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Australia’s new mass surveillance mandate

digitalrightswatch.org.au

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Re: Australia’s new mass surveillance mandate

#411

Post by shushpanchik »

roody15 wrote: post #369
0xdeadb00f wrote: post #308

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This talk about "Draconian" lockdown in Australia needs to stop. Our privacy and digital rights laws are awful. But the lockdowns are necessary. NSW had upward of 1000+ cases and that's why they're (still) in a strict lockdown. QLD and i beleive WA as well for example are not in lockdown at all because of their much much lower daily cases. Also, "50 cases in a nation of millions"? I dont know where you're getting you…

1200+ cases in NSW out of a population of over 8 million. So we should extend a strict lockdown … to do what exactly? Is the plan to manage this virus with a series of alternating lockdowns and get the number of cases to zero? Is this realistic, is this the type of world you want to live in? The virus appears to be as contagious as chicken pox, vaccines help with serious cases but are doing little unfortunately to st…

Please put some effort in getting information instead of creating straw man. NSW and Victoria are in a lockdown to have time to get 70-80% of eligible population double-vaccinated. Modelling by couple of institutes show that if lockdown ends today, hospitals would be overwhelmed and lots of preventable deaths occur. By all estimates we would reach that 70-80% number in 1-3 months time, so that's the plan. Google for "Doherty Institute planning", visit https://covidlive.com.au, check daily press conference of VIC and NSW premiers - answers to your questions are in plain sight.

Re: Australia’s new mass surveillance mandate

#412

Post by cletus »

BrissyCoder wrote: post #314
cletus wrote: post #262

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The central premise of musical chairs is that there are less chairs than people but every round everyone gets an opportunity to get a seat. So in my analogy, the last round ended in Sydney in 1978 meaning if you weren't sitting then then you didn't get another chance at a seat. I remember seeing property shows in the 2000s and there'd be a young couple in their mid-20s with a baby looking at houses that were up to $8…

Ahhh right... I didn't realise Sydney got so unnaffordable that long ago which is what I think threw me off.

Some important context here: this applies to probably every Australian city but is particularly prevalent in Sydney I feel. And that is that the notion of what Sydney in keeps changing.

So when I say Sydney became unaffordable in the 1970s, I mean what people viewed as Sydney back then, which is inner Sydney, the North Shore and coastal suburbs. But these have now been so out of reach for people who aren't wealthy for so long that people don't think of them as Sydney anymore.

Now when people talk about the affordability of Sydney they're talking about the areas where "normal" people buy. Sydney has expanded far to the West, basically to the Blue Mountains (eg Penrith). It's also expanded south (eg Campelltown). But somewhere like Mosman isn't part of the normal person's mental picture of Sydney property where it was 40+ years ago.

This reminds me of something that happened to me in university. I mentioned to someone the suburbs I'd be staying in over the summer when university was out and they literally said "la di da" like it was fancy. To them it was because they were part of a newer generation who lived very far north (I remember they took 3 buses to get to university). To me, it was just where my grandparents lived and had done so for 40-50 years. When they bought that house it was literally the edge of the city, as in the other side of the street was bushland.

You see it on the train too. When I went to university the one where all the students and twentysomethings lived was 5 stops from the CBD. 15 years later it was 8-9 stops.

Re: Australia’s new mass surveillance mandate

#413

Post by stephen_g »

bogomipz wrote: post #362
jclulow wrote: post #165

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Under the current leadership the LNP inches closer to the GOP with each passing day, so, I don't expect they'll be perpetually to the left of the Republicans.

Sorry if this is a silly question but are the LP and the LNP the same party? When I try to look up LNP I see references to Queensland which confuses me if it's a national party. If not are they related?

Yeah, it's confusing. The federal parties are made up of state branches, and the state branches of the Nationals and Liberals merged in Queensland.

Federally the two parties are in coalition, so it's basically the same anyway, even though they are technically different parties in the other states.

Re: Australia’s new mass surveillance mandate

#414

Post by sircastor »

Teever wrote: post #198
WalterBright wrote: post #186

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> compulsory voting This always seemed like madness to me. You can force someone to vote, but you cannot force them to vote responsibly. They may just vote "screw you" just for revenge. The right to vote includes the right to abstain from voting when one does not care. Forced voting sounds like a recipe for bad election results. I would expect the same from paying people to vote.

I think that I would be okay with compulsory voting if there was a 'none of the above' option on the ballot. If "none of the above" wins the vote then all the people on that ballot are disqualified from running in any election for a period of time, say 10 years and there is a do-over on that particular electoral district election. I'd like to hope that would clean up politics real quick.

Rather than a “None of the above” option (though I do find your disqualification concept interesting) I prefer an “I abstain” option. Food requires a small amount of effort but an effort nonetheless. Every time a voter picks up the ballot, you hey are faced with the question “do I really have nothing to contribute here?”

Re: Australia’s new mass surveillance mandate

#415

Post by stubish »

roody15 wrote: post #386
Gatsky wrote: post #363

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is pretty hyperbolic. Examination of global excess deaths would tell you that the lockdowns were successful in their stated primary aim. Australia and NZ had significantly fewer excess deaths during the first wave [1]. And if they continue with lockdowns, they will have signficantly fewer excess deaths again no matter what else happens. You may think this isn't a good trade-off, which is a fine point to make, bu…

You are correct I think this is not a good trade-off. However I stand by “my mind is blown” that continuing with these draconian measures and the lock down approach borders on madness. For reference in my part of the world we are fully open going on the 5th week of full in person schooling. All athletic teams and events have resumed with full crowds. In a school district of 2600 students we have over 45 positive case…

The low vaccination rate means it takes little for cases to jump from double to triple or even quadruple digits, at which point things spiral out of control like already happened in many other countries. Compare this to countries like Britain or the US with high vaccination rates and even higher percentages of the population with antibodies.

Re: Australia’s new mass surveillance mandate

#416

Post by RileyJames »

roody15 wrote: post #269

I simply cannot wrap my mind around what is happening in Australia. Continuing a lockwdown while the number of positive covid cases remains in the low hundreds and the daily death rate in the lower tens to single digits. Nothing makes sense here. Draconian laws, complete shutdown over something that is and has been statistically under control and managed from months. Am I alone here or do people really think what is…

> Serious cannot leave your house outside and go outside for a jog

This is simply not true. Why are you making a factually incorrect statement?

Even at the highest lockdown level you are allowed to leave your home to exercise.

NSW: https://www.nsw.gov.au/covid-19/rules/greater-sydney

VIC: https://www.dhhs.vic.gov.au/sites/default/files/documents/20...

Re: Australia’s new mass surveillance mandate

#417

Post by didibus »

WalterBright wrote: post #186
layoric wrote: post #159

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Born in AU so bias is to stay, which leads me to push more for political change required to try to address these problems. Most of your 10 years has been under a particularly bad (and honestly corrupt) federal gov. Country has a large state capture problem from largely mining companies but also other special interests that have lobbied and . Anything that might threaten those interests is being pretty heavily targete…

> compulsory voting This always seemed like madness to me. You can force someone to vote, but you cannot force them to vote responsibly. They may just vote "screw you" just for revenge. The right to vote includes the right to abstain from voting when one does not care. Forced voting sounds like a recipe for bad election results. I would expect the same from paying people to vote.

> The right to vote includes the right to abstain from voting when one does not care. Forced voting sounds like a recipe for bad election results. I would expect the same from paying people to vote

I've gone in a bit of a voting system rabbit hole recently, and this depends on the system of voting. There are some systems where abstaining from an election can help a voter's preferred choice win: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Participation_criterion

So I think depending on the election system, it could make sense to have compulsory voting, even if the person voting simply puts all candidates at equal preference.

Re: Australia’s new mass surveillance mandate

#418

Post by cletus »

thenewewb wrote: post #354
cletus wrote: post #185

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So I'm Australian but from the part no one ever visits (ie Perth). I say this because for most visitors Australia = Sydney, maybe Melbourne. Anyway, I've gone to live overseas a couple of times now. The most recent time was to the US 11 years ago. I'm still here. As many problems as the US has, the one big selling point it has is career opportunities and earning potential as a software engineer. Like... it doesn't ev…

With regard to gay marriage - Donald Trump ran and won in 2016 on a platform that included the recognition of gay marriage as a settled right. AU and US aren’t so different!

That's kinda my point. It is of course unknowable but I really wonder if Trump could've won the 2016 election if the Supreme Court hadn't handed down that decision.

This has happened before. Dubya largely got reelected in 2004 because Karl Rove tied the campaign to blowback against states and plebiscites in favour of gay marriage.

Re: Australia’s new mass surveillance mandate

#420

Post by chrisseaton »

Nursie wrote: post #384
gregsq wrote: post #237

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don’t see this as anywhere near the same thing though. These so called ‘donkey votes’ are derided, and categorised as together with voting errors and other invalid voting forms. The right to withhold your vote is as fundamental as the right to withold your labour. Voter turnout is an important metric in its own right, and is observed tactically in, say, the UK. Compulsory voting simplifies competition, and destroys…

And in democracies like the UK, people who don’t vote are disregarded as lazy and ignored too. I agree, you should be able to withhold as a protest, in practice it’s 100% meaningless.

They aren’t ignored - parties try to woo them over.
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