Americans lean on Australia

Conroy's internet filter will block - AND THIS IS A FACT - material which is legal to view and buy in the USA, UK, Canada and other great civilized democracies we respect. Conroy always talks about child porn and bestiality because he's smart and he knows these things press emotional buttons in people. He never talks about the other material him and conservative cronies want to block.

I really don't expect anything more from your own citizens.

People often seek out news relating to what they want to hear, and that includes so called "well informed" people. The man who tells another to "stop watching Fox News" is just as biased in his news as the "Fox News" watcher.

I remember seeing some hokey Australian video on the net where they interview US citizens about their knowledge of "facts" and get some funny responses. It was pretty funny, but when the interviewer said he was the then Prime Minister John Howard, and people believed him, it really hit home just how trivial all these "facts" are to every day use.

Yeah, I guess it doesn't hurt to know who was the first man on the moon, or the prime minister of Russia, or the location of Mauritania. In the end though, is it really worth remembering for the great supermajority of people? Does it help them or really affect them in their lives? Do they need to discuss it, or remember it? Nah, not really. It's just "trivia," which is "trivial." People will concentrate on what's important, not these mundane facts, or things that will not affect them.

So if you happen to be surprised that people here, or anywhere for that matter, don't care about the things that you do, about things thousands of miles (kilometers!) away... don't be. That's generally the occupation of people who have nothing better to do with their time.

@Bob Bandicooter,

This policy is most definitely not the one that Krudd and company went to the last election with, this one appeared after they were in power.

Most Australians regard Stephen Conroy as a dangerous buffoon and an embarrassment to Australia on the world stage. Popular? No way. If you judge by the way people vote, just wait for the next election.

Bravo to the Americans on this one - maybe the Australian government will listen to them, because they sure are deaf to their own population.

@Bob Bandicooter,

Australians voted for the government that promised before
the election that it will censor the internet

The Australian Labor Party proposed an optional filtering system at the 2007 federal elections. They only switched it to be mandatory once they got in power.

So, *nobody* voted for the kind of internet censorship that Labor is planning to bring in now.

@ Jimbo - Although you're right about the selective media and hidden agendas over in the States, their citizens still have the ability to access whatever they want worldwide and make up their own opinions.

That 99.9% don't look beyond their own domestic sources really says something though, yeah?

Australians really love being censored. They have a long history of yearning for it, going back to convict days.

Remember the previous Australian Communications Minister, who became known around the world as "The World's Biggest Luddite". Yes, he wanted to censor the internet too.

The latest communications minister, who will succeed in censoring the net, is a very popular guy in Australia. Judge popularity by the way people vote. Australians voted for the government that promised before the election that it will censor the internet.

I'm not surprised you didn't know about your people censored media.

I mean, come on, you have more clueless people on the street than anybody. And clueless about all sorts of things... Now that scary ;)

@Ryan whenever I criticize the US policies amongst americans I get the excuse that the population isn't responsible and most people aren't behind all their government does.. meanwhile they did vote in bush as often as possible but excuse that with 'he did well with the economy and that's more important to people'
(So it's with some hidden amusement that I saw him destroy the economy completely in the end.)

"Mandy" does not seem to be aware that the EU, both Parliament and Commission, is against key parts of his scenario. EU directives, and there will be a strong one, have force of law throughout the EU. End of the bill in the UK, I'd say. It saddens me that we have to look to the EU to defend our consumer interests against the pro-business types we have.

As an American citizen living in Thailand I've found that not only most U.S. based TV and radio programming is censored outside the U.S. but also some news events unfavorable to the U.S. are also censored to anyone, even American citizens living abroad. I think the majority of U.S. censorship is corporate censorship, but some is not. I must say that I make no distinction between corporate censorship and government censorship as both are equally as disgusting. I have documented all cases of U.s. censorship that I've encountered, whether corporate or government censorship for the past four years. I have also complained to the major networks: ABC, NBC, CBS, MSNBC, and the radio monopoly corporation Clear Channel Communications, among others, and have not received a single reply from any of the major networks. The smaller media websites that responded indicated that it was because of contractual agreements that prevented them from allowing international customers from viewing their news and/or media content. The really sad part is 99.99% of Americans don't know this is happening. You have to be living abroad to realize that censorship exists in the "land of the free". How sad.

Yeah, because there were just a "few" messed up, genocidal, fanatical, a-holes in Iraq or Afghanistan.

Timboj, right on!

"This he felt would be much better than making everyone suffer because of the antics of a few."

Says the man representing the country that invades entire countries "because of the antics of a few."

The decision to roll out a national firewall should be made solely in the capital of the country. In this case, Peking.

Hear, hear!

I read this news a couple of weeks ago and as an Australia that appreciates freedom of thought (and un-hindered speed in his non-child porn-related browsing) I totally welcome this news. The more opposition, the better. Hopefully the US Government is high profile enough to make a difference with our oppressive powers that be.

Say what you want about the yanks, if there's one thing they'll defend tooth and nail is 'Freedom of Speech'. The US government may have a short list of enviable traits, but I think that belief is a page we can take out of their book.