Australian band and environmental activists Midnight Oil
recently released their latest climate protest song, Rising Seas, timed to coincide with the opening
of the COP26 (26th Conference of Parties) climate
change conference. The band has publicly stated that the song
is a protest against the Australian government's current stance
on climate protections and emissions targets.
Protest songs and public commentary are not new. Public
criticism is not always comfortable to hear by those who are within
its cross-hairs, and over the years there have been many attempts
to suppress this discourse.
But in recent times, the focus in Australia has turned to
intellectual property law, to test whether trade mark and copyright
law can be used as a defacto means of suppressing public
commentary. Several recent Australian court decisions
involving politicians, public companies and protest groups, have
answered that question with a resounding "We shall not be
moved".1
