Contradiction is balance. [entries|archive|friends|userinfo] Axver [ website | U2-Vertigo-Tour.com: for all your U2 setlist needs! (Got a question, suggestion, or addition? Feel free to leave me a comment! I co-maintain the site.) ] [ userinfo | livejournal userinfo ] [ archive | journal archive ]

[24 February 2008|11:48 pm] [ Tags | alp, australian politics, greens, john howard, liberal party, peter costello, politicians, politics ] [ Current Mood | tired ] [ Current Music | 'Glow (live)' by Blackfield ] Well, well. I am enjoying the new post-Howard reality, watching the Liberal Party implode. When the leader of your party's popularity is at only 9%, surely you can't slide much further and things will soon start to look up, but I'm going to relish this for as long as it lasts. In today's news, some of them want the old guard out. Behind the diplomatic veneer, it seems some directions are being encouraged very pointedly. I can't help but wonder what knives are out in the backrooms. You know they are. Any party this suddenly unpopular will have all kinds of shit going down behind the scenes. I've questioned the sincerity of some former Howard ministers' intentions to quit politics in the past. I'll be glad to see Alexander Downer go (quite possibly the politician with the most appropriate last name) and I believe he will, but my expectations are not so high for others. Specifically Peter Costello. Costello is one hell of a cunning politician, and his desire to take over the reins from John Howard was hardly a secret. Then, of course, after the thumping loss, he stunned everyone and announced he wouldn't take the leadership and instead would retreat to the back bench to serve out his term and mentor younger politicians. The cynic in me believes he just did that to avoid taking a lot of shit for the loss, come out clean, and rather than "mentor" younger politicians, gather them onto his side to launch a successful leadership challenge at the right time. I still believe that, too. But I don't doubt some in the backrooms would like him and his fellows in the old guard gone. Will he try to hold on, and can he? The Howard era has very quickly come to be viewed with disdain, at least in an electability sense. Costello has probably lost any chance he has of winning an election in the near future simply due to his close association with Howard. I would be absolutely delighted to see this blow up into more of a feud. In all likelihood, things will probably resolve quietly and at least some of the old guard will retire and fade from the scene, but a split within the party would, let's be honest, provide endless entertainment and surely both solidify Labour's power and give the much more unified Greens a chance for growth. As I've noted in the past, the Greens in some electorates are either the second party or close to it. If the Liberals fall into disarray, the Greens can seize the opportunity to portray themselves as the stable opposition to Labour. Thus, despite the fact they do not have much prospect of directly picking up support from Liberal voters, the establishment of themselves in a position of opposition in place of the Liberals would be an absolute boon to them. I can keep living in hope anyway. Link Leave a comment

Here I was, thinking the forces of social conservatism in Aussie politics had been banished ... [1 January 2008|10:37 pm] [ Tags | alp, australia, australian politics, censorship, family first, internet, john howard, kevin rudd, stupidity ] [ Current Mood | annoyed ] [ Current Music | 'Sunset Of The Age' by Anathema ] Politicians, eh? Vile scum. Labour's Telecommunications Minister, Stephen Conroy, has announced mandatory filtering of online content at the Internet Service Providor level in Australia (Source: the ABC and the BBC). All last year, I took shot after shot at the Liberal government's social policy, and rightly so. It's archaic, out-dated bigotry based upon intolerance and discrimination; a dislike of anybody who deviates from certain "traditional norms". It was hardly a surprise that the Liberals were quite happy to hop into bed with Family Fundies First. It was more than a relief to see them voted out of office on 24/11, and just yesterday, before this filtering was brought to my attention, I proclaimed happily that "Australia's political future really does look brighter". I take it back. Meet the new boss, same as the old boss. Now it's time for LiveJournal to show its true colours; recent news posts have devolved into festivals of paranoia, with people fearing the sale of LJ to SUP will result in all kinds of implausible scenarios in which nasty Russian figures censor journals. But when it's something that actually matters, when it's something that's actually on the table and happening, when it's not just your little online blog, will people do anything? Somehow I doubt we'll see much drama about this at all. Well, I'll have my rant in any case. Firstly, let's see what exactly this entails. From the ABC: "Senator Conroy says it will be mandatory for all internet service providers to provide clean feeds, or ISP filtering, to houses and schools that are free of pornography and inappropriate material" (emphasis mine). The BBC adds that "Australians wanting unfettered access to the web will have to contact their supplier to opt out of the new regime" (emphasis mine). The reasons why this constitutes complete stupidity are multitudinous. Allow me to throw around just a few of them. 1. Who, praytell, decides what constitutes "inappropriate material"? Some government censor maintaining a blacklist who knows better than me? Funny, I thought this was a liberal democracy. And just what constitutes inappropriate? Go back a few decades and the mere discussion of homosexuality was inappropriate. I don't want somebody else's values being forced upon me. 2. Why is it opt-out as opposed to opt-in? If I for whatever reason felt the filter were necessary (e.g. if I maintain a primary school's Internet network), then I could opt-in to a government-provided filter. The rest of us can continue to surf the Internet uninterrupted. 3. How transparent will the opt-out process be? How do I know that if I opt-out, I won't end up on some government list of people whose online activity may be suspicious? All my activity is above board, but I value my privacy and my freedom. 4. Why is this even necessary? Conroy's statements reek of "won't someone PLEASE think of the children!", and I frankly have the voice of Helen Lovejoy from the Simpsons in my head whenever I read any quotes from him. Look, if you're such a poor parent that your children are readily accessing content inappropriate for their age, then that's your problem, and it should not affect anyone else - and especially not legal adults like me who are not parents! No children use my computer, thus the entire argument that this is to protect children is a complete irrelevancy. 5. Will it even protect the children? Last year, the Howard government introduced a software filter that parents could put on their computer, only for the Sydney Morning Herald to report that a 16 year old schoolboy managed to get past it within 30 minutes, all while leaving the appearance that the filter was still on to deceive his parents. This filter will similarly be exploitable; if bloggers in China and Iran can get around much more severe and restrictive state filtering, teens with IT knowledge far superior to that of their parents will be easily able to get around the filter. While Mum and Dad are content in the knowledge the government's Internet filter is there, little Johnny's in the other room, bypassing the filter and downloading some steamy porn film. 6. Which brings me to my next point. There's the "won't someone PLEASE think of the children!" argument in the sense of protecting children from porn (oh no, the human body!), violence (depending upon what we mean, perhaps justifiable), and some vague and ill-defined concept of "inappropriate content". Then there's the "won't someone PLEASE think of the children!" argument in the sense of blocking access to child pornography. That sort of disgusting and exploitative filth should be combatted at every turn, but this filter does not help. Child pornography is already the subject of major international police activity, and it is safe to say that if you are accessing child pornography at the moment, this filter won't make a single jot of difference to you. This filter will not do a thing to stop sick people who get their jollies from the exploitation of children. 7. At the end of the day, you search for content on the Internet. Porn doesn't just spew onto your computer uncontrollably. Parents, if your child is looking at porn, it's because they looked for it and it's your responsibility to do something about it if you think they shouldn't be allowed to see it. Government, if people are looking up illegal content, it is your job to 1. prosecute those making and hosting the illegal content and 2. prosecute those who are actively searching for this content. This should not involve law-abiding Internet users, i.e. the vast majority, having to opt-out of a filter. This filter will almost certainly not impact my day-to-day Internet activity. However, it strikes me as a gross breach of individual freedom, not to mention a staggering waste of taxpayer money and IT specialist time. Australia's Internet is quite backwards enough, thank you very much. I would urge every Australian citizen reading this to write to Senator Conroy as well as your local member and state senators to protest this moronic decision. Oh, and surely, surely, this backwards tool of subtle social control violates the human rights charter Victoria introduced today! Link Leave a comment

[12 December 2007|09:27 pm] [ Tags | asylum seekers, australia, australian politics, immigration, john howard, kevin rudd, nauru, politics ] [ Current Music | 'Quiet' by This Will Destroy You ] It's early days yet, but the new Rudd Labour government is doing me proud. A start has been made on dismantling the institutionalised latent racism of the John Howard era. In response to the MV Tampa affair, Howard & Co. established their morally repulsive "Pacific Solution". Thousands of islands which were formerly in Australia's migration zone were removed, and asylum seekers who land there or are otherwise intercepted prior to reaching the Australian mainland have no right to apply for an Australian visa. The government even tried to do this retroactively to some territories after asylum seekers landed there. So what happened to these people? They were transported to processing facilities also located outside Australia's migration zone to have their applications for refugee status assessed, most notably to the effectively bankrupt island country of Nauru in the middle of the Pacific Ocean. In other words, the Australian government deliberately sought to reduce the rights of and their responsibility to some of the planet's most vulnerable and desperate people. After all, to quote (possibly paraphrase) Howard, "we will decide who comes to this country and the circumstances in which they come here", and it's not hard to guess who Howard and his cronies decided they wanted to let in after one government minister incorrectly asserted that African migrants are more prone to criminal activity. You better believe that if there were white refugees from a civil war in New Zealand or a repressive theocracy in the US or widespread "dirty" terrorism in the UK, they wouldn't be sent to languish for up to three years in Nauru. As you would expect, this policy was an absolute failure. Acording to an August 2007 article in the Sydney Morning Herald, the Pacific Solution cost Australian taxpayers a cool billion dollars over a five year period, and the cost of processing asylum seekers offshore was seven times that of processing them in Australia. Money that could have been spent on improving healthcare and educational facilities with better equipment and higher wages was burnt on blatant deprivation of rights. Money that could have been spent on urgent infrastructural upgrades to boost capacity on rail and lower pollution by transferring freight to environmentally friendly trains was burnt on a pathetic attempt to demonstrate the government's muscle to the right wing. The Howard government tried to pretend to Australians that it was the best option for economic growth and strongest on security. In reality, it pursued an option that was economically daft, stripped thousands of people of the security of law, and even failed to achieve its desired outcoming in reducing how many people are seeking asylum in Australia. Thank goodness these foolish xenophobes are gone. Problem is, the ramifications of the Pacific Solution will last years. I am not referring to Australia's tarnished image on human rights or whether Rudd will restore the former boundaries of Australia's migration zone, though those are significant issues. I'm referring to poor Nauru. Once a wealthy Pacific island state, it is a lesson in why you need to manage your money well and why you should not let large multi-national companies gang-rape your land and take all your resources. Nauru was loaded with phosphate; was. The resources are gone. The island has precious little else to offer. My uncle went to Nauru to help build a new hospital ward (and lost an eye there); I understand that funds ran out and the ward remains unfinished. The place has gone down the economic gurgler. Howard & Co. effectively bribed Nauru to participate in the Pacific Solution; they preyed on Nauru's economic desperation and vulnerability by offering considerable financial aid in exchange for establishing a centre to process illegal immigrants in their territory. Nauru received millions of dollars in exchange for doing so, and in the process has become considerably dependent on the Pacific Solution. Now, with Rudd phasing it out, The Age reports that Nauru fears that it is screwed. That's right; not only did Howard pursue a repugnant policy "solution" in response to asylum seekers, but he also made an entire country dependent on it. Now what will the people of Nauru do? No matter how well Rudd phases out the Pacific Solution and no matter how much financial aid Australia continues to supply, that's simply not going to cut it. It keeps Nauru dependent and on the verge of insolvency if the political or economic winds in Australia shift away from it. Let's hope no more politicians exploit this tiny country for their own gain. I am so genuinely relieved that Howard has gone, and writing this entry really drove that home for me. The Howard government sure enjoyed exploiting the desperate and vulnerable people of this world, both to gather votes ("oh noes illegal immigrants - crime, disease, terrorism!" played well to morons on the right wing) and to accomplish their morally bankrupt schemes ("hey, Nauru, we hear you could use some money ..."). I don't think anybody with a sense of compassion will miss them. Link 4 comments|Leave a comment

The federal election and three other topics [14 October 2007|01:59 pm] [ Tags | 2007 australian federal election, 2007 rugby world cup, john howard, music, university ] [ Current Music | 'Our Illuminated Tomb' by Sculptured ] So, what's been happening lately? 1. John Howard finally announced the date of the bloody Australian federal election. It'll be on 24 November. Here's hoping we've got just approximately 40 days of Howard left. He's been Prime Minister the entire time I've lived in Australia and every term seems to be worse than the last. The desperate fearmongering attempts by the Liberals at the moment are hysterical, and Kevin Andrews should be ashamed of himself. Now that nobody gives a shit about terrorism and there are no waves of illegal immigrants, something has to be manufactured to appeal to the far right morons who unfortunately exist in this country, so of course, people who look different like the Sudanese appear in the crosshairs. Ironic how a group so apparently prone to crime has a crime rate lower than the Australian average. It's time to turf this braindead government out onto the streets. I was fairly lukewarm about Liberal-lite Labour until Kevin Rudd came to the helm, but now I sure know where my vote's going. I especially hope that those of you in marginal seats vote against the Liberals/Nationals. I'm (un?)fortunately in a safe Labour seat. 2. I've just about stopped giving a shit about the Rugby World Cup. It's not just that New Zealand's gone; Argentina's the only team really keeping things interesting. The problem is the scheduling. We just went six days without a game and it felt like a damn year. Didn't the RWC organisers learn a thing from the mindnumbingly drawn out Cricket World Cup? Play games more frequently! 3. You know what I hate? How Radiohead are suddenly being hailed as changing the face of music for releasing their new album independently via their website and listeners can choose to pay however much they like (or precisely nothing). It's hardly anything new; I've gigabytes of albums I acquired for free directly from bands' websites, but apparently that doesn't matter if you're a Radiohead hipster who needs to hype up a rather mediocre band. Also, the new album is laughably bad. Literally laughably bad. I'm not kidding when I say I burst out in laughter during the first track. What a trainwreck of an album. 4. You know what I love? Justifiable bragging. Yeah, I can't help myself. I got an essay back earlier this week with the following note: "this is a very impressive piece of work, one of those rare essays which I both marked and took notes from." Somehow I think I will pursue this topic further. And that's about it for now. Have a good one, folks. Link 17 comments|Leave a comment

The election cannot come soon enough [22 August 2007|11:41 pm] [ Tags | australian politics, exclusive brethren, fundies, john howard, politics ] [ Current Music | 'Safety In Crosswords' by Look Blue Go Purple ] Fancy a meeting with the Prime Minister of Australia? Step #1: Start a radical fundamentalist cult. John Howard will see you now ... I'm sure a similar Muslim group would be under surveillance by ASIO, if not already illegal. Link 2 comments|Leave a comment

A second brief letter to an incompetent excuse for a Prime Minister [4 February 2007|11:23 pm] [ Tags | afghanistan, australia, australian politics, david hicks, guantanamo, human rights, incompetence, injustice, john howard, politicians i abhor, united states, war on terror ] [ Current Mood | infuriated ] [ Current Music | 'Epidemic' by Blackfield ] John Howard, Imagine the following scenario. An Australian serving in Afghanistan to aid the Global Spread Of DemocracyTM is captured by the Taliban. They believe he is a threat to their existence and throw him in jail, pending a trial to determine whether he is guilty of criminal conduct. They then hold him in miserable conditions without trial for five whole years, and without charge for the majority of this time. He is treated appallingly during his imprisonment and denied basic legal and human rights, though the Taliban claim otherwise. What do you do, Mr Howard? What do you do? Do you just take the Taliban's word that they're treating him OK and that everything is proceeding as swiftly as possible and he will receive a fair trial? Or do you call bullshit and do everything within your power to secure fair treatment and trial? Yeah, that's pretty much the David Hicks example flipped. I'm using it to make a point. I'm calling you out on being a complete hypocrite, you disgusting little man. You want to know something funny about human rights? The point is that they apply to everyone, including the people you don't like. The point is that you don't allow Australian citizens to be thrown in a miserable jail for five years without trial, even if the jailor is supposedly our ally. The point is that it's fucking inhumane to lock someone up for five years with the barest of contact with the outside world when they haven't even been put on trial, let alone found guilty of anything! The point is that you don't fucking do that, you don't! Especially not when this US government has been proven time and time again to be completely incompetent, completely full of shit, completely untrustworthy, and completely unconcerned with upholding international law or the Geneva Conventions or basic human rights when it isn't convenient for them to do so! David Hicks is a citizen of the country you were elected to lead, Mr Howard. He has been mistreated and denied basic human rights by a country deemed to be our ally. What are you going to do about it, huh? Stop sitting on your hands and stop responding with meaningless blather. If you don't get off your hands, just fucking resign and let someone with a sense of compassion and a modicum of intelligence do the job. Fuck you. Sincerely, Intelligent People of Australia PS If anyone thinks my profanity in this entry is excessive, just imagine if your father was held in miserable conditions without trial by a foreign country for over five years. Bloody hell, the David Hicks issue makes me angry and I think I've remained remarkably composed in this entry. Link 4 comments|Leave a comment

A brief letter to an incompetent excuse for a Prime Minister [3 February 2007|07:44 pm] [ Tags | australia, australian politics, global warming, ignorance, john howard, nuclear power, politicians i abhor, stupidity ] [ Current Mood | irritated ] [ Current Music | 'See No Evil' by Television (heh ...) ] John Howard, Please, stop being such an anti-intellectual. First you had a problem with historians, and now you're going to stick your fingers in your ears and shout "la la la NUCLEAR POWAH la la la I'm not listening la la la NUCLEAR POWAAAAAHHHH!" while ignoring scientific data on global warming? You're an absolute disgrace to this country and thoroughly impossible to take seriously. Sincerely, Intelligent People of Australia PS I am not inherently opposed to nuclear power, I just think it's laughable that John Howard routinely sticks his head in the sand when the issue of global warming comes up, no matter how many scientists present verifiable data and debunk the claims of the crackpots who say things that Mr Howard likes, or when he does bother to somewhat acknowledge the scientists and their data, he just uses the opportunity as a means to push his nuclear power agenda. Link 29 comments|Leave a comment

[29 January 2007|11:53 pm] [ Tags | alexander downer, amanda vanstone, australia, black books, british comedy, dylan moran, george bush, john howard, peter costello, philip ruddock, politicians, politicians i abhor, politics, state of the union, tony abbott, united states ] [ Current Music | 'Nimos And Tambos' by Pure Reason Revolution ] ( (Axver's Lack Of Feelings About) The State Of The Union. ) ( A quick comparison of the current US and Australian governments. Guess which I dislike more! ) So there's a brief return to my politically themed writing. On a lighter note, this evening, I watched the TV show Black Books for the first time. I'd previously caught a couple of Dylan Moran's stand-up comedy gigs on TV and he amused me a good deal, so when I saw that Black Books was going to be on, I made a point of checking it out. That was some pretty funny stuff; the Brits and Irish certainly know how to do comedy better than anyone else. Now if only I had the money to buy some Blackadder DVDs ... Link 10 comments|Leave a comment

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