The author is claiming that OLO operates on “Journalistic balance” and thereby not silencing dissent.
I would contend that “journalistic balance" is just media spin designed to justify quantity V quality, not dissimilar to talk back radio. The more reasonable comments are swept away in an avalanche of the opinionated and least factually supportable (the lowest common denominator).
Conversations at this level devolves into two sides yelling at each other no-one learns (a waste of time).
Equal time is not balance! e.g. A shout of “fire” in a crowded theatre followed by another yelling the opposite serves only to confuse and panic.
A balanced debate is where individuals state their case with provable (hopefully) factual arguments devoid of hyperbole, rancour, and Dogma.
I have noted that some topics are plagued with an increasing number who argue that this is so and either refuse to say why or simply spout unprovable opinion and attack. A recent topic on public opinion being swayed by surveys was attacked by describing statistics as “the 20th century version of throwing monkey bones at a wall….. “. It might be the commenter’s opinion of statistic but how does it add to the discourse?
Other topics have been swamped with irrational/unprovable dogma and belittling anyone who doesn’t agree. This drags the topic away from the original intention into a “no win” religious diatribe. Religious views are fine but in their context. Neither do they have automatic superiority in a constitutional or legal sense. (Australia is a secular country and therefore its laws).
In short a balanced argument comes from WITHIN EACH contribution being base on rational analysis (preferably provable facts) where respect is given for other opinions and addressing the points raised not gamesmanship for some other agenda.
All relevant facts regarding an author of a topic should be declared so responders can make an informed decision if they wish to be involved. The argument that we are all lobbyists in comparison a paid or professional is a mischief as is the last word tactic. I READ AND CONTRIBUTE TO TOPICS TO LEARN NOT RUN AN AGENDA.

Pelican expressed pretty well exactly my views.

I have a lot of contact with Europe where everybody daily sees the effects of humans on the environment. The Netherlands mainly lies below sea level and generally there is little interest in 'waiting to see which scientist is right'. To err on the side of caution and do whatever is possible is seen as the pragmatic thing to do. The choice is certainly drowning or maybe not drowning, or at least maybe delaying drowning. A bit of a no-brainer.

Australia has a vested interest in denying or being sceptical of human effect on GW. Our coal industry is very important to our economy. Europe does not have a similar economic interest.

Examinator has a point, but who is going to decide whose contribution has no merit or does have merit? And in a way having everyone politely debating can make for a boring forum. A few loonies at least give something to laugh about.

I enjoy OLO very much. It is one of the very few places where it is possible to express opinions, be challenged on those and re-articulate or adjust opinions.

Anyway, I've now read Clive Hamilton's piece. It would be a real loss if he does stop posting.

Yvonne,
Thanks for the comment.
Take a look at the topic "stirring the pot on Poligomy"this site
Read my criteria of a measured post and tell me which one is so wrong.
This poster has a habit of this sort of post.It is niether funny or clever it is simply obscene.
My self test is on what I write is: does this add to the debate?
Is it the truth, or is it unsubstaniated oppinion.(yes I do have them but I recognize them for what they are.)?
Cheers
Examinator

Freedom of opinion and expression is an inalienable right of a free people.

Australia is committed to The Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Article 19 of the Declaration provides:
Everyone has the right of freedom of opinion and expression; this right includes freedom to hold opinions without interference and to seek, receive and impart information and ideas through any media and regardless of frontiers.

In a truly democratic society open debate, discussion, criticism and dissent are central to the process of generating informed and considered choices. These processes are crucial to the formation of values and priorities and help in assessing and finding solutions to social, economic and political problems.

A free press means a free people and the people of Australia have a right to freedom of information and access to differing views and opinions and declare that the following principles are basic to an unfettered flow of news and information both within Australia and across the nation’s borders.

I would like to think they are my words, but they are from the Australian Press Council, yet they certainly fit both OLO and this current discussion, whilst I do not agree with everything said, I certainly agree with providing this forum.

I suppose on OLO we can talk about whatever we want, but the climate change skepticism debate seems to me an increasingly sterile online shouting-match that pleases no-one and resolves nothing.

Meanwhile, the Federal Government seems to be getting ready to announce one helluva round of policy reforms, on the same scale or possibly even greater than the GST.

Perhaps we should move the debate off the climate science, in which very few if any of OLO's contributors are expert, and instead focus on the policy reform debate, where there are numerous OLO contributors and commenters who could frame a productive discussion?

Think back to the GST debates and the big questions that were addressed as that policy was formed and implemented: eg. Food - in or out? Business impact - how to minimize it? Low income households - how best to protect them?

We need to be focusing on those type of questions in relation to emissions trading and climate change policy. But instead, OLO is rejecting the underlying premise of the policy landscape in which we find ourselves - which is today's equivalent of advocating for Pauline Hanson's 2% Flat Tax proposal in the context of the 1998 GST election

I wonder how long before some of the denialists begin to trash Garnaut?

And I wonder how long before OLO prints some half baked rebuttal of his report? (Admittedly Rudd and his merry gang of HowRuddistas might do that any way when they produce their response to his report. But that's another question.)

I am beginning to read the report. I have criticisms of it, including that I don't think an emissions trading scheme will actually address the problem in the short to medium term. Relying on the market to fix a problem flowing from the market doesn't seem sensible. Allowing polluters to pay for their pollution (and pass on the costs to consumers in sectors where demand is fairly inelastic) appears to me to be an indaequate response, as does the chimera of clean coal.

But his basic premise, that AGM exists, is something I agree with.

Clive, please give us your views on Garnaut in an article for OLO, to help those of us who read OLO for the ideas and debates, and to help further our own knowledge. Please!

Examinator makes some good points, but I think that there is a place for opinion and a little bit of light hearted hyperbole. Even the nutters are sometimes funny. And reading some posters helps me understand that they represent a section of our society, something before OLO I may have been intellectually aware of but not in a practical sense. So OLO helps me understand there are pockets of Christian fundamentalists, anti-semites, racists and AGW denialists (for example) out there. Prior to reading them on OLO I had no idea of their reality.

I think Examinator refered to Irfan as an islamic ranter or words to that effect. Actauly Irfan is quite moderate and sensible and makes a good case for the vast majority of muslims. (If it wasn't Examinator who said that, my apologies.)