I wonder if PM Cameron can do this?

http://www.ultraculture.org/uk-to-censo ... -websites/

(maybe this should be a horary question)

Remember Curtis, we live in a democracy and fight for freedom, of course this can happen! I don't think it will though, just more fear-mongering and distraction from real issues and events.

Thanks for the link Curtis. The Huffington post reports

According to Cameron, the new parental control settings will be turned on for all new broadband subscribers "by the end of the year".

So I guess we'll see soon enough. This wouldn't surprise me: in the past BT internet had default settings that listed Skyscript as an unsafe site, but I don't think any IP provider or internet security program has shown any problem with it for years now. I can imagine if those "broad generalisations" are applied, parental controls may prevent access to astrology sites, and IP's providers will require users to "opt-in".

There seems to be a lot of confusion. This page shows how pagans are being advised not to over-react:

Open Rights have NOT said that ?esoteric content? will be censored. This is a misinterpretation of their article, which has been doing the rounds online for a couple of days, and which they have edited their article in an attempt to counter. I quote from their article on the subject: ?The category examples are based on current mobile configurations and broad indications from ISP? (i.e. this is a guess based on a few informal trend), and ?The precise pre-ticked options may vary from service to service.? I think it is incredibly important not to jump to conclusions before any research has been done into this story. The fact is that nobody knows if ?esoteric content? will be filtered or not, and the signs at the moment suggest that it will not be filtered by default ? if it is, it will happen service-provider-by-service provider. It is so important to get facts straight when we?re campaigning about incidents that may affect the Pagan community. And this is an overreaction based on incomplete information.? - See more at: http://wildhunt.org/2013/07/will-uk-int ... dl8Nv.dpuf

I'm not personally concerned about the impact on Skyscript, so long as astrologers can access the site if they want to, but I am concerned to know how broadly the term "esoteric" is being used, and if this is a situation which will have an impact on the freedom of expression for pagans, homeopaths or anyone with interests in any kind of alternative field (the word esoteric is supposed to refer to something that is closed, secret or private - so if the site really is "esoteric" ...).

I think this is one to watch. The fact is that astrologers are already subjected to censorship in the UK by the regulations that ensure it receives no serious consideration within the mainstream media, and must be treated as a subject of light-hearted entertainment which could only be taken seriously by deluded fools or frauds. I am quite sure that pressure to "lessen the appeal" of astrology and all alternative subjects has been coming from the top - a reaction to the realisation a few years ago that too many university students were wanting to study the humanities, with not enough applicants for degrees in hard sciences. Since we are supposed to live in a democracy, remember that it is generally much more successful (and less troublesome) to lessen the appeal of a subject through negative spin rather than censorship.

Deb wrote:Thanks for the link Curtis. The Huffington post reports

According to Cameron, the new parental control settings will be turned on for all new broadband subscribers "by the end of the year".

...

That could be a tactical and legal decision.

With the far right gaining momentum and retaliation bound to happen,they want to take away the excuse that one accidentally browsed a website.
Once, you opt-in then you are liable to prosecution(or persecution).

PD

pankajdubey wrote:That could be a tactical and legal decision.

With the far right gaining momentum and retaliation bound to happen,they want to take away the excuse that one accidentally browsed a website.
Once, you opt-in then you are liable to prosecution(or persecution).

PD

As with anything on the web without human face to face interaction it would be possible to accidentally opt in as well.

I think that the internet is going to have a rough ride over the next several years over issues like this. It is quite clear that elites are running scared. If you look at the legal fine print (I have for several US laws), the trend is definitely toward fascism (see NDAA sections 1021, 1022, the AUMF post 911, FISA amendment act, Obama's refusal to restore habeas corpus, DHS arming with enough hollow points to kill every American twice (they are never used in practice), etc...) The overall trend is quite disturbing.

At the same time the internet is filling up with garbage that is blatantly false from conspiracy websites (not all of them are bad, but most seem to be terribly misleading). So now post Arab Spring, the threat of bail-ins from New Zealand and the one that actually happened in Cyprus, it seems as though officials are quietly preparing for revolt. I think part of the motivation for this censorship is to cool the effects that facebook and twitter have had on the public mind who may not be able to deal with the critical thinking level required to distinguish fact from fiction.

But the block apparently won?t be limited to porn: ISPs will also be forced to block violent material, extremist sites, pro-anorexia and pro-suicide sites, alcohol, smoking, web forums (?!) and even? esoteric material. - See more at: http://www.ultraculture.org/uk-to-censo ... c-websites

If the above is accurate there is a lot more at stake here than pagan websites. Exactly what are "extremist" websites? I can find people that would view The New Advent Catholic Encyclopedia as "extremist." It's a terribly subjective word.

Everyone needs to chill out and reflect on New York based writer Nat Hentoff has said for years: "The answer to free speech that you don't like is more free speech."

I have to agree with Curtis and feel that it should be obvious to anyone (that's awake) that the fascist hammer is coming down.

All possible means of CONTROL are being implemented at an (what should be) alarming pace.

When Uranus and Pluto were together in the 60's, it was "the people" (radicals, hippies, counter-culture, freedom-loving) against "the Man" (government, big business, big money). Now, we have Uranus-Pluto in square and those exact themes are time-worthy again.

Though I'm specifically referencing Pre-9/11 with Post-9/11 in the referenced graphic here (from another post I made on a different forum)...still, it shows the general push away from liberties (and the Constitution) and towards total control (amassing power in the Executive Branch).
Astrology, or any systems which offer Truth and champion the individual, don't fit in with the picture of complete control that the oligarchs and military-industrial pinheads have conceived as ideal. I would expect more and more demonizing of things astrological...in the same vein that the U.S. military (FOIA) documents are showing that libertarians, freedom-lovers, Constitutionalists, gun-lovers, ex-military are being REBRANDED as potential terrorists. If Thomas Jefferson were alive today, he most certainly would be high on governmental watch-lists for his extremist views. (yes, the very same extremist views which can be found throughout our Constitution, which is why Obama is implying that only lawyers can really understand the Constitution, so that we won't "over-react" as they slowly are dismantling it)

Of course, the government has only our best interests at heart. We should trust them explicitly, ask any Indian.

My favorite question, which ties into a comment in Curtis' post above... why does a DOMESTIC agency like DHS NEED billions of rounds of hollow-point bullets and why have they ordered millions of dollars worth of paper shooting targets with rural Americans, children, and pregnant mothers on them? Really, *WHY*??? The answer should be obvious...they fear the near future when the economy crashes (part of THE PLAN) and a large faction of people realize it is the direct result of our elected leaders SELLING US OUT. ie. they see a situation like the French Revolution happening here and they want to make sure that THEY have all the "guillotines" when that happens

Many don't worry that the NSA is mass-storing their Emails, phone conversations, online posts and data-mining them. If the PTB wanted a way to find out WHERE people are, WHO are their friends, WHAT things do they like and believe in, HOW do they appear image-wise; they couldn't do a better job along those lines than to "invent" a Facebook...where they don't have to research potential problem people (dissidents of one form or another), the information is FREELY GIVEN by the person themselves in order to be up-to-date with current social media.

The noose is tightening and most people are more aware of what the Kardashians are doing, of who's Dancing with the Stars, etc.; than are aware that a deadly cage is slowly surrounding us.

In the last 100 years, what is the largest threat to human life on Earth? DEMOCIDE, death by one's own government, and yet DHS orders 2 billion bullets and to most, it's nothing we should be worried about.

If you snooze, you lose...and in this case you might lose everything.

james - atlantean,
i like your post and agree with you in much of what you say.. it is interesting how britian and the usa seem to walk in lockstep with one another, but then maybe that has to do with the history on both or their banking systems..

at any rate - uranus/pluto observations are a topic for the mundane forum. there was someone who recently asked about any thoughts on this square - grannyskot or someone like that. while i have heard these comments made many times before - it doesn't change the interesting coincidences between the times these 2 come together in some fashion.. 1930 was marked by the waning square between these 2 outers.. the 1960's by the conjunction. now the waxing square.. of course saturn overlapped with them in all this as did some other planets, but it is interesting to discuss further, perhaps on the thread grannyskot started? thanks for your comments!

This is from a former NY Times journalist Chris Hedges on his book "Days of Destruction, Days of Revolt" (heavy Uranus/Pluto stuff):

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e6hffN0LFbs

If you don't have time, a good place to start is at 28:00 and the talk ends at about 48:00 with a Q&A afterwards.

Alarming....confirming....but very interesting to listen to...

Thanks for sharing that, Curtis

James

Good evening,

With limited, rapidly diminishing resources and the worldwide 7,200 million human pandemic still exploding by 5 humans net per second, it should hardly be surprising that mass realisation of '1984' is more probable than priority being assigned to 'self-realisation' of each of the so numerous unique individuals. Mr Thomas Robert Malthus' scenario is materialising, albeit far later than he thought in 1799, primarily due to petroleum.

Here is a link to a real-time world population clock:

http://www.worldometers.info/world-population/

In my humble opinion many if not most astrologers themselves are at least co-responsible for general public opinion of astrology as infotainment. Several notorious astrologers cater to this taste by writing sun-sign columns. Others propound so-called 'channelled wisdom' as, similar to religious revelations, an indubitable fount of astrological insight.

Few indeed are those who, like Monsieur Michel Gauquelin and Professor Percy Seymour, engage in sceptical scientific study of astrological hypotheses. Their findings are often shunned and ignored by many astrologers.

Before abhorrence at perhaps being included amongst 'esoteric' subjects, many astrologers might do well to reflect upon how they wish their discipline to be conducted and to 'sweep first their own doorsteps'.

After all, many correlations between celestial and terrestrial phenomena (not to be confused with causation) are rather obvious, ex. gr. the daily apparent solar motion with temperatures, the lunar cycle with tides, the yearly solar cycle with seasons.

Perhaps some of these phenomena, for example that the hottest part of the day is not straddled round the culmination of the sun but after it, might assist in resolving some of the astrological questions discussed elsewhere in this Forum.

Best regards,

lihin

This little story has been doing the rounds of Facebook quite a lot too. Since I've had occasion to refute its wilder claims a couple of times there already, I thought it wouldn't hurt to repeat my own findings here.

As Deb points out via the quotation in the middle of her earlier response, the claims at Ultraculture.org were misleading. So too, in my view, was the original source, the website of civil liberties advocacy group Open Rights Group. Although it eventually admitted in comments after the article, when faced with questions, that the inclusion of an esoteric category in the parental filter it showed as being to be expected in the main article was in fact based solely on the example of some mobile phone companies' existing parental filters, it did not make this apparent in the original article, which therefore gave bloggers such as the Ultraculture writer and even a Huffington Post journalist an entirely misleading impression as to the UK government's proposals and plans. In short, Open Rights Group presented zero evidence for there being any government proposal to restrict access to esoteric websites in the UK. On the contrary, it presented evidence only for there being an unspecified number of mobile phone companies that existingly offer an esoteric category restriction in the parental controls facilities they offer. This, therefore, is not a new (or even old) government initiative to restrict children's access to esoteric ideas, but rather a pre-existing private corporate initiative to allow parents who want to restrict their children's access to esoteric websites to do so. The new government initiative to restrict access to child pornography and self-harm-instruction websites is completely irrelevant to the pre-existing private telecommunications company initiative to allow parents to restrict their children's access to esoteric material if they so choose. In a free country under the law, those telecoms companies are offering those parents a service they have demanded, and no-one has a right to stop them, but equally, their strings are not being pulled by the government in any way on the esoteric filter issue - that's entirely their own initiative.