Oz Politics Blog

GetUp is the latest fad in grassroots internet politics. It describes itself thus,

What is GetUp?

GetUp is a new political movement to build a more progressive Australia.

GetUp brings together like-minded people who want to bring participation back into our democracy. GetUp members use the latest online tools to act on the most important issues facing the country.

Why do we need GetUp?

After nearly a decade of conservative government, our country has changed. Millions of Australians don’t like the direction we’ve been heading. On August 9 the Coalition government takes control of the Senate. It will have more power than any government in a generation.

The other political parties aren’t providing a strong opposition, and the media is dominated by a handful of right-wing voices. People need to take politics into their own hands. GetUp provides them with a way to do this. GetUp members are building a ground-up movement of Australians who want to act, not just complain.

What do GetUp members do?

GetUp members take action. By signing up for updates, GetUp members will receive emails alerting them to new campaigns and providing ways of taking effective action. Whether it is sending an email to a member of parliament, calling a talk back radio station, or helping to get a television ad on the air, GetUp members will always be asked to take targeted, coordinated and effective action.

GetUp’s first campaign was targeted at Coalition senators as the Government took control of the Senate. It generated an email deluge. Apparently, in one week over 30,000 emails were sent to Coalition senators. An achievement reported to the GetUp faithful in these terms.

GetUp was profiled on the 7.30 Report last night. Coalition MP Andrew Robb claimed that Coalition Senators are “besides themselves” because they have been recieiving (sic) emails from the people they were elected to represent. Andrew Robb is so out of touch that he described ordinary Australians contacting their Senator as “spam.” … Keep up the good work!

You know you are getting old and crotchety when your first response to a website is, “Ah, the naivety of youth.”

My second response was not much better. As I clicked and scrolled, I found myself tripping over the spelling and punctuation errors on the site. As someone who struggled with English for morons in high school, I am loath to give advice on grammatical pedantry. I make enough mistakes on this blog. Nonetheless, i before e except after c was not too hard to remember. And could someone — please — find and kill the apostrophe-s gremlin.

My third response was one of anger. 30,000 emails is spam! The immediate response is likely to be two email in-boxes for parliamentarians. A personal email address and a public email address monitored by the office clerk.

But the long-term consequences of this mindless attack could be felt across the blog-sphere. The Joint Standing Committee on Electoral Matters is conducting an inquiry into the Conduct of the 2004 Federal Election. One of the critical issues before that committee is the role of the internet in future elections. The critical issue is potential amendments to the Electoral Act to require websites containing electoral material to identify a person authorising its content. Other constraints on political websites may be under consideration.

Thanks to GetUp’s naivety, the parliamentarians on that committee now know exactly how the Internet can be misused to swamp parliamentarians, and deny them the quality use of a communications technology. Unfortunately, this is an invitation to regulation.

A web site that promotes democratic engagement is to be lauded. But when misuse of the medium becomes the message, it’s time to grow up and get over it.