Somebody Think Of The Children

Chinese net censorship campaign, Game ban petition

Amnesty International Australia is launching a social media campaign aimed at getting Australian bloggers to unite and support their Chinese counterparts who have been banned or imprisoned by the Chinese government for expressing their right to freedom of speech online.

Sophie Peer from Amnesty says a lot of Australian’s are concerned that Chinese style Internet censorship is heading to our shores.

“We know it is an issue the online community is talking about. There is concern in Australia that Chinese Government censorship of the Internet is coming to these shores too. We are asking the Australian online public to amplify their concerns about the issues of Internet censorship and the consequential imprisonment of innocent Chinese people, such as Shi Tao who simply used his Yahoo! email account to pass on censorship directives from the Chinese government and is now serving ten years in prison.”

“Our own Australian athletes and reporters could be inhibited from expressing their own opinions online and using the Internet freely while they are in Beijing. It is a concern for all Australian’s in the run up to the Beijing Olympics.”

July 30 is the online day of action. To take part or find out more, visit Uncensor.com.au

Gameplayer.com.au has a petition to save Fallout 3 doing the rounds. Fallout 3 was banned last week by the Classification Board for its in game drug use.

Petitions are great for creating buzz, but they also lull people into believing they’ve done enough to bring change. If you’re really keen on getting an R18+ rating for games (which you should be), be prepared to write a submission for the Government should they (and they hopefully will) ask for them.

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