The closing date Submissions to the Issues Paper for the Australian Law Reform Commission is July 15 yet, despite being open since the middle of May, there are currently only 80 completed submissions. Time is running out for us to have our say on important issues surrounding classification in this country.
It’s understandable to an extent – it seems like every other week there’s a new survey to fill out, or a new submissions process, but considering that 80% of the submissions made so far are lobbying for an increased amount of censorship and government intervention, it’s important for us to help provide a more balanced view.
Let’s get motivated! These are important issues, and paramount to the way classification will be rebuilt post the Australian Law Reform Commission’s report early next year.
Submissions can be made here.
Thanks folks.
Jeremy
Wednesday, July 6, 2011 at 4:36 PM*click*
Make that 81!
Jeremy
Wednesday, July 6, 2011 at 4:37 PMSeriously though, even a quick and dirty one only takes about fifteen minutes, and you’re not required to answer all of the questions.
thaum
Wednesday, July 6, 2011 at 4:36 PMI’m sorry, the phrase “have my say” is only meaningful under an assumption that someone is actually listening.
Right now, everyone and their dog wants R18+ and we’re still talking about having our say like it actually _meant_ anything?
Aidan
Wednesday, July 6, 2011 at 5:20 PMGovernments are required by convention (and probably law) to open submissions for proposed legislation. Particularly since they’ve ordered a public inquiry into it.
thaum
Wednesday, July 6, 2011 at 6:36 PMGovernments can’t be trusted to do shit. What happened last time there was an inquiry that found that a supermajority of people wanted R18+? More inquiries! The people can’t be trusted!
Give me a break.
Boku
Wednesday, July 6, 2011 at 7:39 PMThere was no “supermajority of people”. The majority of people *who responded* were in favour, but that was always going to happen because it was an online submission, which is a space dominated by those who want it.
If you seriously think that thing was representative of most Australians, you’re deluding yourself.
I want R18+ as much as anyone else, but I’m not going to pretend that particular survey meant anything.
Alinos
Wednesday, July 6, 2011 at 9:46 PMso essentially what your saying is that a submission process is broken because only those that are interested in the topic will submit.
If the politicians work off the same logic than any submissions are useless and as such there is no point in the people filling them out because the govt will ignore them anyways
Junie
Tuesday, July 12, 2011 at 5:39 AMDing ding ding ding ding ding ding!
Bookbuster
Wednesday, July 6, 2011 at 6:23 PMThe ALRC has a good reputation for actually listening to people with regards to this sort of thing. It’s seriously worth your time to submit.
Aaron
Thursday, July 7, 2011 at 1:33 PMBetter to sing out and hope someones listening than be silent until no one notices your dead.
Aidan
Wednesday, July 6, 2011 at 4:39 PMThe Issues Paper (which we’re meant to reference when making a submission) is here:
http://www.alrc.gov.au/sites/default/files/pdfs/publications/IP%2040%20Whole%20pdf.pdf
I have to admit, I had no idea they’d released their initial call for submissions. The last I’d heard they were still calling for submissions into the frame of reference…
Writing a submission at the moment.
Matthew Kermeen
Wednesday, July 6, 2011 at 4:39 PMI’m there at CI 05.
I don’t see an M Serrels on there, Mark. Did you request your submission be kept private? :P
Mark Serrels
Wednesday, July 6, 2011 at 4:42 PMDoing it now! Had to remind myself as well!
Mark Serrels
Wednesday, July 6, 2011 at 4:59 PMJust filled one out to be told I had already submitted one! I think I must have filled it out back in May!
Bookbuster
Wednesday, July 6, 2011 at 6:23 PMYou might have saved it and not submitted it – apparently a lot of people have been doing that.
doubleDizz
Wednesday, July 6, 2011 at 4:42 PMI think their plan is to keep asking us to say the same thing to them forever and ever, until we become so exhausted we give up and they can turn our rights into confetti for their office party.
6 years later and this point right now, is the closest they’ve ever been to achieving their hidden agenda.
Daniel
Wednesday, July 6, 2011 at 4:45 PMThere’s been countless surveys, submissions, and other such things in support of an R18 rating and despite that, every meeting of the Attorney Generals ends up with a resulting “Yeah we’re not sure yet, it needs more consideration”.
Chazz
Wednesday, July 6, 2011 at 4:45 PMI’ll write one when I’m drunk.
That way I’ll be really passionate and more willing to use big fanciful words.
Trjn
Wednesday, July 6, 2011 at 4:46 PMI was halfway through doing my submission when it was time to head home. Going to pop mine in once I get home.
Trjn
Wednesday, July 6, 2011 at 6:57 PMAnd…done.
My little notes section at the end was a little longer than planned.
Key point was that classification should be there to inform, not to censor and that restricting content should only be done if it is demonstrably harmful or illegal. Probably should have been clearer to say illegal to produce, not depicting illegal actions (otherwise no more Breaking Bad and that would make me sad).
Daniel
Wednesday, July 6, 2011 at 4:48 PMI did mine a month ago. Bunch of slackers
James Mac
Wednesday, July 6, 2011 at 4:48 PM*beats head against brick wall*
HolmCross
Wednesday, July 6, 2011 at 4:51 PMIt’s obvious no one in power gives a crap or is too terrified about releasing a single finger of their iron-fisted rule.
So, I’m sorry, but I stopped caring about the classification issue a long time ago; about the same time I discovered importing strangely.
NameUnimportant
Wednesday, July 6, 2011 at 7:11 PMHonestly, I Don’t think that anything we say makes a difference.
Matthew Kermeen
Wednesday, July 6, 2011 at 4:55 PMI’m reading a few of these responses, and the number of people who want R18+ and X18+ content prohibited entirely in Australia (including via the internet) is kind of surprising.
Do I sense the ACL’s hand in this or are that many people independently legitimately concerned about pornography demeaning women?
Bookbuster
Wednesday, July 6, 2011 at 6:26 PMI think that, given that several of the respondents have sections that match each other, word for word, that there is some sort of organization behind some of the ‘more censorship for the children and feeble womens’ submissions. Hopefully the ALRC will note that.
Trjn
Wednesday, July 6, 2011 at 7:12 PMI hope so. It’s pretty damned obvious just by reading a few of them.
I like the people who use broad terms like “offensive” as a reason to censor something.
I’m offended by crucifixes. They are a medieval torture device that caused unimaginable suffering and the constant worship of said device disgusts me. Therefore, all images, depictions or uses of crucifixes should be banned.
Being offensive goes both ways.
Also, swearing is bad?
Man, I wish people were forced to back up these nonsense claims.
Trjn
Wednesday, July 6, 2011 at 7:19 PMAlso, this is the one thing that seems to be in a lot of responses (regarding internet classification):
“All material that would be classified RC,X18+ or R18+should be prohibited to the general user.
Opt in access to R18+ could only be provided subject to strict age verification procedures including
registration of all users to prevent the material being then duplicated and passed on to other non
verified users.”
I’m getting rather angry reading this nonsense.
Aidan
Wednesday, July 6, 2011 at 9:03 PMI’ve seen similar word-for-word-the-same responses in other campaigns (particular complaining about ‘offensive advertising’) – in that case it was the ACL in Queensland who sponsored it.
They have rather a large email list and plenty of people with (often genuinely-held views) who will contribute.
Matthew Kermeen
Wednesday, July 6, 2011 at 7:19 PMYeah, I tried to append that observation earlier but on on an American server at work so Kotaku.com.au loads really badly. Practically form letter remarks about “abolishing R18+ content from the internet” unless people opt in for R18+ only, and specifically noting that NO R18+ rating should be added for videogames. Interesting…
Johnny Sweetbread
Wednesday, July 6, 2011 at 4:55 PM“considering that 80% of the submissions made so far are lobbying for an increased amount of censorship and government intervention”
Really? Where did you see these? I just scanned through a majority of the submissions and they all seem to be in favour of changing/adjusting the classification system to make it clearer and introduce a common set of classifications across all media types (including R18+ for video games).
Cephalxn
Wednesday, July 6, 2011 at 4:56 PMDoh! Accidentally submitted the form before finishing it, stupid iPhone.
Lord Crumplebottom
Wednesday, July 6, 2011 at 5:15 PMI know I did one… just not sure it was *this* one.
Tom
Wednesday, July 6, 2011 at 5:16 PMNote there have only been 80 “public” submissions. With these sort of submission processes, the vast majority are kept confidential.
Aidan
Wednesday, July 6, 2011 at 5:20 PMDone. That took a while -____-
Weresmurf
Wednesday, July 6, 2011 at 5:31 PMSubmitted. Felt pointless. You know compared to those what, 30k plus others we did last year? Seriously if the AGs screw this up I’m gonna Goomba stomp them…
Bookbuster
Wednesday, July 6, 2011 at 6:38 PMThis is a completely different process, looking at, not just the R18+ issue, but at whether or not the system that’s been denying us an R18+ rating (i.e. SCAG) is fair and appropriate.
Weresmurf
Thursday, July 7, 2011 at 7:17 AMIndeed, possibly why it isn’t gaining more popularity or attention.
Patrick
Wednesday, July 6, 2011 at 5:32 PMsubmitted!
Braaains
Wednesday, July 6, 2011 at 5:42 PMMaybe they’d have got more responses if it didn’t keep giving “Validation Error” when I try to go to the second page, but it doesn’t actually tell me what’s invalid about my submission. I’ve filled in all the boxes, both mandatory and optional ones, but apparently that’s not good enough.
Tower man
Wednesday, July 6, 2011 at 5:43 PMThat was hard… “If the current Commonwealth, state and territory cooperative scheme for classification should be replaced, what legislative scheme should be introduced?”… does anyone know any legislative schemes?
JK
Wednesday, July 6, 2011 at 5:45 PMI thought i already did this.
codework
Wednesday, July 6, 2011 at 5:47 PMNice to see that the couple of hours I invested into this (CI 28) a while ago at least made it to a very formal looking list.
What they are discussing goes much further than just “Should we have R18 for video games”. I hope that the end result is better than we could have imagined. Especially for small developers.
braunman
Wednesday, July 6, 2011 at 5:56 PMWow. I was the 7th person to make a submission? Us gamers really have been slack on this one!
braunman
Wednesday, July 6, 2011 at 6:21 PMAlso I’ve checked out a few of the other public responses and it’s really revealing. I know my grammar skills are terrible but seriously, read some of the pro-censorship responses! It may be bad form to attack spelling and grammar, but if those are the people who are against us then we’ve got nothing to worry about.
Nat
Wednesday, July 6, 2011 at 6:19 PM…validation error???
:(