20 ms·

I'm always kind of surprised by people who move to Australia. It's a country that has had an active policy of censorship on entertainment for a very long time -

I'm always kind of surprised by people who move to Australia. It's a country that has had an active policy of censorship on entertainment for a very long time - books, video games, movies. The fact that the populace is okay with such a policy would make me reconsider moving there. I've also read some really questionable things about policies regarding aboriginals in the northern territories. In 2007 the government 'temporarily' banned alcohol and porn for aboriginals as an 'emergency' measure.[0] And apparently it, or some replacement, is still in effect.[1] Edit: also, turns out that banning alcohol doesn't get rid of alcohol consumption.[2] Who knew? [0] https://www.theguardian.com/world/2007/jun/21/australia.jamessturcke https://www.theguardian.com/world/2007/jun/21/australia.jame... [1] https://www.abc.net.au/news/2020-08-17/nt-police-commissioner-calls-for-rethink-of-alcohol-ban/12565756 https://www.abc.net.au/news/2020-08-17/nt-police-commissione... [2] https://www.abc.net.au/news/2021-07-07/qld-mornington-island-indigenous-community-wants-alcohol-back/100237374 https://www.abc.net.au/news/2021-07-07/qld-mornington-island...

bin_bash 5y ago
Well to be fair the US bans alcohol for native eskimos in the Alaskan bush. EDIT: I guess in the 1980s the government allowed the villages to make their own decisions to be dry or not: https://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2015/09/is-prohibition-a-good-idea-after-all/405028/ https://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2015/09/is-proh...
- animal_spirits 5y ago
  Interesting. I found this: > ABSTRACT: When Alaska became a state in 1959, state laws removed control of alcohol regulation from the federal government and Native communities. In 1981, however, the state legislature changed alcohol laws to give residents broad powers to regulate how alcohol comes into their communities via a local option referendum. By mid-1999, 112 small communities had held 197 alcohol control elections under the state law. Sixty-nine percent of these elections added new restrictions on alcohol, while 13% removed restrictions previously imposed. The remaining 18% of elections did not receive a majority vote needed to change the existing status. Most communities passing local option restrictions chose to ban sale and importation. Although most of these elections occurred during the first eight years after the law was passed, elections continue to occur as the law evolves and as communities debate the merits of alcohol control. Although growing evidence suggests that the local option law may reduce adverse effects of alcohol abuse in Alaska Native communities, its most important contribution may be to restore to these communities a limited form of self-government. [0] https://iseralaska.org/static/legacy_publication_links/Alcohol_Arctic.pdf https://iseralaska.org/static/legacy_publication_links/Alcoh...
  - bin_bash 5y ago
    thanks for pointing that out, I edited my original comment to reflect that this isn't imposed on them anymore.
- ocschwar 5y ago
  And any reservation where the tribal council votes to go dry, the Federal government will enforce it. (Well, to the extent that it will, you know, actually spend the money to have BIA police officers assigned to that Rez.)
  - bin_bash 5y ago
    Is that enforcement a positive thing or not?
    - ocschwar 5y ago
      Life on a Rez is so outside my experience that I'm not going to second guess tribal politicians on it.
cenophor 5y ago
You can say the same things about a lot of things in many countries, someone can probably say the same about the one you live in. I suspect the censorship that you talk about are not as black and white as you seem to be trying to project. It's easy to cherry-pick the things that you don't like to get your own view across. Not really sure what you are trying to achieve here than to push your own personal viewpoints on things that you don't like? I mean, I could say something like "I'm always kind of surprised by people who want to move to the US because the lack of gun laws", and what does that achieve?
- JesseWright 5y ago
  > Not really sure what you are trying to achieve here than to push your own personal viewpoints on things that you don't like? I mean, I could say something like "I'm always kind of surprised by people who want to move to the US because the lack of gun laws", and what does that achieve? The previous post simply engaged the original with additional comments on why someone might not want to move to Australia. You could always counter with your own thoughts on the matter. This is a place to discuss ideas. The post hardly felt pushy to me, and I don’t understand the skepticism of the poster’s intentions.
  - cenophor 5y ago
    > The post hardly felt pushy to me, and I don’t understand the skepticism of the poster’s intentions. Two things that lead me to thinking that: * Blanket statement on censorship without providing further details and references * Picking a policy that affects a small part of the population and referencing articles that already say that many experts already find problematic I think it's great that you could read the comment with good intentions, but the way that the details are presented and cherry-picked doesn't sit right with me. I can only agree to disagree on your point that's just part of how we communicate.
- pessimizer 5y ago
  > I suspect the censorship that you talk about We're on the internet, you can look it up.
Barrin92 5y ago
>that the populace is okay with such a policy would make me reconsider moving there When I had to decide for a job relocation whether I should move to the UK or to the US I had many issues in mind, wages, safety, public transport, childcare, culture but I'm gonna be honest 'censorship in videogames' wasn't very high on the list. Not to mention that the discourse in regards to Australia seems incredibly hyperbolic in contrast to more strict countries like Singapore or China, which actually have significant limits on freedom of expression, and even in those countries for the average middle-class person it is almost irrelevant compared to safety, income, housing, and whatever else.
- fomine3 5y ago
  I'd like to say it just 'censorship' than 'censorship in videogames'. OP said 'books, video games, movies' so it seems that every media can be censored in the future.
- eru 5y ago
  Well, I wouldn't mention Singapore in the same sentence as China here. But I see your point.
monkeycantype 5y ago
Like everything, the reality is more complex up close. We've never had to think too hard about what underpinned our prosperity, about the law that underpinned our freedoms, because they never failed too badly, for too many people. Perhaps we've had as much law as we needed, and when things chafed we have pushed for changes? Australia has no official right to the kinds of freedoms you're discussing, but those books and movies were here. Economically Australia has always been top at nothing, top 10 in everything, and that prosperity meant people were free to choose a life they wanted and live free of coercion. Like the poster above, I fear we're embedding an inequality we don't have the will to resolve. But that's been the perpetual fear, that the luck has finally run out. I don't agree with the 'Intervention' the measures you mention in Aboriginal communities, but not because it restricted rights, because I think Aboriginal communities must be allowed to define how individual rights and collective obligations are balanced in their communities. I disagree with it because I don't believe it was driven by Indigenous people. Colonisation dropped a new worldview and law onto an existing civilisation and imposed it with genocide. Indigenous civilisation has different conceptions of duty and rights. If Non Indigenous Australia manages to build a new relationship with Indigenous Australians, I might feel I have the right to form my own opinions, but for now I don't think it's possible for me to understand enough to understand what is right for Indigenous communities, that has to be Indigenous led. I detest the government that brought in the intervention, but in doing so they were supported by senior Indigenous leaders whom I respect. https://www.abc.net.au/lateline/leigh-sales-talks-to-director-of-the-cape-york/81778 https://www.abc.net.au/lateline/leigh-sales-talks-to-directo... https://www.smh.com.au/national/its-time-to-stop-playing-politics-with-vulnerable-lives-20071130-gdrprf.html?page=fullpage#contentSwap1 https://www.smh.com.au/national/its-time-to-stop-playing-pol...
Nursie 5y ago
The ban on alcohol in some communities is (AFAICT) welcomed by those communities, which have massive problems with it. There are laws in other states which allow people to declare their house a “dry place” which is then enforceable by law, to try to stop anyone from bringing alcohol into the house. I can’t tell you whether any of these measures work, but they aren’t implemented for reasons of racist suppression, from what I can tell. Also no idea on the porn bans. I’ve just moved to Australia, for the second time. The censorship you talk about is trivial and easily worked around (Video game didn’t get approved for sale? Order in from New Zealand or Hong Kong) The populace isn’t so much OK with the policy as unaffected by it. These policies usually come from SA and are usually rooted in religion, which still seems to hold sway there. The appeal of Aus to this Brit is that it has space, so much space, and sunshine. And it’s not as downright crazy as the USA (guns, employment rights, healthcare etc)
- SV_BubbleTime 5y ago
  So your points arethat “some people like authoritarian measures” and “the censorship isn’t bad because today you can get around it”. Sounds like you have a vested interest in not realizing what these new laws mean for you.
  - Nursie 5y ago
    I think the idea that the alcohol rules are authoritarian is misplaced and it’s more complicated than your summation. To have an informed debate you would need to be familiar with the situation on the ground, which I am only in passing, and (respectfully) I suspect you are not at all. The “censorship” is not really any worse than the UK’s BBFC. I know what these laws mean for me because I’ve lived here before. They mean very little.
  - eru 5y ago
    > So your points arethat “some people like authoritarian measures” and [...] Well, that's how democracy is supposed to work, ain't it?
    - 5y ago
AussieWog93 5y ago
That's such a bizarre take. I would love to meet these immigrants that care more about whether or not there is gore in Left 4 Dead 2 than social stability, health care, education and economic opportunities.
yesenadam 5y ago
> I'm always kind of surprised by people who move to Australia. It's a country that has had an active policy of censorship on entertainment for a very long time - books, video games, movies. The fact that the populace is okay with such a policy would make me reconsider moving there. That seems very bizarre to me. I'm not sure what you're talking about here exactly, what you've heard/read. Compared to which countries? Where are you, that censorship in Australia seems like a dealbreaker, or a way of feeling so superior? How would 'it' affect you at all? "The fact that the populace is okay with such a policy" - is it a fact, or your guess? (Personally, the apparent US movie/TV morality of genitals or swearing being forbidden, but someone shooting peoples' heads off by the dozen being absolutely fine, seems crazy to me. The other way around would be far more sensible. At least for childrens' viewing.) p.s. I just learned more than I ever knew about a history of censorship in Australia by reading https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_films_banned_in_Australia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_films_banned_in_Austra...
- slavik81 5y ago
  Age ratings in Australia are legally mandated, but the rating agency regularly refuses classification to video games. Until 2013, it was illegal to publish a video game unsuitable for 15-year-olds. The introduction of R18 for video games was a step forward, but it seems to be backsliding again. In 2019, Hotline Miami was prohibited from being re-released. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_banned_video_games_in_Australia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_banned_video_games_in_...
- JimTheMan 5y ago
  For the day to day, actual lived life of an Australian, I can't think of any media I want that I cannot get.
  - partomniscient 5y ago
    There's a lot of media we can get that we don't want though...
haihaibye 5y ago
The USA has dozens of dry counties, most famously the home county of Jack Daniel's.
laurent92 5y ago
> In 2007 the government 'temporarily' banned alcohol and porn for aboriginals as an 'emergency' measure.[0] And apparently it, or some replacement, is still in effect.[1] In 1976 France implemented a temporary permission to abortion, just to hedge the wave. A lot of social rights come from temporary laws that were never deactivated.
- selcuka 5y ago
  To be fair temporary permissions are harder to take back. It's not the same as a temporary ban.
fancy_hammer 5y ago
> I'm always kind of surprised by people who move to Australia. It's a country that has had an active policy of censorship on entertainment for a very long time - books, video games, movies. The fact that the populace is okay with such a policy would make me reconsider moving there. On my list of things to be concerned about as an Australian, censorship of media is pretty low down. It's not something we run up against in day to day life.
- BelenusMordred 5y ago
  > It's not something we run up against in day to day life. Perhaps consider that instead you just don't hear about it? Australia has some of the harshest defamation laws on the planet and journalists routinely self-censor. When evidence of Australian war crimes in Afghanistan came out the federal police raided the ABC head office taking hordes of hard drives and documents trying to find out who was the whistleblower. None of the evidence presented by the ABC was ever contested and has subsequently been proven true. The raid has been deemed entirely valid under Australian law. Maybe that doesn't bother you, but it's clear that investigative journalism in Australia runs the same risks as many basketcase countries. https://www.theguardian.com/media/2020/feb/17/federal-police-raid-on-abc-over-afghan-files-ruled-valid https://www.theguardian.com/media/2020/feb/17/federal-police...

bin_bash 5y ago

Well to be fair the US bans alcohol for native eskimos in the Alaskan bush. EDIT: I guess in the 1980s the government allowed the villages to make their own decisions to be dry or not: https://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2015/09/is-prohibition-a-good-idea-after-all/405028/ https://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2015/09/is-proh...

animal_spirits 5y ago
Interesting. I found this: > ABSTRACT: When Alaska became a state in 1959, state laws removed control of alcohol regulation from the federal government and Native communities. In 1981, however, the state legislature changed alcohol laws to give residents broad powers to regulate how alcohol comes into their communities via a local option referendum. By mid-1999, 112 small communities had held 197 alcohol control elections under the state law. Sixty-nine percent of these elections added new restrictions on alcohol, while 13% removed restrictions previously imposed. The remaining 18% of elections did not receive a majority vote needed to change the existing status. Most communities passing local option restrictions chose to ban sale and importation. Although most of these elections occurred during the first eight years after the law was passed, elections continue to occur as the law evolves and as communities debate the merits of alcohol control. Although growing evidence suggests that the local option law may reduce adverse effects of alcohol abuse in Alaska Native communities, its most important contribution may be to restore to these communities a limited form of self-government. [0] https://iseralaska.org/static/legacy_publication_links/Alcohol_Arctic.pdf https://iseralaska.org/static/legacy_publication_links/Alcoh...
- bin_bash 5y ago
  thanks for pointing that out, I edited my original comment to reflect that this isn't imposed on them anymore.
ocschwar 5y ago
And any reservation where the tribal council votes to go dry, the Federal government will enforce it. (Well, to the extent that it will, you know, actually spend the money to have BIA police officers assigned to that Rez.)
- bin_bash 5y ago
  Is that enforcement a positive thing or not?
  - ocschwar 5y ago
    Life on a Rez is so outside my experience that I'm not going to second guess tribal politicians on it.

cenophor 5y ago

You can say the same things about a lot of things in many countries, someone can probably say the same about the one you live in. I suspect the censorship that you talk about are not as black and white as you seem to be trying to project. It's easy to cherry-pick the things that you don't like to get your own view across. Not really sure what you are trying to achieve here than to push your own personal viewpoints on things that you don't like? I mean, I could say something like "I'm always kind of surprised by people who want to move to the US because the lack of gun laws", and what does that achieve?

JesseWright 5y ago
> Not really sure what you are trying to achieve here than to push your own personal viewpoints on things that you don't like? I mean, I could say something like "I'm always kind of surprised by people who want to move to the US because the lack of gun laws", and what does that achieve? The previous post simply engaged the original with additional comments on why someone might not want to move to Australia. You could always counter with your own thoughts on the matter. This is a place to discuss ideas. The post hardly felt pushy to me, and I don’t understand the skepticism of the poster’s intentions.
- cenophor 5y ago
  > The post hardly felt pushy to me, and I don’t understand the skepticism of the poster’s intentions. Two things that lead me to thinking that: * Blanket statement on censorship without providing further details and references * Picking a policy that affects a small part of the population and referencing articles that already say that many experts already find problematic I think it's great that you could read the comment with good intentions, but the way that the details are presented and cherry-picked doesn't sit right with me. I can only agree to disagree on your point that's just part of how we communicate.
pessimizer 5y ago
> I suspect the censorship that you talk about We're on the internet, you can look it up.

Barrin92 5y ago

>that the populace is okay with such a policy would make me reconsider moving there When I had to decide for a job relocation whether I should move to the UK or to the US I had many issues in mind, wages, safety, public transport, childcare, culture but I'm gonna be honest 'censorship in videogames' wasn't very high on the list. Not to mention that the discourse in regards to Australia seems incredibly hyperbolic in contrast to more strict countries like Singapore or China, which actually have significant limits on freedom of expression, and even in those countries for the average middle-class person it is almost irrelevant compared to safety, income, housing, and whatever else.

fomine3 5y ago
I'd like to say it just 'censorship' than 'censorship in videogames'. OP said 'books, video games, movies' so it seems that every media can be censored in the future.
eru 5y ago
Well, I wouldn't mention Singapore in the same sentence as China here. But I see your point.

monkeycantype 5y ago

Like everything, the reality is more complex up close. We've never had to think too hard about what underpinned our prosperity, about the law that underpinned our freedoms, because they never failed too badly, for too many people. Perhaps we've had as much law as we needed, and when things chafed we have pushed for changes? Australia has no official right to the kinds of freedoms you're discussing, but those books and movies were here. Economically Australia has always been top at nothing, top 10 in everything, and that prosperity meant people were free to choose a life they wanted and live free of coercion. Like the poster above, I fear we're embedding an inequality we don't have the will to resolve. But that's been the perpetual fear, that the luck has finally run out. I don't agree with the 'Intervention' the measures you mention in Aboriginal communities, but not because it restricted rights, because I think Aboriginal communities must be allowed to define how individual rights and collective obligations are balanced in their communities. I disagree with it because I don't believe it was driven by Indigenous people. Colonisation dropped a new worldview and law onto an existing civilisation and imposed it with genocide. Indigenous civilisation has different conceptions of duty and rights. If Non Indigenous Australia manages to build a new relationship with Indigenous Australians, I might feel I have the right to form my own opinions, but for now I don't think it's possible for me to understand enough to understand what is right for Indigenous communities, that has to be Indigenous led. I detest the government that brought in the intervention, but in doing so they were supported by senior Indigenous leaders whom I respect. https://www.abc.net.au/lateline/leigh-sales-talks-to-director-of-the-cape-york/81778 https://www.abc.net.au/lateline/leigh-sales-talks-to-directo... https://www.smh.com.au/national/its-time-to-stop-playing-politics-with-vulnerable-lives-20071130-gdrprf.html?page=fullpage#contentSwap1 https://www.smh.com.au/national/its-time-to-stop-playing-pol...

Nursie 5y ago

The ban on alcohol in some communities is (AFAICT) welcomed by those communities, which have massive problems with it. There are laws in other states which allow people to declare their house a “dry place” which is then enforceable by law, to try to stop anyone from bringing alcohol into the house. I can’t tell you whether any of these measures work, but they aren’t implemented for reasons of racist suppression, from what I can tell. Also no idea on the porn bans. I’ve just moved to Australia, for the second time. The censorship you talk about is trivial and easily worked around (Video game didn’t get approved for sale? Order in from New Zealand or Hong Kong) The populace isn’t so much OK with the policy as unaffected by it. These policies usually come from SA and are usually rooted in religion, which still seems to hold sway there. The appeal of Aus to this Brit is that it has space, so much space, and sunshine. And it’s not as downright crazy as the USA (guns, employment rights, healthcare etc)

SV_BubbleTime 5y ago
So your points arethat “some people like authoritarian measures” and “the censorship isn’t bad because today you can get around it”. Sounds like you have a vested interest in not realizing what these new laws mean for you.
- Nursie 5y ago
  I think the idea that the alcohol rules are authoritarian is misplaced and it’s more complicated than your summation. To have an informed debate you would need to be familiar with the situation on the ground, which I am only in passing, and (respectfully) I suspect you are not at all. The “censorship” is not really any worse than the UK’s BBFC. I know what these laws mean for me because I’ve lived here before. They mean very little.
- eru 5y ago
  > So your points arethat “some people like authoritarian measures” and [...] Well, that's how democracy is supposed to work, ain't it?
  - 5y ago

AussieWog93 5y ago

That's such a bizarre take. I would love to meet these immigrants that care more about whether or not there is gore in Left 4 Dead 2 than social stability, health care, education and economic opportunities.

yesenadam 5y ago

> I'm always kind of surprised by people who move to Australia. It's a country that has had an active policy of censorship on entertainment for a very long time - books, video games, movies. The fact that the populace is okay with such a policy would make me reconsider moving there. That seems very bizarre to me. I'm not sure what you're talking about here exactly, what you've heard/read. Compared to which countries? Where are you, that censorship in Australia seems like a dealbreaker, or a way of feeling so superior? How would 'it' affect you at all? "The fact that the populace is okay with such a policy" - is it a fact, or your guess? (Personally, the apparent US movie/TV morality of genitals or swearing being forbidden, but someone shooting peoples' heads off by the dozen being absolutely fine, seems crazy to me. The other way around would be far more sensible. At least for childrens' viewing.) p.s. I just learned more than I ever knew about a history of censorship in Australia by reading https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_films_banned_in_Australia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_films_banned_in_Austra...

slavik81 5y ago
Age ratings in Australia are legally mandated, but the rating agency regularly refuses classification to video games. Until 2013, it was illegal to publish a video game unsuitable for 15-year-olds. The introduction of R18 for video games was a step forward, but it seems to be backsliding again. In 2019, Hotline Miami was prohibited from being re-released. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_banned_video_games_in_Australia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_banned_video_games_in_...
JimTheMan 5y ago
For the day to day, actual lived life of an Australian, I can't think of any media I want that I cannot get.
- partomniscient 5y ago
  There's a lot of media we can get that we don't want though...

haihaibye 5y ago

The USA has dozens of dry counties, most famously the home county of Jack Daniel's.

laurent92 5y ago

> In 2007 the government 'temporarily' banned alcohol and porn for aboriginals as an 'emergency' measure.[0] And apparently it, or some replacement, is still in effect.[1] In 1976 France implemented a temporary permission to abortion, just to hedge the wave. A lot of social rights come from temporary laws that were never deactivated.

selcuka 5y ago
To be fair temporary permissions are harder to take back. It's not the same as a temporary ban.

fancy_hammer 5y ago

BelenusMordred 5y ago
> It's not something we run up against in day to day life. Perhaps consider that instead you just don't hear about it? Australia has some of the harshest defamation laws on the planet and journalists routinely self-censor. When evidence of Australian war crimes in Afghanistan came out the federal police raided the ABC head office taking hordes of hard drives and documents trying to find out who was the whistleblower. None of the evidence presented by the ABC was ever contested and has subsequently been proven true. The raid has been deemed entirely valid under Australian law. Maybe that doesn't bother you, but it's clear that investigative journalism in Australia runs the same risks as many basketcase countries. https://www.theguardian.com/media/2020/feb/17/federal-police-raid-on-abc-over-afghan-files-ruled-valid https://www.theguardian.com/media/2020/feb/17/federal-police...