OPINION
The defeat of the “Indigenous Voice” referendum, if nothing else, showed just what a grassroots, low-budget campaign can achieve against the assembled might of the elite.
The Yes campaign had the backing of the government, most of the minor parties, and even prominent members of the opposition. Every single state government threw their weight behind it. Corporations representing half of the wealth of the ASX handed over tens of millions of shareholder’s money, other rich donors forked out even more. The voice was backed by sporting codes and the entirety of the media. Arts organisations and universities, schools preached to kids and handed out Yes badges in the playground.
Standing against this political, financial and cultural Goliath was a tiny David figure named Advance Australia.
Advance was set up as a direct opposite to powerful left-wing lobby group GetUp! Its first campaigns targeted superannuation changes and attempts to change or abolish Australia Day. But it was the crucible of the Voice referendum that really forged Advance Australia as a credible lobby group. As John Roskam, formerly of the Institute of Public Affairs puts it, “It shows what can happen if you fight for a principle, no matter how outnumbered you might feel at the time.”
Now, Advance Australia is preparing to fight for another principle: freedom of speech.
The peak body behind the No campaign for the Indigenous voice to parliament has revealed Labor’s misinformation laws will be its next target, claiming its opponents will attempt to use the legislation to “silence” conservative voices.
“Misinformation” is the left’s latest buzz-word. Like “fascism”, “white supremacy”, and “racism”, it’s deployed with scant regard for fact. Like the other buzz-words, its only real purpose is to demonise whoever it’s flung at. It’s a sneer masquerading as an argument.
Which is why the sour grapes losers of the referendum are hammering it so heavily.
“You and I destroyed their divisive agenda … even so, they are regrouping,” Advance Australia executive director Matthew Sheahan said in the email.
“Why do you think they’re already talking about new laws to make misinformation a crime?
“They think the only way they can win is if they silence their opponents.”
As we saw during the pandemic, our so-called “sole sources of truth” are the biggest liars and shonks on the face of the planet.
“You know that politicians enforcing their own views as the state-held ‘truth’ is nothing short of being totalitarian and despotic. It’s un-Australian and cannot be allowed” […]
Mr Sheahan said when politicians labelled content as misinformation or disinformation, “they are really saying ‘You are too stupid to make up your own mind’,” invoking comments of voice supporters who criticised the No campaign ahead of the referendum.
“They think if you oppose their radical vision of Australia, you’re a dinosaur or a dickhead, as Ray Martin put it,” he said in his email.
And, like all tyrants, they’re determined to silence their critics.
Under draft legislation currently proposed by the Labor government, the Australian Communications and Media Authority would be given the powers to penalise digital platforms if they failed to combat misinformation and disinformation.
The government has faced backlash over the legislation from some legal experts, religious groups and the Coalition, who have accused Labor of setting up a “ministry of truth” that could impinge on freedom of speech.
Other concerns include the “broad definition” of harms potentially caused by misinformation that elicited an intervention from ACMA.
The Advance Australia website claimed that if the government decided someone was guilty of misinformation, “they’ll shut you down and hit solid citizens with unfair criminal convictions”.
The Australian
If nothing else gives the game away on Labor’s Orwellian laws, consider this telling fact: the draft laws will specifically exempt the government, but not the opposition. It will also exempt the mainstream media.
When the biggest liars on the face of the planet, the least-trusted group in our society, want to be exempt from their own laws on “misinformation”, the threadbare mask is torn away.
Would you, after all, allow used-car dealers to pass laws exempting themselves from fraud claims?