Dear Gormless Youth of Canberra. Get registered to vote you fools

Truthiness said :

Wasn’t he saying that possession of child porn isn’t the same thing as actual sex with children? .

Breathtaking in your avoidance of responsibility. If you’re typical of the internet “freedom fighters” then bring on censorship, say I. Possession of child porn means some child has been abused and exploited. The children in those images. If you possess those images, you are complicit.
It is highly unlikely that unsolicited child pornography will “find its way into your inbox”. I expect it is expensive (being risky) to purchase. I expect police forensic scientists could discover on your behalf whether you had actually clicked on that child porn. I expect that would be a defence if you ended up in court.

dtc said :

One (or the main) benefit of compulsory voting:

– with voluntary voting, the key is to get people to vote. So you appeal to the basest instincts, the radical people who have strong views about something (usually being something relating to tax or ‘morality’) and who want their views enforced across society. Hence abortion being a major issue in US politics and a nothing issue here

– with compulsory voting, you are appealing to the people ‘in the middle’ ie who dont have strong views one way or the other and are willing to swing vote. So all politics get moderated, because you are after the ‘moderates’.

Dont know about you, but I like having politics arguing about the middle ground. Can you imagine Tony Abbott if he had to spend his time appealling to the extremes of his party?

I thought he already was.

Still, I agree. One of the reasons that the US is in the mess it’s in is because most of the people at the bottom of the heap don’t vote. Here, at least there’s a culture of voting and even people who feel disempowered probably give at least a tiny bit of thought to who they’re going to vote for, even if they vote above the line.

pirate_taco said :

c_c – you are obviously referring to the following articles written by Falkvinge
http://falkvinge.net/2012/09/07/three-reasons-child-porn-must-be-re-legalized-in-the-coming-decade/
http://falkvinge.net/2012/09/11/child-porn-laws-arent-as-bad-as-you-think-theyre-much-much-worse/

Rick Falkvinge is the founder of the Swedish Pirate Party, which was the first Pirate Party worldwide.
He is no longer involved in the Swedish Pirate Party.

Pirate Party Australia does not advocate the legalisation of child pornography,
Rick Falkvinge is not a spokesperson or representative of any Pirate Party.

Pirate Party you need to go further than simply distancing yourselves from Falkvinge. You would be wise to let the Canberra community know, unequivocally, that you draw the line on internet freedom at kiddie porn. Otherwise I, and no doubt many others, will assume that you may be inclined to make exploited, abused children collateral damage in the freedom debate.

Wasn’t he saying that possession of child porn isn’t the same thing as actual sex with children? In an age where any image can be hidden in practically any file, how can we be sure that merely having a banned file is really evidence of guilt? How can anyone who downloads porn be sure that all of the “models” in a given collection are over age?

Seems like our current child porn laws were written by people who are scared of technology and don’t understand the medium they are regulating. I mean, A cups and female ejaculation are banned, even porn comics about the Simpsons are banned. All of this fails to recognise that any individual could come into possession of this stuff without even knowing.

Let’s say I go to a friend’s place and trade hard drives, firstly the entire concept of sharing is illegal, which is ridiculous. Secondly, if I grab a directory of comics without vetting them, the same thing my friend did when she downloaded them, suddenly I could be a child pornographer too?

Let’s say I’m looking for a PDF for online study, I find a torrent with a zip with the right name and download it, suddenly I get distracted and never open or look at that file again. That file could be overflowing with child porn and I wouldn’t know, and since torrents seed auto magically, within a few weeks I am guilty of distributing child porn to thousands of people.

What if I’m browsing along, when a wild child porn pop-up appears, I close it as quick as I can, but it is too late, the image is in my browser cache and I am now unknowingly in possession of child porn.

I put it to you that it is unreasonable to assume the average person has any idea what is or isn’t on their own computer at any given time. The vast majority of people have no idea how their computer works nor what it contains.

It seems to me politicians are trying to whip up fear about virtual pictures on the internet to distract us from their “secret” international child sex rings.

Why Glen, are you upset that you’re been negatively viewed in light of the founder’s comments?

Love the irony. You see if you want to subvert copyright, then the original owner has no control over how their work is adapted or used.

A person could come along, take someone’s work and adapt it for use in hate speech, or in a manner that otherwise reflects poorly on the original creator.

Hence if I now wanted to use Creative Commons to take and adapt the branding of ‘Pirate Party ACT’ and use it to advocate for something society finds untoward, you would no doubt be displeased with me. And yet you couldn’t do anything about it.

Logic is the ultimate downfall of libertarians and anarchists alike.

One (or the main) benefit of compulsory voting:

– with voluntary voting, the key is to get people to vote. So you appeal to the basest instincts, the radical people who have strong views about something (usually being something relating to tax or ‘morality’) and who want their views enforced across society. Hence abortion being a major issue in US politics and a nothing issue here

– with compulsory voting, you are appealing to the people ‘in the middle’ ie who dont have strong views one way or the other and are willing to swing vote. So all politics get moderated, because you are after the ‘moderates’.

Dont know about you, but I like having politics arguing about the middle ground. Can you imagine Tony Abbott if he had to spend his time appealling to the extremes of his party?

c_c – you are obviously referring to the following articles written by Falkvinge
http://falkvinge.net/2012/09/07/three-reasons-child-porn-must-be-re-legalized-in-the-coming-decade/
http://falkvinge.net/2012/09/11/child-porn-laws-arent-as-bad-as-you-think-theyre-much-much-worse/

Rick Falkvinge is the founder of the Swedish Pirate Party, which was the first Pirate Party worldwide.
He is no longer involved in the Swedish Pirate Party.

Pirate Party Australia does not advocate the legalisation of child pornography,
Rick Falkvinge is not a spokesperson or representative of any Pirate Party.

pirate_taco said :

Perhaps you’d be interested in some of what we have to say.
Pirate Party Australia and by extension Pirate Party ACT has plans to enhance democracy, at least through it’s own membership base with what we call Liquid Democracy – a blend of the best bits of direct and representative democracy. Work on the system is still in the very early stages, but it will be very exciting if we can implement it successfully.
We also have a policy of supporting e-petitioning to help the public directly force issues into the spotlight.

A speedway for electric cars? It’s not on our policy list, but I’d personally love to see one, as long as they allow electric bikes too 🙂
3D printers? Yes please. Pirate Party Australia is trying to make sure that the law allows them to flourish when the technology is ready to go mainstream.
Australian Independence on a global scale? That’s one of the reasons why Pirate Party Australia has been pushing back on things like TPP and ACTA which threaten to remove our ability to set our own laws.

Pirate Party ACT seeks to break the status quo.
Why don’t you give us a go?

Stuart Biggs for Molonglo
Glen Takkenberg for Ginninderra
Mark Gibbons for Brindabella

Glen Takkenberg
Pirate Party ACT

No party is more in touch with issues affecting youth than Pirate Party.
Particularly their founder, who advocates legalising child pornography.

(Something the ACT Branch has distanced itself from, but which speaks much to the warped, schizophrenic ethos on which the party is built and will no doubt be sustained.)

Truthiness said :

There aren’t candidates saying we’re ruled by a banking Plutocracy, that our representatives are perpetuating and supporting. There aren’t candidates trying to implement direct democracy, or pointing out Australia’s role in the ongoing economic oppression of most of the world.

There aren’t candidates who admit we can’t fix climate change, or even acknowledge the true scale and severity of what is happening. There aren’t candidates who want to overhaul our entire society before we careen into a future of our own making.

Who do you vote for if you want a speedway for electric cars? Who do you vote for if you want driverless cars, public 3D printers and telecommuting? Who do you vote for to expand the dole to everyone who wants it? Where is the party which stands for Australian independence on the global scale?

These candidates represent a very small slice of our available options, and most of them cater only to rich, white consumers with a vested interest in the status quo. Strangely, some people think that is not good enough, and that every option is just more of the same.

Half the world is going through revolutions, and we get stuck choosing between tweedledum and tweedledumber.

Perhaps you’d be interested in some of what we have to say.
Pirate Party Australia and by extension Pirate Party ACT has plans to enhance democracy, at least through it’s own membership base with what we call Liquid Democracy – a blend of the best bits of direct and representative democracy. Work on the system is still in the very early stages, but it will be very exciting if we can implement it successfully.
We also have a policy of supporting e-petitioning to help the public directly force issues into the spotlight.

A speedway for electric cars? It’s not on our policy list, but I’d personally love to see one, as long as they allow electric bikes too 🙂
3D printers? Yes please. Pirate Party Australia is trying to make sure that the law allows them to flourish when the technology is ready to go mainstream.
Australian Independence on a global scale? That’s one of the reasons why Pirate Party Australia has been pushing back on things like TPP and ACTA which threaten to remove our ability to set our own laws.

Pirate Party ACT seeks to break the status quo.
Why don’t you give us a go?

Stuart Biggs for Molonglo
Glen Takkenberg for Ginninderra
Mark Gibbons for Brindabella

Glen Takkenberg
Pirate Party ACT

Masquara said :

Why are drugs a “youth issue”? Druggies all seem to look at least 25 years older than they are! Most druggies I know are cosmic waste aged around 40 and looking like they should be in the Ozanam care facility …

The company you keep my dear…

johnboy said :

There are issues affecting younger people, from drug policies through housing and education at play in the local candidates and I agree the range is not great.

Why are drugs a “youth issue”? Druggies all seem to look at least 25 years older than they are! Most druggies I know are cosmic waste aged around 40 and looking like they should be in the Ozanam care facility …

poetix said :

What is gorm, anyway?

Whatever it is, there should be less of it.

poetix said :

LSWCHP said :

poetix said :

What is gorm, anyway?

It’s a common attribute of those who are gruntled. 🙂

Lookin’ forward to meeting you on Thursday. And actually, I’ve never (yet) shot a poet who’s messed up the meter, and I’ve even written poems that don’t rhyme.

I’m sure you have. Written such poems, that is! Perhaps you are even couth. Which bloody auto-correct tried to make into cough.

As to your point at #23, I don’t think we can discriminate on the basis of education. I’ve met some very ignorant people with lots of degrees.

And thoughtful people with little formal education. The there’s the question of who decides who should be excluded: do we want politicians doing that? Patricians and plebeians.

See you Thursday! I must resurrect the launch thread: ‘I am Lazarus, come from the dead’.

You’re right about education not necessarily equating to intelligence. What about a civics test though? In other words, you have to pass a “drivers test” that demonstrates basic understanding of the electoral system before you are permitted to drive the system at an election. If you don’t know what you are doing or how the system works then you don’t get to participate.

In “Starship Troopers” Robert Heinlein suggested military service was a good indicator of a commitment to one’s society, and that was the criteria for being eligible to vote. I don’t concur with that idea, but it shows that I’m not the only one that thinks there should be some sort of qualification required before one is entitled to vote.

And to think it’s the Greens who want to lower the voting age. Having said that, it’s most likely that those in that age group who would vote would vote Green.

LSWCHP said :

poetix said :

What is gorm, anyway?

It’s a common attribute of those who are gruntled. 🙂

Lookin’ forward to meeting you on Thursday. And actually, I’ve never (yet) shot a poet who’s messed up the meter, and I’ve even written poems that don’t rhyme.

I’m sure you have. Written such poems, that is! Perhaps you are even couth. Which bloody auto-correct tried to make into cough.

As to your point at #23, I don’t think we can discriminate on the basis of education. I’ve met some very ignorant people with lots of degrees. And thoughtful people with little formal education. The there’s the question of who decides who should be excluded: do we want politicians doing that? Patricians and plebeians.

See you Thursday! I must resurrect the launch thread: ‘I am Lazarus, come from the dead’.

johnboy said :

It’s an ACT election. It’s not going to do more than change the town. But it’s not too late to get yourself registered as a candidate.

I am not under the illusion that I could win a popularity contest against millionaires. Judging by the reception on RA I half suspect I’d get beaten up by angry mobs if I ever showed my face outside the internet.

Does the relative insignificance of our elections make it more or less important people for people to vote?

I’d also like to point out that nobody has to vote. You just have to show up and get your name marked off the roll in order to ensure procedural correctness within the constraints of the system.

If you then choose to wipe the ballot paper on your freckle and stuff it in the box, that would be your choice and your loss.

neanderthalsis said :

arescarti42 said :

So get down to the post office and get registered or you’re going to get screwed.

The wrinklies are going to screw us either way, they have sheer numbers on the side.

The fact that so few young people are enrolled is evidence of the stupidity of compulsory voting IMO. If you’re so disinterested in the system that you can’t even be bothered enrolling to vote, even when it is compulsory, then you really shouldn’t be engaging with it.

I agree that it is hard to reconcile compulsory voting with a true democracy. However, if voting were optional, the fringe dwelling loonies on either side would be those who are most likely to vote. Political parties would drift further to the fringes to accommodate the loons and we end up with people like Pauline Hanson or an Australian version of Mitt Romney running the show.

I agree with this 100%. Everybody should have a say.

Still, and I know this will sound elitist but what the hell, I honestly think that some votes are worth more than others. I have seen interviews with people who clearly have no understanding of the political system at all. The common perception that people “elect” the PM in some manner is evidence of this.

I would like to see some sort of system that weights votes based on education, or having passed a knowledge test on how our electoral system works, or some other reasonable set of criteria.

A lot of people either believe 95% of the world’s scientists, in which case labour, liberals and the greens are endangering us all by doing bugger all. Or they believe the 5% of scientists and think all the major parties are wasting our time and money on a conspiracy.

So on that one issue alone you can see how populist centrist statism is failing many people.

poetix said :

What is gorm, anyway?

It’s a common attribute of those who are gruntled. 🙂

Lookin’ forward to meeting you on Thursday. And actually, I’ve never (yet) shot a poet who’s messed up the meter, and I’ve even written poems that don’t rhyme.

There aren’t candidates saying we’re ruled by a banking Plutocracy, that our representatives are perpetuating and supporting. There aren’t candidates trying to implement direct democracy, or pointing out Australia’s role in the ongoing economic oppression of most of the world.

There aren’t candidates who admit we can’t fix climate change, or even acknowledge the true scale and severity of what is happening. There aren’t candidates who want to overhaul our entire society before we careen into a future of our own making.

Who do you vote for if you want a speedway for electric cars? Who do you vote for if you want driverless cars, public 3D printers and telecommuting? Who do you vote for to expand the dole to everyone who wants it? Where is the party which stands for Australian independence on the global scale?

These candidates represent a very small slice of our available options, and most of them cater only to rich, white consumers with a vested interest in the status quo. Strangely, some people think that is not good enough, and that every option is just more of the same.

Half the world is going through revolutions, and we get stuck choosing between tweedledum and tweedledumber.

Truthiness said :

I have had more of my friends refusing to vote at this election than any other. the feeling seems to be, both young and old, that no party represents them, only business, and that all politicians are self interested liars anyway.

I’ve tried to convince them to vote anyway, but its a tough one to entirely disagree with.

What sort of moron deliberately doesn’t vote? There are candidates representing a wide range of views.

Yeah well if dumbass ACT Electorate Office chief Phillip Green had bothered to put the DEADLINE for enrolment in his ‘,000s advertising campaign, more youth would know that there IS a deadline. And have the chance to meet it. What a debacle.

milkman said :

Youth shouldn’t vote. They vote for retards.

clearly the trend holds with age.

milkman said :

Youth shouldn’t vote. They vote for retards.

One can only vote for the candidates on the electoral form at the polling booth. If one or more of the candidates are retards then the youth are entitled to cast their vote as they see fit..
Democracy at work.

I have had more of my friends refusing to vote at this election than any other. the feeling seems to be, both young and old, that no party represents them, only business, and that all politicians are self interested liars anyway.

I’ve tried to convince them to vote anyway, but its a tough one to entirely disagree with.

Youth shouldn’t vote. They vote for retards.

neanderthalsis said :

I agree that it is hard to reconcile compulsory voting with a true democracy. However, if voting were optional, the fringe dwelling loonies on either side would be those who are most likely to vote. Political parties would drift further to the fringes to accommodate the loons and we end up with people like Pauline Hanson or an Australian version of Mitt Romney running the show.

See, I’m not so sure about that. Granted the nutbags will surely vote, but I like to think there is still a large group of people who are reasonably well educated and fairly informed about the issues facing society, who will vote either because they are genuinely concerned about how government is run, or simply recognise the need not to give the nutbags too much influence.

From my perspective, ditching compulsory voting just gets rid of the group of people who really don’t give a s*** either way, only vote because they are forced, and base their vote on some piece of industry propaganda they saw on TV the night before the election while they were flicking channels between A Current Affair and Big Brother.

I reckon part of the reason the quality of the political discourse in this country is so shockingly abysmal is that parties realise that the “don’t give a s***” category of votes are probably the easiest to capture. They don’t need to be smart, provide leadership, or engage with the issues, they just need to be louder than their opponent so that they are the one that gets remembered on polling day.

I have one slight qualm.

Why am I, an Inner North resident, in the same electorate division (Molonglo) as the Inner South residents.
I don’t believe we share the same priorities in life.

We need a boundary along the Lake to separate us from them.

I voted in the federal election, but this is my first local one, do I have to register separately for it does any one know? I’ve been hassling my younger mates to get enrolled and don’t want to be hypocrite.

johnboy said :

Either way the more youth enrolled the more youth friendly the party policies will be.

Oh that’s naive, surprisingly so.

arescarti42 said :

So get down to the post office and get registered or you’re going to get screwed.

The wrinklies are going to screw us either way, they have sheer numbers on the side.

The fact that so few young people are enrolled is evidence of the stupidity of compulsory voting IMO. If you’re so disinterested in the system that you can’t even be bothered enrolling to vote, even when it is compulsory, then you really shouldn’t be engaging with it.

I agree that it is hard to reconcile compulsory voting with a true democracy. However, if voting were optional, the fringe dwelling loonies on either side would be those who are most likely to vote. Political parties would drift further to the fringes to accommodate the loons and we end up with people like Pauline Hanson or an Australian version of Mitt Romney running the show.

johnboy said :

Either way the more youth enrolled the more youth friendly the party policies will be.

You can’t be suggesting that that would be a positive outcome

What is gorm, anyway?

So get down to the post office and get registered or you’re going to get screwed.

The wrinklies are going to screw us either way, they have sheer numbers on the side.

The fact that so few young people are enrolled is evidence of the stupidity of compulsory voting IMO. If you’re so disinterested in the system that you can’t even be bothered enrolling to vote, even when it is compulsory, then you really shouldn’t be engaging with it.

Free ipad to two lucky enrolled voters.

Also, you get to engage with the political machine and become responsible for the actions of own government.
The benefit is that you get to shake your fist at politicians and tell them to perform better because they’re not up to scratch. The downside is well, you’re as much to blame as they are, because you voted for them.

PS: Enrolling and voting is compulsory. They may not break thumbs, but there are fines for not enrolling.