

Travellers to Australia to be searched for porn - kareemm
http://www.smh.com.au/technology/technology-news/travellers-to-be-searched-for-porn-20100520-vh09.html

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boyter
As an Australian I am totally pissed at this.

First we are getting an internet filter despite a crooked trial run which
"prooved" it was possible and the majority of the people being against it
(especially when told what it is).

Secondly no R18+ rating for games because too many people wanted it
apparently. When 98% of people who respond to the open comment thing say they
want it then it must be flawed. It seems to be a game of "Head I Win. Tails
You Lose" on that one.

Finally there is this. Not only is porn not illegal in this country but this
is being brought in with the age old "Think of the children!".

So so angry right now. You Americans dont know how lucky you are to have a
bill of rights which our politicians are still arguing over if we deserve or
not. Obviously they dont want it so they can get stupid laws like this in.

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jacquesm
Are they that desperate for porn?

Maybe they should give the people in Australian customs an internet
connection, that way they can spend their time in more useful ways when
dealing with travelers.

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pavel_lishin
> Are they that desperate for porn?

Only big-breasted porn.

~~~
redcap
For those who don't get it, women with A-cup breasts are banned in Australian
pornography.

~~~
wmf
I hate to interrupt your fun, but technically I think women who appear to be
underage are banned.

~~~
redcap
That's the rule as it stands. As it's interpreted, small breasts = appears
underage for the most part.

The issue has been widely reported in the press as either a small breast ban
or Australian demanding large breasts as indicated upstream.

From [http://www.inquisitr.com/59633/australian-government-
censor-...](http://www.inquisitr.com/59633/australian-government-censor-
confirms-small-breast-ban-sort-of/)

"Fiona Patten from the Australian Sex Party (ASP) said she attended a ACB
training session late last year where they showed examples of publications
that had been Refused Classification due to the size of the woman’s breasts."

As to whether I'm having fun or not, the Australian Labor government has been
behaving weirdly when it comes to censorship and personal freedom (net
censorship, etc). I guess I'm lucky that I live overseas at the moment, but I
do find the moral pandering (www.somebodythinkofthechildren.com) to be over
the top.

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DrSprout
If I go to Australia before this decision gets reversed, I'm going to be sure
to pack a lot of porn.

Also make sure I have some time to kill getting into the country. Really,
that's the best solution: everyone needs to carry enough porn coming into the
country that the customs officials get so bogged down filtering porn (by
hand!) that they have no choice to give up. This is a _prime_ opportunity for
civil disobedience.

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cubicle67
_Patten said if the question was designed to stop child pornography being
smuggled into the country then the question should have been asked about
"child pornography", without encompassing regular porn._

Yeah, change the question to "Are you carrying any child porn?". That'll stop
its import for sure. We should extend this idea further; perhaps we could tick
a "Are you planning on robbing this bank?" box before entering a bank. Heck,
why not do away with the who judge/jury thing? Next time someone is charged
with a crime, just give them a card that says "I committed this crime [Yes]
[No]"

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Jun8
I didn't know there was a Australian Sex Party. Can we vote for them :-)

This porn thing is really getting out of hand in Australia, first they tried
to block web pages, now this. I've never been there, but my naive picture
gained from the movies (admittedly not a reliable source, but nevertheless a
data point) is that they seem to be quite a normal bunch and not a prudish,
bible-thumping, porn-hating crowd. So, which part of the Australian society
backs this anti-pron movement, I wonder.

~~~
prawn
The Sex Party is actually pretty sensible and, under our voting system, worth
a vote. Unlike the US system (as an example - not sure where you're from) we
can vote for minor parties and then preference our preferred major (Liberal or
Labor) party.

Australia is not overly religious, generally speaking, but both major party
leaders are reasonably prudish, Abbott (Liberal, in opposition) very openly
so. Many other politicians don't really show any outwardly obvious signs of
being religious.

The lobbyists and so on must be more powerful than we realise because this
"censor the internet" and "search for porn" pressure is coming from no one I
know and comments online seem to mostly favour the "This is ridiculous" line
of thinking.

Very sad to see what is a decent country take these backward turns for the
worse.

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danudey
So if I say no and I do have porn, that's me lying to customs, right? What if
I don't know I have it? What if my kids downloaded something onto my laptop,
or there's some pictures still in my browser cache?

Despite what Australian politicians seem to think, they won't be able to build
an anti-porn wall to keep new porn out and then filter the porn they already
have. They can't build a porn-free zone, no matter how hard they try.

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steveplace
Thoughtcrimes are a heinous offence.

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hartror
Wow this is horrible, I already have on my international travel check-list
"put all data into a hidden true crypt volume"! But that was mostly to avoid
other countries, not my nice supposedly liberal homeland!

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benologist
That's pretty lame.

Fortunately who needs to carry porn these days?

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etherael
This is beginning to look suspicious. Does anyone know what on earth is going
on with these concerted, ridiculous assaults on freedom in Australia? It
almost looks like the work of some ridiculous lobby with an agenda.

