[GandalfTheGrey]

They're not a Sponsor obviously

Correct.

So we're actually going on the say of the Facebook lady

nope.

Alan Jones himself

there's a reliable source

Territory FM

which has nothing to do with it

as well as the news outlet that reported that story

who was reporting Alan Jones's allegations.

[OldBill]

The 1984 scenario is poor old Winston Smith and all his fellow outer party members being watched by TVs, even when he thinks he has a finally found a private space in which to make love.

The Jones Incident is the exact opposite. It is people who have had no way to respond to a traditional broadcast medium using the internet to respond in a spontaneous and uncontrollable fashion.

The comparison to Nazism is absurd and obscene. As it happens, my then teenage father was bashed on the streets of Vienna by brownshirts on that night, abused and spat on by dozens of them, then forced to clean up the spit and blood from the street with a tooth brush while they stood around laughing and spitting some more.

Get real!


Someone around should send their CV to the Ministry Truth right away.

[GandalfTheGrey]

Welcome to you OldBill - and great post.

I'm extremely sorry you had to see such trivialising of the very real and horrific ordeal your father must have gone through. Alan Jones wouldn't know the first thing about persecution. What a joke. Swagman should be hanging his head in shame.

[Bounce]

Likening this to a pogrom is a tad absurd isn't it?

Isn't this 'censorship' just a greater version of free speech?

[GandalfTheGrey]

Isn't this 'censorship' just a greater version of free speech?

Indeed. Jones is not the only one who fears this new form of people power. Mainstream media fear it because they are no longer the exclusive gatekeepers on who gets to speak, and what they can say about the media:

Boycott shines light on problems of power

The power of the internet has let David have his day with Goliath in the Jones affair. But power corrupts no matter who wields it - a media mogul or a citizen group, writes Leslie Cannold.

The controversy swirling around Alan Jones and the withdrawal of more than 70 sponsors and advertisers from his 2GB radio show illustrates that the absolute power of the mainstream media to determine who speaks - and what they speak about - is no more.

Less than a decade ago, anyone who sought to influence public debate - community activists, corporate leaders, politicians, academics, billionaires - had to pass through the mainstream media gatekeepers to broadcast their message.

Today, anyone with an internet connection, a modern website and some social media savvy holds at least some of the keys to the influence kingdom.

The most interesting aspect of the Jones saga, and the radical changes to the influence landscape it highlights, is the unaccustomed light it shines on power.

As Jones told his listeners Monday morning, their "right" to boycott his show did not extend to "the right to attempt cyber-bullying of people who listen to the program or advertise on it... These false petitions are anything but civilised..."

Australians don't like talking about power. We don't like analysing how it distributes many of the benefits and opportunities generated by our economic, political and social system. We don't like discussing how important a distributive mechanism it should be for the goods and opportunities on offer.

Instead, we focus on our guiding philosophy that the world should - and so it does - run according to rules that apply to all of us equally. We believe these rules offer us a level playing field for a contest of ideas that admits all comers and determines the winner by a free and fair fight.

The powerless are as invested in this myth as the powerful.

For the powerless, the merit myth is a bulwark against despair. It promises them that if their ideas are sound and they play fair, they'll have as much chance as anyone else to influence the shape of our world. The alternative - that's it's not what you know but who you know - makes a mockery of not just what they've invested in their own education and lives, but that of their children.

The powerful - men like Jones - have both their pride and the luxury of a self-focused life at stake. It's because the powerful believe they got where they are on merit that they can dismiss the "bleating" of feminists, Indigenous Australians, the disabled and gay people. This leaves them free to enjoy the fruits of their hard work without guilt, knowing the merit principle is at work and all is right with the world.

A more sophisticated understanding of power would allow us to dismiss Jones's complaint about cyber "bullying" out of hand.

In fact, consumers are entitled to organise in whatever ways they like to influence the corporations who profit from their business. How effectively they do this - the numbers they muster, the cost of their action in dollar terms - will determine the extent of their influence.

While I'm open to arguments that money ought not to speak in our society as loudly as it does, it seems odd that debate should only surface in the rare moment when the collective pockets of the many - rather than the usual swollen ones of the corporate few - are wielding influence on national debate,

The word "bully" also sees Jones play the victim card in a highly unconvincing way.

The definition of bully - a person who uses his superior strength or power to harm or intimidate someone weaker - implies that it is not the influencing of others that is wrong, but the improper use by the strong of their superior strength to get their way.

But the Jones v Citizenry fight is more than fair. Not only has it taken thousands of persistent and well-organised citizens to match the power of a single man whose influence has determined the national agenda for years, but petitions and phone calls are well within the bounds of civilised forms of protest. No websites have been brought down; no advertisers' premises stormed.

Indeed, it's hard to escape the sense that for Jones, the real problem with the cyber campaign is its effectiveness. Do what you like as long as it's impotent, his generous offer to listeners of their "right" to turn him off suggests. But don't try to have your voice heard and succeed. That's my prerogative.

But a sophisticated understanding of power would also curtail any "People Power" dances around the maypole. Not just in the short-term, but forever.

Sure the power of the internet and social technology has let David have his day with Goliath in the Jones affair. Indeed, if the consumer David keeps up the pressure, he may even succeed in bringing the Jones Goliath down. But for every Alan Jones there is a Waleed Aly: a powerful (usually male) radio presenter who wields his influence responsibly and with a certain - to use an old-fashioned term - noblesse oblige.

In the same way many of us may be revelling in the success of the Destroy the Joint movement because we despise Alan Jones, the next target of a cyber-mob might please us less. Julian Assange perhaps, or another David Hicks or Muhamed Haneef.

The truth is that power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely no matter who wields it - a media mogul or personality or a citizen group. It was this problem of corruption that the rule of law and the merit principle were designed to upset.

Democracy evolved with checks on power for this reason. How we can apply our sure knowledge about the corruptive impact of absolute power on our democracy, business and social world to both the mainstream and social media - to the media mogul and the cyber mob alike - remains the 21st century's greatest challenge.

http://www.abc.net.au/unleashed/4301880.html

[OldBill]

Greetings Gandalf,

To tell you the truth, I immediately regretted personalising my comment. It doesn't matte who my father is, the point is that it is grotesque and just lazy rhetoric to invoke the Nazis in this context. What exactly was the moral transgression? Corporations pay big bucks to gather customer feedback? Why shouldn't people exercise free speech in volunteering the information? Cry me a river!

[OldBill]

Excuse typos above. Under attack by hyperactive kitten.

I suppose we all now that Jones organises boycotts of companies, urges people to 'bombard' the targets, and posts online videos to reinforce the message?

Ask Coca Cola, for one example.

[Swagman]

The comparison to Nazism is absurd and obscene. As it happens, my then teenage father was bashed on the streets of Vienna by brownshirts on that night, abused and spat on by dozens of them, then forced to clean up the spit and blood from the street with a tooth brush while they stood around laughing and spitting some more.

Get real!

Ok OB real it is, why is the comparison of Facebook Destroyers to Nazism "absurd, obscene" and "grotesque and just lazy" ? Emotional tirades aside that is.

BTW GTG has already invoked "Godwin's law".

Someone around should send their CV to the Ministry Truth right away.

.............and the untruths are?

[GandalfTheGrey]

BTW GTG has already invoked "Godwin's law".

who was the first to mention nazism and kristalnacht swag? Not me.

[Swagman]

I did and I don't deny it. Ok you already mentioned Godwin's Law. "Invoked" was the wrong word.

[pugsville]

2GB has said that there are problems with the factual content on Jones's show and that Jones will be 'trained' in fact checking.

Really? I dont expect anything to change but it's a big admission.

[GandalfTheGrey]

But its free speech pugsville - powerful white millionaire broadcasters should be able to say whatever defamatory or inciteful thing they want - regardless of how many people suffer from it. But God forbid if anyone dares participate in free speech through facebook thats just evil - and equivalent to 1984 and nazism...

[Swagman]

But should the businesses advertising on his show be threatened, and harassed by an angry cyber lynch mob of pimply whingers simply because they advertise on his radio show?

The cyber lynch mob might not like what Jones says and they can comment about that till the cows come home but they don't have the right to threaten and mob intimidate these business people. That is the comparison with Nazis.

[colliric]

But its free speech pugsville - powerful white millionaire broadcasters should be able to say whatever defamatory or inciteful thing they want - regardless of how many people suffer from it. But God forbid if anyone dares participate in free speech through facebook thats just evil - and equivalent to 1984 and nazism...

You know the Romans invented the idea of a Police Force for a reason right? To stop people from committing crimes against each other that could potentially "threaten the peace and stability of the state". Point is that free speech isn't a right, it's a privilidge afforded to us should we not commit a crime against another citizen. A privilege that can be given and also taken away(the main job of a police force, at which point we recieve "the right to remain silent!").

[GandalfTheGrey]

But should the businesses advertising on his show be threatened, and harassed by an angry cyber lynch mob of pimply whingers simply because they advertise on his radio show?

I would be against this also - but despite my constant appeals, no one has provided any compelling evidence that this actually happened. The only person we know was threatened during all this was someone who dared criticise Jones on facebook.

The cyber lynch mob might not like what Jones says and they can comment about that till the cows come home but they don't have the right to threaten and mob intimidate these business people. That is the comparison with Nazis.

likewise, you shouldn't have the right to make baseless accusations about this so called "cyber lynch mob".

[Swagman]

likewise, you shouldn't have the right to make baseless accusations about this so called "cyber lynch mob".

Details are scarce but Here's one

[GandalfTheGrey]

Details are scarce

ya don't say..

[Swagman]

ya don't say..

I do say and one is enough.

[colliric]

I do say and one is enough.

Not to mention the Territory FM incident too.

[GandalfTheGrey]

I do say and one is enough.

no evidence of intimidation though. Nothing wrong with emailing per se.