Tuesday 11 October 2011

Crackdowns (2) - And Cameron 'governs' this country?

I posted yesterday about 'crackdowns' and how they are used to take the public's eye of more important matters du jour. But then, of course, these 'crackdowns', presented as 'government initiatives' are nothing of the sort - they are, in some instances, policies being implemented prior to a forthcoming directive from Brussels, the basis of which has already been agreed.

Politics Home advises, with links to other media, that subscribers to four of the UK's biggest internet service providers will have to opt-in to view pornographic websites as part the Government's plan to curb sexualised imagery online. Then further searching reveals this - and the two are not linked? For the Mail to report (presumably having been briefed by No10) that the crackdown is being introduced in response to a report by Reg Bailey, chief executive of the Mothers’ Union charity does stretch incredulity a tad. That Bailey was not aware of the EU involvement and that Member States would have two years to implement the directive is rather shot to pieces by his demand in the Guardian that if service providers did not voluntarily implement the recommendations in his report, they should be forced to do so within 18 months.

It is noticed from the other media reports that access to pornographic sites will be denied by service providers unless the subscriber has 'opted-in' - which begs the question for those that do, what other draconian measures may be forthcoming. Presumably those 'opting-in' will have their names placed on a register, which will then provide children's social services the opportunity to visit and make a case for taking any children in the family into care as those parents will be deemed 'unsuitable'?

What people wish to view and what parents will allow their children to view is not my concern (do not pre-empt my views on this subject - that would be the subject of another post). What does annoy me - and is the point of this post - is the obfuscation that our political elite use to hide the fact that they no longer form our government. What happened to transparency?

4 comments:

Bill said...

Am I losing it?
Could have sworn I posted a comment on this post earlier this evening.

WitteringsfromWitney said...

Bill: you did indeed - I got email notification but for some reason it has not appeared.

for the benefit of readers, I copy and paste below:

"Here'e the proof you are bang on again David.

Despite millions of Euros being spent on promoting internet safety for children, only 14% of
parents across Europe have installed web filtering software to prevent their children from
seeing certain websites. The survey carried out by London School of Economics also found
that 40% of parents did realise that their child had seen sexual images online, while over half
of parents did not know that their child had received hurtful or abusive messages online. The
European Union is pushing ahead with legislative initiatives over the next year to make the
internet safer for children and address data collection practice and behavioural advertising.

source;
http://www.southwark.anglican.org/downloads/mu/Faith&Policy_Watch_Mar11.pdf

There is no end to the attempted meddling in the lives of families across the land by control freaks dressed up as do gooders aka THE RIGHTEOUS.

My wife and I have never ever regulated the internet for our two children. We took the opinion that they will come across images, copy, videos of things they might not like anyway so why not let them find their own level. It comes as no surprise they have done just that. They don't get pissed, they don't 'do mobile phones', they are not perverts, in fact they are both perfectly normal, almost sane, human beings.

Hell we even let them watch films and cartoons from a young age where people actually smoked. How liberal is that?
Hope Dreadful Arnott reads this blog."

Ian Hills said...

Good post, WfW. Labour (I mean the EU) started this Internet crackdown. Wonder if it's linked with Common Purpose front the Media Standards Trust's aim to license publishing (papers, blogs etc.)?

Re. an above post, the EU maintains a database of "vulnerable children". Bit rich seeing as Belgian government ministers, also based in Brussels, are mostly pedos.

And Europol (reports to the European Commission, due to take over regional police forces under Lisbon constitution) maintains a database of "troublemakers".

I think that means us, but maybe they padded it out with a few terrorists to make it look legit.

Bill said...

you did indeed - I got email notification but for some reason it has not appeared.

If the price of free (blogger) is errant comments they it's a price worth paying.
Many thanks.