Link ABA mission: Debriefing - Part 2: Prelude
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linksyd2.txt Robin Whittle Thursday 25 April 1996
Parts 1, 3 and 4: http://www.anu.edu.au/mail-archives/link/link9604/0155.html
Link Time 06:29 hours
Link Date 1996 April 22: Monday
The huge expanse of the starboard wing was an impressive sight as the
engines of the Link-Craft wound up to the full throated roar which
would soon take us confidently from terra-firma to 37,000 feet and
cruising.
Outside, the pre-dawn light of damp, overcast Metropolis was dull as
the Craft accelerated at approximately 0.3 G - pressing us, blinking
and expectant, into our seats.
The logic was inexorable. Link had identified firstly a threat and
secondly a strategic response in a tactical timeframe. Someone had
suggested me as the best agent for the mission and since no-one else
had stepped forward, I had, duty bound, accepted the challenge.
How aware, I wondered, were my fellow travellers of plans being
hatched at our destination that would curtail their sense of self and
threaten their well-being? Oblivious, I surmised, accustomed as they
were to a society in which they could say, in private, whatever the
fuck they liked, about anything at all - about purported deities on
Earth and in heaven, about their own fears and passions, about
trivialities and about bodily functions.
Soon we were above the clouds, bathed in dawn sunshine, leaving
behind the Metropolis and its web of roads and rails which were now
beginning to carry the influx of citizens to their places of
employment.
Behind and below, amongst the thousands of people on foot, on
bicycles and motorbikes, and in cars, trains and trams, following
their individual courses towards their work places, was Commissioner
Gilding - who first threw down the challenge from which this mission
developed.
In the heart of the Metropolis was the HQ of Group C - a little known
organisation where Commissioner Gilding and his small staff toiled
valiantly, working on the crises of the day, and preparing for the
challenges and opportunities of the future.
I mentally saluted the Commissioner across the hundred kilometres of
free air-space which now separated us. Formalities over, it was time
for breakfast.
Link Time 07:00 hours
Link Date 1996 April 22: Monday
The engines' thrust was reduced appreciably as we passed the Capital
and commenced our descent towards the intenCity. Ancient Lake George
was now in view - unspectacular and obtuse, inconveniently taking
over valuable grazing land according to the rainfall.
It had been thought necessary to create a new lake for the Capital -
something more convenient and predictable. However the new lake was
still considered lacking, and so had been fitted with a water-spout
which, in the interests of efficiency, was turned off when no-one was
deemed to be looking. No doubt Lake George's waterfowl had come to
appreciate the new lake, but some must have been disturbed if they
happened to be paddling gently or flying above the epicentre at the
start of one of the waterspout's intermittent eruptions.
The Capital had many positive qualities, including fresh air and the
everyday surrealism of kilometres of suburban homes and backyards
sharing a knife-edge boundary with even more kilometres of sparsely
populated sheep paddocks.
The specialisation and conformity of the Capital was a concern - it
was a nice *campus*, where no-one truly owned their house blocks and
where it was forbidden to erect front fences. So cocooned were some
of the citizens that concerns were raised about public-service
mismanagement when, last year, the Capital was covered with smoke
from bush burning-off operations. It was as if the responsible
department should have been able to turn it off or prevent it, just
as easily as turning the dial on a thermostat. Some citizens had
lost touch, I thought, with the fact that the Capital was in fact a
physical town, surrounded partly by bush, and that fire prevention by
controlled burning was at its best, and inexact science. Wind
changes when burning off undergrowth sometimes caused people to be
smoked out and no Earthly measures could completely prevent it.
It may be similarly easy for parliamentarians, unfamiliar as they
generally have been with the Internet, to think that since it is a
technological, flexible, computer-driven creation of humanity, it
should be more controllable than a supposedly controlled burn of
scrub. However, a contact in Parliament house reports that
parliamentarians are generally extremely enthusiastic about using the
Internet and it is the IT people and their security concerns which
have held up Internet connectivity in the building.
The Capital had no fiery industry, like Wollongong. No industrial or
visible working class heritage. Given these problems, it might have
been expected that the House of Parliament might have been built
somewhere more sensible than in the middle of a roundabout!
How could our representatives think straight - or more specifically
think with a desirably broad range of moods, flavours and
perspectives - in a building with un-openable windows, with neat
grass, European trees and pumped water ponds in its midst? Eucalypts
had been relegated to the periphery - a buffer zone against the
eternal mockery of the Herzogian procession of circling cars.
Surely Australian citizens - and their representatives in whom they
entrusted legislative and executive powers - would have been better
served by a Parliament House which backed onto sheep paddocks, a
river and some eucalypt forest. Parliamentarians should not be
cocooned for long periods. They need, like everyone else, to be able
to go for a walk, ride a horse, hear and touch the rivers and trees,
without concern for who might be watching. How could our national
interests be properly served when our leaders are denied the benefit
of time spent in contemplation, whilst defecating, in a wooden dunny,
in peace, with sunlight and insects entering above and below the
serrated-top privy door?
I was reminded of a principle expounded by my friend Charlie, in the
early seventies.
Charlie's Principle states:
"Where there's big buildings, there's bullshit!"
But not, I thought, the organic, grounding, humbling kind which
sticks to your boots.
Decisions made in the Parliament would have a profound effect on all
Australians, even those living in the remotest desert, pastoral,
forested and oceanic reaches of this fabulous country.
Some Capital based mandarins had suggested that the common folk would
- or should - be happy with weak or key-escrowed cryptography, hoping
that society would be more secure if all communications were subject
to interception by the Australian Security Intelligence Organisation
and other law enforcement authorities. ASIO was a secret force,
funded by taxpayers, accountable - it seemed - to no-one, which
apparently could monitor the phone calls and movements of, take
photos of, and bug the conversations of, any citizen it chose.
In moments of darkness I had wondered if I too had been the subject
of their scrutiny. Having written publicly - on my WWW site - in
support of strong crypto for the masses, I may have drawn attention
to myself. I doubted that any harm would come to me from ASIO's
interest, but I was unhappy at the prospect that details of my
personal life, and wide ranging conversations with friends, might not
be entirely private.
My memories of contact with law enforcement agencies have a largely
Keystone Cops flavour, dating from my days in share houses when our
homes and cars were searched for drugs, and highly trained detectives
would carefully unfold little balls of aluminium foil chocolate
wrapping from my glovebox expecting to find hashish. These memories
require no embellishment to make good dinner party stories.
However there have been times when the assistance of law enforcement
agencies has been valuable, and I have felt confident about their
abilities and intentions.
Once, driving alone through Genoa, on the Princes Highway north of
Mallacoota, at approximately 04.00 hours, in the dead of night, I was
flagged down by a lone policeman standing in the middle of the road.
There were no other cars around as he asked me politely who I was and
where I was going. As we spoke, another policeman quickly opened the
sliding door on the port side of my Mango-Mothership and immediately
searched the interior. It was a quick search - he was clearly
uninterested in minutiae and the door was closed again within 30
seconds.
Puzzled by this unexpected deployment of national resources at such a
remote location at this hour, I asked what was going on. The first
copper told me they were looking for an armed escapee who had gone
bush in the area several days before. In a flash I realised these
blokes were working to protect me and everyone else from a serious,
potentially lethal threat and that they had had to search my vehicle
because I may have been unable to admit the escapee was on board
because of the gun he may have been pointing at my head.
The copper who searched the van must have been prepared to face an
armed and desperate man. I was enormously impressed and thanked the
first copper. As I drove away, I wondered where their families were.
This business of law enforcement is delicate, imperfect and bloody
important. Even under ideal situations, it is sometimes at odds with
privacy.
Privacy is more than desirable, it is essential to sanity and
civilisation. However I would rather the occasional police search -
properly directed against real threats rather than pot - than the
extreme invasion of privacy of having a hitch-hiker pull a gun on me.
There are times when one form of privacy must be traded against
another. Ideally the decision is made by the individual concerned.
In some cases, such as this particular Police search, intrusions
without warrant are supported by the consensus of society, and in my
case at least subsequently by the individual.
Trading a person's privacy for something else, like profit, to
satisfy someone else's moral convictions, or as an enforcement of
mere "Community Standards" is a serious matter, unless the individual
gives informed, unpressured, explicit consent.
The law enforcement system is far from perfect. I have heard
reports, which I consider reliable, of teenagers being bashed in
Police stations, including one child whose deprived and abusive home-
life should have entitled her to the best caring efforts that society
could provide.
In any state, the Police can in many respects fact do what they like.
They could enter any home or vehicle - to raise objections to an
urgently expressed intention to search would only cause further
trouble. Police have been known to fabricate evidence. In the state
of the Metropolis, they are believed by many to have broken hundreds
of shop windows to profit from kickbacks from glaziers. I had read
that the state of the intenCity is being rocked by revelations
regarding paedophilia, supported by and practiced within the police
force.
I had been told by a security specialist that some ASIO buildings had
electrically shielded walls and conductive glass - to form a Faraday
cage which would thwart attempts to eavesdrop on conversations and
the operation of their computers. From well funded, unaccountable
ASIO, to the local coppers - underpaid and too often immersed in a
culture of mateship and alcohol abuse - we have entrusted the law
enforcement agencies with our privacy and safety.
Interception, cryptography, censorship, community standards,
defamation, vilification . . . freedom of public and private
communication. These were some of the issues at stake in my Link
mission to the Australian Broadcasting Authority - whose Inquiry in
to Online Content Regulation was beginning to write its final report.
Link Time 07:22 hours
Link Date 1996 April 22: Monday
The Link-Craft circled the intenCity clockwise in preparation for
landing. For a moment, the sun's glistening reflection from the
harbour framed the high-rise buildings of the commercial centre.
"Perfect!" I thought. "All too perfect." I thought some more . . .
What would this mission hold? The government of the State of
intenCity had promised to censor the Internet: email, World Wide Web
and all, to the level of films suitable for teenagers. Draconian
penalties were being proposed by this government, who admitted they
had never used the Internet.
This was analogous, I thought, to a bunch of land-lubbers, who had
never set foot outside Alice Springs or Canberra, first hearing of
the deaths and danger to adults and children alike from oceanic
activities, ranging from swimming, surfing, sailing, snorkelling,
SCUBA diving, fishing from rocks and boats, trawling and costal and
international shipping. Concerned that something *must* be done to
protect the young, the innocent and the unwary, and with an unstated
concern about what would happen to community standards and the very
fibre of moral and intellectual rectitude on which Christendom was
founded, they framed the legislation which seemed, to them,
appropriate.
How, they thought, could civilisation continue to thrive when
citizens found that there were alternatives to standing with their
feet placed firmly on the ground. Even apparently innocent oceanic
activities were a cause for concern. The land-lubbers had heard
reports of people, young and old alike, allowing themselves to be
rolled over and over by the largest waves they could find - emerging
with their swimwear in places other than where it had been, with
giddy grins on their faces, exclaiming how much fun it had been to
feel totally out of control, as if in the grip of an all-powerful
washing machine.
The land-lubbers had seen photos and videos of the ocean, and had
seen the maps which indicated its extent, but they, and all the
people they knew, had been wary about getting too close to it.
Certainly their own lives had felt complete without the benefit of an
experience which resembled being in a washing machine.
The ocean was evidently shared by countless other countries. Anyone,
from anywhere could put anything they liked into the ocean and
Australian people could be exposed to these items when they visited
the coastline. National borders and Australian Community Standards
were clearly threatened by citizen's unrestricted access to the
ocean.
The land-lubbers considered the dangerous possibilities - which began
to boggle their minds as they discovered the extraordinary scope of
the ocean. A provocative black and red lace bra, cast overboard in
the midst of lascivious shenanigans on a gondola in a Venetian canal,
could be washed to the shores of Australia, where it might shock or
damage the adults or children who discovered it.
Messages could be put in bottles, anonymously, by the thousands,
anywhere in the world. Foreign ships could dump message bottles by
the container load, and the messages could instruct and incite in
matters of crime and hatred, including how to make and use drugs and
bombs. Paedophiles from overseas, or perhaps even Australia, could
be broadcasting solicitous messages, targeting children, in soft-
drink bottles . . . The possibilities seemed endless and the land-
lubbers decided that something *must* be done before it was too late.
The legislation was forthright and comprehensive - backed up by
penalties to show the land-lubbers were serious about putting a stop
to this dangerous nonsense:
* All providers of beaches would install barriers to ensure that
flotsam and jetsam from the ocean could not affect swimmers.
* All swimmers were to be kept from large waves unless they were
adults and had satisfied authorities that they were mature enough
to handle being tumbled.
* Security cameras would be installed and all activities monitored
so that paedophiles could not exchange photographs and so that any
adult contact with children could be closely monitored for
dangerous signs.
* Underwater cameras were to be installed to thwart young teenagers
engaging in improper activities whilst holding their breath to
avoid the gaze of their parents.
* All swimmers near rocks would be required to wear safety helmets
and elbow and knee protection.
* Messages or sculptures created in the sand, would be monitored to
ensure that the no disturbing text or figures were created.
* All beach users would pay a tax to fund the new Department of
Oceanic Affairs.
Protests about the laws referred to such concepts as freedom and the
right to commune with nature. These were dismissed as soft issues
compared to the potential deaths, disorientation and undesirable
contacts which unregulated oceanic contact threatened to inflict on
society. From within their own party, murmurs were heard about the
effect on the international tourist trade, but these were dismissed
too - we shouldn't depend financially on foreigners who wanted to
come and use our beaches for unhealthy activities.
By a similar process it seems, the government of the state of the
intenCity had apparently arrived at its proposals to censor the
Internet in all possible respects. However (as reported to Link by
Sandra Davey on 17 April) their proposals would have to wait on the
Capital's Senate Attorney General's Standing Committee - which would
be meeting in July. That committee would be reading the ABA's report
with interest at the start of July, and the ABA was keen to meet with
me . . .
The flight had been perfect - perhaps too perfect. The Link-Craft
had traversed the 900 km with satin smoothness and just a few seconds
of minor turbulence. The omens had been good: the Inquiry had met
with Cisco - the company which manufactures most of the routers in
the Internet. They had visited Internet Service Providers and
inspected their facilities. They had travelled interstate and read
200 submissions, making most of them available on their WWW site:
http://www.dca.gov.au/aba/ But could things go disastrously wrong,
as they had in the USA - where draconian, unrealistically restrictive
legislation had been passed?
Link Time 07:31 hours
Link Date 1996 April 22: Monday
Having landed safely the Link-Craft was now taxiing to its docking
port. We passed a Qantas 747-400 painted fully in deep red, with
vivid Koori designs of kangaroos all over it. "Yes," I thought, "in
Australia, sense would prevail."
Moments later, we passed another jumbo. Cold, steely grey, imperious
and terminally tight-arsed, it was emblazoned with the name of a US
airline. "Surely," I thought, "in Australia, sense would prevail!"
Link Time 08:50 hours
Link Date 1996 April 22: Monday
The Link-Mobile bus to the centre of the intenCity was crowded and
warm as it pushed its way through the traffic. I planned to alight
near the IBM building which houses the ABA, the intenCity Morning
Herald and other organisations, near Darling Harbour. In my
conversation last week with a journalist with the Herald, who was
very keen to talk to me about my ABA meeting, I learned that he did
not realise that the ABA was in the same building as his. Strange,
how physical and conceptual gaps and connections evolve.
The trip to the centre was a kaleidoscope - a slice of life. A
fellow traveller calls a friend from his mobile phone. Mirror glass
buildings and wasted, empty blocks of land - maturing towards their
moment of financially optimal utilisation, like expensive wine in
dusty bottles. We pass 245 Chalmers St where Link member David Vaile
works for the Community Legal Centres of NSW. We had spoken at
length the night before as I prepared my draft submission for the
ABA, explaining how the Internet actually works. This location
houses a number of community and advocacy groups, and had until
recently been the home of Consumers' Telecommunications Network, of
which I was an active member.
David, and other Linkers would soon be checking their email, to find
my announcement that the draft was available from a special directory
in my WWW site. My ability to use email to share ideas with the 400
members of Link had been crucial to getting this far. On Saturday, I
asked for "proofreaders" to check the first draft of the submission
on Sunday - and several people responded, enabling the Monday morning
version to be greatly improved.
We passed a bus bearing an advertisement for Time Magazine. The ad's
image was horrible - a man's head totally covered in black gaffa
tape, with a pair of scissors which had purportedly cut away a patch
of tape to reveal one of his eyes, staring blankly straight ahead.
The public display of a disfiguringly bound human head was
disturbing, as was the concept of cutting anywhere near someone's
eyes. The caption was simple:
FREE YOUR MIND
This, from a mass-media publication, which had greatly muddied the
Internet pornography debate last year, was just shit. Its heavily
edited articles did something to inform readers of reality, but
delivered it in a safe format, like a television current affair show,
which encouraged the reader to feel glad they had read about the
terrible goings on, and that they weren't too close to them. The
"Time" context, I thought, often amounted to disinformation, since
only the "Time" perspective was offered, with a pretence of
objectivity, without alternative views or footnotes leading to other
sources, and with minimal scope for feedback from readers.
Still, I thought people bought it, when they could have bought
something with greater depth.
Community Standards - this was a key element in the content
regulation debate. To judge "content" according to such things as
propriety ("fitness, correctness of behaviour or morals" - I had had
to look it up) in order to determine whether:
1 - It should be illegal to posses the material.
2 - It should be illegal to make the material available to adults.
3 - It should be illegal to publicly display the material.
4 - It should be allowed to be shown to minors (under 18 yo) or to
younger children, according to circumstances such as the presence
of adults.
The purpose was to follow, and in-so-doing, strengthen "Community
Standards", as well as to protect children.
Forty or so people stood at the traffic lights, ready to cross Eddy
Avenue. Perhaps a fifth of them were not of Asian, or maybe Indian
descent. Perhaps two or three were born into the Anglo Irish culture
on which Australian governments have been based for over 200 years.
In the state of the intenCity, it is widely acknowledged that
corruption has been endemic for all of that time.
The bus had a recorded voice announcement welcoming us to the
intenCity - the city the Link-Craft's pilot had told us was the most
beautiful in the world. "Four million people from over 140
nationalities" the voice told us, before it went on to extol the
delights of the city and the benefits of buying an all day ticket.
"Community Standards?" I thought. "Which Community?"
Moments later I saw a Sikh man wearing a burgundy coloured turban.
"What are his community's standards?" I wondered. He was standing
near a bus shelter with a larger than life illuminated colour
advertisement with a photograph of a young fair-skinned woman clad
only in lace bra and panties, luxuriating amongst satin sheets. What
would a community which insists that men wear turbans have to say
about public images of scantily clad women?
Community standards are weird indeed. Movies regarding serial
killers remain highly popular. Though I am a seasoned operative in a
variety of off-beat fields, I could hardly think of any subject more
repulsive. Yet it was almost impossible to buy good magazines
regarding spanking between consenting adults. Maybe the discrepancy
had nothing to do with censorship in a legal sense. Maybe I was
seeing this wrong - maybe the serial killer movies were just as
pathetic as the second rate spanking magazines. Maybe the difference
was that their budgets were immense because current fashions, and
current Community Standards, held that ripping holes in people's
bodies with knives and guns in order to kill them was entertaining
and that a resounding whack on the posterior was beyond the pale. (I
am of course referring only to spanking concerning consenting
adults.)
Community standards could certainly change. For the first century or
so the early Christians could barely bring themselves to mention the
cross - so horrible was its spectre in their minds. It would have
been inconceivable to them that their descendants would celebrate the
instrument of their beloved saviour's excruciating death.
Community Standards. The venomous sparring of the most popular
commercial radio hosts can transform a pleasant intenCity taxi ride
into a Journey into Darkness.
Meanwhile grown, respected, men think twice about responding to
toddlers who smile at them from their mother's supermarket trolley -
for fear of being suspected a paedophile. I was later to learn that
Michael Gawenda wrote beautifully on this matter in "The Age" (1996
April 22 page 13) - the quality Metropolis newspaper which is outsold
by a factor of two by a smaller parochial paper of the same price and
half the size.
Community standards - uuuggh! As a professional writer, I had, for
fear of being thought sexist, agonised over whether to call a man a
chairman, a woman a chairwoman, a woman a chairman or . . . to call
them simply a chair.
Link Time 09:17 hours
Link Date 1996 April 22: Monday
After alighting, I was walking towards the IBM building, and found it
hard to take my eyes off a shapely young woman, of European descent,
power-walking ahead of me with shorts, T-shirt and a bare midriff.
"Look but don't touch" I thought. Us blokes have been well trained
against the instincts which ensured our ancestor's reproductive
success - to the point where we have conflicting thoughts about
whether to look at all. Community Standards, it seems, dictate it is
OK to have the lingerie advertisement and the comely woman on the
street with her visible belly button, but that what blokes did with
their eyes and their attention was something to be monitored. Weird.
Then I saw a slender, young, Chinese woman wearing a T-shirt closely
fitting against her breasts, highlighting her womanly shape and
contrasting with her long black hair. She was walking a dog on a
chain - a miniature terrier, wearing a miniature, and looser, T-
shirt. Children see women in close fitting and skimpy garments like
this all the time. Just a millimetre away are the bare breasts they
are not supposed to see.
Concern about electronic *images* of naked women, and about
explicitly sexual and violent *images* being available to children
via the Internet - *from* the Internet as some had thought - was a
driving force behind the ABA Inquiry.
It was a highly confused set of "Community Standards" which had
evolved in Australia - without any planning at all. However we were
less confused than in the USA, where hand-guns were legal and it was
permissible for network television to show endless murders, but not
to show images of women in a way which revealed the outline of their
underwear.
The mass media, citing the threat to "Community Standards", had
invoked the spectre of "net-porn" and seriously clouded the
discussion of one of humanity's greatest achievements: cheap,
flexible, global communications via the Internet.
Link Time 09:27 hours
Link Date 1996 April 22: Monday
I entered the lift and was soon transported to the fifteenth floor.
Four hours after awaking, Link-Power had transported me to the
Australian Broadcasting Authority.