Censorship and Classification in Australia - Free Samples to Students

Australia ranks 19 th in the world censorship ranking (Rsf.org 2018). This reveals the fact that the Australian media tends to censor a lesser amount of media that is circulated within the country. The public media of the country is very strong and is majorly managed by the two main media groups, Fairfax Media and the News Corporation (Freedomhouse.org 2018). The Australian government tends to allow more freedom to the press. China ranks 176 th in the world censorship ranking and does not allow much freedom to the press media (Rsf.org 2018). The Chinese government tend to pose a huge number of threats to the freedom of the press media and tends to put a huge amount of restriction on the various news that might get published in the press media. The journalism in China tends to be regulated by the government on the basis of the various regulations that deal with the state secrets and thus tend to be harmful for the future of the country. China is one of those countries that implement very strict censorship rules (Theguardian.com 2018). The following essay deals with the comparative study of the media censorship in the countries of Australia and China with a major focus on the various arts, music and the magazines that are censored in the countries. Both the countries, Australia and China, tend to censor the pieces of art that might be referred to as holding the content that might go against the standards that are set by the rules of the country. The countries seem to censor the materials on the basis of the age of the residents who have been viewing the same. The concerned authorities tend to ban the exclusive and the dark materials that might be depicted in any art form. The censored materials in both the countries might include the forms of the art that might depict sexually explicit content as well as the content that might display extreme violence. The Chinese censorship laws tend to be stricter than the censorship laws that are practised in Australia. The Chinese government tends to implement the various censorship laws on the circulation of the art forms within the country. The Chinese government tends to put ban on any art form that might prove to be a threat to the national integrity of the country. The bans imposed by the Australian government are mainly observed in the instances wherein the content displays the use of violent and explicit content. In case of the Chinese government, however, the censorship is done on the basis of the threat posed and thus might include all types of the art forms that are imported from the various foreign lands all over the world. The countries Australia and China impose censorship on the various music albums and other musical productions in cases wherein the content of the music tends to be explicit for circulation among the residents of the country. The Australian censorship board like its Chinese counterpart exercises a ban on the music under the conditions wherein the content of the music might be in strict disagreement with the laws of the country and the sentiments of the residents (Musicinaustralia.org.au 2018). The musical pieces might be banned by the countries if they do not comply with the terms in the laws of the country or might prove to be demeaning for a certain section of the residents of the country. The Chinese censorship laws for the musical items in circulation among the residents of the country tend to be stricter than those that are implemented by their Australian counterparts. The Chinese government is known to have imposed a ban on the musical pieces that tend to portray a criticism of the concerned government. The Chinese government, unlike the Australian government, tends to put a censorship on the circulation of the musical compositions that point at the political affairs of the state. The Chinese government is also reported to have put a partial censorship on the musical album X by the Australian singer Kylie Minogue and to have permitted the release of the album un the country only after three songs were removed from the concerned album (Osnos 2018). There are found similarities among the censorships that are implemented by both the Australian and the Chinese governments in the matters pertaining to the censorship of the various internet sources. The countries enforce a ban on the various websites that display any kind of unwanted content or the content that is not suitable for viewing by the children. The censored websites might include those that might put forth gruesome, violent and explicit content. The Chinese Government unlike their Australian counterparts have deemed certain websites to be potentially dangerous for the members of the country. The various websites are Facebook, Wikipedia, Twitter, some of the services by Google and YouTube. The Chinese government tends to put either a permanent ban or a temporary one on these websites during the various critical conditions that might occur within the country (Cfr.org 2018). The Australian Government however does not instill huge controls over the social media handles that exist within the country. The citizens enjoy their freedom of expression over the various social media handles and even use the same to bring a certain occurrence to the limelight (Aph.gov.au 2018). In lieu of the above discussion, it might be stated that there are major dissimilarities between the censorship that is used by the concerned governmental bodies that have been operational in the countries. The censorship laws that are practiced by the governments of Australia and China tend to vary from each other in all the areas that are included in the media. The censorship in case of the media on the internet is a practice that is observed to be followed by all the countries in the world and is thus considered to be a usual occurrence in the countries of Australia and China, the two countries that have been considered in the above composition. It might be safely concluded that though both the countries exercise the media censorship laws, the laws that are implemented by China are stricter than those implemented by Australia. Aph.gov.au 2018.  Censorship and Classification in Australia – Parliament of Australia. [online] Aph.gov.au. Available at: https://www.aph.gov.au/About_Parliament/Parliamentary_Departments/Parliamentary_Library/Publications_Archive/archive/censorshipebrief [Accessed 6 Mar. 2018]. Cfr.org 2018.  Media Censorship in China. [online] Council on Foreign Relations. Available at: https://www.cfr.org/backgrounder/media-censorship-china [Accessed 6 Mar. 2018]. Freedomhouse.org 2018.  Freedom of the Press 2017 | Freedom House. [online] Freedomhouse.org. Available at: https://freedomhouse.org/report/freedom-press/freedom-press-2017 [Accessed 6 Mar. 2018]. Musicinaustralia.org.au 2018.  Freedom of Expression - Music in Australia - Knowledge Base. [online] Musicinaustralia.org.au. Available at: https://musicinaustralia.org.au/index.php/Freedom_of_Expression [Accessed 8 Mar. 2018]. Osnos, E. 2018.  Opinion | China’s Censored World. [online] Nytimes.com. Available at: https://www.nytimes.com/2014/05/03/opinion/sunday/chinas-censored-world.html [Accessed 8 Mar. 2018]. Rsf.org 2018.  Australia : Surveillance threat | Reporters without borders. [online] RSF. Available at: https://rsf.org/en/australia [Accessed 6 Mar. 2018]. Rsf.org 2018.  China : World’s leading prison for citizen journalists | Reporters without borders. [online] RSF. Available at: https://rsf.org/en/china [Accessed 6 Mar. 2018]. Theguardian.com 2018.  The world's most censored countries. [online] The Guardian. Available at: https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2006/may/04/pressfreedom [Accessed 6 Mar. 2018].