This new law had to get started somewhere

Just curious, do you understand that Australians don't each occupy a square of territory of equal size? You do know that we have cities, don't you? In fact, some of them are quite large. Sydney and Melbourne are around 5 million each. That means 40% of our population lives in two cities and another 25% in the next three largest cities, two of which are over 2 million. So, 65% of our population lives in just 5 cities that have a similar population density to most US cities not called New York.

People experience population density as the area they live in, not some abstract equation based on the size of their country. Most Australians experience population density in a near identical way to most Americans.

We have had gangs since the C19th and we have had a drug problem since the 70s. What we don't do is write off entire urban areas, take the wrong approach to practically every criminal & substance abuse issue and make guns so easy to get that the lowest level street thug can get one whenever they want.

In sort, we are a better run society than America. Most first world nations are.

 

Social media strikes back?

we have some very experienced moderators here who could probably become good policymakers for what is adequate behavior on the internet

It's inevitable they got to rein it in sometime

Did you know that Putin actually implements selective availability GPS in a bubble around him wherever he goes . If he's in the Kremlin and you walk up to it your in Zimbabwe

 

You run a more restrictive society, I will give you that.

It is the speech that offends us that needs protected the most. If the internet has content that offends you, don't go to that site. If you don't want your kids watching offensive material, monitor and control their internet access. By what right do you presume to decide what people can or cannot see, particularly when is takes place in the public view?

 

Australians knowingly running into the arms of tyranny and wanting their nanny state to protect them from all sorts of microagressions and verbal offenses.

Freedom of internet is a reflection of all sorts of freedoms in the rest of that society.

 

I don't recall discussing the issue, but your argument in support of the free distribution or streaming of child pornography is duly noted. Under your formulation kiddie porn is allowed.

Cue rush to qualify statements.

 

We live in a perpetual war zone and have for 50 years at least.

 

Child pornography does not take place within the public view. Even so, trying to equate banning child pornography and banning a video whose content took place well within the public view and is infact, a public news event, is just stupid. Yes, yes, I know...you don't recall discussing the subject...but you discuss your acceptance of government control of information as though that is the mark of the superior society.

I reject that notion and frankly, as someone else already pointed out earlier in this thread, America has the 1st and 2nd Amendments and they are the law of the land. Americans don't care what the rest of the world thinks about that. If you don't like it, don't come here.

 

You have no idea what a war zone is. Go spend a week in Syria and find out.

 

Last year in India a child was kidnapped, held in a Hindu temple and raped over the course of a week by priests, local police and others. Her screams were clearly audible from outside the temple. Her rape and eventual murder were world news. This was as 'public' as numerous other such crimes. Presumably you would be fine with footage of this or other child rapes carried out in public being freely available.

I didn't discuss that at any point in my original post.

Dear me, someone has their panties in a knot.

If you didn't care what the rest of us think then you wouldn't feel the need to engage me with such vigour and such an obvious predetermined agenda. Methinks the lady doth pretest too much.

You are welcome to limit your travels to nations whose policies you entirely agree with. The grown ups amongst us prefer to see things for ourselves. Hopefully that will mean you are confined to your little corner of the world. The rest of us will enjoy the world much more that way I imagine.

 

There are bigger issues than terrorism. White, black, environmentalist, Islamic, etc... It seems silly to make such laws. Really discussing things will help make healthier minds than trying to hide information. Its not as if they take it off twitter or facebook that it won't fester behind the scenes in small bubbles where things can become radical.

 

Oh, come on! Absolute safety for one's family has been a prerequisite of our species since the dawn of time!

But, if you prefer to live in a country that is prone to throwing around its DoD-weight to impress that world - often with our kids coming back in body-bags, then will you permit my disagreement with your outlook-on-life?

Countries have been at war with one another since the advent of mankind. In the past, it was families that ruled countries in a system of monarchies. They felt no disquiet whatsoever when sending off their children to fight a war.

Times have changed since then. Except in the US that LOVES THROWING AROUND ITS MILITARY WEIGHT. Which is VERY COSTLY!

Can't believe that? Then see here:

Think of what America could do by (for starters) cutting in half the DoD-expenditure and employing it upon a Decent Healthcare System. Or, Tertiary-education for our kids.

Nope! Not for you? Guns are sooooo much more interesting and "good fun" ...

PS: May heaven help Uncle Sam. Because he needs it!

 

MISSION IMPOSSIBLE

I'm not sure what you're saying in this comment - "what laws". Anti-gun laws?

New Zealand was a shocker because what happened was "not supposed to happen there". It was also a shocker for Australia, because "that slaughter is not supposed to happen in Australia either - but it's an Aussie who perpetrated the massacre!"

But, what happened happened?

Meaning from where did the perpetrator got his idea? And I, for one, think it is something he saw on TV. Virtually anybody anywhere, if they want to do so, can take arms and make them fully automatic or semi-automatic; then look for an appropriate target and wreak havoc!

All they need is a good reason. And fanaticism seems sufficient a reason to explain that human behaviour.

Which means what? It means that in some countries you must be careful about where you go in crowds. In other countries, the risk is less because gun-control laws minimize the danger. Having said that, in France that has drastic controls on automatic weapons, was unable to stop 7-gunmen who killed 130 victims at the Bataclan nightclub in Paris.

Fanaticism is wholly a part of human nature. We cannot avoid it as a human expression, regardless of its murderous source of expression. Still, as humans, we should know how to prevent its harm upon innocent people as a "fanatical expression of one's beliefs/feelings/sentiments".

But we don't ...

 

Finally a couple of posters who get it.

 

Uh I don't think you have a clue Russians don't use GPS.

 

Or a week in parts of Chicago.

 

Wow, this is really deep, did you come to this by yourself ? or did someone helped you ?

Now to the real world. What is violence ?
Is cutting off a man's hand violence ? To some it is. To Saudis it is due process.
Is stoning a gay person violence ? To some it is. To Sudanese, people from Mauritania, Nigerians, Somalians, people from Afghanistan, Qatari people, Saudis it is due process.
Is talking about those nations rules violence ? In most civilized countries not, In US/Canada/some EU universities it is extreme violence.

So, there is no one definition what is violence, in fact the definition varies profoundly.

 

Bla, blah, blah.

Useless sarcasm ... quite in keeping with present American mentalities. Sarcasm was never ever a substitute replacement for good reason nor ever will be ...

 

Maybe now that they have their organisations and dark web and what not. However reality is that the internet has been used to make views which were socially unacceptable acceptable and that, along with other things like the economy not working, has brought us back to the mentality of the 30's. Would that have happened without the net? I doubt it. Indeed they now know that the extreme right are very different from those of say 40 years ago who everyone knew about anyway and who being a part of can risk a person losing their job or friends. Now everything is anonymous - until their get to their training camps in Europe. The allowing of the views being expressed has made them more socially respectable. I suspect there is very little difference between one who only speaks and one who acts on his convictions and the ones who speak will be there when all our liberties are taken away because like it or not the hard right is authoritarian and looks like the future in many places.

 

Lots of meaningless blah, blah, blah - from someone who has never read a dictionary.

From here:

 

What a load of pretentious, presumptuous crap. "Our kids"? America's kids are not France's ... whatever.

Talk about an ant wagging a finger at a lion... Uncle Sam sure as **** doesn't need your help. Get your own house in order.

 

Like doing something about the over the top number of mass shooting they have in their country, way more mass shootings then we have here in the U.S., but there are people all over the world that love to attack the U.S. for the microscopic number of high profile mass shooting we have here, while their streets are flowing in the blood of their own citizens as a result of high profile mass shootings they have in their own country.

It's a shell game where they are trying to claim their country is so civilized mass shootings are not a problem when nothing could be further from the truth.

 

MENTALITY IS MOSTLY PSYCHOLOGICAL

You will find that in almost any countries the arch-radicals are amongst the most uneducated. Both on the Left and the Right.

A psychological aspect to the discussion seems clear from this study translated into English::Demographic and Social Characteristics of Murderers and their Victims - excerpt:

There is even some opinion regarding the matter both in the US and Europe:
*France: From the above linked document, scroll down the document until you reach Table 4 on page 22. Note the table titled: "Social origin of the perpetrators of homicides". Note further that the largest class (at 55%) of perpetrators of homicide is the "Blue Collar" (workers class).
*US: From the Guardian for a same assessment but in the US here: The surprising factors driving murder rates: income inequality and respect
- excerpt:

Permit me a conclusion from the above analyses: Yet another reason - and a very good one - why we should make Tertiary-education free, gratis and for nothing!

 

There is no such thing as "free." People who can't help but throw around this empty notion like grandpa giving out sweets are revealing a lack of seriousness and/or intelligence.

 

To the government and those who suck off of it, consider free to be taking one persons money and giving it to another person, while taking a cut of it for themselves.

 

And it isn't hard to get, if one places great value upon intelligence, logic, rationality and reason and then exercises that. But party and ideological hyper partisanship self evidently destroys these most essential and important things, and one gets locked into a bubble, that is also an echo chamber, that insures objectivity and intelligence is another inconvenience to what one believes. It is the human condition, thanks to a human nature that has not evolved at all, as everything else is in the process of evolving.

But intelligence and self awareness of what one is, what one is doing, can transcend at least some of what is human nature and without that, humanity would have never progressed as much as we have in various areas. A good pause before a conditioned, response, the knee jerk is a start to being self aware, but one of course has to devote time and energy to any endeavor to transcend anything.