It’s clear Lifehacker readers think the plan to make Internet censorship mandatory in Australia in 2010 is a deeply stupid idea. While there may be ways of working around the filter, not having the filter would clearly be a better idea. How can you effectively make your views known?
We’ve assembled below some ideas on what to do to protest the law, which is still some months from hitting Parliament. Many of the ideas come from the No Clean Feed site’s Take Action page, while others come from Twitter or reader suggestions. (On Twitter, the #nocleanfeed tag is especially useful.)
Get informed on the issues
Pro-censorship argument often seem to boil down “people who disagree with this concept are pro-child-porn”, but there’s no reason to sink to that level. Over at Gizmodo, Nick’s rounded up a heap of useful reading on why the proposal is so flawed, which is good ammunition if you do run into someone who wants to have a sensible discussion on the topic.
Protest to your local member of Parliament
They’re your representative, so make sure they know your views. For maximum effect, try calling and sending a (snail mail) letter as well. You can find contact details for all current parliamentarians via this link. While there are lots of online petitions doing the rounds, grass-roots activism remains an important step.
Protest to relevant Senators
Any legislation will have to pass both houses of Parliament, and (as recent climate change developments have shown) is where any legislation is likely to get held up or ignored entirely. The No Clean Feed site lists the relevant Senators on all sides of politics covering communications issues. Crikey has some useful extra advice on how to write to politicians.
Talk to family and friends
Chances are that your non-geek friends and rellies either don’t know the law is proposed, or think that anything that’s designed to crack down on online child abuse is worth trying no matter what the consequences. Explaining exactly what the issues are — in particular, that the proposed regime would give the government a means of shutting down access to views it disagrees with on any topic — makes it harder to characterise opponents as a nerdy minority and/or perverts.
What other protest tactics are you exploring? Share them in the comments.
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