polite_gandalf wrote on Aug 7
th, 2017 at 9:24am:
freediver wrote on Aug 3
rd, 2017 at 11:54pm:
So don't fix it because it aint broke, except it is actually broken, but that's OK because it is a popular flaw? Are you having trouble finding a principle here Gandalf?
Its not broken, and that is evidenced by the fact that I don't think anyone has ever had their freedoms curtailed by 18c - beyond what would have been curtailed in any defamation case. Its probably got to do with the huge disclaimer in 18d. I'd even go so far as to say its working exactly as intended.
So 18C is meant to destroy the lives of people as they are dragged through the courts on trumped up accusations that were left to fester instead of being dealt with appropriately?
That alone meant it was a fkked up law used by a professional victim to screw some poor bastards out of a heap of cash.
In a decision that was seen as a litmus test for the controversial section 18C of the Racial Discrimination Act 1975 (Cth) (RDA), the Federal Circuit Court has dismissed Cindy Prior’s case against Queensland University of Technology students Alex Wood, Calum Thwaites and Jackson Powell. Prior had alleged that these students breached section 18C. Judge Michael Jarrett concluded that Prior’s claim against them had no reasonable prospect of success.
What was the case about?
On May 28, 2013, Wood and two other students were using a QUT computer lab when Prior asked them whether they were indigenous. They replied they weren’t. Prior then asked them to leave.
Later that day, on the “QUT Stalkerspace” Facebook page, Wood posted:
Just got kicked out of the unsigned Indigenous computer room. QUT stopping segregation with segregation…?
Many people commented. Powell posted:
I wonder where the white supremacist computer lab is….
Prior alleged that Thwaites posted “ITT black people”. (A claim that Thwaites has always categorically denied.)
Prior complained to QUT about these and other comments, which were promptly removed. However, Prior was ultimately unhappy with QUT’s handling of the matter and lodged a complaint in the Australian Human Rights Commission (AHRC). The AHRC conciliated Prior’s complaint. However, it did not contact the students directly about the complaint or the conciliation conference. Instead, it left this task to QUT. Powell did not know about Prior’s complaint until after the conciliation conference.
Conciliation failed, and Prior commenced proceedings in the Federal Circuit Court against QUT, certain QUT employees, and a number of QUT students including Wood, Thwaites and Powell. Prior’s claim was for A$247,570.52. Prior alleged that the students had breached 18C. She also alleged that QUT and its employees had breached section 9 of the RDA.
http://theconversation.com/qut-discrimination-case-exposes-human-rights-commissi...