JAMES DELINGPOLE reviews Finko & Rickety's plans for free speech:
"Raymond – or Pinkie Finkie, as I'm sure he'd preferred it if I called him, because the Aussies do love a bit of informality, don't they? – has produced a report on media regulation in Australia so terrifyingly authoritarian it makes the Leveson Enquiry look like a model of balance, sanity and restraint. (According to Mark Steyn – via Jo Nova – the Chinese have been eyeing Pinkie Finkie's report with gobsmacked admiration, wondering whether they could ever get away with producing something quite so extreme…)
"You can read the full 400 pages here, if you're feeling masochistic. But Australian Climate Madness has a pretty good summary of the key issues of concern, starting with Pinkie Finkie's proposal to create a new super-regulator called the News Media Council [missed a trick there, didn't he? surely Ministry of Truth would have been more appropriate] which will impose its idea of fairness and balance not only on newspapers but even on blogs with as few hits as 15,000 a year.
"But whose idea of fairness and balance?
"It's an astonishing fact that of the 10600 submissions received by the inquiry no fewer than 9600 were boilerplate submissions from left-wing pressure groups, led by Avaaz 'a global civic organization launched in January 2007 that promotes activism on issues such as climate change, human rights, poverty and corruption.' (See Andrew Bolt for further details)"
The stink of Finko & Rickety's handiwork can be smelled on the other side of the world. At the University of Canberra, however, they may need some further reminders that a journalism professor who comes out for political censorship besmirches his employer's good name.
Readers who agree might care to drop a note to Stephen Parker, the university's vice-chancellor:
Once again, here are Prof Parker's contact details:
Phone: 02 6201 5000
Fax: 02 6201 5036
Email: Stephen.Parker@canberra.edu.au
Postal Address: University of Canberra ACT 2601
Executive Assistant: Ms Alexis Johnson
Phone : 02 6201 5000
Fax: 02 6201 5036
Email: Alexis.Johnson@canberra.edu.au
(Thanks to Spot The Dog)
With unfeigned respect Prof, I cannot fathom why you think that any correspondence of the kind you envisage would influence Parker to do anything at all about Rickety's tenure or behaviour at the former teacher's college at Belconnen. Other, that is, than to call him in to congratulate him on promoting the institution's brand as a 'progressive' body in the halls of government and the world of received opinion. What VC's like Parker do is the problem, not a source of a solution.
ReplyDeleteTrue, I'm afraid. As an example of the institution's ideological bent, Jon Stanhope was recently appointed to the UC as a 'professorial fellow'. According to a July 2011 press release, Stanhope: "will take on a varied role at UC, including teaching, research and strategic advice to Vice-Chancellor Stephen Parker".
DeleteStanhope is a lefty - most of his mental resources seemed to have been drawn from the duller editions of Green Left Weekly - but not perhaps as extreme as, er, 'quixotic' Troskyite John Passant, who also now lectures at UC.
Consuela Potez
I'm still waiting for a reply from him......
DeleteProf, from what I can tell the Chinese Government are dedicated to growing their economy while bringing everyone's unit cost of living down.
ReplyDeleteThe Australian government isn't.
It doesn't get anymore fundamental than this. Deserts are shrinking with increases in CO2 - aerial plant fertiliser. Improved water use efficiency means more plants in more places requiring less water for same growth; which affects albedo and rain distribution positively. The Chinese are growing their economy and shrinking their deserts and unit cost of living with our coal.
Now that's fundamentalism. Right wing extremism, ha?
Australia is being run by Gillard, Brown, Oakeshott and Windsor. Could you possibly conceive of a Michelle Grattan or a Mike Charlton saying anything that could threaten any of their personal lifestyle choices?
Prof - blessings or curses. If someone is "here" to "curse" this nation one doesn't fight it with "bows and arrows", "sticks and stones". Russia had Lenin, China had Mao, Europe had Napoleon, the middle east has Muhammed. Do you think any of this is new?
but thanks. The details help fill in the blanks even if the picture isn't changing.
[Victoria's desalt plant sits there like a great shrine honouring the Great Green River god - throw him your children and sing OMMMMM]
Boilerplate submissions for the Maestro Boilerplaters. Thanks to Ms. Gillard and her 'government' we are now a world laughing stock, as well as in clear and present danger at home from gathered local and international 5th columnists hijacking the grand old heritage of the Oz 4th Estate: an Estate comprising of the once respected writers of columns and column inches, plus all the little fishies swimming in the blogosphere and immense variety of birdies trilling on the airwaves.
ReplyDeleteAdditionally, thanks are due from all concerned to that noted intellectual institution The University of Canberra for nurturing and enabling a journalism professor of such stunning capabilities as to contribute to this assembled democratic wisdom. Clearly, this top Australian house of education aims to rival the University of East Anglia in international renown as a place of probity and respect.
I'm sorry but I couldn't agree more. The one place in this country (and most developed nations) where you can be sure of verbal and often physical attack if you dare to make any comment or express any idea which is not the required PC, multi-cultural permitted thought is our "hollowed" (pun intended) halls of academe. I'm not saying you shouldn't be writing to Parker but please make it sufficiently congratulatory on the ACT Teachers College support of PC Newthink that even he might get the point!
ReplyDeleteThought Id chuck in my 5 cents worth, heres the email I sent.
ReplyDeleteI am writing to inform you of a staff member who appears to favor the shutting down of unorthodox or unpopular enquiry in the media.
Universities were some of the strongest voices heard during episodes such as Jos’ Queensland, the Vietnam war and (nowadays) refugee policy. All of those went against the “norms” of the day, and it was only through the power of persuasion and being allowed to voice their opinions that public sentiment changed.
Now a person seeks to allow publishing of ALL sorts to be allowed only under government sufferance? And your institution employs this totalitarian enemy of free speech? Arent you alarmed your institution may be judged as anti free speech?
Ray Finkelstein is a learned fool and should be shunned by any institution which values free speech.
Imagine the 3 examples I quote above if only the government approved news/commentary was sanctioned?
Jo in Queensland, no Royal Commission.
Vietnam, no public dissent reported, longer engagement, more lost lives.
Refugee policy, I would argue the ABC has run an editorial campaign in support of refugees out of step with government policy for 15 years now. Would Australia be better off if it was forbidden from doing this?
I would be interested to hear your thoughts on why the ANU should support/employ a person who is Anti free speech. It may be an important “line in the sand” for the ANU to draw. It would not be necessary to expel or terminate the employment of the man, but a letter of censure or similar might focus his mind on the necessity of free speech.
Id rather an idiot “stormfront” person posted a stupid comment, and was shown to be an idiot in free debate, rather than a government banning what offends it. Free debate, and exposing ignorance for what it is is best.
There is an unfortunate tendency for people to cease arguing positions once they become mainstream, then expect the debate to be closed off, this ignores human nature.
Thank you, ********.
Mr. Mole,
DeleteExcept he isn't at ANU. Its the old Canberra Teacher's College. Now Canberra University.
Otherwise pretty much what I said, except I just called him a dick.
If someone was trying to take over the world, this would be a good start.
ReplyDeleteThough it'll certainly confuse The Lone Haranguer to have to gallop past someone's window and yell "The Fink is a King!"
Weak and inadequate "national socialist Fascist" "leaders"NEED to be protected from Justfied Criticism by "LAW" as they do not have the ability to "defend" their mistakes.
ReplyDeleteThis sort of rant from the rapidly retreating Right really makes me smile. Yelping dogs running with tails between their legs. Our side is winning at last, and the last vestiges of Right-think is fast being wound back. Your so-called free speech is of course your precious vehicle for ensuring that wrongful opinion gets promulgated throughout to muddy the waters of true morality. It's about time that issues like climate change, total sovereignty for aboriginals, the profit motive and the horrifying opposition to gay marriage and women's rights, to mention a few, are finally put away.
ReplyDeleteHammy: You have the whole parodic thing backwards. The game is to put this stuff up on leftoid sites, where they can't tell it from the real thing. Please don't do it here. The joke was thick to start with, and it has now worn very thin indeed.
DeleteLavatory Pronto would provide a good audience, as might Crikey or The Drum.
Any further posts like this they will not be published. Not censorship, sense-orship
What supreme hypocrisy!!!! Here you are screaming "free speech free speech" like a six-year old and you can't stand an opposing view. The Right really make me sick.
DeleteHe’s not the Right, he’s a Bunyip! And on their own blogs, Bunyips can do whatever they bloody like.
DeleteDo as gentle Bunyip has suggested and continue your ranting somewhere that your true intelligence and free speech is appreciated. And when the other mob takes government from the current Collection of Dunderheads and Tony appoints Alan Jones to oversee the new Media Police, I’ll take great delight in reporting you for calling me a dog.
Well,hammy, you are having vapors and screaming outrage all over the 'net...here and Catallaxy...so obviously you are not being censored unlike most left wing blogs where opposing views don't get the light of day.
DeleteThe Prof is right to get rid of you and Numbers. Those that would muzzle freedom of speech have just made their move and there is much to be discussed and exposed.
Trolls just suck the oxygen and derail the process and while it was amusing for a while, its time to go
hammy,
DeleteI'm delighted to se irony is not lost on you.
Yours,
The Lone Haranguer.
Bunyip, I know hammy is a frustrating fool troll but you should keep your usual calm.
DeleteThe more he rants, the more we laugh.
I know it's your site and you have every right to ban anyone; but hammy's latest rant doesn't cross over to what should be censored. He's just a dill.
Free speech includes the right to be wrong and annoying.
By the way, I really enjoyed your defence of free speech opus.
The point about Hammy, as the Professor clearly realises, is that he is fake. He is simply a stereotype of what conservatives like to believe about the left. It's an obvious attempt just to push as many righty buttons as possible in as few words as possible. Why Hammy does it I don't know, but it really doesn't work, whatever his motivation is.
DeleteWe will see how wrong "the hamster "is on the 24 th March ,when the "national socialists"are HAMMERED in Queensland ! And then again when the
ReplyDeletePeople, DESTROY the useless GiLIARd mob ! Bye bye "socialism"
power To The Real People! ,
Prof,
ReplyDeleteThis may go against your principles but, may I suggest banning numbers. I suspect he uses your site and at least two others to entice people to his own.
Apart from that, if he is banned, he might then see where we are heading with the recommendations of his beloved media inquiry.
In which case, I cannot see he would have a thing to complain about.
Have you seen numbers' site?
DeleteIt's like he got a certificate in Boring from the Boring Teachers' College in Boring.
Not even worth trolling.
Numbers served in a non-combat capacity in Vietnam in 1969-ish, anyway late in the war, 7-9RAR, was a conscript who never got over the unfairness of not being able to fire a shot in anger. Conventional wisdom has it he was in the catering corps, peeling spuds and filling dixies for the men who had actually been out in the scrub on operations.
DeleteIt's believed he returned to Oz just in time for the Whitlam brainfart, found his natural level as a belated Simon Townsend, and embraced his numbers as the epicentre of his bitterness, then proceeded to train as a teacher and inflict himself on a generation of unsuspecting children.
Now, in retirement, he inflicts himself on the blogosphere.
Numbers, get over yourself and leave the rest of us alone, as my husband and many of his mates with army numbers have done. They're over it, so why aren't you?
Precisely what do I have to get over - do tell.
DeleteMy posting as a rifleman in 5 platoon, B Coy 7RAR, participation in operations during my tour, my successful rehabilitation as a teacher of students with disabilities, my completion (part-time - teaching by day - studying in the evening) of two degrees and further post graduate qualifications in this field, my work in rural and remote education (for which I received an award in 1996), my appointments as principal of a number of schools, my work in regional management positions and my retirement after 40 years to continue to work a part-time rural consultancy?
You're the one exhibiting bitterness by ad hominem attacks because I disagree with you.
Get over it.
Ham Person - you are still able to post your mindless rants on Catallaxy Files, where a suitable culture is available for them to get the extremely robust derision they deserve (people are more polite here in the company of the august Professor Bunyip); but even on the Cat, serially mindless yah-boo-sucks trolling is eventually rejected.
ReplyDeleteWhat you completely fail to see Hammy is that free speech has everything to do with the right to hold a 'wrongful' opinion and to argue for it (note that second part, because you give no arguments for your opinions, just declarations). Nevertheless you are free to express your opinions and declarations. No less a thinker than Voltaire suggested he would die for your right to spout nonsense.
Onya Prof
ReplyDeleteThat moral coward and vacuum Hammygar has to go!
He seriously lowers the tone of any blog he infests
Mark Leibler trying to change the constitution, Raymond Finkelstein attempting to do a way with frre speech. Why an inquisitive fellow might start asking questions.
ReplyDeletePerfessor, the troll hammygar is a fascist like the Henry Gibson character in The Blues Brothers. The scary bit is that he IS the intellect of the Brown Government, which now appears to be unrestrained in its ambition to jackboot the whole country and its institutions, the ALP under Gillard having become a balloon fart like GetUp that is unrecognisable from its former identity of even five years ago. I am now actually very depressed about the future of this country. But I don't think you should ban trolls, except for ad hom insults (which you have previously allowed through).
ReplyDelete