Is our 2 party system just a con?

[facthunter]

What about the Pressure they bring to Bear on governments?  (as well as their OWN flock. ?) Remember the DLP? It wasn't the Labor Party It was a Catholic Party. Look at the Australian CHRISTIAN Lobby , and Rupert Murdoch is a PAPAL Knight.  as well as Various Jewish Associations.  Don't kid yourself Religious groups Have No Political Input. HERE. Nev

[octave]

3 minutes ago, facthunter said:

Don't kid yourself Religious groups Have No Political Input. HERE. Nev

That is not really my point. I was commenting on the notion that our freedoms now are less than before.  Sure, religion seeks to influence the government, but in terms of personal freedom, religious folks are not in any real sense degrading my freedom.  I am saying that in the past, religion did have great control over the average person, but this power has decreased with time. 

 

So yes, I agree that religion does attempt to influence the government and does have its little victories; however, in issues like same sex marriage, divorce, etc., society has moved on from the old repressive rules (for most of society at least). 

[old man emu]

5 hours ago, octave said:

I'm wondering what rights people think have been stripped away?    

I don't think that the basic Human Rights have been stripped awy. It's the more trivial that people whinge about. It's hard to come up with a list of Rights that people seem to think they have lost, or the extent of former rights. 

[onetrack]

There are rights and there are privileges. We have only minimal basic rights in Australia, but a lot of privileges extended to us. Privileges such as drivers licences, and firearms licences, and fishing licences.

 

All those privileges can be restricted or withdrawn, according to the Govt of the day, reacting to pressure from parties involved with those issues, or the courts responding to offences against the Acts that govern those privileges.

 

Ever-increasing restrictions on firearms ownership and use, is what seems to get a lot of people going - along with restrictions on fishing.

Most people seem to accept the ever-increasing restrictions as regards driving on public roads.

Ever-lowering speed limits, increasing levels of driving penalties, and intrusion by automation, such as AI-assisted cameras.

Radar detectors are banned in every State and territory, another restriction that seems to cause great levels of complaint about Govt becoming Big Brother.

 

We definitely have a vast array of major restrictions now, that we didn't have in my youth. I could buy explosives in any co-op and go and blow up anything I liked - all I needed was an explosives permit handed out by the local policeman, who just asked a few perfunctory questions.

 

I could get multiple firearms and a licence with ease, along with unlimited amounts of ammo, and no need to tell any authority where I was going to shoot, or what I was going to shoot.

 

I could go fishing nearly anywhere with only minor restrictions. I didn't need a boat drivers licence, I could go buy any boat and roar off in it anywhere.

 

There were no demerit points and the fines for traffic offences were mostly mere annoyances. Drunk driving was regarded as a no-no, but no-one did anything about it, and it took a very drunk driver to get arrested. Even then, they were just released when they sobered up.

 

We could knock down trees and vegetation wholesale and no-one could stop us. But nowadays, clearing bans and massive fines for "environmental damage" rule the day.

 

Our basic human rights are still the same as they always were. We have no Bill of Rights, as America has, and the writers of the Australian Constitution decided there was no need for one, as we were a civilised country who treated people with respect. Well, the white Europeans, anyway.

 

The Aboriginals rights were trampled for decades until they started taking Govts to court, aided by smart white lawyers - and they won a lot of concessions and reparations. That seems to stick in a lot of white Europeans throats, too.

 

All in all, I think the biggest problem we have today is excessive bureaucracy. There are Depts and Divisions for everything, and ever increasing regulation of every single thing you want to do.

Somewhere along the line we have lost a lot of the old "freedoms" - to do what we liked, when we liked, and where we liked.

 

The cause of that has been vastly increasing numbers of people, increased numbers of badly-behaved people, and increased disapproval of activities that were formerly tolerated - not necessarily because they were harmless, just that few people saw it happening, and few people were affected by what is now regarded today, as unacceptable behaviour.