Upping the ante in the fight for free speech

Upping the ante in the fight for free speech
Why spiked wants to make freedom of speech the great cause of 2014.

Free speech needs to be rudely and constantly defended.

Discussion Summary:

Politicians criticising the ABC or reducing its funding are not a threat to freedom of speech. 

Decades ago we had a national broadcaster worth defending. In those days, most ABC journalists attempted to report news with minimal bias. Today, the ABC wraps virtually all it's product in editorial spin and has become a political player. If ABC is widely trusted, it should have no problem getting its users to fund it. In wanting to sell off the ABC, I am not anti-freedom, just anti-free-loading.

But the ABC supports artists who would not be able to earn a living otherwise.

Everyone from car makers to baby makers, from paint sprayers to rap sayers - none of them can last another day unless the government grows another teat and suckles them. The arts teat has permanently infantalised it's industry at tax payers expense. Tell those 'rent seekers' to earn their way by pleasing someone who earns.

The future of quality journalism

The future of journalism is assured but it is an online Babel with a nearly indistinguishable continua from paid to unpaid; from objective to propagandistic; from balanced to fanatical; from truth to lies. We will not be losing quality journalism. Already, publically funded organizations like Wikipedia are attempting to provide facts on which to judge many “stories”, and a blogosphere provides us with unlimited editorial. What we have substantially lost already is quality editors. Editors should be the gatekeepers that shape and select the news that will be given the credibility of being printed below a masthead. Over past decades in Australian newspapers, we have seen these editors replaced again and again in a search for the most malleable, or the most likely to ensure a consistent “line” is followed. A captive culture had only 1,2 or 3 papers to choose from, and so they survived, not because they were great, but, like political parties, because they were the best of a bad lot, and whether you liked them or not, they defined discussion within the culture. Now the internet has opened the gates, and readers are voting with their clicks. The demise of newspapers is merely one aspect of the larger international trend towards cultural fragmentation. The internet is only one of many enabling forces that are amplifying this trend. Wikipedia is the most famous attempt to broker a new editorial internationalism – strictly limited to factual reporting. Perhaps, the ‘bad press”, it receives contains some jealousy that it may just be a model for the future of the press in Babel.

Stephen Digby

Communities have a right to be informed of criminals in their midst

The offender has "done his time" and "paid his debt to society" and "that's how our legal syatem works". These common sayings are a common but ridiculous distortion of the operation of todays legal system.
One of the key reasons for the public loss of trust in our legal system is the almost total absence of this sense that criminals have a debt to pay. The frustration of citizens at the lenient treatment of child molesters is partly fueled by the fact that our legal system treats them much more as victims that need support for the rest of their lives rather than people who owe a moral debt to their society.
Additionally, there are a huge range of situations where a criminal conviction must be communicated to the criminal's "local community". Teachers, lawyers, policemen and anyone who volunteers for any community service where children are present, must reveal their criminal record (not restricted to child sex offences) and be subject to official discrimination for the rest of their lives.
It does not seem in any way inconsistent to ensure that a community is informed of the presence of a criminal from a group where repeat offences are statistically very common.
This latest case is merely an expression of extreme public frustration over the latest mishandling by the legal system of their responsibility to protect the public.


Stephen Digby

• Sex offender laws 'flawed' - Queensland - BrisbaneTimes ...
• Convicted sex offender Ferguson released - ABC News (Australian ...
• Doctor calls for 'serious' sex offender support - ABC News ...
• Sex offender relocation sparks meeting - Local News - News ...
• Sex offender Steven Bickle back in custody The Courier-Mail
• ABC Life Matters - Comments

730 Report on Costello Dinner

The details of the dinner were "reluctantly" agreed to be off the record by the reporters and treated as such for a considerable time.
The breach of this agreement by one of the journalists prior to an election could be reasonable construed as a self serving ("I need a headline story, so stuff the treasurer and the other journailsts").
The decision to join the pack by the 730 report could be reasonable construed as a mix of motives:

• don't want to miss out on the story regardless of ethics;
• don't want a politician to get away with denying a remark agreed to be "off the record" (short sighted if journalists want off the record remarks to continue to flow !);
• implying bias in that the politician and the topic are ones that are grossly over represented and over-emphasised in ABC publications

Overall, another instance of the ABC considering itself as a "balance" to the government and the other media and thus inherently biased towards the opposition. The ABC has lost my support (and that of many I know) due to its drift into partisan stances on so many national/ internation politcal/ social/ scientific issues.
I want to pay taxes for an objective review of the issues NOT a counter attack on some perceived hegemony.

Stephen Digby

Redfern Riots & Parental responsibility

In response to ABC discussion convened by John Faine after Redfern Riots

The key difference between the present and the past is the huge loss of parental guidance in the lives of these children. Parents should be WITH their parents on many evenings, on other evenings they should be at adult supervised activities such as clubs and sports. The acceptance by parents and our culture that youth should be able to congregate unsupervised in public places is a recipe for disaster. The idea that we can construct some new frail structures (mentoring etc) that can redirect this inherently unstable and immature groups is a fallacy. The apologists for failure can be readily identified by phrases such as "in this day and age". As well as returning to parental responsibility and adult supervision, we need to regard the antisocial media influences on music video and advertising in general as health risks in the same way as smoking and aggressively control them. The only suggestions coming from the apologists for cultural collapse are more money from government and more "tolerance" of the loss of public freedom in public spaces. In summary, the key practical actions that would make a difference are: - public campaign reinforcing parents responsibility to know where their children are and what they are doing. Similar style to TAC & drug ads. - public campaign and perhaps "curfew" legislation to ensure children of different ages are at home or under direct parental supervision at certain hours - legislative changes to make parents legally responsible for children's supervision (i.e. parents supervises or ensures that child is involved in supervised activity) - directed financial assistance from local/ state / federal govt towards activities such all sorts of healthy socially beneficial supervised sporting and special interest clubs. Provide supervision for skate ramps etc. (dispensers of support have responsibility to be careful that sick elements do not get into this funding e.g. rap group = violence antisocial misogyny etc) - community leaders actively challenging the pop culture as antisocial and in many cases "sick" by almost any index. Local/ state / federal leaders identifying the execs in pop culture (music clothes etc) and advertising and making them responsible for using their enormous creativity for positive socially uplifting messages embedded with their sales pitch. Threaten c legislation but hopefully avoid. Treat them like the irresponsible road speed encouragers, the tobacco pushers, the alcohol pushers, the gambling pushers etc. - more if you are interested ....... In summary, the key actions that are great BUT won't make much difference BUT will look good on a local/ state/ federal govt action plan are: - expensive highly supported high profile pilot programs in a range of great ideas that just cannot be scaled up to make any significant impact e.g. mentoring, big brother - more youthful youth officers employed by local govt to run tiny groups that make a few newsletters with the involvement of either the better behaved and educated do-gooders OR some worst offenders who have "seen the light" (possibly literally). - more attractions to congregate without adult supervision such as nooks and crannies, seating, skate parks, ramps, etc etc.