Australia

Be A Rebel And Attend Your Local Rally

JasonMR — Wed, 03 Dec 2008 17:04:51 -0600

Activists are organizing protests in all major cities for December the 13th, I encourage my readers to join their local rally. This is too important of a subject to take lightly. If we don't show up in numbers, the current administration will get away with setting up the Great Firewall of Australia, curtailing freedom as we know it. Even the Libs see the plan as misguided, and that says something.

And don't forget to sign the GetUp online petition.

Say No To Australian Firewall

JasonMR — Thu, 27 Nov 2008 23:39:57 -0600

Dear friend,

Imagine a government proposing an internet censorship system that went further than any other democracy - one that made the internet up to 87% slower, more expensive, accidentally blocked up to one in 12 legitimate sites, and missed the vast majority of inappropriate content.

This is not China, Saudi Arabia or Iran - this is the vision of Senator Stephen Conroy for Australia. Testing has already begun. The community must now move to stop this plan. Click here to save the net:

www.getup.org.au/campaign/SaveTheNet

The system that Senator Conroy wants is a mandatory filter of all internet traffic, with the government of the day able to add any unwanted site to a secret blacklist. Already, the wrangling has begun for the inclusion of material relating to anorexia, euthanasia and gambling. It isn't difficult to see the scheme is open to abuse.

Even when it comes to preventing child p-rnography, the filter will not prevent peer-to-peer sharing and is very simple to sidestep. The protection of our children is vitally important - that's why we can't afford to waste funds on this deeply flawed system. We should be concentrating on solutions that are more effective and won't undermine our digital economy or our democratic freedoms.

This must rank as one of the most ill-thought decisions of the Rudd Government's first year in power. We need to act now to tell big brother the mandatory internet filter is incompatible with the principles of a modern democracy and modern economy:

www.getup.org.au/campaign/SaveTheNet

Our government should be doing all in its power to take Australia into the 21st century economy, and to protect our children. This proposed internet censorship does neither. Take action to save the net today.

Thanks for being a part of the solution,

The GetUp team

PS - The proposed scheme will pass all internet traffic through a government filter - it's like asking Australia Post to filter every letter sent in Australia. Click here to save the net.

Deception Is Profit

JasonMR — Fri, 25 Jul 2008 07:11:32 -0500

As the SMH has recently reported, the plastic bag producer Valpak likes to claim ...Bio Bags: Deceptive brand and logo created by Valpak.

.. aware of the environmental limitations of plastic bags and we are focussing our business into the use of sustainable resources as well as offering degradable and compostable Cellophane bags where appropriate.

Quoted from Valpaks' About page.

What is so appauling about Valpak?

"We have never claimed bio-bags are biodegradable," Valpak's managing director, Alan Reid, said. "We registered the trademark six or seven years ago. It was never intended to make people think the bags are biodegradable."

Talk about cynicism. So Valpak unapologeticaly declares the bio-label as nothing but a legal misleading of consumers. Obviously they are not the only offenders, but an example that should serve as a lesson to all consumers: a green lable means nothing. If you want to follow your conscience and moral norms, make sure to research all your consumer choices.

Erosion Of Civil Liberties

JasonMR — Tue, 01 Jul 2008 21:23:15 -0500

Australia is feeling more and more like a totalitarian state.

POLICE have told organisations planning to campaign during World Youth Day events they need to have placards, banners and T-shirts pre-approved or risk losing their protest "rights"

Quoted from SMH article Protests need our blessing, say police.

What's next?

Painful Irony

JasonMR — Fri, 20 Jun 2008 18:53:00 -0500

Australian immigration officials handed him over to Chinese immigration officials who returned him to his home city, where he was immediately arrested, beaten and tortured for "shaming" China by accusing its government of human rights abuses in articles he had written in the Chinese-language press in Australia.

Quoted from SMH article Tragedy of refugee Australia sent back.

Finally

JasonMR — Sat, 24 Nov 2007 07:15:49 -0600

I didn't vote for Labor, but...

Image courtesy of Spiegel Online.

One Nation, One Vote, One Future

JasonMR — Mon, 29 Oct 2007 20:04:24 -0500

Sound arguments are impossible to refute. You can debate them, but don't you have better things to do, then spend precious time pondering issues which are out of your hand? Democracy is a farce, time to vote for the only way a country can be governed efficiently - Vote For Fascism!

Australian Government Propaganda

JasonMR — Mon, 01 Oct 2007 14:55:44 -0500

As we all should know, the term propaganda has become a word only applied to totalitarian regimes, in democracies we call the same phenomenon communications. Hence in Australia the goebbelesce institution is called Government Communications Unit.

A Wikipedia article on propaganda gives us the following explanation:

"Propaganda is a concerted set of messages aimed at influencing the opinions or behavior of large numbers of people. Instead of impartially providing information, propaganda in its most basic sense presents information in order to influence its audience. The most effective propaganda is often completely truthful, but some propaganda presents facts selectively to encourage a particular synthesis, or gives loaded messages in order to produce an emotional rather than rational response to the information presented. The desired result is a change of the cognitive narrative of the subject in the target audience."

All highlights added by the author of this article!

Currently Australians are being flooded with ads on TV, radio, and in print media, trying to convince everyone who doesn't run a business, that the latest attack by the Liberal government on the benefits of employees is a good thing for all involved. So while schools and hospitals are lacking funds, our current government always seems to have millions of dollars to spend on their propaganda. Sadly, pointing this out just leads to a finger-pointing game, with the Liberal government noting "Labor has also done it".

I'm just glad someone else had the same idea, to create a series of videos with sticky notes, based on the original financed by our government, that states the actual facts.

Effect Of AWA's on Young Workers

Effect On Foreign Workers

GCU Logo

JasonMR — Mon, 01 Oct 2007 14:05:16 -0500

Telstra Sells Your Phone Number To Telemarketers

JasonMR — Tue, 28 Aug 2007 22:05:54 -0500

I just received an unsolicited call from people begging for money. Without even letting the women explain in detail why she thought it to be appropriate to call me at home to hawk her product, I asked how her organization had gotten hold of my phone number and was told, that they had purchased a list of working phone numbers from Telstra - the former public telecommunication service provider for Australia. This is especially interesting as I'm not, and never have been a customer of theirs. At least the lady was "kind" enough to take me of their list. Well, we will see about that.

A friend of mine is already investigating Telstra for their shady business practices, as it seems that they are charging their clients for advertising sent to the client, and are blocking users from rightful access to services purchased, if the user dares to block those nefarious activities. With the Australian government pushing for ISPs to start controlling the content delivered to paying customers, one really has to worry about the quality of internet services the Australian public will receive in the future.

That services have a price, is well understood and undisputed. If a service has value to a potential customer, they will be willing to pay that price, if it is in line with the perceived value. Some strange mental bug, or meme how it has been recently labeled, causes citizens to believe, that a government under cost pressure, works differently, in the sense of [in-]efficiency, than a private business under cost pressure. What is left out, or rather neglected in the public discourse concerning the topic of privatization campaigns, is the supposedly negligible concern of government acting in a framework of values supported by the wider public, which private enterprises do not need to be concerned with. What is commonly referred to and summed up in the concept of public duty. Without it governments loose their raison d'être - their justification for existence.

I find solace in the knowledge, that after every period in history, where greed of a few takes precedence over the well being of the wider public, or at times where greed is regarded as a virtue, a revolution occurs or at least radical change to the benefit of the deprived in the face of a revolutionary threat is carried through. Contrary to popular belief, such historic phenomenons are rarely the subject of short timelines, but developments which often take up centuries. The French Revolution might be pinpointed in the late 17'th century, but the build up started decades earlier. One can easily be blinded by distracting details, when attempting to understand what caused the French Revolution. The desire for freedom is far lesser a force, then the desire for equality and fairness, as we are free by default. A society producing masses of wealth, but only allowing for its accumulation with a few, is defective by design. And societies are designed by the collective of individual desires and aspirations. Elites can believe all they want, that they are in control, when all they have is a managerial position. And like a business goes bust, if its management becomes inefficient, so does a society.

Telstra sold my phone number to telemarketers fueled by their managements need to accumulate profits. I can take it personal and live a life of frustration, or just see it for what it is - a sign of the times holding promise for a better future.