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Australia is becoming a surveillance state
61–70 of 437 posts
Re: Australia is becoming a surveillance state
#62I hope the AI watches us and then takes us over
Re: Australia is becoming a surveillance state
#63Earlier quoted context omitted.
> My country hasn't hired more nurses, built more ICU beds, legislated for or supported better air circulation indoors, or subsidised antigen testing - but they have implemented a vaccine passport for cafes and restaurants, against the advice of our council on civil liberties, our data privacy chief, and the WHO covid envoy. We're told it's a temporary measure, and I have no doubt that it will be as "temporary" as th…
> Yeah this is what bothers me too. Yet you fell for government propaganda and report the fault on people who don't want to take part in clinical trial. The restriction of liberty with a vaccinal passport is purely a political choice and has nothing with health per se. A lot of countries are doing fine without it.
I understand what you mean but I'm just trying to debate the government at the reasoning they imposed.
I agree a vaccine passport isn't necessary in these cases. I can see the benefit for international travel, but imposing it on every aspect of public life is a really invasive and unwarranted measure.
I don't think taking the vaccine is such a big deal, but I understand that others feel differently. I don't want to give up my privacy for their privilege though :)
Re: Australia is becoming a surveillance state
#64No guns, no FREEDOM.
Re: Australia is becoming a surveillance state
#65>“[These laws] represent, in my view, significant expansions of the existing powers of law enforcement agencies away from a traditional focus on investigation and the collection of admissible evidence of specific offenses to disruption, to attack, to take-over, to take-down,” Dr Mann said. Yikes. This is like government being infested by cancel culture (attack w/ no evidence needed, pile on & take down). What phenome…
> What phenomenon is driving this?
Read Davidson/Rees-Mogg: Sovereign Individual (1999)
Basic thesis: violence's utility declines in the information age. The institutions that are built on it, like nation states, go through a phase of decline and decay, during which they make rather more arbitrary use of force in a desperate attempt to resist obsolescence.
Re: Australia is becoming a surveillance state
#66Since leaving Australia (and started living in Europe) I have come to the conclusion that Australia is not a "real" country - it is just a continent owned by corporate interests that happens to also have people living on it.
Corporate interests own the media, politicians, food production, education etc. and no one cares, because Life Is Good. Why expect anything to change, or people to care about strong democratic institutions, when there is no incentive for them to care about abstract concepts such as privacy or governmental oversight.
Decades of bull markets, house price increases, a decline in public education, torpedoed communication infrastructure and complicit "independent" media has resulted in a wealthy, ignorant and complacent society who allow their representatives full control over their lives. It is not that they don't care about these issues, they are not even aware they are issues at all.
But who cares, when you can go to the beach?
Re: Australia is becoming a surveillance state
#67Since leaving Australia (and started living in Europe) I have come to the conclusion that Australia is not a "real" country - it is just a continent owned by corporate interests that happens to also have people living on it. Corporate interests own the media, politicians, food production, education etc. and no one cares, because Life Is Good. Why expect anything to change, or people to care about strong democratic in…
So what are we Aussies missing out on then?
Re: Australia is becoming a surveillance state
#68Since leaving Australia (and started living in Europe) I have come to the conclusion that Australia is not a "real" country - it is just a continent owned by corporate interests that happens to also have people living on it. Corporate interests own the media, politicians, food production, education etc. and no one cares, because Life Is Good. Why expect anything to change, or people to care about strong democratic in…
This was written in 1964 https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Lucky_Country , it still rings true today.
Re: Australia is becoming a surveillance state
#69The TV mini-series "Secret City" (https://www.imdb.com/title/tt4976512/) was courageous in its depiction of the growing surveillance state in Australia.
(And it stars Anna Torv, from "Fringe", but with her native accent! ;-)
Re: Australia is becoming a surveillance state
#70Because we care more about climate change than our privacy. Sad