Where the bloody hell were you?

[spider]

Dear lankylanders, you can't just join a facebook group or whinge about this on lankyland and not ever participate in trying to stop the filter.

Seriously, all the time I see friends and fellow lankylanders post links & videos on youtube about the filter, start websites & fbook groups dedicated to it, get outraged about the filter, start threads and even forum sections about the filter, but no one was free on Saturday for the Day of Action?   Did you all forget to invite me to something else?  Am I getting barred by you people?

I don't have time for this shit, but given how the people supposedly leading the fight against the clean feed don't know what they're doing, I'm going to have to step in.

I'm calling this Operation This Is Why We Can't Have Nice Things and as of right now, every Sydney resident in this forum (all what... 4 of us?) has been conscripted to the cause.  

Please google the definition of conscription to fully grasp what I'm telling you.

I will bring you a petition in the coming weeks, and notify you of the next upcoming events that you WILL be attending, and any associated working bees for creating banners or shit like that.

RULE 31 people.

Thank you in advance for your compliance.  

[lanky]

I actually had a reason for missing the Protest on Saturday. I was at work.

[spider]

Not good enough.

[lanky]

Not good enough.

Sorry I couldn't job the hippie sit-in lovefest. From the sounds of it it was a waste of time. I didn't even hear anything about it on the news.

[pianoman]

Picnics don't do jack. Stop whining and talk to your local rep. I whinge but I haven't once assumed that government is people. I was attending a faith healer.

[spider]

Whoa.  Okay, I was only half-joking around to try to get people involved.  I had this delusion that there was actual interest here and that we just needed the motivation to organise together to participate in the movement. 

I don't see how joining facebook groups and posting links on facebook that only your friends can see is going to do more than a picnic or demonstration. 

The main problem with the picnic was the lack of attendance and visibility.  Increase the attendance, and you can get media attention, which raises awareness and can potentially embarrass the government into dropping this scheme.   That's not "government is people".  That's just putting pressure on the government to do what it should have done in the first place if that "government is people" crap was true.

One of the things that arguably helped to take down the Howard government was WorkChoices.  Union campaigns had a big hand in that.  Are you really going to tell me that taking the whinging off-line to the streets achieves nothing at all?  At least it would be something to show that we didn't just let it happen quietly. 

Lankyland has particular interest in this legislation and we could even represent ourselves as an online community that values free speech.  Hey, we might get new users... 

There are lots of different ways to participate. Yes, writing a letter to a "rep" is one.  I'm not a fan of that, a bit like petitions, but I'm willing to try everything for this.  It's surely more effective if we have more than one person doing the letter writing. 

Fuck, even 4chan has more motivation than this.

Please, just think about it.  It could be fun.  We could all do it together, we could come up with original ideas on how to contribute and we'd be doing more with our time than simply turning up to our shit-house jobs (or unemployment in some people's cases) and then going home to fap to Dancing with the Biggest Loser Hot Seat or whatever. 

I was attending a faith healer.

Are you trolling?

[lanky]

I am up for attending protests and such, unfortunately my need for money on Saturday outweighed my need to picnic.

If it had of been at Town Hall or somewhere close I would have attended after my shift but as it stands, Parramatta would have taken me ages to get too.

We need something that will actually get the public's attention. Something that will make people sit up and ask themselves, "什麼是地獄，是這個政府做什麼？" before it is too late.

[pianoman]

OK, that's better. I kinda do believe in public rallies, actually. Once they get attention (the right kind of attention) it gets picked up by some bullshit artist in parliament parliamentarian and the government needs to provide a satisfactory outcome.

I was attending a faith healer.

Are you trolling?

No.. I went to a vision training course and it turns out it was more to do with faith than Western clinicism? Clinicalism? Clinicality?

So, I'm with you. I sometimes wonder why you're not in politics, spider. You're loud enough for it. And you're always right. For a real groundswell, average Joe Blow and Mum-who-doesn't-know-what-Windows-is need to be intrigued about what the filter is.

We need something that will actually get the public's attention. Something that will make people sit up and ask themselves, "什麼是地獄，是這個政府做什麼？" before it is too late.

Um... Google translated this back as:
What is hell, what this administration is to

That could be our slogan. What Is Hell!! <insert anime-emote>

[spider]

We need something that will actually get the public's attention. Something that will make people sit up and ask themselves, "什麼是地獄，是這個政府做什麼？" before it is too late.

Yeah exactly.  

So, I'm with you. I sometimes wonder why you're not in politics, spider. You're loud enough for it. And you're always right.

Uh gee thanks?  I have been to a few rallies on my own because no one else cares, but before that I was a student activist.  Then I got sucked into a group of uh.. very single-minded people and when I finally got out of that, I felt it was necessary to stay away from activism for a few years.

We need something that will actually get the public's attention. Something that will make people sit up and ask themselves, "什麼是地獄，是這個政府做什麼？" before it is too late.

I must say that when Anonymous first came into the public eye, I was really impressed with their fresh approach.  Remember?  It was very eye-catching, it had a sense of humour, and it got people in that I don't think usually wanted to be associated with political activism.  Ironically, the moralfags made it cool for the kids to join the moralfaggotry.

Some of the anarchist collectives and autonomists and so on used to do a really good job of making Reclaim the Streets a lot of fun.  They also are good examples to look at.  The years I attended, it was about celebration rather than rabble-rousing.  Maybe a positive message might help?

This cause is in definitely need of some major attention-whoring, potentially in the form of some kind of publicity stunt.  But when Block the Filter and the EFA get their act together and organise a city protest, I reckon we definitely should have some kind of visible presence there.  And we need to make this shit fun.  Sitting in the boiling sun listening to people ask repetitive questions of a Greens senator is not fun.  Save the interviews for Four Corners.

Hey look, I quoted you twice.  How's that for Alzheimer's?

[pianoman]

The years I attended, it was about celebration rather than rabble-rousing.  Maybe a positive message might help?

Yes. Australia's not what you'd call an oppressed country. If it was, rabble-rousing would have more support. Instead, you need to draw out Eddie Punchclock from his protective cocoon to wonder about whether he should be interested.

[Superman]

Oh, hey, look at all these threads hiding in here.  When did that happen?

Cider is 100% correct.  FB groups do jack shit unless they're used to organize people to actually go do something about it in the real world.  Your representatives don't give two shits about what FB groups you're in, because the real world doesn't give two shits what FB groups you're in.  You have to give your representative real world consequences to their actions.  Starting 10 forum threads and 100 FB groups is just intellectual beating off.

Saying that you don't want to participate in demonstrations because they aren't getting media attention is retarded.  The only reason they won't get media attention is if enough people don't demonstrate.  Someone has to take the first step, and it's not going to be the guys that can get the same ratings running a story about the Dramatic Gopher.  This is only a staging ground, not the actual fight.  Quit bitching on line about what's going on and get out there and actually do something about it.  Go make a fucking scene.