Brad in Brisbane

Thank you for your recent correspondence, Senator Conroy. In that correspondence, you took pains to point out the *already existing* measures that we have in place to enforce existing laws regarding the legality or otherwise of content and the possession thereof. Given the almost daily media reports of successful seizures, arrests, and convictions under those existing legal frameworks, why does the government feel it necessary to make Australia look, in the international and national community more akin to China or North Korea than anyone else by insisting on this short-sighted, and doubtless politically motivated policy of attempting to "filter" the internet. Without actually crippling it, it is technically to do. Any proposed "filter" can be bypassed trivially - I know, I work in the internet industry. Any "filter" that would prevent such bypassing measures would effectively build a bananna wall around the country, preventing any and all communication with the "outside world" other than that which was Government sanctioned. And that way totalitarianism lies. I, for one, find it extremely distressing that the Government that I helped elect finds it incumbent upon themselves to restrict my ability to speak, legally and without encumbrance, on issues that I feel strongly about, in an open and free community and on a free and open platform. It may, however distasteful the thought is, be time to apply for a Green Card and get out of here. Even the land of the rule of the Gun and Guantanamo Bay looks more inviting than the draconian and "big brother" attitudes that seem to be taken as standing for "good government" by our elected servants in the corridors of power in the isolated and manicured political eden which is Canberra. You truly terrify me, Senator Conroy. As, with all the good will in the world, you ignore all the community advice raised against your will, you ignore the existing legal and regulatory frameworks, and plan to put in place a secret reigime which will lay the groundwork for a Government - perhaps not this government, but a Government - to throttle both my speech and my access to information. Such a plan, coming from the Minister for (among other things) Communications would be laughable if it were not so terrifyingly real. I ask you, in all conscience, again, as I did in writing directly to your office, to reconsider and withdraw the plans on which you seem so intent.

Sincerely

Brad Wood, Runcorn, Queensland, Australia