Who gets to decide what exerts are published? How long would that process take? How about freedom of speech etc?
this post was submitted on 07 Sep 2026
50 points (96.3% liked)
Australia
5154 readers
237 users here now
A place to discuss Australia and important Australian issues.
Before you post:
If you're posting anything related to:
- The Environment, post it to Aussie Environment
- Politics, post it to Australian Politics
- World News/Events, post it to World News
- A question to Australians (from outside) post it to Ask an Australian
If you're posting Australian News (not opinion or discussion pieces) post it to Australian News
Rules
This community is run under the rules of aussie.zone. In addition to those rules:
- When posting news articles use the source headline and place your commentary in a separate comment
Banner Photo
Congratulations to @Tau@aussie.zone who had the most upvoted submission to our banner photo competition
Recommended and Related Communities
Be sure to check out and subscribe to our related communities on aussie.zone:
- Australian News
- World News (from an Australian Perspective)
- Australian Politics
- Aussie Environment
- Ask an Australian
- AusFinance
- Pictures
- AusLegal
- Aussie Frugal Living
- Cars (Australia)
- Coffee
- Chat
- Aussie Zone Meta
- bapcsalesaustralia
- Food Australia
- Aussie Memes
Plus other communities for sport and major cities.
https://aussie.zone/communities
Moderation
Since Kbin doesn't show Lemmy Moderators, I'll list them here. Also note that Kbin does not distinguish moderator comments.
Additionally, we have our instance admins: @lodion@aussie.zone and @Nath@aussie.zone
founded 3 years ago
MODERATORS
"MISTAH SPEAKAH!"
Absolutely ridiculous,
“They do not consent to the reposting of our evidence to social media sites or the reproduction of our likenesses for the purposes outside the framework of the parliament and the transparent public proceedings of this committee,”
They are public officials, no consent is necessary. It is almost like they are trying to pretend they have copyright or some equally disturbing argument. Luckily it was rejected.
I mean, we all know short clips taken out of context can be used to smear people. And we know it's effective.
I have not read or thought about what he's suggesting in detail, but I don't think the headline fairly represents his position.
He's talking about the misleading use of editing, especially soundbites with editorial text put on them without context to twist peoples words.
Ironically, the headline demonstrates the same problem by sensationalizing the issue out of context.
The board called for rules that would stop videos being edited or having captions added. Politicians would also be stopped from sharing content or commentary that targets individual officials for ridicule or harassment.
Calling for footage of full hearings and transcripts to be made available instead of clips, and for comments to be disabled, the board said its proposal would ensure “that scrutiny remains focused on evidence, administration and accountability rather than becoming personal”.
100% you're on the money here..!
Then I suggest politicians stop being ridiculous
This isn't the pollies, this is the public servants who work at government departments.
Pollies go into the role knowing they will be all over TV and social media. The public servants are the everyday workers, who are participating in the process of ensuring departments are transparent in what they are spending tax payers dollars on.
OK, but the public servants should stop being ridiculous as well.
They're meant to be doing stuff for the public and if they're caught out doing dodgy shit or even just dodging questions, then it should be shared.
Their complaint is the sharing of edited clips and soundbites, especially with editorial text put on them without context to twist peoples words and subject them to abuse online from randos. Ironically, the headline sensationalizes the discussion without context, demonstrating the problem.
They are OK with full video being available for transparency, they don't want to be remixed into a 7 second tiktok with some "infuencer" overlaid pointing at them and misleading/abusive text on top.
Calling for footage of full hearings and transcripts to be made available instead of clips, and for comments to be disabled, the board said its proposal would ensure “that scrutiny remains focused on evidence, administration and accountability rather than becoming personal”.
They don't want criticism. This is completely legal in Australia and they already have laws about personal defamation in case it crosses the line. This is non-starter in my book.
Here's your starter: Anti-wind group sues planning minister and wind project owners, threatens public servants
The group is promising that if this suit is successful, it will then sue public servants involved in the decisions “such as James Todd, Inka Veltheim and present and past DELWP/DEECA/DTP Secretaries,” according to a form letter intended for other wind farm developers, sent to Renew Economy.
Cookers threatening public servants for doing their jobs.
The article says if they followed the law they have nothing to fear. My guess is they have something to fear. Let us see how the law handles it before we destroy the right to criticize.
100% hence we should have systems for transparency, and if they are doing dodgy shit they should be called out on it.
Dodging questions is difficult cos often they can't tell you why things are implemented (that's a decision of the government of the day), which is often what they'll say, but it is often percieved as 'dodging'. If it's not a question for government then I completely agree they should answer. And if it is about a government decision, you're asking the wrong person to answer it.
I also think this is part of their job too (if they're somewhere that's on livestream), the alternative: making parliament less transparent, just isn't something I think we can live with.
Defamation is already able to be sued for.
I agree the government needs to be transparent, I just reckon ppl should be more respectful and remember these guys are just moving at the whims of the government of the day. Thats thier job and posting them on socials isn't the nicest thing to do. Go after the pollie that ordered them to do it.
But most can't tell the difference between a politician and bureaucrat and thier local mayor.
Public servants have more responsibilities while on the clock; they're not just like any other job. They're representatives of both the state and the public.
Having clips shared online out-of-context with misleading captions is a negative consequence of the current state of media. I think it would fall under misinformation, or even libel or harassment, depending on severity; but good luck chasing down all the reposts.
Reducing transparency to fix this one specific problem isn't a good solution. I don't know what the good solution actually is, though.
Completely agree, I love the transparency we have and its levels above other modern democracies cough US cough but feel we owe these people a bit of respect. Often the policy decisions come from government and their job is to implement, regardless of their personal opinions on the matter
I just reckon ppl should be more respectful and remember these guys are just moving at the whims of the government of the day.
The APS should probably command more respect in general, sone very bright people work there and they manage good work despit constant meddling.
However many department heads have quite a bit of leeway in how they carry out their brief and shaping the desires of a minister is not hugely difficult. Nobody is reading past the first paragraph of the executive summary of the report.
Plus despite pretending to be they are not apolitical creatures.
Accountability is necessary, and everyone could stand to be laughed at more.
The secretaries board – made up of the heads of government departments and chaired by the Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet boss, Steven Kennedy
The people who are asking for this are partisans, not regular employees of departments.
The people they seek to protect don't need protecting. You'll notice that this isn't coming from CPSU members, it's coming from the bosses.
Some are 'aligned' and swing in and out with each change in government, whilst some have been in established roles for both sides of government.
But for the record, I never stated that they were union members or reps, just that they were public servants not politicians.
(though my personal opinion is the CPSU couldn't protect a house cat if it tried)
My point is that the people calling for this are the heads of departments, not regular public servants.
We should not put in extra restrictions.
The EL 1s and above full well know they might be in front of Parliament one day. It's covered in training pretty well, in the anti corruption stuff especially. The department chiefs and the APS heads get paid very well for being regularly dragged in front of the circus and asked why they've carried out the government's instructions.
I'm not saying they shouldn't be in front of the camera, I'm saying they are generally hard working ppl implementing what the government has asked them to do.
I was just asking for them to be respected, if you have a problem with the policy they are implementing that's great, take it up with the politician/minister that asked them to implement it.
You literally embarrass yourselves all the time shut up you idiots.
yes, they should be more mindful of how their words can be used against them
"This is my fault, and in upset about it!"
