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If you're wondering why this kind of thing happens all the time in Australia, the late Donald Horne summed it up beautifully in the 1960s: "Australia is a luck

If you're wondering why this kind of thing happens all the time in Australia, the late Donald Horne summed it up beautifully in the 1960s: "Australia is a lucky country run mainly by second rate people who share its luck" [1] Australia has many intelligent, brilliant people. For some reason, the design of our political system results in almost none of them getting into Government. This awful, fundamentally flawed law (literally only passed into law because our opposition was terrified of being called "soft on crime" in the media over Christmas) is just one in a long line of disappointments. 1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Lucky_Country https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Lucky_Country

tomatotomato37 8y ago
Don't worry, that pretty much describes all of western government. If they aren't trying to spy on their own people, they're getting into slapfights over social media corporations or invading random third world countries "Democracy is the worst form of government, except for all the others"
erentz 8y ago
Maybe. But I really-really wish we had Australia’s STV system here in the USA.
- JadeNB 8y ago
  What is Australia's STV system? I went Googling a bit, and the only quick hit was https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/STV_(TV_station) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/STV_(TV_station) , which seems unlikely to be what you meant.
  - khr 8y ago
    erentz was probably referring to the single transferable vote system (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Single_transferable_vote https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Single_transferable_vote), which uses a ranked ballot in elections and results in relatively proportional representation. CGP grey explains it pretty well: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l8XOZJkozfI https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l8XOZJkozfI
    - JadeNB 8y ago
      Thanks! That makes much more sense than a TV station.
testvox 8y ago
See also https://independentaustralia.net/life/life-display/queensland-polices-orwellian-fixated-persons-unit,11395 https://independentaustralia.net/life/life-display/queenslan... https://mobile.twitter.com/1EarthMedia/status/963656364387168263 https://mobile.twitter.com/1EarthMedia/status/96365636438716...
kodablah 8y ago
From a selfish American-centric perspective, sometimes it feels like different west-aligned countries/regions use these attempts as test beds to gauge acceptableness in other countries/regions.
- majormajor 8y ago
  I worry "grand conspiracy" views distract from the problem of public opinion often being in favor of the bad ideas. After Snowden I had a couple people I barely knew comment to me something like I should "stop there from being more Snowdens" as a software developer, since they saw it in very simplistic terms as "my country = good, this guy = sabotaging my country" but I didn't run into anyone offline who shared the privacy-conscious reaction with me. I think that explains why these things pop up everywhere much more simply. And without changing that perception, the other battles seem like losing fights.
  - kodablah 8y ago
    > I worry "grand conspiracy" views distract from the problem of public opinion often being in favor of the bad ideas. The cynic in me is not concerned because I feel public opinion can be swayed and/or the issue is not the biggest/most-important issue in representative democracies. I admit being overly cynical on the importance of public opinion and therefore my disagreement efforts manifest more in counteracting technologies than politicking (and even then, the efforts are little and of limited consequence).
- plugger 8y ago
  Isn't that exactly what has happened here? IIRC there was a Five Eyes get together not too long ago where they all decided this was the direction they should follow and Australia would take the lead. https://www.arnnet.com.au/article/621107/australia-looks-lead-five-eyes-encryption-discussion/ https://www.arnnet.com.au/article/621107/australia-looks-lea... https://www.itnews.com.au/news/five-eyes-nations-to-force-encryption-backdoors-511865 https://www.itnews.com.au/news/five-eyes-nations-to-force-en...
simonebrunozzi 8y ago
I'm from Italy originally, and visited Australia several times. Your comment could be applied to Italy verbatim :(

tomatotomato37 8y ago

Don't worry, that pretty much describes all of western government. If they aren't trying to spy on their own people, they're getting into slapfights over social media corporations or invading random third world countries "Democracy is the worst form of government, except for all the others"

erentz 8y ago

Maybe. But I really-really wish we had Australia’s STV system here in the USA.

JadeNB 8y ago
What is Australia's STV system? I went Googling a bit, and the only quick hit was https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/STV_(TV_station) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/STV_(TV_station) , which seems unlikely to be what you meant.
- khr 8y ago
  erentz was probably referring to the single transferable vote system (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Single_transferable_vote https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Single_transferable_vote), which uses a ranked ballot in elections and results in relatively proportional representation. CGP grey explains it pretty well: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l8XOZJkozfI https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l8XOZJkozfI
  - JadeNB 8y ago
    Thanks! That makes much more sense than a TV station.

testvox 8y ago

See also https://independentaustralia.net/life/life-display/queensland-polices-orwellian-fixated-persons-unit,11395 https://independentaustralia.net/life/life-display/queenslan... https://mobile.twitter.com/1EarthMedia/status/963656364387168263 https://mobile.twitter.com/1EarthMedia/status/96365636438716...

kodablah 8y ago

From a selfish American-centric perspective, sometimes it feels like different west-aligned countries/regions use these attempts as test beds to gauge acceptableness in other countries/regions.

majormajor 8y ago
I worry "grand conspiracy" views distract from the problem of public opinion often being in favor of the bad ideas. After Snowden I had a couple people I barely knew comment to me something like I should "stop there from being more Snowdens" as a software developer, since they saw it in very simplistic terms as "my country = good, this guy = sabotaging my country" but I didn't run into anyone offline who shared the privacy-conscious reaction with me. I think that explains why these things pop up everywhere much more simply. And without changing that perception, the other battles seem like losing fights.
- kodablah 8y ago
  > I worry "grand conspiracy" views distract from the problem of public opinion often being in favor of the bad ideas. The cynic in me is not concerned because I feel public opinion can be swayed and/or the issue is not the biggest/most-important issue in representative democracies. I admit being overly cynical on the importance of public opinion and therefore my disagreement efforts manifest more in counteracting technologies than politicking (and even then, the efforts are little and of limited consequence).
plugger 8y ago
Isn't that exactly what has happened here? IIRC there was a Five Eyes get together not too long ago where they all decided this was the direction they should follow and Australia would take the lead. https://www.arnnet.com.au/article/621107/australia-looks-lead-five-eyes-encryption-discussion/ https://www.arnnet.com.au/article/621107/australia-looks-lea... https://www.itnews.com.au/news/five-eyes-nations-to-force-encryption-backdoors-511865 https://www.itnews.com.au/news/five-eyes-nations-to-force-en...

simonebrunozzi 8y ago

I'm from Italy originally, and visited Australia several times. Your comment could be applied to Italy verbatim :(