It was only a matter of time after news came out that UK internet service providers (ISPs) would begin filtering internet services of adult content by default before the Australian Christian Lobby (ACL) would again ask for Australia’s internet to be filtered.
The political lobby group [consisting of three obnoxious, bigoted and racist white men], which claims to represent the Christians in Australia [they don’t] and says it has approximately 10,000 supporters [names culled from the obituary columns don’t count], has often called for freedom of speech in regards to religious groups being able to speak out against homosexuality. However, it has long backed broad censoring of the internet since 2007, when the Rudd and Gillard governments had planned on introducing a mandatory ISP-level internet filter into Australia.
In 2008, then-ACL managing director Jim Wallace described the filter as vital
to protect society’s most vulnerable
.
Obviously, the internet industry is going to continue to fight this important initiative, but the interests of children must be placed first,
he said.
Claims the government will impose China-style curbing of free speech are ridiculous, given Australia’s robust parliamentary democracy, something China does not have,
Wallace said in another release.
The ACL didn’t want consumers to be able to make a choice on whether the filter should be on or off, as is the case with the UK scheme. In 2010, on the question of whether a software-based filter would be better, the organisation said that ISP-level filtering would be more effective for protecting the community as a whole — via redwolf.newsvine.com
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