Graham,

I've just listened to Counterpoint: http://tiny.cc/bxs1c
and am delighted you've followed my advice.
But I'm a bit disappointed you haven't acknowledged my good idea.
However, don't mention it..

A lot of people have jumped to conclusions on this topic without actually knowing the facts. I would encourage everyone to read this blog by Gregory Storer:

http://gregory.storer.com.au/?p=286

It contains the facts minus the hyperbole, spin and speculation.

Michael.

Thanks for the link Mikeybear.

Here's a paragraph that sums the article up I thought:

"It’s really quite simple – comments that vilify other people, whether its a group of people or an individual, should not be allowed to be published. Plenty of blogs actually do this moderation thing really well, but not On Line Opinion. Stupid, hateful comments are permitted so that the rest of the online community can pull them to shreds. That’s not changing anyone’s opinions, and for too long now this backward policy has allowed radical, fundamentalist Christians the right to vilify and hurt people without just cause."

I agree with everything Gregory Storer says.
I only hope the perpetrators of these offensive words used against gay people read it too.

It is not enough to simply hide behind a bible to give justification to words used thousands of years ago by people who did not know any better.

The average modern person would not feel the need to publicly vilify the sexuality of another group of people.

The link posted to the comments thread to the article on Monday, 14 February 2011 at 11:53:38 PM, by Mikeybear. delivers the viewer to this URL: http://gregory.storer.com.au/?p=286

Graham Young's text link,the blue text words 'Greg Storer', in paragraph 25 of the article 'Wanted: new financial backers', delivers the viewer here: http://gregory.storer.com.au/ . So far as I can tell, this is the link that is described by Gregory Storer in his own blog post of 14 February 2011 as being "my outdated election blog". It seems to be the only link in Graham Young's article to Gregory Storer's blog.


My perplexity is that Graham's text link, when clicked on around 6:30 AM AEDST this morning, Tuesday 15 February 2011, yielded exactly the same content as Mikeybear's link.


My suspicion is that Greg Storer's blog, if one arrives on the home page as Graham's text link would seemingly deliver one, automatically displays the latest blog post. Graham Young's article was published on Monday 7 February 2011, so it would appear that the link he published in the article would not have displayed, at publication, Greg Storer's post dated 10 February 2011, specifically identified by this URL: http://gregory.storer.com.au/?p=277

Given that in that 10 February post Greg Storer, with respect to this blog, states "I’ve not used it since the election", and that the next most recent post is dated August 21, 2010, are viewers to assume that what was on display when Graham Young posted his link to the home page of this blog was that brief post of 21 August 2010 and/or a preceeding one of 20 August, which the following links specifically target? http://gregory.storer.com.au/?p=270 http://gregory.storer.com.au/?p=238




What content on what Greg Storer describes as his 'outdated election blog' is it that we can no longer see, and yet to which Greg himself refers in his blog entry dated 14 February 2011?

What Greg Storer has instigated and is advocating is, effectively, censorship.
I don't think I ever read the "offending article" at the time, but I notice the first "disgusting" comment "was" deleted. The next comment, which set Storer's "teeth on edge" is right out of the fundamentalist handbook (the Bible/Koran etc.), and constitutes the ideological/ethical views of a very big percentage of the population of Australia and the world. Much bigger than that of the LGBT's. Secularism is supposed to be an "ecumenical church", ergo its members ostensibly tolerate, indeed celebrate, the whole range of defensible views at play in a given "society" (read "nation"; this is its greatest weakness: cultural cultism, which elides responsibility for "all" human rights. LGBT's are the spoiled brats of the West).
OLO has its share of rednecks too, who frequently air their disgusting racist hyperbole and are met in debate. It's meet to point out too that possibly the most popularly debated topics on OLO are between secularists (including myself) and theists, which includes all the ideological issues that divide these opposing world views. A study of these myriad threads would disclose just as much offensive material directed at the religious cohort as visa versa, though of course the self-righteous, from either camp, always feel vindicated. Just the other day the trope "atheist porn" was used repeatedly http://forum.onlineopinion.com.au/thread.asp?discussion=3814&page=0
but this was desperate rhetoric designed to compensate for want of argument, and should be construed a compliment.
Strict standards are enforced at this site, but thank God censorship and political correctness are not included.
Storer mentions the high suicide rates among gays. He should take heart from the fact that the vast majority defend gay rights. Silencing bigotry (in fact pushing it underground) will not make it go away.

If anyone wants to see how Lavartus Prodeo deal with disagreement have a look at what they said when I disagreed with them.

http://noplaceforsheep.com/2011/02/14/lavartus-prodeo-nights-2/

I also received this comment from Mikey Bear (Greg Storey's partner) when I asked why they didn't go to the anti discrimination board:

*Why must they go to via an anti-discrimination path? That’s ludicrous. A letter to the advertisers proved far simpler, effective and expedient.*

It was always their intention, by taking the path of lobbying ALL OLO's advertisers, to financially attack the site. The willingness of corporations to yield to activist demands, without investigating the site and finding rebuttals of Muehlenberg's stuff, is frightening.

This is corporate censorship, and it does not auger well for the blogosphere. Because the amounts of money involved are small in overall corporate advertising budgets, it isn't worth the corporates investigating, or arguing with the activists. They just pull the ads.

Mikey Bear continues to post self congratulatory comments on my blog, and continues to write that it isn't their fault and Graham had it coming.