Net Censorship – The Thin Wedge

As opposed to Chris Anderson’s long tail theory, the Australian Government is attempting to have the public accept a “thin wedge” in the form of enforced censorship.
This thinly disguised attempt to justify control of internet content is masked under the terms of protection of its citizens and for the common good by allowing the government to set up mandatory internet filtering to stop access to child pornography sites, filters which are already available and easily implemented to any netizen who wishes to use them.
Blind Freddy can see that it is an attempt at social control of the internet. If a law like this is passed it gives the bureaucracy permission to block any content they wish, a massive violation of freedom of speech.
There would be no way that any member of the public could monitor the implementation of such a filter – how could one challenge the blocking of internet content when it is blocked and therefore unavailable to be viewed?
There is no doubt that this is an attempt at social control and I am ashamed to hear it come from a government official (or department) in this country which supposedly prides itself on its so-called freedom.
A cynic may look a little deeper into this; it may be the use of a political publicity tool to take the attention away from something else that is being brewed up. Time will tell.
It is very difficult to imagine any intelligent person putting forward such a proposal of introducing something by law into a nation on an issue that is of a global nature and that can easily be dealt with on a personal level. There is very little that can be done about these sites unless they originate in Australia.
And who is to say that even this post could not be “banned” because it may upset the sensitivities of our fine political representatives.
A waste of time and effort in this proposal. The people responsible for this idea deserve public admonition in the waste and pure hypocrisy of assuming control over our personal freedoms. A quick scan of the ISP Level Content Filtering Final Report does nothing to change this point of view.
I am in no way condoning those that are involved in internet child pornography. Federal laws are in place to deal with those partaking in internet child pornography in Australia. I feel it is sufficient.
Results of the Feasibility Study on ISP Level Content Filtering (Feb. 08) can be accessed from this link as well as the results of closed environment testing.
See also this related article on this subject from The Australian.