@box text intr = Capitalist governments are no friends of civil liberties and democratic rights at the best of times. Since the September 11 attack on the World Trade Center in New York, they have been seizing the opportunity all around the world to restrict our democratic rights even further.
Starting with the draconian USAPATRIOT Act, First World governments have been passing "anti-terrorism" legislation which removes the right to legal counsel and gives police and secret police agencies the authority to arbitarily detain people suspected of terrorism or having had contact with alleged terrorists. In Australia, this legislation is likely to be introduced into federal parliament early next year.
These laws fulfill long-term goals of most First World governments. They provide new and greater opportunities to harass and intimidate those who oppose the corporate elite's policies of screwing more wealth out the world's working people. By further empowering police agencies which are already mostly unaccountable, these laws will make it harder for the left to organise.
Governments, including the Howard government, have been able to propose such severe restrictions on commonly accepted rights because of the intense climate of fear whipped up since September 11. Convincing First World citizens that their very lives are threatened by Third World "terrorists" has provided many governments with mass support for such attacks.
This atmosphere of fear, and support for repression of dissent, poses a threat to all those who disagree with some aspect of government policy, and to Arabic and left-wing organisations in particular. The misnamed "war against terrorism" has created a climate where other bodies — including local councils, businesses and universities — have felt emboldened to take measures that either restrict our democratic rights or make public expressions of dissent more difficult.
We can expect to see more examples like: the Burwood City Council's fining of Socialist Alliance candidate Max Lane for using a megaphone in public; the arrest on Sydney University of Nuclear Disarmament Party members for holding an anti-war stall; and the attempt by the Hobart City Council to ban the distribution of Green Left Weekly in the Elizabeth Street Mall.
Some of the restrictions on the right to dissent will come from private companies. The recent axing, by numerous US newspapers, of the comic strip Boondocks because of its satirical take on US patriotism, is one example of this. Increased limits placed by employers upon the use of staff email facilities is another.
These attacks on civil liberties are described by their proponents as measures to "protect freedom". But even restrictions on free political speech or other civil liberties supposedly introduced to limit the power of the extreme right will eventually be used against the left. This has been eloquently shown by the investigation, under racial vilification laws, of Australian left-liberal political commentator Phillip Adams for questioning US foreign policy.
In a climate of restrictions on dissent, Green Left Weekly is vulnerable, as recent experience in Hobart has shown. Any attempt by local councils to impose fees or restrict the areas in which activists can distribute non-profit publications is a violation of the right to free speech. GLW readers and supporters will need to stand ready to mobilise in our defence in all cases of such attacks.
It makes no difference which excuses are used to justify the measures in question or by which body they are implemented. If proposed measures restrict our freedom to organise, they should be considered an attack on democratic rights.
GLW has a long record of defending free speech and civil liberties for all. Our opposition to "closing down" the public meetings of the One Nation party (while not renouncing our own right to organise large counter-protests) is one case in point.
Experience has also shown that the best way to defend democratic rights under attack is with open, mass, public campaigns. Such campaigns are more necessary now than ever, as we must seek to convince the majority of people of the dangers inherent in the current climate of patriotic hostility to dissent.
In the 1970s, bans on protest marches in the streets were overcome by mass, public defiance of the bans. The Hobart City Council ban on the Tasmanian Gay and Lesbian Rights Group stall at Salamanca markets was overturned after a long campaign which included repeated weekly attempts to set up the stall in the face of council harassment.
Working people have the most to gain from the radical extension of democratic rights, and the ability to freely organise in defence of our interests.
From Green Left Weekly, December 12, 2001.
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