Censorship is REAL and ADVANCING

[Logan94]

Your comparing real life to a movie... A very fake movie.

 

[s0denone]

Why doesn't anybody get the American freedom of speech aspect. YOu can say anything until it inflicts on someone else's rights. So untill you endanger someones health (for example, yelling "fire" in a building, someone can get hurt), insult them, or just plain offend them. So if someone is shouting obsinities in public, a poliece officer just has to asy anybody if they are offended, and if anybody is offended, the he can take the person who is shouting in. The only reason barely anyone enforces that is because people are missinformed on this subject. So to sum it up, you can say anything, unless it inflicts on someone elses rights.

1)That's America, we're talking about Denmark, not sure how the laws compare.
2)This speech most definitely is infringing on others' rights, such as the right to not be stolen from.

People were saying that this would spread to America.

So your argument that it will not, is because you have freedom of speech? Have you lived in a cave for the last few years? Denmark printed the Muhammed drawings. Not a very wise move, but if anything, it proved that Denmark celebrates its own freedom of speech.

I imagine Denmark and the U.S.A to have comparable laws on the subject, but I expect Denmark to allow their citizens greater freedom.

Your argument does not hold up.

 

[Deathbird]

Take a look at what Australia is trying... It makes China's control on the net look tame by comparison. Rudds government is trying to push it under the guise of 'protecting the children' but of the sites they are telling us they want to block less then 1% are related to crimes against children and those sites: ARE ALREADY ILLEGAL. The government refuses to release the whole list of sites it will have blocked, if the laws get passed, and what it isn't telling us is what should get you really worried.

Oh, it will have the power to censor the net at a whim, adding any site it wants to the list when it wants, without anyone being able to stop them. That is the 'requirements' for the government to block a site: because we said so.

PS: The internet community proved within five seconds just why these plans will not work to begin with and how spending millions, even billions, to censor the net is just stupid. In short: PROXY.

This alone is reason enough to not apply the censorship filter to Australia, as a citizen born in Australia this was terrible to hear.
Giving your government the ultimate decision over what you as a person are allowed to watch or see is wrong and it goes against Freedom and Rights that we in Australia enjoy.
It would be a sad day to call my self Australian if i can't freely look on the internet with thinking I must be in China due to websites being blocked.
Don't get me wrong i think kiddie porn is wrong and id bring back captial punishment for anyone touching a child, but really how will censoring random unpublicized websites solve anything.
If they ban a website we should know why and what it is.
Otherwise we're just sheep and I'm no kiwi

 

[terribleyetfun]

Excuse me, but what the fuck is the world coming to?

The end?

I dont care how offensive something is, it should never be censored, if you have a problem with it DONT FUCKING VIEW IT YOU ASSHATS.... sorry... anyway, ya agreed

you sir are my new best friend behind all my real friends and the internet itself

 

[Logan94]

Why doesn't anybody get the American freedom of speech aspect. YOu can say anything until it inflicts on someone else's rights. So untill you endanger someones health (for example, yelling "fire" in a building, someone can get hurt), insult them, or just plain offend them. So if someone is shouting obsinities in public, a poliece officer just has to asy anybody if they are offended, and if anybody is offended, the he can take the person who is shouting in. The only reason barely anyone enforces that is because people are missinformed on this subject. So to sum it up, you can say anything, unless it inflicts on someone elses rights.

1)That's America, we're talking about Denmark, not sure how the laws compare.
2)This speech most definitely is infringing on others' rights, such as the right to not be stolen from.

People were saying that this would spread to America.

So your argument that it will not, is because you have freedom of speech? Have you lived in a cave for the last few years? Denmark printed the Muhammed drawings. Not a very wise move, but if anything, it proved that Denmark celebrates its own freedom of speech.

I imagine Denmark and the U.S.A to have comparable laws on the subject, but I expect Denmark to allow their citizens greater freedom.

Your argument does not hold up.

Im just saying that people do not understand the concept of freedom of speach in america. you cant say things that hurt other people.

 

[stompy]

An industry? No, the government did, following the sentence of the court.

My apologies, I was in a rush. What I meant to ask is, Were recording companies pressuring ISPs to block 'The Pirate Bay'?

 

[Malkavian]

This thread is constantly veering on the edge of OT...
The discussion is not whether piracy is illegal, should be legal, harms anyone, makes anyone happy, can produce magic rabbits, or whatever.
Piracy is illegal, and that's that.
However, acting as the medium for piracy, is not. Sure, thepiratebay is more or less only about pirating. There are loads of legal content, but the illegal content far outweighs it.
But that is not the issue.

The issue is, that it has been decided by government and by court(a lawsuit against danish ISP Tele2 a year or so ago) that thepiratebay, while not actually providing illegal material, is to be blocked since it acts as a medium, in which persons UNAFILLIATED WITH THE SITE can distribute material illegally to other persons UNAFILLIATED WITH THE SITE.
Now, this may not seem so bad, but governemt practice makes for some precedence, and court decissions certainly makes for precedence.
Now, if we block thepiratebay with this reasoning, there is a hell of a lot of other webistes we can ban... And one i particular I would like to bring up, is youtube.
Youtube has a lot of music illegally distributed. No emplyees of youtube's are providing this music or uploading it, but persons UNAFILLIATED WITH THE SITE are, and it is being heard by persons UNAFILLIATED WITH THE SITE. Youtube, in a sense, provides the same service, in that it allows users to share music, without viewers(downloaders, in the case with TPB) having to pay for it.

How would you respond if Youtube is closed off? In Denmark, it is now doable. A decission has been made in court, and it sets precedence.

And that is what bugs me. I can live without thepiratebay, sure, but that is not the issue. The issue is that I have no choice in the matter, and I don't want my government to deprive me of my choices. It is an infringement of my freedom. I doesn't matter that if I made the choice to access thepiratebay, then it would most likely result in me carrying out a criminal act. If I do something wrong, they can come after me.
You can't arrest a man for having a hell of a good reason to kill someone, util he has actually done the crime, or been proven to plan it. You can't arrest people because you make an assumption of what their intentions will be.

Blocking thepiratebay is wrong, for these reasons. Whether or not piracy is illegal, is irrellevant.

 

[ElTigreNegro]

If they think that by banning just one or two sites of torrents the downloads will stop they might as well throw a party in the magical kingdom of unicorn-land. Not going to happen: ever, now the scary part would be that, using the torrent sites as the excuse, they started to ban other sites, blogs and the likes that had different opinions about certain subjects. We are still not there, but if that started to happen, then yes, we would have something to worry. But just for one torrent site? Nah.

 

[theultimateend]

Blocking thepiratebay is wrong, for these reasons. Whether or not piracy is illegal, is irrellevant.

I made that point a while back and people just hopped past it and attacked me for not going balls deep into how piracy is the same as child pornography. (A comparison that I think is one of the dumbest things I've heard in the last 72 hours by the way)

 

[Malkavian]

Blocking thepiratebay is wrong, for these reasons. Whether or not piracy is illegal, is irrellevant.

I made that point a while back and people just hopped past it and attacked me for not going balls deep into how piracy is the same as child pornography. (A comparison that I think is one of the dumbest things I've heard in the last 72 hours by the way)

I know. I read the entire thred through, and couldn't believe how people are avoiding the actual subject. Sure, piracy is illegal - how can we deny it? But that's not the issue here.

 

[stompy]

Post

Thank you my good sir, you have made my argument for me... it's a shame people are ignoring the question.

 

[Lord Krunk]

I also find it fucking funny that someone from Australia, the land of censorship and Drop Bears, would allow and even agree with the government banning a site.

Depends on the site, really.

 

[Jinx_Dragon]

Why child porn: Simple, it is an emotional trigger. Whenever a government wants to pass a law which, as rational people, we might object to they will always go for the emotional triggers. This is why 'protecting the children' is big, as nearly everyone has children and want them to be protected. Those three words trigger an emotional response, one which leaves these parents feeling if they don't support the government then somehow they will be putting their children into harms way. At this point they, blindly, support the government and let them get away with draconian (I hate that words meaning) measures.

Often only after the law is passed can you learn the full extent of it. This is particularly true in this case involving Australia. The government is refusing to hand over a list of what sites will be banned on the first run, or what regulations a site has to meet to be banned. It does come down to: cause we said so and nothing more. Even if we could trust Rudd with this power, and I don't think we can, what the next government does with it we can not foresee.

Yet the damage is done at that point, and many will still believe the 'protecting the children' cover story cause they haven't realised the extent of the damage. It makes it near impossible to change the law, which is what those who dream of being our masters want. If you do fight against it the government, trying to further mislead and suppress dissent, will label you a 'child rapist' or some other bullshit. Many times they will even use your struggle against an unjust law as justification to search and seize, to harass at every turn and maybe even lock you up though you have done nothing wrong.

This will kill any attempts for change in it's tracks, as no one wants to listen to a child rapist now do they?

That is why it is always 'protecting the children.'

 

[Jinx_Dragon]

How would you respond if Youtube is closed off? In Denmark, it is now doable. A decission has been made in court, and it sets precedence.

I will take it one step further: Any website that allows user created content has the potential to act as a medium in exactly the same way. This means a good chunk of the internet can be banned. Email? Banned. IMs? Banned. Facebook? Banned. Yahoo? Banned.... Even this site? BANNNED! It allows me to post comments and I could so easily start posting copyright text based material or give you a link to a pirate site, hence acting as a medium.

You might say that is ridiculous, that it is going to the extremes, but thanks to the way the western legal system is: Nothing is exempt unless the law is clearly stating what is and is not to be exempted. If there is no clear exemptions, or set in stone regulations on how the law is to be implemented, then there IS NO EXEMPTIONS!

ANY site that acts as medium... that includes whatever extreme example you can think up... BAAANNNNEEEEDDD!

 

[Jinx_Dragon]

But just for one torrent site? Nah.

It starts with one... never ends there. Before you know it you have accepted so much censorship that you can't see the harm of even more censorship. Till they censor you, yet at that point no one seems to be giving a damn.

 

[orifice]

Sounds to me like the Danish government (like many others!) are taking the piss. May'be organising some protests might help, failing that a bombing campaign!

 

[Xaryn Mar]

With this ruling of the Danish court (it has been taken to the High Court as far as I know now) could actually be taken so far as to ban Google and other search sites since they are also providing links to torrents of illegal material. I don't think they would do that since they would get a lot of protests from everybody but thepiratebay are seen as an illegal site by many (although it is not. Not by Danish law or by Swedish law, where it resides) and there will be no protests of relevance in this case.

 

[orifice]

A question occurs to me. Did they mention the possibility of this censorship in the last general election in denmark? Or are they acting without mandate?

 

[Malkavian]

A question occurs to me. Did they mention the possibility of this censorship in the last general election in denmark? Or are they acting without mandate?

It has not been mentioned in relations to the elections, but really, a government cannot mention all their views on every single thing, especially since new cases and situations occur every day.