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Censorship Industrial Complex

Australia’s Misinformation Bill Is Dead…for Now

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From the Brownstone Institute

By  Maryanne Demasi 

The Australian government’s attempt to ram through legislation to combat misinformation online has been blocked after the Greens party announced it would not support the controversial bill.

“We are concerned this bill doesn’t actually do what it needs to do when it comes to stopping the deliberate mass distribution of false and harmful information,” said Greens Senator Sarah Hanson-Young.

This unexpected move is said to be the final nail in the coffin for the bill that intended to grant the media watchdog unprecedented regulatory powers to oversee digital content and determine what is ‘misinformation.’

A Domino Effect

During this week, an interesting display of parliamentary dynamics unfolded as an array of Senators announced they would oppose the bill, one by one.

Senators Lidia Thorpe, Tammy Tyrell, David Pocock, Jacqui Lambie, Gerard Rennick, Fatima Payman, and others declared their opposition.

Their reasons varied from concerns over government overreach, and vague definitions of misinformation, to the implications for political discourse and the potential for misuse. Each statement chipped away at the bill’s support, creating a domino effect.

An urgent call to action resulted in significant public outcry. Australians, concerned about their digital rights, flooded senators with emails, petitions, and social media campaigns.

The sheer volume of these communications likely played a crucial role in shaping the Senators’ views.

The vigorous debate also garnered international attention.

Michael Shellenberger, an American author and free speech campaigner, visited Australia to warn that these “totalitarian” laws would have implications for democracy, and blur the line between regulating harmful content and stifling dissent.

Nov 20, 2024 – Michael Shellenberger on Sky News Australia

According to Shellenberger, misinformation should be countered with more and better information, not through suppression or censorship.

Elon Musk, whose influence in the digital sphere is undeniable, especially after taking the helm of X, expressed similar views, and has been vocal about his disdain for what he perceives as “overreach” in digital governance, labelling the failed bill as “fascist.”

Digital ID for Under 16s

It has not quelled the government’s enthusiasm for its proposed ban of social media access for individuals under 16. This bill, which introduces a mandatory age verification process, has implications for digital identity and privacy.

The rapid legislative push on Thursday only allowed a 24-hour window for public submissions, a move to fast-track the controversial legislation without due public scrutiny.

The bill would require all Australians to undergo identity verification to use social media, raising alarms about the collection and potential misuse of personal data. The process could involve gathering biometric data, posing a risk for data breaches or misuse.

Today, Musk described the legislation as a “backdoor way to control access to the internet,” which promises to punish platforms, including X, with steep fines if they allow children under age 16 to hold social media accounts.

The combination of these legislative proposals (the misinformation bill, and the digital ID for under-16s), paints a picture of a government intent on tightening control over what you can say and read online.

What Happens Now?

After this week’s news, the Labor government must now retreat and reassess.

It could decide to abandon the legislative approach altogether and focus on other means like public education campaigns or working with social media platforms on voluntary codes of practice. But this is unlikely.

The government will most probably go back to the drawing board, either to revise the bill with more stringent protections for free speech or to explore alternative, less direct methods of addressing misinformation, hoping to revive the bill in the new year.

Republished from the author’s Substack

Author

Maryanne Demasi, 2023 Brownstone Fellow, is an investigative medical reporter with a PhD in rheumatology, who writes for online media and top tiered medical journals. For over a decade, she produced TV documentaries for the Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC) and has worked as a speechwriter and political advisor for the South Australian Science Minister.

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Censorship Industrial Complex

Is free speech over in the UK? Government censorship reaches frightening new levels

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From LifeSiteNews

By Frank Wright

Instead of changing policies which threaten the collapse of Western civilization, the liberal-global governments prefer to make public opposition to their politics a crime.

The UK’s crackdown on free speech continues, with two online platforms withdrawing over censorship concerns – whilst liberal-critical speakers are banned from entering Britain, and even arrested on arrival.

Following the introduction of laws which could see online platforms fined millions of pounds, free speech social media company Gab and video sharing platform Bitchute have withdrawn their services from UK users.

As Reclaim the Net, a UK-based online freedom campaign group, said on March 28:

“The British government has begun aggressively extending its censorship regime beyond its borders, invoking the sweeping powers granted by the Online Safety Act 2023 to demand compliance from foreign-based platforms.”

Bitchute withdrew its services from UK users “over online censorship laws,” as the Free Speech Union reported on April 10. Gab’s statement, published on its UK domain, said the company was acting to protect British users from being jailed for posting on its platform:

After receiving yet another demand from the UK’s speech police, Ofcom, Gab has made the decision to block the entire United Kingdom from accessing our website.

This latest email from Ofcom ordered us to disclose information about our users and operations. We know where this leads: compelled censorship and British citizens thrown in jail for ‘hate speech.’ We refuse to comply with this tyranny.

The UK government claims its laws support “online safety” – but as Reclaim the Net explains, “critics argue … the term … is being used as a smokescreen for state-sanctioned thought control.”

The future of information in Britain looks bleak, as one UK commentator said, promising a “TV version” of the internet – sterilized by UK government media watchdog Ofcom:

“Unless the White House really forces Britain to do it, Ofcom will not be abolished, because the mainstream parties approve of it and no party that doesn’t will be allowed anywhere near power.”

Millennial Woes concludes that there is likely a “hit list” of further online platforms to be taken down in order, beginning with video outlets Odysee and Rumble, the messenger service Telegram, then the free speech publisher Substack – and on to Elon Musk’s X.

“If allowed to continue in its current mode, Ofcom will take down the platforms it wants to, then tame the others by hook or by crook. The Internet in Britain will be a homogenised, redacted farce – a pathetic ‘TV version’ of what people in more civilised countries have.”

Cambridge professor arrested

The charge of “state-sanctioned thought control” is reinforced by the arrest – on Good Friday –-of a Palestinian Christian and Cambridge University professor at London’s Heathrow Airport. The reason for Professor Makram Khoury-Machool’s detention was that he has spoken out against Israel’s war in Gaza, as reports from the UK said.

 

“Keir Starmer’s long and intensifying war on pro-Palestine, anti-genocide speech through the misuse of the Terrorism Act … has continued to escalate,” noted UK outlet Skwawkbox, which covers stories such as this – neglected by the mainstream press “because it doesn’t fit their agenda.”

Professor Khoury, whose speech was criminalized under anti-terror laws, had in the past co-founded an anti-extremism institute in 2016 at Cambridge University.

British left-populist George Galloway responded on X (formerly Twitter), saying the arrest of this “gentle, devout moderate academic father” suggests that the “government has declared war on its own citizens, that liberty is dead in this land, and that Britain is no longer a safe country.”

Galloway’s warning of “It can happen to you. And it will” came a day after reports that a French philosopher noted for his outspoken criticism of mass migration had been banned from entering the UK.

French anti-migration speaker banned

Renaud Camus is the author of The Great Replacement – coining a term now used to describe the liberal-global policy of the replacement of Western populations via mass immigration.

The “great replacement” is routinely “debunked” by the ruling elite as a “conspiracy theory.” As Camus once said to Britain’s Matt Goodwin, “How can it be debunked when it is evident in every street?”

 

He was due to speak at a “remigration conference” in England on April 26. Organized by the nationalist Homeland Party, it is dedicated to the discussion of policies similar to those now being enacted by the Trump administration.

According to the Daily Telegraph, Camus was denied entry to the UK by government order.

In an email seen by The Telegraph, the Home Office informed Mr Camus that he had been denied the electronic travel authorisation (ETA) needed to enter Britain.

‘Your presence in the UK is not considered to be conducive to the public good,’ the email read.

The Telegraph reports that Mr Camus, “who is gay and has advocated for non-violence,” supplied one convincing explanation for his treatment:

[He] told The Telegraph that ‘of all the European governments guilty’ of allowing unchecked migration, ‘the British government is one of the guiltiest’.

‘No wonder it does not want me to speak,’ Mr Camus added.

The fact the British government is banning speakers who promote policies now being enacted with widespread support in the United States has not only provoked criticism – it may derail UK/U.S. trade negotiations.

Days ago, Vice President JD Vance warned UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer that Britain will get no deal with the U.S. over tariffs if its “hate speech” laws remain in place.

“Sir Keir Starmer must embrace Donald Trump’s agenda by repealing hate speech laws in order to get a trade deal over the line, a Washington source has told The Independent.”

A “Washington source” told the UK-based Independent, “No free speech, no deal. It is as simple as that.”

Vance has been a stern critic of British and European moves towards increasing censorship and the suppression of freedom of opinion, describing it in his February Munich speech as a “threat” to democracy “from within” Western Europe – and one which is led by its liberal-globalist governments.

Vance is reportedly “obsessed by the fall of Western civilisation,” The Independent’s Washington source explained. It is clear that Vance believes that this fall is very much a threat created by the political decisions of governments like Starmer’s.

The use of “hate speech” and “anti-terrorism” laws in these cases shows how the UK state-sanctioned suppression of speech affects anyone – from the left, right, or from the Christian faith – who criticizes the policies of the government.

These are not fringe extremist views, but those held by increasing numbers of ordinary people in Britain and throughout the Western world. Instead of changing policies which threaten the collapse of Western civilization, the liberal-global governments prefer to make public opposition to their politics a crime.

In the case of the British state, its hardline stance to defend its idea of democracy from free speech is now threatening its economic future. The politics and laws celebrated as the guarantee of safety increasingly resemble a form of extremism which will not tolerate debate.

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‘Great Reset’ champion Klaus Schwab resigns from WEF

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From LifeSiteNews

By Jonathon Van Maren

Schwab’s World Economic Forum became a globalist hub for population control, radical climate agenda, and transhuman ideology under his decades-long leadership.

Klaus Schwab, founder of the World Economic Forum and the face of the NGO’s elitist annual get-together in Davos, Switzerland, has resigned as chair of WEF. 

Over the decades, but especially over the past several years, the WEF’s Davos annual symposium has become a lightning rod for conservative criticism due to the agendas being pushed there by the elites. As the Associated Press noted: 

Widely regarded as a cheerleader for globalization, the WEF’s Davos gathering has in recent years drawn criticism from opponents on both left and right as an elitist talking shop detached from lives of ordinary people. 

While WEF itself had no formal power, the annual Davos meeting brought together many of the world’s wealthiest and most influential figures, contributing to Schwab’s personal worth and influence.

Schwab’s resignation on April 20 was announced by the Geneva-based WEF on April 21, but did not indicate why the 88-year-old was resigning. “Following my recent announcement, and as I enter my 88th year, I have decided to step down from the position of Chair and as a member of the Board of Trustees, with immediate effect,” Schwab said in a brief statement. He gave no indication of what he plans to do next. 

Schwab founded the World Economic Forum – originally the European Management Forum – in 1971, and its initial mission was to assist European business leaders in competing with American business and to learn from U.S. models and innovation. However, the mission soon expanded to the development of a global economic agenda.  

Schwab detailed his own agenda in several books, including The Fourth Industrial Revolution (2016), in which he described the rise of a new industrial era in which technologies such artificial intelligence, gene editing, and advanced robotics would blur the lines between the digital, physical, and biological worlds. Schwab wrote: 

We stand on the brink of a technological revolution that will fundamentally alter the way we live, work, and relate to one another. In its scale, scope, and complexity, the transformation will be unlike anything humankind has experienced before. We do not yet know just how it will unfold, but one thing is clear: the response to it must be integrated and comprehensive, involving all stakeholders of the global polity, from the public and private sectors to academia and civil society …

The Fourth Industrial Revolution, finally, will change not only what we do but also who we are. It will affect our identity and all the issues associated with it: our sense of privacy, our notions of ownership, our consumption patterns, the time we devote to work and leisure, and how we develop our careers, cultivate our skills, meet people, and nurture relationships. It is already changing our health and leading to a “quantified” self, and sooner than we think it may lead to human augmentation.

How? Microchips implanted into humans, for one. Schwab was a tech optimist who appeared to heartily welcome transhumanism; in a 2016 interview with France 24 discussing his book, he stated:  

And then you have the microchip, which will be implanted, probably within the next ten years, first to open your car, your home, or to do your passport, your payments, and then it will be in your body to monitor your health.

In 2020, mere months into the pandemic, Schwab published COVID-19: The Great Reset, in which he detailed his view of the opportunity presented by the growing global crisis. According to Schwab, the crisis was an opportunity for a global reset that included “stakeholder capitalism,” in which corporations could integrate social and environmental goals into their operations, especially working toward “net-zero emissions” and a massive transition to green energy, and “harnessing” the Fourth Industrial Revolution, including artificial intelligence and automation. 

Much of Schwab’s personal wealth came from running the World Economic Forum; as chairman, he earned an annual salary of 1 million Swiss francs (approximately $1 million USD), and the WEF was supported financially through membership fees from over 1,000 companies worldwide as well as significant contributions from organizations such as the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. Vice Chairman Peter Brabeck-Letmathe is now serving as interim chairman until his replacement has been selected. 

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Jonathon’s writings have been translated into more than six languages and in addition to LifeSiteNews, has been published in the National PostNational ReviewFirst Things, The Federalist, The American Conservative, The Stream, the Jewish Independent, the Hamilton SpectatorReformed Perspective Magazine, and LifeNews, among others. He is a contributing editor to The European Conservative.

His insights have been featured on CTV, Global News, and the CBC, as well as over twenty radio stations. He regularly speaks on a variety of social issues at universities, high schools, churches, and other functions in Canada, the United States, and Europe.

He is the author of The Culture WarSeeing is Believing: Why Our Culture Must Face the Victims of AbortionPatriots: The Untold Story of Ireland’s Pro-Life MovementPrairie Lion: The Life and Times of Ted Byfield, and co-author of A Guide to Discussing Assisted Suicide with Blaise Alleyne.

Jonathon serves as the communications director for the Canadian Centre for Bio-Ethical Reform.

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