The Null Device

Labor's national firewall

Seemingly trying to outflank the Tories on the right and court the favour of the evangelical churches and wowsers, the Australian Labor Party has announced that it will institute ISP-level blocking of adult internet content should it win power. The policy, which will allow those who wish to access porn to sign a perverts' register and get access to a less-filtered version of the feed, originally belonged to Christian Fundamentalist party Family First, to whom Labor has been cozying up lately (such as, for example, by giving them preferences ahead of the Greens and Democrats in recent state elections).

Of course, the prospects of Labor winning power within the next decade or so aren't exactly promising. Though the prospect of two paternalist wowser parties trying to outdo each other's social conservatism isn't exactly appealing. Though, if anything, this is the first time in ages that the Liberal Party has lived up to its name as the more liberal end of the spectrum.

There are 4 comments on "Labor's national firewall":

Posted by: substitute Tue Mar 21 19:08:24 2006

Sorry to see our USian disease is spreading. Here our star politician, one Hillary Clinton, is wasting her time on things like naughty bits in video games while the ruling party carries on as though the opposition didn't exist. Everything just keeps sliding right.

Also, your url field won't accept more than 24 characters.

Posted by: Andrew Tue Mar 21 22:20:04 2006

They're going about this all wrong. They should provide the filter and allow people to sign up to it, not the other way around. Like gambling addicts ban themselves from TABs, porn addicts and terrified families can ban the scary images from their children.

Posted by: steff http://ofterdingenandkro Tue Mar 21 23:10:04 2006

Not really sure what vote they're trying to capitalise on. In any case, their tech adviser must be a suxx0r n00b 4nd unl337!!! I wouldn't consider this a further "trend" to the right, though. Labour has done nothing to convince me that they're not some opportunistic right-minded party to start with. Of course, patronising the electorate ("too hard for them to sort out") is a feature of Australian Liberalism. Wear a helmet or *POW*.

Posted by: acb http://dev.null.org/ Tue Mar 21 23:47:56 2006

Labor basically lost the plot a few elections ago. Currently they're running around like a headless chicken, trying desperately to market themselves as being every bit as good as John Howard only less nasty/better. Now, it seems, they're trying to seize on the New Wowserism. Of course, they have next to no chance of winning government in the next election or so, unless something truly bizarre happens (by which I mean something like Tony Abbott and Peter Costello being proven on live TV to be 10ft flesh-eating lizards, and Packer and Murdoch refusing to spin them out of it). As such, Australia's basically a one-party state with some rather unfunny sideshows.