AUSTRALIA — Although the Australian government appears mad with power when it comes to observing and regulating the erotic activities of its citizens – all in the name of decency and safety, of course – not everyone with a position of power is enthusiastic about the Rudd Government’s goal of filtering the internet. Nick Minchin, the shadow minister for broadband, communications and the digital economy recently had more than a few harsh things to say about the proposal and both its monetary and regulatory value.
Needless to say, he doesn’t have a very high opinion of the plan’s success.
In a piece entitled “Big brother filter plan insults parents,” that appeared in The Sydney Morning Herald, Minchin echoes many of the same concerns that U.S. opponents to internet filtering have expressed.
Chief among Minchin’s objections to the government deciding what makes it through to its citizens’ computer monitors is the belief that parents have the right and responsibility to parent their children; not the government. As Minchin sees it, wresting that right from parents sends out “an offensive message: that parents cannot be trusted to mind their children online.”
While it may well be true that many parents slack off when it comes to learning how the internet and the computers that bring it into their homes work, the shadow minister still contends that “Adult supervision should be front and centre of the effort to improve online safety…” instead of the Communication Minster, Stephen Conroy.
Conroy, he contends, has proposed that filtering content “is center to the Government’s plan to make the internet a safer place for children,” thereby placing too much trust in technology and discouraging parents from becoming empowered and informed enough to decide for themselves how they wish to address and interpret such issues.
Perhaps most important to the power of Minchin’s message is the fact he points out that those who pose the most realistic risk to minors are likely not to be found in adult erotic environments, such as porn sites or sexuality chat rooms. Instead, those who prey upon children are more likely to work around filters while visiting chat room or peer-to-peer areas sanctioned by Conroy’s “clean feed” philosophy and least likely to be considered a threat by parents lulled into believing that a national content filter will protect their offspring.
Given that filtering trials have still not begun and are not popular, Minchin may have the opportunity to debate the value of the $40 million earmarked for the program – money he contends would be better spent on more conventional forms of curtailing illegal activity: law enforcement directed at crushing the production and distribution of child pornography.
