Bettina Arndt: ALP misinformation bill will silence government critics
The writing is on the wall – our society is already being subject to constant censorship. This is a bill which threatens anyone who might cause “disruption of public order or society”, writes Bettina Arndt.
September 18, 2023 – 9:12PM
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‘This is a horror movie for the govt’: Legal warning over Labor’s…
Shadow Communications Minister David Coleman says it’s just “another day, another disaster” for the Albanese government over its misinformation bill. Mr Coleman’s remarks come as constitutional expert and lawyer Anne Twomey is warning Labor’s proposed misinformation bill is risking the very freedoms it seeks to protect. Ms Twomey warns the draft bill is “virtually impossible to properly implement,” and will seriously risk undermining free speech in Australia, calling it a “fiasco”. “This is a horror movie for the government, and barely a day passes without someone smashing it,” he told Sky News host Sharri Markson. “This bill should be torn up into little pieces, thrown in the bin – it should never have been introduced by the Albanese government, and it is a disaster for them.”
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What fun to watch Transport Minister Catherine King twist and turn after it was revealed she’d rejected Qatar Airways flights due to Doha strip searches.
Here was ideology trumping policy, with a minister’s feminist outrage taking precedence over the public’s desperation for cheaper air travel.
The whole mess would have likely flown under the radar had it not been for Prime Minister Anthony Albanese cosying up to Qantas, and the events that followed: planes with YES slogans, Chairman’s Lounge membership for the PM’s son, customers cheated out of refunds.
But when all that blew up, an essential truth about this government became very clear – the sinister reach of feminism is never far away.
Make no mistake. If Labor’s proposed Misinformation Bill makes it into law, it will be ruthlessly employed to ensure feminist views are the only ones heard.
Minister for Infrastructure, Transport and Regional Development of Australia, Catherine King during Question Time at Parliament House in Canberra. Picture: NCA NewsWire / Martin Ollman
I should know. Two years ago, I was given an Australia Day honour for “promoting gender equity through advocacy for men”.
The sisterhood’s fury was unleashed. I was denounced for challenging orthodoxies on domestic violence and sexual abuse – all the issues where my presentation of true facts and figures clashed with misleading anti-male dogma.
My honours award was the feminists’ chance to try to take me out. They recruited numerous powerful figures to join the attack, including two attorneys-general.
The Australian Senate was hoodwinked into denouncing me. Week after week the ABC continued the barrage.
Yet, during this time, the Governor-General’s office reported receiving tons of emails supporting my honour from people who also fought back on social media arguing the award was well deserved.
Bettina Arndt was decried for her anti-feminist views.
There’s no way that could have happened if Labor’s Misinformation Bill was law.
Support for my views would be seen as misinformation, and banned from social media.
Censorship is increasing, even as many media platforms are already totally captured.
My critics have managed to destroy my once-thriving YouTube channel, where more than 788K viewers enjoyed my take on the politics of cleavage – which I argue is about women flaunting their sexual power over men.
YouTube destroyed my channel, “shadow banning” my videos until they received hardly any views.
Today’s feminists are the ultimate sexual killjoys. This means we have good reason to fear putting this new method of controlling our society into their hands.
Support for alternative views could be censored online under Labor’s Misinformation Law, writes Bettina Arndt.
Just look at what happened to Jenni Hermoso, the Spanish soccer player, who didn’t seem too fazed after being kissed by her football boss until the sisterhood got in her ear. Camille Paglia nailed the problem: “Leaving sex to the feminists is like letting your dog vacation at the taxidermist.”
Be warned that the proposed bill would exclude government organisations, which means they could spout misinformation and prosecute anyone who called it out.
That’s a worry, given the attitudes within many government bodies.
Our eSafety Commissioner, Julie Inman Grant, notes that “women are disproportionately targeted in every form of online abuse”. Yet the Australian Federal Police warns of increasing numbers of boys being preyed upon by international sex offenders.
The commission’s annual report showed seven of 10 cases of online sextortion were male. Under the proposed bill, simply pointing out such blatant bias could be labelled “disruptive” and duly punished.
A similar fate could have awaited the online critics who exposed the former director of the Institute of Criminology when he announced that 23 per cent of young people had witnessed their mums being attacked by dad, but conveniently failed to mention the same study found 22 per cent saw their dads being physically abused by their mums.
The writing is on the wall – our society is already being subject to constant censorship. Two years ago, I started a GoFundMe to raise money to assist a university tutor mount an unfair dismissal case.
The Australian Federal Police warns of increasing numbers of boys being preyed upon by international sex offenders.
He’d lost his job following sexual harassment accusations from a girl who he says took a shine to him but became annoyed when he made it clear he wasn’t interested.
The money was pouring in when the fundraising platform suddenly announced they were closing down the campaign and banning me from the site because they claimed my fundraiser was “prohibited conduct”.
This is a platform which regularly fundraises for alleged “rape victims” long before their cases are determined in court. Luckily our donors received their money back, unlike the Canadian truckers who had funds donated to them frozen by GoFundMe.
Then there’s the case of a group of ordinary women who started Mothers of Sons website, publishing stories of their sons’ ordeals in our anti-male justice system. Their stories are heartbreaking – a granddaughter murdered by her violent mother when she lost custody to the father, sons suiciding after losing their children through family court decisions, older parents spending retirement savings on legal help for sons facing false allegations.
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All true stories, yet Facebook constantly censors the mothers’ activities. That’s obviously bad enough – but are we now going to allow this proposed bill to empower activists to totally shut them down?
This is a bill which threatens anyone who might cause “disruption of public order or society”. That’s me. I’m determined, as are others like me, to expose damaging feminist control of our bureaucracies, to challenge anti-male policies and to restore traditional legal protections to men.
So I will be in the firing line, as will everyone else who seeks to hold governments to account.