Net filter unworkable, games a threat to human liberty: Hockey

Governments can't be trusted with an Internet censor
Shadow treasurer Joe Hockey

Shadow treasurer Joe Hockey

Shadow treasurer Joe Hockey has slammed the Federal Government’s proposal for mandatory ISP-level filtering.

In a presentation at Melbourne’s Grattan Institute, Hockey said the proposal opened the possibility of function-creep whereby future governments could censor additional material once the filter infrastructure was in place.

“What we have in the Government’s Internet filtering proposals is a scheme that is likely to be unworkable in practice,” Hockey said to an audience at the think-tank.

“But, more perniciously, it is a scheme that will create the infrastructure for government censorship on a broader scale. Protecting liberty is about protecting freedoms against both known and future threats.

“Some may argue that we can surely trust a democratically-elected government in Australia to never try to introduce more wide-spread censorship. I am not so sure,” Hockey said, adding that responsibility for child protection on the Internet lay with parents, “not the government”.

Hockey also weighed-in on the push for a R18+ classification for games arguing that violent games instilled violence in users.

“What concerns me about these games is that they, at the most benign end, make us immune to violence or, worse still, encourage us to think of violence as a legitimate tool,” Hockey said.

“Fundamentally, the loss of respect for human life and dignity that these games encourage becomes a threat to the respect we have for individual liberty.”

“In contrast to watching a violent movie on the odd occasion, spending hours embedded in a game – actually “pulling the trigger” and “killing” virtual people that are now so realistic that fantasy and reality have merged – can rewire our brain,” he claimed, referring to comments from Macquarie University Psychologist Dr Wayne Warburton.

Hockey's full speech can be read in full online

References show all

Comments

1

DD

Fri 12/03/2010 - 17:29

I don't get it, he supports game censorship but not internet?

2

Chris

Fri 12/03/2010 - 18:24

Well Hockey, if you were leader of the opposition instead of that right wing nutter that is currently, you would get my vote

3

Cybes

Fri 12/03/2010 - 21:06

I find it incredible that the guys in charge of things still do not understand the issues behind the game reclassification push. It seems not to matter how often they are told, nor by whom.

We don't want R-rated games so that we can play games with more gore (is that even possible?) or graphic sex. We want R-rated games so that inappropriate material isn't shoehorned into MA-rated games! Every time the OFLC tries to apply the classification system properly, something ends up banned which is available everywhere else, and the users have a huge whinge until the government recants. If these things were rated properly in the first place, that wouldn't happen.

It would be nice to think that parents might notice the <R> on the cover and not allow kids to play it... But who are we kidding? Parents seem to have abrogated any responsibility - it's not as if the kids Hockey is worried about should be playing MA15+ games anyway.

4

Frankie Goes to Hollywood

Sun 14/03/2010 - 02:19

Is this a sign that members of the opposition are looking to get votes because they can see the filter becoming an election issue?

Here's hoping that's the case and Labor will be forced to pull out the filter laws currently sitting on the table for voting.

5

Daniel

Tue 30/03/2010 - 09:28

Has Hockey ever played these so called 'violent' games?

Huh? Well? Have you?

If so, did they make you want to go and and shoot everyone, or drive into people, or start injecting yourself with god knows what?

Huh?

Generational change will come (even in politics)... it's inevitable.

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