It may not be politically correct to say so but I have some sympathy for the position in which the tobacco industry finds itself.

Cigarette companies are off to the High Court to attempt to preserve copyright against legislation that stops them from using it to brand their cigarette packets. Which, to a degree, is fair enough. If the product is a legal one, they should be able to exercise their copyright over it. Otherwise, why else would they bother to go through the expensive copyrighting process?

There are many companies and individuals in Australia who don't approve of smoking and don't like what it's doing to the health system but are concerned that if the government can extinguish copyright on health grounds, they might try to remove it for other reasons.

A far better approach would be to abandon the attack on copyright as a means of controlling smoking and use the proven method of restricting point of sale. Philosophers and social planners have long recognised that the way to reduce consumption of any product in society is to restrict it as much as possible without banning it. Blanket bans on popular products create a black market that almost always end up being smarter than the advertising industry in penetrating the marketplace.

People will be able to choose what gender they want to be listed as on new Australian passports, even if they have not undergone a sex change.

In the past, Australians could only change their gender on their passports if they had had a sex change operation or were travelling to get one.

Now the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade (DFAT) has introduced new guidelines so that instead of surgery, all that is needed is a letter of support from a medical practitioner.

The changes mean Australians can identify their sex of choice and select Male, Female or X. The 'X' choice is available to intersex Australians.

Labor Senator Louise Pratt says international travel can be downright dangerous for people whose appearance does not match the gender listed on their passport.

"There have been very many cases of people being detained at airports by immigration in foreign countries simply because their passports don't reflect what they look like," she said.

"It's very distressing, highly inconvenient and frankly sometimes dangerous."

We hear a lot of cynicism about politics these days and the alleged uselessness of caring or fighting for political change. Julia Gillard, Tony Abbott - what's the difference?

They both put the human rights of asylum seekers down their list of political priorities.

And they both run around wearing fluoro vests and hard hats trying to convince us they're fair dinkum supporters of hard-working, decent Australians.

While they're at odds over putting a price on carbon pollution, it's pretty amazing how much Julia and Tony actually agree on.

Their twin position that gays and lesbians shouldn't be allowed to get married is another spectacular case in point, especially when you consider that Gillard is an atheist, child-free woman living in a de facto relationship and Abbott is a Catholic, married father of three.

We are however, seeing ground-roots political activism starting to erode this unholy political alliance of social conservatism.

UPDATE 20/9/2011: Yesterday this blog was the first news outlet to confirm that director Srdjan Spasojevic’s A Serbian Film has been banned by the Classification Review Board. This afternoon the CRB distributed an official media release which opens with the following sentences:

A three member panel of the Classification Review Board (the Review Board) has by unanimous decision determined that the film A Serbian Film is classified RC (Refused Classification).

In the Review Board’s opinion, A Serbian Film could not be accommodated within the R 18+ classification as the level of depictions of sexual violence, themes of incest and depictions of child sexual abuse in the film has an impact which is very high and not justified by context.

What the release doesn’t explain is why the same film was green lit for distribution in Australia with an R+ rating only three weeks ago. The fact that the CRB can come up with two very different rulings, as I noted below, sends a clear message that our classification system is fickle and inconsistent.

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Porn sites should be legally banished to the new .xxx domain to make the web safer for children, Family First has urged.

Triple-X domain names went on sale for the first time last week, allowing adult businesses to register their trademark under an official adult domain.

Dennis Hood, Family First’s leader in South Australia, told news.com.au there was no good reason why adult businesses should continue to operate under a .com address.

“Family First strongly believe the government should legislate to require all adult internet sites to move over to a .xxx domain so that children will be able to be safe online,” he said.

“If they’re as serious about child safety online as they claim then this must be done without delay.”

A spokesperson for Communications Minister Stephen Conroy said X18+ content was already banned and could not be hosted on Australian-based websites.

“The Government could not legislate to force overseas content to move to a .xxx domain,” the spokesperson said.

Yesterday around 70 people gathered outside Mr Katter's office in Mount Isa in north-west Queensland to show their support for same-sex marriage.

It was the town's first gay rights rally and organisers say there is support for equality in regional Australia.

Mr Katter has previously said he would "walk backwards to Bourke" if there was a large gay community in his electorate.

Protester James Newburrie says Mr Katter should start walking.

"I expected it to be one short, fat guy with a sign and there are nearly 70 people here in support of this cause," he said.

Another protester said Mr Katter., who has a gay half-brother, did not want to acknowledge gay people in regional Australia.

"We all work in his community, we serve him - we're in the shops and the banks - everything," a protester said.

"He doesn't want to acknowledge that we're here, he just wants to ridicule us."