Sydney Censors Vaccination Speeches-
November 19th, 2017
Sydney mayor, Clover Moore believes she has the right to censor events that provide information about vaccinations. On Monday Moore, prompted by social media backlash, ordered an advertisement pulled from the City of Sydney’s website's “what's on” section. The section lists all events held in Sydney, pulling only events deemed inappropriate due to violence, or adult themes. Yet acting under her own discretion Clover ordered the speech by Dr Judy Wilyman's PhD be pulled from the cities page. In her own unqualified opinion she gave this reasoning:
“In this case, my view is that a controversial event promoting messages about vaccinations that have been refuted by science should not be an event that is listed on our city’s website.”
So apparently Clover believes she is a scientist as well as a politician now and is entitled to provide, or censor an actual doctor's professional opinions. This seems like dangerous territory, should the mayor truly be permuted to make calls to censor information she disagrees with? Shouldn't the people of Sydney be permitted to make their own conclusions about what they believe, or should they simply start visiting the mayor for her medical opinions?
Sydney's city counsel found that promoting this event was “harmful and irresponsible”, isn't it much more “harmful and irresponsible” to allow politics and public opinion to censor professionally delivered medical information?
This kind of censoring of speech has been on the rise worldwide. In Canada and the US there are frequently speeches that are canceled simply because of opposition to the ideologies. It is terrible to think that a few peoples opinion's can be weighed as so important that it keeps information from millions. The censoring of information has become an epidemic, and it must be culled in. People have a right to learn, speak, and believe in what they want, so long as they allow others the same right.
Clover has deprived the rights of her constituents to arrive to their own conclusions simply because of a few complaints on Twitter. If this kind of censoring continues, where will our future lead?
