I was distracted from my current pre-occupations yesterday by Minister for Communications Stephen Conroy’s comment that he has “unfettered legal power” in his portfolio, and that if he told telcos to wear red underpants on their heads at spectrum auctions they’d have to do it.
There is a very good reason why no single individual in government should have “unfettered legal power” over anything: absolute power corrupts absolutely. When one has unfettered power there is no longer any need to engage and consult with others, one can simply, as Conroy’s boast exemplifies, force one’s will on everybody else. It is the antithesis of democracy and democratic process. That a Labor politician should hold this belief about himself and feel confident enough to trumpet it for the world press whilst in the US, makes me wonder yet again what the hell the ALP is about these days.
The following is a quote from a piece by Dr Robert Aziz in his Huffington Post blog on the subject of power and corruption:
So why does power corrupt? It corrupts because it gives license to unconsciousness and neglect. It corrupts because it licenses individuals to unilaterally, unreflectively and thus arbitrarily impose their will on others. It licenses individuals to impose their will without having properly engaged and processed through the Reality at hand. Power inflates the ego and through it the ego is erroneously led to believe it has the power to make people, ideas and even Reality itself disappear without due process. In the big picture nothing is further from the truth. Power corrupts because it gives license to unconsciousness, and in so doing it not only destroys the growth opportunity of the victim of such imposition, but no less the growth opportunity of the victimizer. Failure to engage another in consciousness, not only does the other individual harm, but it no less does serious harm to oneself, for in both cases the precious opportunity to extend consciousness by way of self-organizing nature is altogether lost, corrupted.
While I don’t take Conroy’s example of forcing others to wear red underpants on their heads literally (though who knows with this man?) his delight in his own raw power is revealed in his unpleasant desire to humiliate and demean others by forcing them to make themselves look ridiculous, just because he can. What does this say about Stephen Conroy?
To me it says we are likely dealing with a little man, one who lacks the wisdom and intelligence to hold high office, one who has already been seduced by the power bestowed on him by his portfolio, and one who will not hesitate to exercise that power for his own psychological benefit without any awareness at all of what he is doing. It sounds as if Stephen Conroy has lost sight of his purpose and instead has come to believe the unfettered exercise of power is his right and his priority. These are dangerous beliefs for anyone to hold, particularly if they are in charge of communications.
Conroy’s ongoing mission to control the internet takes on new dimensions after his latest megalomanic claims. He wants unfettered legal powers over the world-wide web as well. These ambitions are infantile, as is the example of red underpants as an exercise of power over others.
Conroy was out to crassly impress his audience, not with what he has or might achieve in his position, but with the raw power he believes he has. Power in itself means nothing. It’s how it’s exercised that is the measure of the man.
No Place For Sheep 
Conroy :
‘Stephen Conroy,’ he said, “has aspired lifelong to mediocrity and he’s not gonna make it.” attrib. to Rodney Cavalier, I think.
I don’t want to attract Godwin’s law so early in a thread, so I won’t draw the parallel with certain officers of a certain regime from the middle of the 20th century which springs to mind; they actually had that sort of real power, and got thoroughly drunk on it.
And he is more of a fool than I thought if the thinks that the Court won’t strike down any excesses of his exercise of power. He administers Commonwealth of Australia laws, under the Commonwealth of Australia Constitution. And that is the limit of his power.
Sack him, Julia. Put him out to pasture.
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Here here!! He has past his shelf life!! Which was extremely short!!
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oh look it’s Borat’s brother Zardoz.
re Steve Con the megalomaniac – preciously the type of character who claws their way to the top of the heap of s#*t. Over 5 decades I have been employed in enough offices to know there is always a sociopath in the upper level making it hell for everyone.
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Ain’t that the truth, I bet there’s plenty among us who have stories to tell about sociopaths in the workplace and the havoc they bring. I was once asked to deliver an entirely plagiarised lecture by one such nutjob. Fortunately I recognised the text before I agreed.
This experience also revealed to me the extent to which staff in universities plagiarise,while throwing out students for the same crime. Nobody could understand why I was so upset about it.
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The accompanying outfit in the photo would look more at home at Liberal HQ.
Ask Downer.
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DQ It might be a very good idea to sack him.We have the possibility of closet skeleton or two, and the permanently Labor-focussed excavating Aust MSM salivating already.
I don’t think Gillard can possibly sustain any more mud from Abbott and co, over this issue.(or any other Ministerial misdemeanour’s or political gaffs.Then we have Ashby’s latest ‘independent idea’ to sue Roxon.Independent? Hahahaha)
We all know Labor hold on by a hair, and to lose that hair (which they just borrowed recently) will see them crushed on the rocks)
And as per all potential despots Conroy will probably cop it from within,via some poor little Vegemite shunned or embarrassed once too often, and who can now feel a leak coming on.
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Clicking JW’s text link “unfettered legal power” in the opening paragraph delivers the viewer to a photoshopped picture of the said Senator worth a thousand words. In the interim before the viewer clicks, I shall abbreviate:
Stephen Conroy, would-be Cardinal Prince of the Internet.
I leave it to those more familiar with childrens’ underpants sizes to estimate the age-range for which the seemingly well-fitting photoshopped headgear shown would normally be designed.
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Forrest,
:”…Cardinal Prince of the Internet.”
(Chortle, splutter,…tee hee!)
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…and I think this Freudian (hint) slip of Conroys probably alerts us to the very real possibility that Labor WILL introduce their draconian security regime on the internet despite the forces against it.
In other words if they don’t do it via legislation they will do it by stealth.
I think this has probably always been the case.
And could Conroy’s addiction to web censorship still be simmering away in the background?
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Totes agree, Hypo. Stealth it will be.
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The plan he hatched to filter the internet and his attitude to Facebook and Twitter leave even more to be desired. He seems to be of the view a whole raft of Australian media and publishing laws need to be applied to publication on the internet.
They don’t dickhead! Well why else would your wear your undies on that end of your body?
He omits to inform the public that their concerns are usually pretty adequately addressed by the social media sites themselves. You can block, delete, be unfriendly, and report spam using the tools provided for the purposes of taking personal responsibility for your own on-line experience. Kids need help from parents and new users need help from people in the know. Responsible ministers should be people in the know! Period. Not megalomaniacal killjoy idiots with underpants on the scones using their balls for brains!
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HG,
WDYTUHYRF?
😉
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Perhaps you’re over-reacting? Sounds more like he was bragging childishly. I’d be more worried if he was acting corruptly.
As for his campaign for censorship on the internet, I assume he’s doing what Freud called Projecting, in that all the pathology which fascinates and obsesses him is inside his own head.
That explains why he doesn’t care about the predicted failure of the censorship. /He’s/ not talking about the internet. I repeat – he’s talking about himself. And that’s the bit that sickens me.
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Yes, that analaysis stands up, I agree. I also agree that it
is childish bragging but I fear he believes it!
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Oh.Childish bragging?
That’s OK then!
But then,,,,,,,
He has form.
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Sen. Conroy can be treated as an (other) exemplar and symptom of a tendency that has spread through civilisation like a cancer over recent times.
You could call it the “Dr Haneef” syndrome.
It is about the arrogant and cowardly movement to dismantle long evolving, tried and tested Habeas Corpus law and removal of accountability and constraints that uphold a civil society rather than invite some form of relapse into feudalism, denialism, fantasy and fascism.
The really sad thing is that Conroy is the unremarkable norm, not the exception. Never make the mistake of considering him exceptional, except in his arrogance; his soul mate is the equally dishonest Tony Abbott.
In the last 24 hours I’ve stumbled across two more examples that fit well with Jennifer’s proposition.
Here in Adelaide, an ALP government that looks suspiciously like having been captured by developers, probably miffed at the public’s resistance to untrammelled “development”, has decided to take assessment and decision making further out of the hands of more accountable local councils and place much of the process into the hands of private companies outside of of normal accountability, for reasons of “efficiency”. As if the bastards didn’t have it enough their own way already, what with FOI and CIC constraints.
Meanwhile, the best example so far of what to expect if we get rid of Labor, the Qld “Can Do” dictatorship in the form of minister Jeff Seeney, has unilaterally decided to geld the Corruption watchdog set up after the Bjelke-Petersen years.
Marilyn would no doubt include the due process battles concerning asylum seekers and I’d point to the knot of surveillance/ security laws being inexorably developed, most recently in the example of fed Minister Roxon concerning internet surveillance.
But where is the example otherwise?
The ultimate wrong so far has been committed by President Obama, a former Law Professor who should have been a bulwark against this sort of encroachment, in allowing severe arbitrary detention and Executive Orders legislation in the US- Laws that give the security apparatus and President the powers of God or a Mafia Don.
What happens, if as is probably inevitable, power falls into the hands of a hard right individual; a Dick Cheney or worse?
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+1
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And Parliament gave Bowen complete dictatorship over human trafficking and jailing outside the law.
Rockson is supposed to be AG and seemingly couldn’t care less about law so long as they can pander to the racists.
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I just think the current ALP impersonators want to be the worst ALP government since their inception.They may get the bonus trophy of being the last ALP one, if they keep this up.
I have no sympathy for such overt plagiarism.
They have also put back the cause of female politicians as well,because the way our media works the records will say “Failed govt,lots of female ministers,female PM, ergo, women broke it”.
Lock it in Eddie.
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I agree, they are appalling. Melissa Parke for one is a great talent being wasted while wastrels like Bowen get a gong.
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Conroy’s clumsy speaking style (red underpants) fades to pale pink when compared to our National Hero, AlanJones’ comments about John Gillard dying in shame because her daughter is a liar…..
Why have you Aussies kept this truly vindictive man on the pedestal for such a long time,he has poisoned many an Oz mind…
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…did he ,like Abbott, perhaps rescue a young boy from a burning house ?
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…oops HIS daughter,( in Finnish, his and her is ‘hanen’,one word for both genders)
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I think such a comment says more about Jones than it does about Gillard.
We’re surely plumbing the depths in contemporary Australian society with the sort of people that receive ongoing kudos courtesy of a mind-numbing populist media.
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Rush Limbaugh in the ‘States does this, also Kyle Sandilands locally. Publicity seeking through spiteful dog in the manger tactics, based on ad hominem.
The filthy creature’s own parents must have died an agonising death of shame at the realisation of what he is when they found out.
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He is so full of hate and inner ugliness he’ll just about explode, I don’t want to be there when it happens….
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It seems that Conroy may not be the only public figure who is qualified to don the headwear of scarlet…Forrest’s “Cardinal Prince” turns out to be an accurate metaphor for some who, it seems, are over-stimulated by their own pretensions to “power”.
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Oh, how right you are Helvi, these latest comments by Jones are atrocious.
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I am an Aussie Helvi and I don’t think I consider many would put him on a pedestal.Maybe something pointier???
He speaks for himself,his suppressed guilt and his puerile supporters, no-one else.
Waste of space ans air time. IMHO
Most Aussies would call him a loud mouthed dickhead.
He would probably get biffed in the first 5 minutes at the average weekend suburban BBQ.
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Not Aussies like you and me and the other sheep, I’m talking of the rednecks that also include Dutch, Finnish, German, Italian, Greek,Croatian, Serbian, Turkish, Lebanese etc,etc, etc people amongst them.My Canadian friend used to listen to him, it almost came to a friendship divorce.
Many people listen to him, read him, take notice of his views…Why?
I rather put my Aspidistra (cast iron plant) on a pedestal…
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Let’s invite him to a BBQ. 😉
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Ah, yes Jones and Bolt and such like.
Regrettably freedom of speech requires that such people are entitled to air their views.
We can’t have it both ways, so that only people we agree with are entitled to speak.
As Obama recently said, the best reply to hate speech is more speech – channeling John Stuart Mill. As in this passage from an article from Dec 2000 :
“John Stuart Mill had the right answer long ago in his famous essay “On Liberty.” He said that we must allow for the expression of bad ideas — whether opinions or alleged statements of fact — because they may contain some grain of truth that corrects the conventional wisdom or, lacking that, provide a challenge to accepted beliefs, without which those beliefs in the long run become mere prejudices. ”
http://prospect.org/article/remedy-more-speech
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I guess that means we should do away with defamation then?
Where does it end, or doesn’t it?
It brings us back full circle to others imposing their morals on us ,and vice versa does it not?
Open slather?
Everything in moderation?
Nothing nice to say,say nothing?
Sticks and stones…?
Can I blame the lawyers?Law?
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Defamation is supposed to be a last ditch protection of people’s reputations being publicly and maliciously maligned when natural remedies are not possible. All the logic of better speech does to inform that is to say that if the truth can be told that proves an allegation against somebody wrong then at the earliest opportunity it must be. But there’s a difference between how we treat the truth about events, historical or scientific facts and how we treat personal insults and unwarranted ad hominem.
Having somebody with the wherewithal to disseminate lies about others using their position and influence to take the reputations of others apart can’t be a good thing. I dislike how defamation has been used to mistreat Jennifer’s right to free speech by Ms Reist in recent months, but I also dislike the way that the media is able to report sensational allegations against sportsmen, celebrities and other public figures without any proof. I think the whole system is in real danger of failing to protect people’s rights and instead reducing them to something of a lottery.
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Perhaps defamation should not exist as a remedy for a public figure, a political operative or the like. Definitions are, as usual, the problem. Perhaps defamation should never exist to enrich anyone, nor to ruin anyone; quite how we do the latter, I don’t know.
Perhaps, perhaps, perhaps.
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Take a look at Ben Pobjie’s take on Alan Jones :
http://benpobjie.blogspot.com.au/
LOL guaranteed.
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Thanks DQ.
So much of it is true,but I still had a guffaw or two.
Thanks Ben.
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But that is part of the essence of humour, Hypo. It must be close to reality, in that we can recognise the eternal truths of the human condition, and recognise our common humanity.
If we were all perfect – if any of us were perfect – there’d be no humour. Thus, Hell must be far more interesting than Heaven!
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This article by Leslie Cannold seems as if it would not be out of place here: http://www.abc.net.au/unleashed/4301880.html
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I guess this post will be as off-topic here as anywhere, but I think it perhaps has some relevance to the perils of unfettered power, and perhaps also to the briefly recognised elephant that might have been in the room.
Earlier, JW retweeted this: https://twitter.com/Gibbot5000/status/256499483016306688 .
Presumably, the seeming endorsement of the term ‘trolling’ by ‘@Gibbot5000’ and ‘@Liz_loveslife’ in the retweet was based upon some article of the like of this article in The Telegraph, http://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/news/wife-of-nsw-deputy-premier-andrew-stoner-busted-twitter-trolling-attacking-us-michelle-obamas-religious-beliefs/story-e6freuy9-1226494084225?sv=69cb32febb8a22c9a556e8b9a7e08256#.UHcv1oOOosE.twitter , dated 7:08AM Friday 12 October 2012, headlined:
“Wife of NSW Deputy Premier Andrew Stoner
busted Twitter trolling, attacking US Michelle
Obama’s religious beliefs”
Scrolling down the page, one can see a screenshot of a portion of Rob Oakeshott’s (@Oakey_MP) Twitter timeline. It clearly shows him addressing Twitter userID ‘@CathyStoner’ in one of his tweets. It seems there is no question as to the Twitter account ‘@CathyStoner’ having actually been that of Cathy Stoner, wife of NSW Deputy-Premier Andrew Stoner. Andrew Stoner has confirmed it, it would appear.
My question is as to how either of Cathy Stoner’s twitter conversations reported constitutes ‘trolling’? There has been absolutely no attempt at deception as to her identity in the Twitter userID under which she tweeted. Surely the essence of trolling lies in the use of a pseudonym to hide from accountability for unfounded allegations or personal attacks?
A more appropriately headlined article reporting upon at least half of these twitter conversations can be found here: http://www.smh.com.au/opinion/political-news/deputy-premiers-wife-gives-oakeshott-both-barrels-for-slipper-vote-20121011-27frq.html .
Have those seemingly endorsing the descriptor of ‘trolling’ in relation to Cathy Stoner’s tweets been taken in by the ‘Stop the Trolls’ campaign because of disagreement as to the particular message Cathy Stoner was attempting to convey, rather than noting what is effectively an OBJECTION on the part of at least some parliamentarians and parts of the MSM to the right of members of the public, particularly bloggers and posters thereto, to participate DIRECTLY in the public discourse now, courtesy of the web, that they have the means?
Is this Telegraph article being used as both a dog-whistle to those who might identify as ‘pro lifers’, and a false-flag provocation of ‘pro-choicers’, to the end of insulating the established media and political organisations from an unfiltered communication feed? Stopping the so-called Trolls?
If I had done what Cathy Stoner has done, perhaps I could have been accused of trolling, as my identity is concealed, but I didn’t, and she isn’t. How I wish I had been ‘the troll who trolled Liberty Valance’ (and the Telegraph, where, as we are told, being a Christian gets you crucified)! But ‘@GrogsGamut’ beat me to that distinction, so I guess I’ll just have to content myself with a role at the OK Corral. Come to think of it, my nice blue coat is somewhat reminiscent of a dust-coat, isn’t it?
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oh thanks. I have to blame you for inflicting a Pitney Earworm on me for the day (because I don’t read Grog’s anymore since he was unkind to me with no cause).
My definition of trolling (at this blog too) is cowardly commentors who are nasty and have no link-back to their own cave. Anyone who wants to slur me can follow me home and do it there instead of sullying JW’s blog.
My other definition of trolling is those anti-choice evangelists (I will not call them prolife, we are all pro life FFS) who have ‘alerts’ for all the trigger words, and come flying into blogs they have never been at before, to spew revile and damn.
The Obamas are intelligent civilised, attractive, and honest – if they were caucasian they would be admired by republicans too. She hasn’t put a foot wrong. Love the cardigans – she doesn’t alienate poor people by wearing Rich Chick outfits. I do hope he prevails at the polling booths.
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ann odyne,
I am getting the feeling I have made myself sufficiently obscure.
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ann odyne,
This may help ease your Pitney Earworm pain: https://noplaceforsheep.com/2012/01/21/entitlement-bullying-and-private-faith/#comment-11175 . It was to the Miranda Devine article herein subjected to chronological analysis that I was parenthetically alluding as ‘getting one crucified’. Just in case you were unaware.
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Man Who Shot Liberty Valance – lyrics by Gene Pitney
‘When Liberty Valance rode to town the womenfolk would hide, they’d hide … ‘ X X
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“Only…24 hours from Tulsa.
Only…one day away
from your heart.”
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helvityni, in her post of September 30, 2012 at 8:52 am, says:
“Why have you Aussies kept this truly vindictive
man [Alan Jones] on the pedestal for such a long
time,he has poisoned many an Oz mind…”
Quite some time ago, at the urging of some well-meaning friends who purported to know somewhat, in a seemingly non-redneck way, of some things in relation to an issue with which I was even more familiar, I was put up to speaking on talk-back radio with Alan Jones. In such circumstances I have only ever been prepared to make allegations or express an opinion where I could point to specific evidence, or unexplained publicly recorded contradictions, in relation to the issue concerned.
Let me tell you, the on-air exchange, in which I spoke only in compliance with my rules outlined above, was an education. Principally, it was an education to those that had done the urging, for they heard with their own ears and with the benefit of already knowing a fair bit about my own position with respect to the issue, the determined attempts by Jones from the outset to frame the exchange in the terms HE had evidently pre-determined. The exchange did not go well for Jones, for no reason other than that it was obvious to all listening that I refused to let him put words into my mouth.
My greatest satisfaction was in demonstrating to the urgers that He upon whom they looked as a voice for them, was in reality filtering out ‘their’ voices, merely using the little they were given opportunity to say, via their talk-back ‘champions’, as launchpads for diatribes fitting his own pre-conceptions or agenda.
What I think this event also casts some light upon, and in the process perhaps goes some way toward answering Helvi’s question, is that it may well not be ‘us Aussies’ who have kept shock jocks of the like of Jones on pedestals, but those who have exerted a perhaps not fully recognised degree of control over MSM performance. It has been the advent of the internet, with its enabling of blogs such as ‘Sheep’, that has weakened the control over the public dialogue the terms of which, up until now, has been set by the MSM, to the extent that there is now a scramble for continued relevance by those such as Jones.
In my opinion, the biggest mistake that can be made with the gift of internet enablement on blogs like ‘Sheep’ is to waste it in continuing to give these posturing blow-hard MSM bell-wethers oxygen by even discussing their views. Leave them to condemn themselves, as it is tacitly recognised Jones did on this occasion. (In this context, the cancellation of a rally in support of Alan Jones reported here: https://twitter.com/vexnews/status/256625871182495745 , is interesting.)
Nevertheless, it has to be recognised that many have been prepared for quite a long time to hang on such shock jocks’ every word. Could this be because there exists a widespread perception in the community that, somehow, ITS views and interests have nowhere been being, to its satisfaction, articulated?
In my opinion, this has been so, and largely because of a widely-held expectation that someone ELSE will do the legwork upon which the discontented/disregarded, immediately their concerns appear to be being articulated, can commence to pole. The sad thing is, that amongst the digitally literate and enabled there appears to be so much engagement upon lightweight issues like the keeping up with the irrelevant Joneses, that the serious and more immediate threat to their internet enablement posed by the implications of claims as to the possession of ‘unfettered legal power’ are also going unarticulated.
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You are a brave man Forrest Gump, for going on Alan Jones show, perhaps everybody ought to experience it… 🙂
You are right; us talking about him here or there only gives his ugly views more air, we keep him (his words) alive longer by repeating them…
I was amused by some people saying that only oldies listen to him, really, why are the companies paying big money to advertise their wares for a couple of pensioners…
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helvityni,
You ask “why are the companies paying big money to advertise their wares for a couple of pensioners…”.
Perhaps it is the Dick Smith Theory of Publicity at work: “All publicity is good publicity, even bad publicity”.
Perhaps the sponsors have heretofore valued his opinionations, or at least his standing in the eyes of that possibly substantial part of his pensionable age, but not necessarily pension-entitled, audience that fails to identify him as a bell-wether, or dare I say it, ‘dog-whistler’. For all of the smallness of his audience (166,000 out of a potential 3.5 million) it must be remembered that it would have a likely relative concentration of persons making significant pre and/or post-retirement financial dispositions amongst its number.
Perhaps it also is that blogosphere commentary, increasingly having come to circumvent the traditional media gatekeepers, is more effectively articulating the frustrations of the erstwhile hangers-on-every-word that has been the basis of the shockjockery business model to date. Perhaps the sponsors are waking up to that.
Perhaps that also explains Jones’ desperate attempt to paint himself as the victim here, although in reality being victim only of his own arrogance and poor taste.
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I don’t know how accurate the audience-size surveys are, as some might be shy to admit that they are actually listening to the man.
One poster admitted that listening to Alan Jones was her secret pleasure. In the past blokes used buy Playboy only for the
articles, and my open pleasure has been buying Italian and French fashion and gardening/ decorating magazines for yonks, and no, not to refresh my language skills.
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Not with a Bang, but a Whimper :
Conroy announced a few days ago that the federal government has abandoned its plan to try to filter the internet.
I don’t know about you, dear reader, but for me that is another box ticked, a move to the light side (as opposed to the dark side). Just one of many.
How many of you single-issue types will now change your votes? Hmmm? Hands up please!
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It’s a great thing that the ridiculous proposal to have an internet filter in a country like ours has finally been taken off the table. Hooray for that!
But let’s not characterise this as a change of heart so much as a recognition of the political realities steadfast opposition to that policy have realised. You’d no more be likely to convince me that Conroy and those who backed his policies have greatly changed or improved their misshapen views in relation to the internet than Tony Abbott has of convincing us he’s not a misogynist.
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Glad I am not a single issue type.
The reality is that the internet filter may be dropped,but Labor will still go ahead with giving greater powers to monitoring by security types.
We may not be filtered,but we are being/ will be watched.
This is a fluff moment.
No box ticked,just a smoke and mirror act.
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Just cause you’re paranoid doesn’t mean you aren’t being….
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Touché
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I see the racist xenophobic ‘haters of all’ WASPS have latched onto the bottom of this page.
I guess I blame the parents for leaving the author in the hot car when he was a little tacker.
He has obviously not grown intellectually since that day.
Inciting race hate is still a crime, is it not?
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