Outside of these matters, standards for television, radio, recorded music, the press and most commercial advertising are enforced, in the first instance, by means of industry self-regulation.
[5] The section which outlawed Langer from encouraging people to vote this way has since been repealed and the law now says only that it is an offence to print or publish material which may deceive or mislead a voter.
Bolt was found to have contravened the Racial Discrimination Act 1975 (RDA) in 2011 following comments regarded to be representative of a "eugenic" approach to aboriginal identity.
[11] In 2014 the Supreme Court of Victoria issued a blanket media gag order on the reporting of a high-profile international corruption case.
[15][16] In 2000, Liberal Party of Australia Prime Minister John Howard had the Australian Classification Board prohibit depictions of certain sexual fetishes including candle wax, bondage, spanking, fisting, and golden showers.
[19] Publications, films, computer games and any other goods that describe, depict, express or otherwise deal with matters of sex, drug misuse or addiction, crime, cruelty, violence, terrorist acts or revolting or abhorrent phenomena in such a way that they offend against the standards of morality, decency and propriety generally accepted by reasonable adults are not allowed.In Australia, the importation of certain books, video games, and media are prohibited based on its non-fictional or fictional contents.
It was reported on in 2021, that the Australian Border Force stated that any depictions of sex, drug misuse or addiction, crime cruelty, violence, terrorist acts, or revolting content that offends moral standards and decency, are prohibited.
[23][24] Each state had its own legislation, including: Norman Lindsay's Redheap was the first book to be banned from import into Australia, in May 1930, under the Commonwealth Customs Act 1901.
[32][33] However the main cause of its ban was its socialist tone and subversive agenda which criticised capitalism,[34] featuring Communist characters in its portrayal of life in the relief camps of the Depression.
[35] In the early 1970s Don Chipp, the federal Minister of Customs and Excise, largely ended censorship of printed material in the country, with Australians being able to read such books as Portnoy’s Complaint and Henry Miller's Tropic of Cancer.
In June 2019, federal police raided the Sydney offices of the Australian Broadcasting Corporation and the home of Sunday Telegraph political editor Annika Smethurst, seeking evidence against officials who may have leaked sensitive government information to journalists.
[40] The conviction of one of the Vatican's most senior officials made headlines around the world, yet a suppression order banned all Australian media outlets from reporting the story.
Melbourne's Herald Sun newspaper posted on its front page "CENSORED" in large print in protest of the ban, noting that international sources were reporting on a "very important story that is relevant to Victorians".
[43][44] Victorian authorities later charged[needs update] 36 individual journalists and news organisations with breaching suppression orders related to the verdict.
[45] On 10 December 2002, the High Court of Australia delivered judgment in the Internet defamation case of Dow Jones v Gutnick.
[54] Commonwealth and State governments ban or restrict certain types of advertising in order to maintain the integrity of elections, personal injury law and the Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme[citation needed].
Lawyers in most Australian states are censored in respect of public statements they are allowed to publish concerning personal injury compensation law.
In New South Wales, all statements by lawyers concerning personal injury compensation including on websites are banned and strict penalties apply.
The majority also ruled against the plaintiffs on the second argument (but the minority were strongly of the view) that the law unreasonably interfered with lawyers going about their constitutionally protected vocation.
The Australian Lawyers Alliance opposes the censorship and believes that "content-rich statements" concerning the availability of all legal services are in the public interest.
In their view, the protection of insurance company profits is not a sufficient "public purpose" to warrant the interference in personal freedoms by way of censorship.
On 31 December 2007 the Telecommunications Minister of the newly elected Labor government, Stephen Conroy, announced that Australia would introduce mandatory internet filtering.
Slated for blocking, should the "Clean Feed" Act be passed by Australia's Federal Parliament, is the website of Dr Philip Nitschke's banned book, The Peaceful Pill Handbook.
The Peaceful Pill Handbook was listed on the leaked internet website blacklist, wedged in alphabetical order between the porn sites panty-ass.com and pickyourperversion.com.
[70] Concerns include the influence of the People's Republic of China on university administrations; 'deplatforming' of controversial speakers and viewpoints; and demands that academics refrain from contesting one another's conclusions.
In 2016, James Cook University sacked marine scientist Peter Ridd for publishing an article questioning the reproducibility of his colleagues' work on the Great Barrier Reef.
[72] Campaigners including the anonymous American group Sleeping Giants have attempted to force certain conservative and libertarian commentators off Australian radio and television by threatening to boycott broadcasters' advertisers.
Targets of this approach have included both hosts, such as radio presenter Alan Jones and former Northern Territory Chief Minister Adam Giles, and guests, such as former senator David Leyonhjelm.