With time continuing to wind down in advance of the 2010 South Australian state elections (scheduled for March 20), candidates from the Gamers4Croydon party took time out to answer questions from Kotaku Australia readers.
Participants included Kat Nicholson, who is taking on current South Australian Attorney General Michael Atkinson directly, and Chris Prior, who is running for the Legislative Council.
Nicholson was asked if she thought the name of the G4C party was alienating:
… the name was chosen back when the G4C founder was still running around getting enough people to sign up. I don’t think it will alienate voters – we’re visibly more than just a one-policy party. Although our name might give that initial impression, our actions during the campaign will prove otherwise.
Prior on the chances of a live debate with Atkinson happening:
Obviously, we’d love to have Mr Atkinson out from behind his media minders and be able to confront him live. Given that he’s demonstrated he wants to play dirty, and would rather demonise us than engage with us, we don’t like the chances of that happening. That doesn’t mean we won’t try our hardest though.
Next, Prior was asked, if Gamers4Croydon fails, as Atkinson predicts, would such a loss further empower Atkinson and the anti-R18+ movement?
He has said he expects we’ll not get more than 1% of the vote. We will, and that will haunt him. In the event that he retains his seat, it is almost certain it will be despite a (significant) swing against him, something that will put him on unsteady ground when it comes to ‘the people have spoken’ type rhetoric.
Many more questions are answered by the pair over at Kotaku.
Comments
Re: Gamers4Croydon Candidates Answer Questions
Maybe it is me, but I think there are lots of people who want Mr Atkinson out of power, and if he gets any death threats, he blames it on the gamers all because we are an easier target than those who want to keep the internet free whom are allot more bigger in numbers and who are also joined by allot of gamers who buy games online.
In fact, I don't think these death threats are even real at all, I think they are just a ploy by Mr Atkinson wanting to chase for votes from anyone who would believe that he is a victim in all of this.
I would not be surprised to find that this is all just dirty tactics from Atkinson.
Re: Gamers4Croydon Candidates Answer Questions
It looks like Atkinson is worried. I law has been passed in South Australia, requiring people to post their full names and postcodes if they comment about the election of certain websites. There's talk that they may be trying to apply the law to Facebook and Twitter as well.
http://www.news.com.au/breaking-news/attorney-general-cracks-down-on-sewer-internet-election-comment/story-e6frfku0-1225825769940
Who is behind this law? Atkinson of course.
Re: Gamers4Croydon Candidates Answer Questions
That's interesting, and yes, you are right, it suggests he's a lot more nervous about what people's opinion is than he is pretending...
Let's not forget, however, that Australia has also started refusing to classify films that include women with small breasts...
http://www.somebodythinkofthechildren.com/australia-bans-small-breasts/
Right now, I'm actually genuinely relieved I don't live in Australia. Not being funny, but the Australian government doesn't have the best history of rights for young people, the last two generations have both had to be apologised to by the Government, both for the Lost Generation, and the forced immigration of British children (though, in fairness, those particular people are still waiting on an apology from the UK Government for their part in that little debacle), it seems that they cannot learn their lesson with regards to human rights, even after this long. They seem to work on the policy of 'abuse now, apologise later', rather than simply not abusing those rights in the first place.
Re: Gamers4Croydon Candidates Answer Questions
And as an example of how Atkinson will only censor for as long as people let him get away with it, and for as long as he thinks he won't lose votes over it:
http://www.adelaidenow.com.au/victory-atkinson-loosens-gag/story-e6frea6...
Re: Gamers4Croydon Candidates Answer Questions
Good one, be backflips on an internet issue all because it might look bad in the voter's eye, but he refuses to even budge against the R18+ rating for Computer Games even though there is a flood of opposition from other State Attorney Generals as well as from the Classification Board themselves who have had enough of him.
Lets face it, that back down will only last until after the election, and if he regains his seat, South Australia will be even more stuffed with this man still in office.
Re: Gamers4Croydon Candidates Answer Questions
At least this proves that us gamers are not lazy... trying to organize a political party is one of the most time consuming and expensive hobbies of those who are trying to get their foot in the door of politics.
Considering what many people have said about gamers in the past, we have already proved them wrong when those people said that we gamers are not organized.
Re: Gamers4Croydon Candidates Answer Questions
Least they want to talk about it, where Atkinson wants the discussion to die out completely.
Re: Gamers4Croydon Candidates Answer Questions
I am not sure their confidence works to their advantage.
I think their 'we have no expectation of actually getting many votes, but we do want to get the topic out there' worked much better for them, and their crushing defeat would have been less usable as a 'see, people do not care!' retort.