南澳大利亚州总理彼得·马利瑙卡斯驳回了针对16岁以下未成年人社交媒体禁令的高等法院挑战，称其核心的言论自由主张“站不住脚”。社交媒体平台Reddit和一个言论自由倡导团体将于周二主张，这项已实施11个月的禁令侵犯了澳大利亚人隐含的政治交流自由。但马利瑙卡斯——曾主导呼吁对社交媒体实施年龄限制——表示该论点“显然不属实”。
South Australian Premier Peter Malinauskas has dismissed a High Court challenge to the social media ban for under 16s, saying the free speech claim at the centre of it “doesn’t stack up”.
“社交媒体是我们民主运作核心这一观点根本站不住脚，”他在接受澳广公司《新闻早餐》节目采访时表示。“我的意思是，在社交媒体出现之前很久，这个国家就已经拥有了文明、健康的政治话语和言论自由的民主制度。而且我认为有理由主张，它让情况变得更糟，而非更好。”
他表示，禁令的初衷不容忽视。“澳大利亚之所以有这项法律，之所以现在感觉每个月都有新国家宣布将采取相同做法，是因为关乎儿童利益，”马利瑙卡斯说。“这是关于保护儿童免受我们通过同行评审研究明知正在伤害他们的平台侵害。”
Social media platform Reddit and a free speech advocacy group will on Tuesday make the case that the 11 month-old ban impinges on Australians’ implied freedom of political communication.
他表示，这“与管制香烟或酒精没有区别”。“我们的意思是，看看在适当年龄你应该获得使用权。而在本案中，这个年龄是16岁，”他说。
But Mr Malinauskas – who led calls for age restrictions on social media – said the argument is “plainly not true”.
Reddit在其提交高等法院的文件中辩称，社交媒体平台是“新闻和政治信息的常见来源”。它强调了其“问我任何事”环节，该环节允许用户直接向政治人物提问。它与数字自由项目共同发起挑战——该团体由新南威尔士州自由党籍议员约翰·拉迪克领导。
在堪培拉高等法院外，拉迪克在为期两天的听证会开始前，称安东尼·阿尔巴尼斯为“暴君”。
“The idea that social media is central to the function of our democracy just doesn’t stack up,” he told ABC’s News Breakfast.
“人们说这是滑坡效应的开始——抱歉，我们早已远远超出了滑坡效应的范畴，”他说。“我们需要反击。”他接着表示，制止“重新争辩言论自由问题”的唯一途径，是通过一项“宪法修正案”明确保障言论自由。
这项全球首创的政策出台，源于澳洲新闻集团旗下《让孩子做孩子》运动发出的警告，称澳大利亚正在“失去一代人”。该运动揭露了社交媒体对澳大利亚儿童造成的心理、社交、身体和情感伤害，失去孩子的自杀家庭也加入呼吁改革的行列。后续报道敬请关注
“I mean, we’ve had a democracy in this country with civil, healthy political discourse, freedom of speech, for a very long time before social media ever came along. “And I think that there’s an argument to make that it makes it worse, not better.” He said the motivation of the ban could not be forgotten. “The reason why we have this law in Australia and the reason why now every month it feels like a new country is announcing they’re going to do the same is because of the interests of children,” Mr Malinauskas said. “This is about protecting children from a platform that we definitely know through peer review research is doing them harm.” He said it is “no different to regulating cigarettes or alcohol”. “What we say is, look at an appropriate age you should get access to it. And in this case, that’s the age of 16,” he said. Reddit argued in its submission argued in its High Court submission that social media platforms are a “common source of news and political information”. It highlighted its “Ask Me Anything” sessions, which lets users put questions directly to political figures. It is making the challenge with the Digital Freedom Project – a group led NSW state Libertarian MP John Ruddick. Speaking outside the High Court in Canberra ahead of the two-day hearings, Mr Ruddick branded Anthony Albanese a “tyrant”. “People say this is the beginning of the slippery slope – I’m sorry, we’re well past the slippery slope,” he said. “We need to fight back.” He the said the only way to stop “relitigating the free speech matter” is a “constitutional amendment” explicitly guaranteeing free speech. The world-first policy came about after News Corp Australia’s The Let Them Be Kids campaign warned that Australia was “losing a generation”. The campaign exposed the psychological, social, physical and emotional harm social media was inflicting on Australian children, with families who lost their children to suicide adding their voices calling for reform. More to come