New ‘Move-On’ Laws Effectively End Democracy in Oz
by judd Friday, May 30 2014, 1:17am
international /
prose /
post
Real democracies are characterised by participation, in other words real democracy is social process/evolution and that form of government allows for legitimate protest or dissent if the people consider any issue worthy of opposition -- usually if that issue threatens the democratic process or hard won rights and freedoms. Freedom of expression and free speech should be integral to all democracies and any threat to these fundamental democratic rights must be viewed with the utmost suspicion.
Recently the State of Victoria passed a bill to include new ‘move-on’ police powers into law; other Oz States and indeed western nations around the world are viewing this move as a smooth, surreptitious means through which Draconian police state measures could be introduced to further erode the rights and freedoms of people that live in democratic nations. It should be noted that democracy by definition means rule by the majority, either directly or by representation and it appears that these new laws were introduced by a tiny minority lobby that caught the majority off guard.
It is hardly necessary to mention that these laws easily allow abuse, they could be applied to anyone standing on a corner waiting for a friend, a legitimate locational protest or to the unfortunate homeless that sleep in doorways, indeed to any persons that remains stationary for whatever reason.
The opportunity for abuse is self-evident, however, we are supposed to trust in the discretionary power of the police not to abuse these laws; one is tempted to laugh out loud at this point, however, serious professional psychological studies clearly demonstrate how easily humans are turned/trained to victimise their own kind to the point of stoking them into gas chambers and ovens and making soap, lampshades and other macabre human bi-products -- in fact it was the holocaust of WWII that prompted the studies.
So now the Oz population with its postage stamp memory and general apathy has allowed these bills to be passed into law -- well, we know what to expect, don’t we?
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/03/12/australia-anti-protest-law_n_4948273.html