A sign of the times?

Written By: - Date published: 7:30 pm, February 20th, 2009 - 5 comments
Categories: australian politics, blogs - Tags:

This item in the Brisbane Times caught my eye as to how the whole nature of campaigning is changing – and the mixed blessing of Facebook:

A senior Liberal National Party staffer has been reprimanded over comments she made on a website attacking Premier Anna Bligh. Katherine Smith, a media adviser for LNP deputy leader Mark McArdle, was one of 76 members of the now defunct “Ana Bligh is a Moron” group on social networking site Facebook…In what is expected to be Queensland’s first “tech election”, websites attacking both sides of politics are becoming as prolific…The election is due in September, but speculation is rife it will be called next week, for a poll in late March.

According to the report she posted the comment: “Anna Bligh is ugly” in work time. And thus all those questions spring forth again that have cropped up during our campaign period here. Does rebuttal on blogs count as work related communications? Is it ok as long as it isn’t personal? Should people use their own names if they are in a paid role? Are we gradually seeing a common understanding of what is appropriate develop (rules by which all engage?). Or is it the nature of blogs/ the net that things are always evolving?

5 comments on “A sign of the times? ”

  • Comments are now closed

  1. Redbaiter 1
    21 February 2009 at 2:51 am

    “According to the report she posted the comment: “Anna Bligh is ugly’ in work time.”

    Why I wonder would anyone presuming to an average degree of intelligence think such naked opinion warranted posting on an internet site. Had she said “the ugly Anna Bligh is a typically smug jack booted socialist who is determined to expand the state, diminish the rights of individuals, and steal as much of their income as she possibly can” it may have been worth it, but “ugly” on its own is just so subjective its kind of “so what?”.

    As for the poster being a “senior Liberal National staffer” this doesn’t surprise me either as the Australian Liberal National Party is infested with confused leftist fuckwits from Malcolm Turnbull down and this woman is probably one of them.

    Like the Nats in NZ they mistake the views of the liberal media for the views of the mainstream middle class, their electorate, without realizing there is a radical difference in the two perspectives, and so Turnbull and his jerkoff mates continue to betray and let down and irritate those who are still bound to vote for them because more socialism and an even worse outcome is the only alternative.

    Turnbull’s sacking of Cory Bernadi was a stark example of how the LNP hierarchy are out of touch with the electorate, when Bernadi’s criticism regarding his colleague Pyne’s complete absence of political principle is a point that needs to be made again and again and again, until compromisers like Pyne and Turnbull are driven from the leadership and replaced by representatives who understand there is an alternative to totalitarian socialism, and the people would vote for it if they were only made aware the choice existed.

    As for such comments being posted during work hours, then this is down to the employee and employer. If one accepts that elections should be heavily regulated, then perhaps political staffers should be bound by tighter rules than non employees.

    For myself, I advocate a complete open slather, in the first place on the grounds that regulation is an infringement of freedom of expression, and in the second place because the regulations, as this instance and so many others reflect, are always going to be a load of unworkable horse shit anyway.

  2. ethical martini 2
    21 February 2009 at 7:32 pm

    Redbaiter, you really are a waste of space. Nothing more to say. I haven’t missed you at all.
    “open slather”? Perhaps you should join the Witches of Facebook

  3. Santi 3
    22 February 2009 at 7:31 am

    A bit rich coming from The Standard, isn’t it?

    You pioneered all sort of attacks on John Key during the last election campaign, including the despicable “internet bomb”, and are now whining and moaning about this?

    Given your knowledge about Key’s many u-turns, do you care to comment on Labour’s vote on the repeal of the EFA, the ultimate betrayal and mother of all u-turns?

    Let me remind you that the now defunct EFA was a cause very close to your heart and you defended to the hilt its promulgation into law.

    [lprent: Google bomb not “internet bomb” – get it right. In fact read this and raise your net awareness.

    None of us did it. The only connnection to the standard is that my niece did it. Now I realize that wingnut conspiracy theory demands that people on the left are borg drones. This isn’t the case, and definitely isn’t in this case. Rochelle doesn’t take instruction from me. However given the mindless coherence to this dogma by wingnuts (in the face of all evidence to the contrary), they sound more borg than human to me.

    She largely did it to test the google algorithms. Based on whales bleating (applied to the NZ wingnuts in general), it would appear their main issue was that they were insufficiently bright and persistent to make one themselves. Incidentally the google bomb is still operational.

    It is going to be interesting to see how much of the EFA winds up in the promised updated electoral law. After all most of the parties in parliament want one or more elements of the EFA in the electoral law.

    But why am I bothering to point out anything to you – you are Borg..]

  5. ColourBlindBaiter 5
    22 February 2009 at 1:18 pm

    Redbiter: What, no reply ?