Would “Great Aussie Firewall” block NORML.org?
Saturday, December 27th, 2008 at 4:28 pm | By: Radical Russ
Uproar in Australia over plan to block Web sites (AP) by AP: Yahoo! Tech
SYDNEY, Australia – A proposed Internet filter dubbed the “Great Aussie Firewall” is promising to make Australia one of the strictest Internet regulators among democratic countries.Consumers, civil-rights activists, engineers, Internet providers and politicians from opposition parties are among the critics of a mandatory Internet filter that would block at least 1,300 Web sites prohibited by the government — mostly child pornography, excessive violence, instructions in crime or drug use and advocacy of terrorism.
First of all, it won’t work. People that want those sites will still be able to get them, and people who are looking for something else like “breast cancer”, “sex education”, or “child porn arrests” won’t find what they’re looking for.
But what I’d notice in the context of this blog is “instructions in crime or drug use”. That sounds very broad to me, and I wonder if that would mean pro-drug law reform sites like this one would be inaccessible “down under”?
It becomes a zen koan if you think about it. We believe laws that punish the personal use of cannabis are wrong. But personal use of cannabis is illegal, so does arguing against the existence of a crime advocate crime? I don’t think so. If you effectively ban people from discussing the righteousness of our laws, how can you have a democracy?
