if a teacher gets charged for child porn. It just goes to show that merely having the images should not be a crime, si
Re:Good for Australia, sucks to Haradine (Score:2)
Oh, wait... Did you mean "since this exposes children to violence"?
Re: (Score:2)
Re:Good for Australia, sucks to Haradine (Score:4, Interesting)
Completely Darwinian?
I'd think it is much more about religiously beleifs of the early American settlers. Plenty of cultlures, both ancient and modern, have been much more relaxed about portraying sex than the USA. Plenty are still around, so it doesn't seem to be a trait promoting survival/reproduction which would make it Darwinian.
That doesn't mean that adultary or the like is more socially accepted there.
Re:Somebody has to...... (Score:2)
Re:Somebody has to...... (Score:2)
Well, I'm just glad it's not of old people ;)
Re:Picks jaw off floor . . . . (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Picks jaw off floor . . . . (Score:2)
Well, they're all going to be very horny.
Women: if you thought Italy was bad, I suggest avoiding Australia in the future.
Aussie! Aussie! Aussie! (Score:2)
Re:Luddites everywhere! (Score:2)