EU mandantory chat control

[PartialDischarge]

I'm just going to leave this here:

The European Commission went a step further on the 11 May 2022 by presenting a proposal which would make chat control mandatory for all e-mail and messenger providers and would even apply to so far securely end-to-end encrypted communication services.

https://www.patrick-breyer.de/en/posts/messaging-and-chat-control/

[MK14]

Well I think that's [R E S T  O F  M E S S A G E - automatically hidden/deleted and restricted, due to violation of new EU Rule #643426.  Offenders IP address recorded and sent back to mothership[EU] . . . ]

So much for freedom of speech.

[BravoV]

The European Commission went a step further ..... make chat control mandatory for all e-mail and messenger providers and would even apply to so far securely end-to-end encrypted communication services.

Shortened the quote down to the bullet point.

I'm not European, simple question, does EU elites are "ELECTED" official by the people ?

[Neper]

Similar attempts on a national level, e.g. that by Ursula von der Leyen in her days as German Minister for Family Affairs, have failed, and so will this one. All she got from it was her nickname 'Censursula'. 

[PartialDischarge]

Similar attempts on a national level, e.g. that by Ursula von der Leyen in her days as German Minister for Family Affairs, have failed, and so will this one. All she got from it was her nickname 'Censursula'.

I disagree, it will go through, one excuse at a time EU is becoming ....., well I cannot say.
 Recently, the "European Parliament's Civil Liberties Committee" extended the Covid pass to 2023, gotta laugh.

[Miyuki]

The European Commission went a step further ..... make chat control mandatory for all e-mail and messenger providers and would even apply to so far securely end-to-end encrypted communication services.

Shortened the quote down to the bullet point.

I'm not European, simple question, does EU elites are "ELECTED" official by the people ?

Those things come from the European Commission, which is an "independent" institution where every state have its representative what shall be independent of country government
How I understand it they make EU laws
And they are not elected
It is a weird system

[tom66]

The EU commission are broadly the same as the civil service in many EU states.

They write the laws, based on political input.  However, the laws are put before the parliament.  If they are not voted on, they don't actually become law.

This is not really any different to how the UK parliamentary system does it for example.  The civil service writes most of the legal text on advisement of ministers, MPs, industry, etc.  This text still needs to pass both houses (or the commons plus one year) to become law and can be variously altered by the parliament. (I can't recall if the EU parliament can add amendments to text from the commission or not.)

[BravoV]

Similar attempts on a national level, e.g. that by Ursula von der Leyen in her days as German Minister for Family Affairs, have failed, and so will this one. All she got from it was her nickname 'Censursula'.

I disagree, it will go through, one excuse at a time EU is becoming ....., well I cannot say.
 Recently, the "European Parliament's Civil Liberties Committee" extended the Covid pass to 2023, gotta laugh.

Its becomes better at each iterations, say than ... North Korea. 

Meh, this is nothing , its even works across countries and "ocean", fine example -> US secretly issued subpoena to access UK's Guardian reporter’s phone records   

[themadhippy]

At last a benefit of brexit,the uk wont need to participate,instead fugly patel and narcissistic dorries can can impose there own much more intrusive version.

[magic]

Indeed, I have always been in favor of Brexit for similar reasons.
France and Germany need to go next

[madires]

No worries! The Court of Justice of the European Union will declare that nonsense null and void sooner or later. We had similar cases already several times. The sad thing is that the EU Commission is repeatedly ignoring court decisions.

[themadhippy]

The sad thing is that the EU Commission is repeatedly ignoring court decisions.

of course they will,there not paying the fines out of there own pockets,instead joe public is asked forced to pay a bit more into the central fund.Take the fines out of the bureaucrats salary's and we'd soon see change.

[eugene]

I'm curious about something. If the EU Commission can write laws, how do they enforce those laws? Laws mean nothing if they cannot be enforced.

[tom66]

I'm curious about something. If the EU Commission can write laws, how do they enforce those laws? Laws mean nothing if they cannot be enforced.

Once the law is passed by the EU Parliament it is enforced by the agencies that the Commission operates and oversees.

This is really not any different to how any government enforces laws: they pay police officers, detectives, judges, prisons...

[dave j]

Indeed, I have always been in favor of Brexit for similar reasons.
France and Germany need to go next

Don't kid yourself.

All EU countries propose/support legislation at the EU level that they know will be unpopular at home and then, when the time comes to implement it in their nation's laws, claim the EU made them do it. The UK were at least as keen exploiters of such behaviour as anyone else when they were members.

Like all the 'evil EU introducing mad/bad laws' stories, this legislation didn't come from the EU commissioners, it came from the MEPs who asked them to produce it.

As @themadhippy said, a UK government will try to introduce something even worse in the UK. They've already had a go on a couple of occasions already.

[eugene]

I'm curious about something. If the EU Commission can write laws, how do they enforce those laws? Laws mean nothing if they cannot be enforced.

Once the law is passed by the EU Parliament it is enforced by the agencies that the Commission operates and oversees.

This is really not any different to how any government enforces laws: they pay police officers, detectives, judges, prisons...

So the independent EU countries are not only bound to laws written by the EU Commission, but are required to use their own criminal justice system to enforce those laws?

That seems wrong to me ideologically. But I suppose if everyone agrees to it...

[Miyuki]

Indeed, I have always been in favor of Brexit for similar reasons.
France and Germany need to go next

Don't kid yourself.

All EU countries propose/support legislation at the EU level that they know will be unpopular at home and then, when the time comes to implement it in their nation's laws, claim the EU made them do it. The UK were at least as keen exploiters of such behaviour as anyone else when they were members.

Like all the 'evil EU introducing mad/bad laws' stories, this legislation didn't come from the EU commissioners, it came from the MEPs who asked them to produce it.

As @themadhippy said, a UK government will try to introduce something even worse in the UK. They've already had a go on a couple of occasions already.

Oh, of course
They must pass this new law because of that bad EU 
Pretty common
Even when it never was the real truth. It always was just a recommendation or way milder regulation was required.

[tszaboo]

I'm curious about something. If the EU Commission can write laws, how do they enforce those laws? Laws mean nothing if they cannot be enforced.

Once the law is passed by the EU Parliament it is enforced by the agencies that the Commission operates and oversees.

This is really not any different to how any government enforces laws: they pay police officers, detectives, judges, prisons...

So the independent EU countries are not only bound to laws written by the EU Commission, but are required to use their own criminal justice system to enforce those laws?

That seems wrong to me ideologically. But I suppose if everyone agrees to it...

EU law takes primacy over national laws. While this might look strange, it is actually a great way of preventing your national lawmakers doing some shady things, like they are always trying.
Everyone has rights to basic human decency, child support, social security, vacation days, and nobody is murdered by the juridical system. It's great. You guys should try it, maybe the US wouldn't be such a miserable place.

Anyway, this seems to go against the recent GDPR and anti data hoarding that the EU was implementing as a law. Having a proposal means nothing. You tell annoying people to write a proposal, so they are busy with it, instead of japping about it constantly.

[BravoV]

I'm curious about something. If the EU Commission can write laws, how do they enforce those laws? Laws mean nothing if they cannot be enforced.

It will be enforced, it must be, as this is the preparation steps as the tsunami of hardship is coming to EU countries, as criticizing or opposing voices must be crushed, hence this policy. Look what happened in Canada on the truck protesters and their supporters, freshly just few months ago.

Just watch this 15 minutes commentaries on the ongoing complete deindustrialisation of Germany that is happening now, as hard times are coming.

[PKTKS]

WTF is that...   

so every device now with a cam and mic will be monitored as well ?

have not proper insults for that..

Paul

[BravoV]

WTF is that...   

so every device now with a cam and mic will be monitored as well ?

have not proper insults for that..

Paul

Even better, including your money in the bank, if you opposed. Just look what happened to Canada's truck protester supporters, even these donators (common avg. Joe/Jane) donated for the protest just for a few dollars, their whole bank account got freezed out, and probably got questioned by law officer or worst detained and subject to court decision. 

Consider to move to North Korea, at there at least they've done it transparently. 

[SiliconWizard]

This is awful, but anyone getting surprised by this would sure have been sleeping for the past decade or so.

[SiliconWizard]

I'm curious about something. If the EU Commission can write laws, how do they enforce those laws? Laws mean nothing if they cannot be enforced.

Once the law is passed by the EU Parliament it is enforced by the agencies that the Commission operates and oversees.

This is really not any different to how any government enforces laws: they pay police officers, detectives, judges, prisons...

So the independent EU countries are not only bound to laws written by the EU Commission, but are required to use their own criminal justice system to enforce those laws?

Independent?

But yes. Actually, EU members are required to transpose EU directives to national laws, so that's how it all unfolds.
That is "funny", as EU directives are "minimal requirements". So members are free to transpose them to national laws that are overdoing it.
That is called "gold plating", and some countries are particularly effective at gold plating. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gold-plating_(European_Union_law)

[Simon]

WTF is that...   

so every device now with a cam and mic will be monitored as well ?

have not proper insults for that..

Paul

How you actually work with such a massive quantity of data seems to elude most people. Sure you can scan for keywords at a basic level but if it could be as bad as people make out basically we will all have to be government employees monitoring each other.....

[Miyuki]

WTF is that...   

so every device now with a cam and mic will be monitored as well ?

have not proper insults for that..

Paul

How you actually work with such a massive quantity of data seems to elude most people. Sure you can scan for keywords at a basic level but if it could be as bad as people make out basically we will all have to be government employees monitoring each other.....

Modern AI is pretty powerful and it will run on your hardware so it free for the government
Plus making a new ministry with gazillion employees is always welcomed by the politicians
Then they just collect a list of suspicious people. And then just investigate a few random unlucky dudes to appear how great it works.

[Simon]

The UK is cutting it's civil service down....

[BravoV]

The UK is cutting it's civil service down....

To save and grab big chunk of money for Ukraine ? Pretty sure its not cheap. 

[tom66]

So the independent EU countries are not only bound to laws written by the EU Commission, but are required to use their own criminal justice system to enforce those laws?

That seems wrong to me ideologically. But I suppose if everyone agrees to it...

Once again, the laws are passed by the parliament and not the commission.

You don't believe, in the US (for instance), that senators write their own bills?  In the vast majority of cases, these are drafted by executive departments, lawyers, clerks, and so on.  That's really no different to the commission.

The laws still have to pass the parliament, which is elected by the people of the EU. 

The Commission actually has very little executive power, unlike in the US for instance where the President can issue executive orders.  That's not really possible in the EU.

[themadhippy]

The UK is cutting it's civil service down.

Yea right

[Simon]

The UK is cutting it's civil service down.

Yea right

Well that is the current news headline, what actually happens remains to be seen. Conservatives tend to like a small state (they claim it no end), labour/left leaning tend to be happy with more government run stuff therefore more civil servants - broadly speaking. Yes minister was careful not to make it obvious what side was in power which was irrelevant to the show anyway as it was about the civil service versus the government.

[eugene]

So the independent EU countries are not only bound to laws written by the EU Commission, but are required to use their own criminal justice system to enforce those laws?

That seems wrong to me ideologically. But I suppose if everyone agrees to it...

Once again, the laws are passed by the parliament and not the commission.

Please forgive my ignorance of how things are done in the EU (even the US for that matter.)

When you mention 'parliament', is that an EU parliament, or parliaments of individual countries?

You don't believe, in the US (for instance), that senators write their own bills?  In the vast majority of cases, these are drafted by executive departments, lawyers, clerks, and so on.  That's really no different to the commission.

The laws still have to pass the parliament, which is elected by the people of the EU. 

The Commission actually has very little executive power, unlike in the US for instance where the President can issue executive orders.  That's not really possible in the EU.

As I already admitted, my knowledge of these things in the US is not deep, despite having lived here for [redacted] years. In any case, my impression is that some federal (US) laws are enforced by the federal government with their own criminal justice departments (mainly FBI) and federal courts. Other federal laws might be expected to be enforced by the individual states using their own criminal justice systems. But in the end, whether or not the individual states choose to enforce the federal laws is effectively up to them. In some cases a state might choose to go in a different direction and write laws that contradict federal laws. I don't know if this is specifically allowed by federal legislation (I doubt it) but the federal government typically doesn't pursue these matters legally.

The consequence (as I see it) is that federal laws in the US are meaningful only if individual states no not choose to explicitly over ride them with state laws.

Back to the distinction between legislation and enforcement: does the EU have its own police and courts, or is that left entirely to the individual countries.

[langwadt]

So the independent EU countries are not only bound to laws written by the EU Commission, but are required to use their own criminal justice system to enforce those laws?

That seems wrong to me ideologically. But I suppose if everyone agrees to it...

Once again, the laws are passed by the parliament and not the commission.

Please forgive my ignorance of how things are done in the EU (even the US for that matter.)

When you mention 'parliament', is that an EU parliament, or parliaments of individual countries?

commission writes the laws, parliament votes on adopting the laws

parliament members are elected in each countries

[Simon]

As I already admitted, my knowledge of these things in the US is not deep, despite having lived here for [redacted] years. In any case, my impression is that some federal (US) laws are enforced by the federal government with their own criminal justice departments (mainly FBI) and federal courts. Other federal laws might be expected to be enforced by the individual states using their own criminal justice systems. But in the end, whether or not the individual states choose to enforce the federal laws is effectively up to them. In some cases a state might choose to go in a different direction and write laws that contradict federal laws. I don't know if this is specifically allowed by federal legislation (I doubt it) but the federal government typically doesn't pursue these matters legally.

The consequence (as I see it) is that federal laws in the US are meaningful only if individual states no not choose to explicitly over ride them with state laws.

Back to the distinction between legislation and enforcement: does the EU have its own police and courts, or is that left entirely to the individual countries.

If you take the recent row about abortion law several states are ready to ban it if the ruling that abortions are to be allowed is overturned, this kind of tells me that a state makes laws within the framework of what the layer of legal system above dictates. I can't remember if other states would still allow abortions but this could also amount to the the rule being that you can allow them, or that you can ban them but not an all one way policy allowing individual states to have a one way choice but not a two way one ie complete independence.

[magic]

Yes, there is an EU parliament with a mix of drones sent in from all countries.

[magic]

Back to the distinction between legislation and enforcement: does the EU have its own police and courts, or is that left entirely to the individual countries.

Thankfully an EU police doesn't exist yet

But,
Every country is obliged to implement and enforce whatever "EU laws" are established following official procedures.
The EU and many member states will be happy to put political pressure on any outliers that refuse to do so.
The general climate in the world today is that mainstream parties are happy to adopt certain kinds of policies, whether dictated from "above" or on their own initiative.

[Simon]

Back to the distinction between legislation and enforcement: does the EU have its own police and courts, or is that left entirely to the individual countries.

Thankfully an EU police doesn't exist yet

But,
Every country is obliged to implement and enforce whatever "EU laws" are established following official procedures.
The EU and many member states will be happy to put political pressure on any outliers that refuse to do so.
The general climate in the world today is that mainstream parties are happy to adopt certain kinds of policies, whether dictated from "above" or on their own initiative.

You seem to have an agenda of your own here. If a group of countries decide to tie themselves together and adopt similar laws so that they operate in a similar way and can work together then no it's not a case of pressure on outlier countries but that those countries have already signed up to obligations that they are not following through on in the same way that you would expect your local police force to go after criminals who break the law so do your partners. You make a pact, you stick to it.

[jpanhalt]

If you take the recent row about abortion law several states are ready to ban it if the ruling that abortions are to be allowed is overturned, this kind of tells me that a state makes laws within the framework of what the layer of legal system above dictates. I can't remember if other states would still allow abortions but this could also amount to the the rule being that you can allow them, or that you can ban them but not an all one way policy allowing individual states to have a one way choice but not a two way one ie complete independence.

The 10th Amendment in America's Bill of Rights is important in that discussion (see: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tenth_Amendment_to_the_United_States_Constitution )

The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.

In direct answer to your question, overruling Roe v. Wade would allow each state to set its own laws regarding abortion.  That was the situation before Roe.  Justice Harry Blackmun wrote the opinion.  His logic was considered to be on very weak ground from the beginning.  Some trivia: Justice Blackmun was previously general counsel at the Mayo Clinic, which was extremely closely associated with St. Mary's Hospital in Rochester, MN.  St. Mary's is a Catholic hospital and does not allow abortions. 

Background: Only specific powers were delegated to the Federal government by the Constitution.  That was intentionally done to limit it.  Our original government was under The Articles of Confederation.  That had very weak central authority and failed.  It could not effectively tax or print money.  The Constitution and our republic were formed in response.  Nevertheless, the desire to maintain relative independence of the states was quite strong.  As an aside, the Commerce Clause of our Constitution, as innocuous as it may seem at first glance, has been used extensively to expand the powers of the Federal government.

[MadScientist]

Clearly the Brexit BS,ers are out in force spreading more lies

The EU commission draws up legislative proposals as it is in effect the EU s civil service , in the case of ordinary law , the proposal must be jointly passed by the European Parliament and the Council of the European Union ( often called the  Council of ministers ) neither body under normal situations can make laws independent of the other . “ Brussels “ contrary to Brexit BS”er does not make community law.

Both groups are democratically selected albeit in different ways , the ministers are all elected domestically whereas the EU parliament is by direct election , contrary to Brexit BS , there is no “ unaccountable “ law making process.

Qualified majority voting exists in most cases to decisions by the council of ministers , so it’s difficult to get contentious proposals passed.

An EU law may be proposed as a regulation or a directive. A regulation must be translated verbatim in to national law whereas a directive can leave national authorities freedom to decide how to implement the principle of the directive. The U.K. government continuously abused thd process by “ gold plating “ EU directives often making them much harsher then intended and  of course it was famous for using the EU law making process to get laws in effect in the U.K. that it could not get through its own parliament ( particulaly intelligence spying laws )

So European Parliament resolutions in themselves are like “ private members bills “ they have virtually zero chance of becoming law.

Again the European Commission is a civil service unlike the US there is no administration with law making ability. The commission does not make community law.

The EU is a confederation of sovereign nations that agree by treaty to devolve certain aspects of national law making to the EU law making processes. EU law only has validity in member states as long as it’s consistent with the principles enshrined in the treaties. Ireland for example has a referendum on every treaty so signed since the 80s. Ireland for example has specific European codicils on neutrality , on NI status etc. No Eu law can change that situation

[MadScientist]

So the independent EU countries are not only bound to laws written by the EU Commission, but are required to use their own criminal justice system to enforce those laws?

That seems wrong to me ideologically. But I suppose if everyone agrees to it...

Once again, the laws are passed by the parliament and not the commission.

Please forgive my ignorance of how things are done in the EU (even the US for that matter.)

When you mention 'parliament', is that an EU parliament, or parliaments of individual countries?

commission writes the laws, parliament votes on adopting the laws

parliament members are elected in each countries

This is only half the process

[MadScientist]

If you take the recent row about abortion law several states are ready to ban it if the ruling that abortions are to be allowed is overturned, this kind of tells me that a state makes laws within the framework of what the layer of legal system above dictates. I can't remember if other states would still allow abortions but this could also amount to the the rule being that you can allow them, or that you can ban them but not an all one way policy allowing individual states to have a one way choice but not a two way one ie complete independence.

The 10th Amendment in America's Bill of Rights is important in that discussion (see: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tenth_Amendment_to_the_United_States_Constitution )

The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.

In direct answer to your question, overruling Roe v. Wade would allow each state to set its own laws regarding abortion.  That was the situation before Roe.  Justice Harry Blackmun wrote the opinion.  His logic was considered to be on very weak ground from the beginning.  Some trivia: Justice Blackmun was previously general counsel at the Mayo Clinic, which was extremely closely associated with St. Mary's Hospital in Rochester, MN.  St. Mary's is a Catholic hospital and does not allow abortions. 

Background: Only specific powers were delegated to the Federal government by the Constitution.  That was intentionally done to limit it.  Our original government was under The Articles of Confederation.  That had very weak central authority and failed.  It could not effectively tax or print money.  The Constitution and our republic were formed in response.  Nevertheless, the desire to maintain relative independence of the states was quite strong.  As an aside, the Commerce Clause of our Constitution, as innocuous as it may seem at first glance, has been used extensively to expand the powers of the Federal government.

I read the preliminary judgement paper, while I am a proponent of women’s rights I also acknowledge  that Rode v Wade was based on some very peculiar and particular Supreme Court interpretations at the time ( similar to More recent 2nd amendment judgements ) hence it’s hard to argue for the support of the 77 decision.

The preliminary paper basically says the US constitution had no commentary on abortion and therefore federal rules have no place and the individual states them selves should decide. This is not unlike the situation in the EU where such matters are by dint of the treaties left entirely at the behest of national governments. People can of course choose where they live within these national frameworks so you can pick the one you like!

[Monkeh]

People can of course choose where they live within these national frameworks so you can pick the one you like!

Because it's just a trivial, low cost exercise to up and move. Houses are cheap, jobs are plentiful, transport is free and there's always time in the day..

[Simon]

Clearly the Brexit BS,ers are out in force spreading more lies

The EU commission draws up legislative proposals as it is in effect the EU s civil service , in the case of ordinary law , the proposal must be jointly passed by the European Parliament and the Council of the European Union ( often called the  Council of ministers ) neither body under normal situations can make laws independent of the other . “ Brussels “ contrary to Brexit BS”er does not make community law.

The fundamental problem is that most people do not understand how any of the governing systems work, and have no place commenting unless they do. Handily no school curriculum bothers to teach children how their society is run making each and every young adult fertile ground for wacky ideas about things that actually they could just go and find out about.

The last time we had a local election the local conservative party produced an entire leaflet mostly talking about voting for your local conservative candidate to "get brexit done". As far as I am concerned there should be rules about making these sorts of false statements. No matter which side you sit on, your local councillors have absolutely no bearing on the outcome of international politics/policy.

My father seems to think that people are just listening to our phone calls and will drive over to discuss anything important with me, despite my explaining that legally no one can tap your line without a court order or unless there is some other really, really good reason and in case he has not noticed, he's not at all relevant to anyone in the grand scheme of things.

[Zero999]

No worries! The Court of Justice of the European Union will declare that nonsense null and void sooner or later. We had similar cases already several times. The sad thing is that the EU Commission is repeatedly ignoring court decisions.

Don't be so sure of it. They didn't do anything when governments imposed forced medical treatments on their citizens and banned peaceful protest.

[PlainName]

despite my explaining that legally no one can tap your line without a court order or unless there is some other really, really good reason

That should read that they shouldn't. But there is nothing to actually stop them doing so, and there are well-documented instances of both the security services and commercial entities doing exactly that. The (still!) ongoing phone hacking case that sunk the NotW is possibly the best known, and Snowdon let drop a lot of otherwise hidden stuff. I believe there have even been instances where it's wound up in court and the governmental service has been told what they did was illegal, but of course you can't throw a service in the nick so not a lot happens.

he's not at all relevant to anyone in the grand scheme of things

And that's the problem. If your comms happen to trigger the AI or ML or whatever that's perusing it all, you're stuffed if you think you can just rationally explain you are a normal non-terrorist non-paedophile citizen going about your innocuous business. Computer says yes, so must be true. Nothing personal, like.

Edit: that reminds me that (literally) every other lamppost around here has sprouted a PTZ camera. No-one has ever asked us if we want them or explained what they are for or mentioned that they even exist.

[Simon]

despite my explaining that legally no one can tap your line without a court order or unless there is some other really, really good reason

That should read that they shouldn't. But there is nothing to actually stop them doing so, and there are well-documented instances of both the security services and commercial entities doing exactly that. The (still!) ongoing phone hacking case that sunk the NotW is possibly the best known, and Snowdon let drop a lot of otherwise hidden stuff. I believe there have even been instances where it's wound up in court and the governmental service has been told what they did was illegal, but of course you can't throw a service in the nick so not a lot happens.

Yes but he thinks that this is like a regular thing they do legally, he knows so little that he does not understand that it's very remotely a chance, here and now. But of course if you listen to the news outlets BBC included it's all doom.

The news of the world were not tapping anyone. They simply broke into phone message boxes just like every other haker is trying to do, again, they are not after every citizen and it's still illegal so no point in trying to make a point with what criminals do, what they are doing is called criminal for a reason and no matter what various governments choose to do it is a separate issue.

he's not at all relevant to anyone in the grand scheme of things

And that's the problem. If your comms happen to trigger the AI or ML or whatever that's perusing it all, you're stuffed if you think you can just rationally explain you are a normal non-terrorist non-paedophile citizen going about your innocuous business. Computer says yes, so must be true. Nothing personal, like.

Edit: that reminds me that (literally) every other lamppost around here has sprouted a PTZ camera. No-one has ever asked us if we want them or explained what they are for or mentioned that they even exist.

Well if you would like to pay an awful lot more tax to have a policeman/woman/couple on every corner lets do that. again I think the risks are being blown out of proportion. My local police cannot find the time to do much, there are not many of them, remember the man that was murdered by vigilantes as the police labelled him a nuisance caller? I have a body camera I keep handy as sadly there are no lamp post camera's around here so I have to DIYit.

[themadhippy]

My local police cannot find the time to do much, there are not many of them, remember the man that was murdered by vigilantes as the police labelled him a nuisance caller

But dare to throw an egg at a statue and they turn up in minutes

[Simon]

My local police cannot find the time to do much, there are not many of them, remember the man that was murdered by vigilantes as the police labelled him a nuisance caller

But dare to throw an egg at a statue and they turn up in minutes

really? I thought the statue ended up in the river/sea before someone did something and then they still got off for criminal damage.

[themadhippy]

really? I thought the statue ended up in the river/sea

Different statue

[Simon]

really? I thought the statue ended up in the river/sea

Different statue

well was it before or after one was pulled down, I mean, cmon, context, in an environment of rampant protest and criminal damage someone throwing an egg at a statute is one thing. With none of that happening someone throwing an egg at a statue is something else, but this is exactly how all these stupid myths and characterizations start, by taking something totally out of context for point scoring.....

[TimFox]

Re: Eugene on US law:

"As I already admitted, my knowledge of these things in the US is not deep, despite having lived here for [redacted] years. In any case, my impression is that some federal (US) laws are enforced by the federal government with their own criminal justice departments (mainly FBI) and federal courts. Other federal laws might be expected to be enforced by the individual states using their own criminal justice systems. But in the end, whether or not the individual states choose to enforce the federal laws is effectively up to them. In some cases a state might choose to go in a different direction and write laws that contradict federal laws. I don't know if this is specifically allowed by federal legislation (I doubt it) but the federal government typically doesn't pursue these matters legally.
The consequence (as I see it) is that federal laws in the US are meaningful only if individual states no not choose to explicitly over ride them with state laws."

In normal US constitutional law, as I understand it, there are Federal statutes (against espionage, for example) and State statutes (against murder, for example). 
There are some Federal statutes, such as against murdering a President, that overlap State statutes. 
However, Federal laws and the US Constitution override State law when they conflict. 
Most "normal" crimes, such as assault, homicide, burglary, sexual assault, etc. are State crimes, which vary from State to State in definition and punishment.
Not all states have capital punishment, for example, but all outlaw murder (though the terms applied to the crime vary from State to State on their lawbooks.)
A specific statute (Federal or State) can be ruled unconstitutional by the Supreme Court.
The power of the Supreme Court to overrule legislation was established by the early decision:  Marbury v. Madison (1803), where Madison was US Secretary of State at the time of the ruling. 
Note that this power is not explicitly mentioned in the Constitution, but was held by the Court to be inherent therein.
Stare decisis!.

[dave j]

really? I thought the statue ended up in the river/sea

Different statue

well was it before or after one was pulled down, I mean, cmon, context, in an environment of rampant protest and criminal damage someone throwing an egg at a statute is one thing. With none of that happening someone throwing an egg at a statue is something else, but this is exactly how all these stupid myths and characterizations start, by taking something totally out of context for point scoring.....

Probably this one. They put up a statue to Thatcher in her home town. Less than two hours later someone had egged it.

[SiliconWizard]

Egged? Wow! Dangerous terrorists!

[Simon]

Sounds like a right mess.

[Simon]

really? I thought the statue ended up in the river/sea

Different statue

well was it before or after one was pulled down, I mean, cmon, context, in an environment of rampant protest and criminal damage someone throwing an egg at a statute is one thing. With none of that happening someone throwing an egg at a statue is something else, but this is exactly how all these stupid myths and characterizations start, by taking something totally out of context for point scoring.....

Probably this one. They put up a statue to Thatcher in her home town. Less than two hours later someone had egged it.

And we are talking about these arrests?:

"Lincolnshire police confirmed it had received reports of criminal damage to the statue but no arrests had been made and inquiries were ongoing."

Oh sorry, NO arrests were made, maybe not the same statue.

[bd139]

Used to work in Grantham so this does not surprise me at all. The whole area is programmed for double-think: thatcher bad, oh we’ll vote conservative again! Oh plus being scared of anything non ayrian.

On topic, and I lack the ability to process this further at the moment apart from suggesting the EU can go and fuck themselves. I’m not sure how the human race, when self organising, almost universally votes to control and enslave in some way.  There should be limits on how many humans can self organise. Keep it under about 50 and it’s ok. That control would solve all the problems.

[MK14]

Keep it under about 50 and it’s ok. That control would solve all the problems.

Would that work ?
Analogy:
My group of 50 people, are still furious about your previous very rude comments about the Raspberry PI 4, and the fact it eats SD cards (data), during power up/down.  In retribution, you need to give us those Lenovo tiny PC's, you got to replace them, then you can have peace.

Yes, the EU in some respects, does seem to have become too big and somewhat unmanageable.  The Covid outbreak, and the mess ups surrounding their vaccination programme, seemed to show that.

[langwadt]

Used to work in Grantham so this does not surprise me at all. The whole area is programmed for double-think: thatcher bad, oh we’ll vote conservative again! Oh plus being scared of anything non ayrian.

On topic, and I lack the ability to process this further at the moment apart from suggesting the EU can go and fuck themselves. I’m not sure how the human race, when self organising, almost universally votes to control and enslave in some way.  There should be limits on how many humans can self organise. Keep it under about 50 and it’s ok. That control would solve all the problems.

who should impose that limit?

[bd139]

Alien overlords or malevolent artificial intelligence.

[bd139]

Keep it under about 50 and it’s ok. That control would solve all the problems.

Would that work ?
Analogy:
My group of 50 people, are still furious about your previous very rude comments about the Raspberry PI 4, and the fact it eats SD cards (data), during power up/down.  In retribution, you need to give us those Lenovo tiny PC's, you got to replace them, then you can have peace.

Yes, the EU in some respects, does seem to have become too big and somewhat unmanageable.  The Covid outbreak, and the mess ups surrounding their vaccination programme, seemed to show that.

The thing is it’s difficult for 50 people to actually do any damage.

My point was to throw an extreme in and see what mid ground comes out as sensible.

[MK14]

The thing is it’s difficult for 50 people to actually do any damage.

My point was to throw an extreme in and see what mid ground comes out as sensible.

My understanding is, from history books.  It is believed, we use to live in small tribes/villages of around 150 to 200 people, per settlement.  Perhaps tens of thousands of years ago.  A bit like the large groups of native Monkeys, that can be observed in the wild.

I wonder what an internet and mobile phone service, would look like.  If it only had up to 200 individuals in it.  Per village/settlement.

Anyway, a good question.  What is the optimal population size, per unit (country, state, etc) ?

[dave j]

And we are talking about these arrests?:

"Lincolnshire police confirmed it had received reports of criminal damage to the statue but no arrests had been made and inquiries were ongoing."

Oh sorry, NO arrests were made, maybe not the same statue.

You are the only one who mentioned arrests, I just tried to provide some possible context. Given the egging of the Thatcher statue was in the news today, I thought it might be that one. We'll have to wait for themadhippy to clarify which statue they were referring to.

[dave j]

On topic, and I lack the ability to process this further at the moment apart from suggesting the EU can go and fuck themselves.

Were we still in the EU, the UK government would have been leading the charge to introduce this. They spent £500K trying to convince people that end to end encryption is for paedophiles earlier this year.

[SiliconWizard]

No doubt mass surveillance is a global trend. But the larger the political organization behind it, and the harder it is to stop, or at least slow down.

[themadhippy]

Indeed the thatcher statue. The police can respond in minutes to a report of egg throwing,meanwhile  many serious crimes are left un dealt with due to a lack of resources

[Simon]

Indeed the thatcher statue. The police can respond in minutes to a report of egg throwing,meanwhile  many serious crimes are left un dealt with due to a lack of resources

But you have still not backed up you claim and I even quoted for you, the police received reports, it does not say they attended or did a damn thing. Where do you live? Grantham is not far from where I work, if it's anything like as well to do as that or stamford they will have a better police force as they have money.

[Simon]

On topic, and I lack the ability to process this further at the moment apart from suggesting the EU can go and fuck themselves. I’m not sure how the human race, when self organising, almost universally votes to control and enslave in some way.  There should be limits on how many humans can self organise. Keep it under about 50 and it’s ok. That control would solve all the problems.

The problem is not the amount of humans, it's the capability of the humans to create operate and understand their own systems of governing so as to prevent a sub group usurping the system for their own minorities' benefit, usually this is the rich, the poor and therefore largely stupid will follow whatever lies they are told and too lazy to find the truth laying in plain site. The biggest monopoly is understanding the systems and therefor how to use them, this is also why the wealthy get what they want and tell the poor what they want, you go to the right post uni/college you get taught how to get on, normal poor simpletons go to universities that have been reduced to protection rackets handing our worthless sheets of hologrammed paper that sort of make it possible to earn enough to have a basic standard of living but still not enough toa think for yourself having spent 3 years copying out the answers to your assignments from the carefully curated texts the university gives you, and people wonder why we are in this mess.

[themadhippy]

But you have still not backed up you claim

Apart from hearing it earlier today on the radio news  most of the papers are saying the same thing,the independant for example

A man in a white T-shirt was seen holding an egg carton in one hand and preparing to throw an egg from the other on Sunday.

Egg residue and a piece of shell could be seen on the statue’s lower half.

Police turned up at the scene within minutes of the incident.

if it's anything like as well to do as that or stamford they will have a better police force as they have money.

doubtful,linconshire is the most underfunded force in the uk,and one of the most over stretched

[PlainName]

the poor and therefore largely stupid

Not at all prejudiced, then 

[Simon]

this is not an abortion debate!

[Simon]

the poor and therefore largely stupid

Not at all prejudiced, then 

Not from me, but the system that we all supposedly created. Just look at the political retoric, you telling me they are aiming that at the intelligent ones that vote for the low taxes - here, poor person, vote for us so that we stop those asylum seekers that are not entitled to work from taking your jobs, is the order of the day, to the point these national issues are the issues of local campaigns ? I'm not stupid by many must be judging by the poll results. 101 on how to control a population.

[Zero999]

despite my explaining that legally no one can tap your line without a court order or unless there is some other really, really good reason

That should read that they shouldn't. But there is nothing to actually stop them doing so, and there are well-documented instances of both the security services and commercial entities doing exactly that. The (still!) ongoing phone hacking case that sunk the NotW is possibly the best known, and Snowdon let drop a lot of otherwise hidden stuff. I believe there have even been instances where it's wound up in court and the governmental service has been told what they did was illegal, but of course you can't throw a service in the nick so not a lot happens.

he's not at all relevant to anyone in the grand scheme of things

And that's the problem. If your comms happen to trigger the AI or ML or whatever that's perusing it all, you're stuffed if you think you can just rationally explain you are a normal non-terrorist non-paedophile citizen going about your innocuous business. Computer says yes, so must be true. Nothing personal, like.

Edit: that reminds me that (literally) every other lamppost around here has sprouted a PTZ camera. No-one has ever asked us if we want them or explained what they are for or mentioned that they even exist.

Yes, AI is notoriously bad at this sort of thing. Try posting anything questioning current affairs in the YouTube comment section and watch it disappear, even if it's not that controversial.

I feel more comfortable with a government agent being allowed to snoop on my emails, rather than a machine. At least I know the government don't have the resources to spy on everyone. I still don't like the idea because the hate speech laws are so loosely defined, I think many people I know, including me, have been guilty of wrong think at some stage.

[MadScientist]

No worries! The Court of Justice of the European Union will declare that nonsense null and void sooner or later. We had similar cases already several times. The sad thing is that the EU Commission is repeatedly ignoring court decisions.

Don't be so sure of it. They didn't do anything when governments imposed forced medical treatments on their citizens and banned peaceful protest.

Given public health policy is not harmonised under EU treaty the EU centrally has in effect no domain on these matters

[MadScientist]

Keep it under about 50 and it’s ok. That control would solve all the problems.

Would that work ?
Analogy:
My group of 50 people, are still furious about your previous very rude comments about the Raspberry PI 4, and the fact it eats SD cards (data), during power up/down.  In retribution, you need to give us those Lenovo tiny PC's, you got to replace them, then you can have peace.

Yes, the EU in some respects, does seem to have become too big and somewhat unmanageable.  The Covid outbreak, and the mess ups surrounding their vaccination programme, seemed to show that.

You do understand that a resolution passed in the eu parliament has virtually zero standing or chance of being passed into law.

[Zero999]

No worries! The Court of Justice of the European Union will declare that nonsense null and void sooner or later. We had similar cases already several times. The sad thing is that the EU Commission is repeatedly ignoring court decisions.

Don't be so sure of it. They didn't do anything when governments imposed forced medical treatments on their citizens and banned peaceful protest.

Given public health policy is not harmonised under EU treaty the EU centrally has in effect no domain on these matters

That's true. It appears there's no protection against the state making its citizens take a drug, vaccine, or medical procedure.
https://www.echr.coe.int/documents/convention_eng.pdf

Anyway, back on topic: I can see this resulting in governments violating the right to freedom of expression.

[MK14]

You do understand that a resolution passed in the eu parliament has virtually zero standing or chance of being passed into law.

The thing is, this whole EU parliament thing.  Started out with good intentions, with a simple agreement as regards cows/beef and butter, to make a common market, between a small number of countries.  Which, eventually because of (political) feature creep, became the EU parliament and stuff, we have today.

I don't know the precise details.  But they seem to discuss and vote in, certain things.  Which seem to be put into actual laws, of the individual EU member states.

I think this mandatory chat control, is a very, very dangerous and slippery slope, in the control of free speech, and in effect news sources (indirectly).  If you look at Russia, an apparently very significant way their government is able to keep control of its people.  Is by basically lying all the time, in various TV media/newspapers/etc.
Even to the point of starting a full on war, while at the same time claiming Russia is being attacked, and there is no war (special operations).

So the EU, really is playing with fire, big time.  With the proposal/creation of new laws like this.  There is also the danger of a Trump like leader, getting into power.  Then using those new laws and infrastructure (information), to control the people.

Arguably, we need chat and things to be relatively free from political interference.  Because of nonsense, such as the Cambridge analytica scandal.

TL;DR
I think this new EU plans, are potentially very dangerous and a very, very bad idea.

[Simon]

Freedoms of expression stuff usually relates to public speach, what you say to your mates no one could give a toss. Now they may want to stop terrorists etc, fine, but if they turn up a text you sent to a mate saying you hate a particular minority does that class as hate speech? nope or at least I suspect legally they will struggle and erm, resources? never mind the resources to detect, now that they have discovered that 1 in 2 people have some unhealthy views that if said to the offendable party or otherwise in public would get them in the nick but in a private chat is not the same, how do they prosecute half the population?

I don't even see the need for all of this end to end encryption no one can ever break. It's a need created by the mere fact that it was provided. For me it's more of a pain, I change phone, well that's all my whatsapp messages gone! yep, oh you want to use whatsapp on your PC, sorry can't see that last message you just sent or received on your phone, it's gone mad and signal is even worse. Since when did we have a problem that needed such unbreakable encryption - we never did. Communications are already sunt encrpted, but they it seems to work now is that it's impossible for even the user to retain their stuff never mind the go,vernment.

My sister insists, or rather her husband does on using signal, so I get all the photos and videos of my niece on signal - it's a pain in the arse trying to get that stuff out of signal thanks to the encryption paranoia! because family chats and photos/videos need high end encryption - for what? oh and needless to say, he who decided to use signal has never donated a penny to them! what a fucked up society we live in, there is one thing the conspiracy theorists have right, one word - sheeple! we care so much for our privacy while we literally give it all away to facebook who all these idiots who refuse to use whatsapp still use.

I'm sick of hearing about privacy and snooping from people who broadcast their lives 24/7!

[Zero999]

Freedoms of expression stuff usually relates to public speach, what you say to your mates no one could give a toss. Now they may want to stop terrorists etc, fine, but if they turn up a text you sent to a mate saying you hate a particular minority does that class as hate speech? nope or at least I suspect legally they will struggle and erm, resources? never mind the resources to detect, now that they have discovered that 1 in 2 people have some unhealthy views that if said to the offendable party or otherwise in public would get them in the nick but in a private chat is not the same, how do they prosecute half the population?

The Scottish government would disagree with you on that.

From its troubled beginnings, the Hate Crime Bill has been altered significantly. Changes were made during cross-party efforts in what some MSPs described as "Holyrood at its best".

Yet even with that scrutiny, concerns remain. Offences can now be committed even in private, an abandonment of an earlier "dwelling defence" in race hate law.

Even with the Scottish government's insistence that the bar for prosecution is high, there are those who still believe this is an example of interference in private and family life. Why should any government, they ask, decide what can and can't be said in the privacy of one's home?

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-scotland-politics-56364821

The bar for what constitutes hate speech is very low. Hampshire police spent a long time trying to track down someone for putting up posters saying "It's okay to be white.". I believe this is because the same phrase has been used by white supremacists,  but that shouldn't make the phrase in itself hate speech, as anyone who hasn't been indoctrinated with critical race theory, would agree with it. Either way they wouldn't bother if it said "It's okay to be black/Asian/Muslim etc." and they should arguably spend their time tracking down real criminals.

[SiliconWizard]

The ECHR you linked to has an article about freedom of expression. The paragraph describing the exceptions is longer than the one describing the guaranteed freedom itself, and of course gives all powers to governments for passing laws to restrict it as much as is convenient.

To be compared with the original Universal Declaration of Human Rights (1948) which guaranteed freedom of expression without any restriction.

[bd139]

Freedoms of expression stuff usually relates to public speach, what you say to your mates no one could give a toss. Now they may want to stop terrorists etc, fine, but if they turn up a text you sent to a mate saying you hate a particular minority does that class as hate speech? nope or at least I suspect legally they will struggle and erm, resources? never mind the resources to detect, now that they have discovered that 1 in 2 people have some unhealthy views that if said to the offendable party or otherwise in public would get them in the nick but in a private chat is not the same, how do they prosecute half the population?

I don't even see the need for all of this end to end encryption no one can ever break. It's a need created by the mere fact that it was provided. For me it's more of a pain, I change phone, well that's all my whatsapp messages gone! yep, oh you want to use whatsapp on your PC, sorry can't see that last message you just sent or received on your phone, it's gone mad and signal is even worse. Since when did we have a problem that needed such unbreakable encryption - we never did. Communications are already sunt encrpted, but they it seems to work now is that it's impossible for even the user to retain their stuff never mind the go,vernment.

My sister insists, or rather her husband does on using signal, so I get all the photos and videos of my niece on signal - it's a pain in the arse trying to get that stuff out of signal thanks to the encryption paranoia! because family chats and photos/videos need high end encryption - for what? oh and needless to say, he who decided to use signal has never donated a penny to them! what a fucked up society we live in, there is one thing the conspiracy theorists have right, one word - sheeple! we care so much for our privacy while we literally give it all away to facebook who all these idiots who refuse to use whatsapp still use.

I'm sick of hearing about privacy and snooping from people who broadcast their lives 24/7!

Just a point on privacy and messaging.

Anything that you tell anyone else is not private any more. At no point can you trust the other party not to distribute it or ensure that their endpoint is secure. The biggest attack vector to privacy is loose mouths. Ergo private messaging is a misnomer.

Signal / Telegram etc are pointless if you want absolute privacy. Don’t say stuff.

[tom66]

The thing is it’s difficult for 50 people to actually do any damage.

My point was to throw an extreme in and see what mid ground comes out as sensible.

Yes and it's also impossible for 50 people to organise anything sensible, so we'd not have roads outside of our small settlements, healthcare, scientific advances, etc.

You can disagree with the existence of large bureaucratic organisations like the EU without making statements like this which fail simple tests.  Overall I think the EU is more positive than it is negative.

[tszaboo]

I love how this thread has the most comments by a bunch of English and American people.

"I don't know how things are done there, but you are doing it wrong!"

[MadScientist]

I love how this thread has the most comments by a bunch of English and American people.

"I don't know how things are done there, but you are doing it wrong!"

One of that group hasn’t any say, the other we kicked out.

[MadScientist]

You do understand that a resolution passed in the eu parliament has virtually zero standing or chance of being passed into law.

The thing is, this whole EU parliament thing.  Started out with good intentions, with a simple agreement as regards cows/beef and butter, to make a common market, between a small number of countries.  Which, eventually because of (political) feature creep, became the EU parliament and stuff, we have today.

I don't know the precise details.  But they seem to discuss and vote in, certain things.  Which seem to be put into actual laws, of the individual EU member states.

I think this mandatory chat control, is a very, very dangerous and slippery slope, in the control of free speech, and in effect news sources (indirectly).  If you look at Russia, an apparently very significant way their government is able to keep control of its people.  Is by basically lying all the time, in various TV media/newspapers/etc.
Even to the point of starting a full on war, while at the same time claiming Russia is being attacked, and there is no war (special operations).

So the EU, really is playing with fire, big time.  With the proposal/creation of new laws like this.  There is also the danger of a Trump like leader, getting into power.  Then using those new laws and infrastructure (information), to control the people.

Arguably, we need chat and things to be relatively free from political interference.  Because of nonsense, such as the Cambridge analytica scandal.

TL;DR
I think this new EU plans, are potentially very dangerous and a very, very bad idea.

It’s only in the U.K. where this nonsense argument about a common trading area is brought up. European integration was always the intention and so  the institutions. In Ireland political integration enjoys 70% support or higher as expressed regularly on the EU treaty referendums

As you say you don’t understand how eu law making works so don’t speculate. Given the government you currently have in the U.K. that is considering breaking an international treaty it wrote and signed up too , I think I’d prefer to be governed by the sane in Brussels.

The U.K. is the most highly monitored society in Western Europe. I fix at home first

[tom66]

I love how this thread has the most comments by a bunch of English and American people.

"I don't know how things are done there, but you are doing it wrong!"

Meh, I never supported Brexit and I hope one day that we'll go back, but I'm not a fool and can see that's probably not going to happen within my lifetime.  Greatest mistake this country has made in a very long time and we'll be paying the price forever.

The NI border issue really just is the tip of the iceberg when it comes to this kind of crap - it just is impossible to see a situation there that won't devolve into "the Troubles, pt. II" if the UK and Ireland continue to diverge on trade regulations.

[bd139]

One of that group hasn’t any say, the other we kicked out.

Hey we kicked ourselves out.

(and no I didn't vote for it)

[MK14]

It’s only in the U.K. where this nonsense argument about a common trading area is brought up. European integration was always the intention and so  the institutions. In Ireland political integration enjoys 70% support or higher as expressed regularly on the EU treaty referendums

As you say you don’t understand how eu law making works so don’t speculate. Given the government you currently have in the U.K. that is considering breaking an international treaty it wrote and signed up too , I think I’d prefer to be governed by the sane in Brussels.

The U.K. is the most highly monitored society in Western Europe. I fix at home first

I can't/won't respond to that, as it would stray too far from the topic of discussion, and could be called 'pure political talk'.  But you (maybe?) and others made a valid point, a society of just 50 people, isolated and on their own, could have a number of deficiencies, compared to modern society expectations.

But in modern times (compared to other modern countries), Switzerland has some kind of non-centralized (as such) government system.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Politics_of_Switzerland

My (hopefully on topic) feelings on the EU mandatory chat control, are that it might potentially cause an unacceptable loss of privacy.  It could easily be a slippery slope, to an overly authoritative state/EU control of things.  A bit like the Great FireWall (Wall) of China.  I.e. It could seriously mess up the political landscape.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Firewall                    EDIT: Simple typo

[tom66]

Yes, the EU encrypted chat policy is utter crap.

However this kind of thing gets brought up repeatedly and ultimately fails because open standards like 'Signal' exist where it is impossible to decrypt the messages because the keys are not shared with the server.  All the server knows is when and where certain accounts are communicating.

This is just typical politicians acting like they can solve a complex societal issue (child abuse) with a simple hammer (ban encryption) rather than the more difficult one: better supervision of children (parents, carers),  less use of social media by youngsters (well understood to be harmful),  and better treatments and detection of potential offenders before they commit acts against real children.  A controversial opinion perhaps but I do not believe such individuals deserves to be jailed until they have intended to, or actually committed an act against a child,  up until that point, they can be treated by medical professionals and carefully monitored.

As long as open source encryption technology exists then end to end encryption will not disappear.  Making it illegal will be effectively impossible.  You can make cracking Blu-Rays illegal, but people will still do it, because it is virtually impossible to detect. 

[tszaboo]

I love how this thread has the most comments by a bunch of English and American people.

"I don't know how things are done there, but you are doing it wrong!"

Meh, I never supported Brexit and I hope one day that we'll go back, but I'm not a fool and can see that's probably not going to happen within my lifetime.  Greatest mistake this country has made in a very long time and we'll be paying the price forever.

The NI border issue really just is the tip of the iceberg when it comes to this kind of crap - it just is impossible to see a situation there that won't devolve into "the Troubles, pt. II" if the UK and Ireland continue to diverge on trade regulations.

I'm a strong believer that a person is not responsible for their politicians, and the elected idiots or their country.
I'm from a country that went back to be a totally mad autocracy and kleptocracy. I stood up from there and left, I've been gone for a decade now. Took down the flag, moved out of the borders and all I am doing is go for elections (which is a farce) every few years, maybe it will be different this time.

One of that group hasn’t any say, the other we kicked out.

Hey we kicked ourselves out.

(and no I didn't vote for it)

There was a time when UK was doing everything in their power to back out of Brexit, and the EU was telling you guys to eat what you cooked.
And now please go back on topic, not every single discussion online has to be turned into US and UK politics.

[PlainName]

This is just typical politicians acting like they can solve a complex societal issue (child abuse)

Child abuse is just the excuse for rolling stuff out. Before that it was terrorists, but then they found kiddy fiddling had a better impact.

As long as open source encryption technology exists then end to end encryption will not disappear.  Making it illegal will be effectively impossible.

Just like not disclosing your phone password on demand is a great workaround? Fine if you don't mind being put away 'because obviously what you have hidden must be really incriminating'. Don't forget that they don't have to nick every single transgression, just enough to make the point and put reasonable fear into the population.

[Monkeh]

There was a time when UK was doing everything in their power to back out of Brexit, and the EU was telling you guys to eat what you cooked.

I see you get just as warped a view as everyone else from the media..

[tszaboo]

There was a time when UK was doing everything in their power to back out of Brexit, and the EU was telling you guys to eat what you cooked.

I see you get just as warped a view as everyone else from the media..

Just to be clear: I don't care what you think about my political or worldview, nor did I ask you to offer your opinion about it. It's none of your business.

[Monkeh]

There was a time when UK was doing everything in their power to back out of Brexit, and the EU was telling you guys to eat what you cooked.

I see you get just as warped a view as everyone else from the media..

Just to be clear: I don't care what you think about my political or worldview, nor did I ask you to offer your opinion about it. It's none of your business.

Then keep your comments on ours out of public places?

[tszaboo]

There was a time when UK was doing everything in their power to back out of Brexit, and the EU was telling you guys to eat what you cooked.

I see you get just as warped a view as everyone else from the media..

Just to be clear: I don't care what you think about my political or worldview, nor did I ask you to offer your opinion about it. It's none of your business.

Then keep your comments on ours out of public places?

Or maybe don't go around and insult people, like you do.

[Monkeh]

Or maybe don't go around and insult people, like you do.

I think I insulted the media, not you. Feel free to take offense, though - I do at your comments, let alone attitude.

[SiliconWizard]

Dunno what's the "ideal" number of people for a given organized society.
50 obviously looks a bit small for achieving anything other than covering very basic needs, and too few people may trigger other issues. Such as the need to have even more exchanges between groups of people (if just for reproduction, you don't wan't inbreeding), which could be a major source of conflicts. Yes, that's what we did thousands of years ago (and that's what some tribes still do nowadays), but that just doesn't scale up much. Not saying that "scaling up" is necessarily a goal either. But whether we want it or not, we are 8 billion+ now and we need to accomodate for that.

More seriously, I've read that for a "modern" type of society, 10 million people would be about the maximum to guarantee reasonable democracy (if that's what you're after) and avoid excessive lobbying, government authoritarianism, etc. It seems to make some sense, considering that among the most developed and "modern" countries in the world, the ones with 10 million people or less are usually classified highest in the democracy/well-being/freedom of press and expression/... indices.

[PlainName]

More seriously, I've read that for a "modern" type of society, 10 million people would be about the maximum to guarantee reasonable democracy

No doubt, but 50 aren't going to agree on anything, never mind 10 million. The solution is obvious: you have relatively small groups who select a spokesperson to deal with other groups. Again, you'll end up with more spokespeople than can agree to breath the same air, so you repeat that (groups of groups) until you've run out of bodies.

Gosh, looks like you've just replicated councils, governments, the EU/USA, etc. And someone, or some few, will have to oversee it all. It's extremely likely that total dickwads will be at the top, because they're the ones that a) have the ability to work their way up there and b) the determination to do so. Reasonable people need not apply.

[Nominal Animal]

Selective application of laws is a sign of unjust, unfair governance.  Fascist dictatorship, really, using the traditional definition of the terms.

These "hate speech" laws –– which, by the way, are nothing such, and instead are exactly intended for selective application; for arbitrary, unjust governance –– hurt me, personally.

I do not believe in defining individuals by arbitrary immutable characteristics, or treating them as representatives of their "protected group".  That is, I do treat everyone I interact with as an equal by default.  However, I do like examining beliefs and mores and cultures, and often assume the role of advocatus diaboli for the sake of such examination and discussion; that is, I can easily discuss a topic as if I held a position that I do not in reality hold.  For thousands of years, this has been known to be a very effective and efficient method of examination; see e.g. Socratic method.

(Those that I interact with directly do not seem to have any problem with this.  Not many agree with all or even most of my opinions, and I find that is good, because it presents opportunities for me to learn and grow.  It is those who overhear that seem to delight in attacking me.  For example, during a single day, at a Finnish University, I've been called both a "dirty commie" and a "far-right elitist exploiter".  I admit that I took weird joy at "the world's only socialist CEO" label, though.)

I am no longer allowed to examine or discuss why certain groups in Finland have 17-fold likelihood of committing sexual crimes than the national average, because such examination is now considered incitement against a "protected group", and is hate speech, unless I myself am perceived as a member of that group.  Thing is, the probable underlying causes for that are completely incidental to them also being part of that "protected group"; that is, the reasons have very little to do with that protected group!  It is like labeling the discussion about female serial killers, misogynist: against all women.

And this indeed is one of the intended effects of these laws: the end of discussion on negative effects of political decisions.

The public will just have to bear the practical effects in silence.  Which is very nice for the politicians: no embarrassments or having to admit making any errors anymore!  Nice!  At least in Finland, the "reporters" have already stated publicly that they "do not want to report bad things done by good people", so the "most free media in the world" is already towing the line nicely.

This is not healthy.  The lack of discussion will polarize those who feel the society is ignoring or suppressing them.  This will happen on all sides.  The arbitrary application of these speech-restricting laws will just turbocharge that.  The end result is violent chaos.

Me, I prefer the uncomfortableness of words and concepts to actual physical violence.  Apparently, I'm in the small minority at least here in Finland, especially when looking at the court decisions.  (You are likely to get bigger fines from bad words than punching someone in the gut.)

[Simon]

Freedoms of expression stuff usually relates to public speach, what you say to your mates no one could give a toss. Now they may want to stop terrorists etc, fine, but if they turn up a text you sent to a mate saying you hate a particular minority does that class as hate speech? nope or at least I suspect legally they will struggle and erm, resources? never mind the resources to detect, now that they have discovered that 1 in 2 people have some unhealthy views that if said to the offendable party or otherwise in public would get them in the nick but in a private chat is not the same, how do they prosecute half the population?

I don't even see the need for all of this end to end encryption no one can ever break. It's a need created by the mere fact that it was provided. For me it's more of a pain, I change phone, well that's all my whatsapp messages gone! yep, oh you want to use whatsapp on your PC, sorry can't see that last message you just sent or received on your phone, it's gone mad and signal is even worse. Since when did we have a problem that needed such unbreakable encryption - we never did. Communications are already sunt encrpted, but they it seems to work now is that it's impossible for even the user to retain their stuff never mind the go,vernment.

My sister insists, or rather her husband does on using signal, so I get all the photos and videos of my niece on signal - it's a pain in the arse trying to get that stuff out of signal thanks to the encryption paranoia! because family chats and photos/videos need high end encryption - for what? oh and needless to say, he who decided to use signal has never donated a penny to them! what a fucked up society we live in, there is one thing the conspiracy theorists have right, one word - sheeple! we care so much for our privacy while we literally give it all away to facebook who all these idiots who refuse to use whatsapp still use.

I'm sick of hearing about privacy and snooping from people who broadcast their lives 24/7!

Just a point on privacy and messaging.

Anything that you tell anyone else is not private any more. At no point can you trust the other party not to distribute it or ensure that their endpoint is secure. The biggest attack vector to privacy is loose mouths. Ergo private messaging is a misnomer.

Signal / Telegram etc are pointless if you want absolute privacy. Don’t say stuff.

Yes exactly, but oh no, your privacy is threatened, use our app! Everything is end to end encrypted, as far as I am aware you can't use an app on a phone that is not which is why the VPN's these youtubers shill are virtually scams. But in the name of you buying into these services they can be bloody hard work to use because the fact that phones encrypt data stored and use encrypted communications was not enough.

But then maybe we do need all this scrutiny, our prime minister was investigated for things the proof or disproof of which lay on a phone he no longer used so the whatsapp messages were lost, so yes we obviously do need this stuff to monitor our corrupt politicians

[Simon]

Selective application of laws is a sign of unjust, unfair governance.  Fascist dictatorship, really, using the traditional definition of the terms.

These "hate speech" laws –– which, by the way, are nothing such, and instead are exactly intended for selective application; for arbitrary, unjust governance –– hurt me, personally.

I pointed this out to my local police force who claimed that "you have a right to be you" but this was meant of course for "minorities". When I pointed out that I had been targeted for being me but was ignored as I did not fit any prescribed minority I was blocked!

[Simon]

More seriously, I've read that for a "modern" type of society, 10 million people would be about the maximum to guarantee reasonable democracy

No doubt, but 50 aren't going to agree on anything, never mind 10 million. The solution is obvious: you have relatively small groups who select a spokesperson to deal with other groups. Again, you'll end up with more spokespeople than can agree to breath the same air, so you repeat that (groups of groups) until you've run out of bodies.

Gosh, looks like you've just replicated councils, governments, the EU/USA, etc. And someone, or some few, will have to oversee it all. It's extremely likely that total dickwads will be at the top, because they're the ones that a) have the ability to work their way up there and b) the determination to do so. Reasonable people need not apply.

Yep, if 50 people can run and fund a modern society I'd like to be put in touch so that I can create my own cult.

[Nominal Animal]

See Dunbar, R. I. M, and Sosis, R. Optimising human community sizes, Evol Hum Behav. 2018 Jan; 39(1): 106–111. (doi: 10.1016/j.evolhumbehav.2017.11.001).
For some reason, societies with 50, 150, and 500 are disproportionately more common than other sizes, in historical small scale agricultural societies.

In more general terms, humans rarely have isolated societies, and instead tend to "layer" according to the type/depth/frequency of interaction.  You have something like a household, something like a village, something like a county (with up to about 2000 humans, about the maximum where everyone can "know" everyone else), and something like a "nation" or "state" (a much more abstract definition).  Laws and mores and culture is similarly layered.

Something simple like whether alcohol or a specific recreational drug is allowed or not, can be governed at any level.  The more abstract or widely affecting human-human interactions a matter is, the wider the reach, and therefore the "higher" up the level such stuff is typically decided.  A "nation" typically has common base laws, but local customs can vary slightly.

I don't have good references for it right now, but I seem to recall that in societies with up to 2000 members or so, "laws" emerge from the social pressure, without anyone really having to set them.  Because of this, I do believe any society with up to 2000 members or socan set their own laws and politics just by interacting with each other, but anything larger, and you need institutions.  Thus, the ten million limit seems quite high to me, unless "layering" is assumed.

Humans haven't yet arrived at any real agreement on global basic laws, either.  For example, in Western societies, 'ownership' and 'possession' are completely separate concepts (and the difference is important for the functioning of Western societies), but there are human societies (in developing countries) where the two are interchangeable in many respects.  (It is an interesting topic in and of itself, but because such societies exist in developing countries, such discussion is considered "hate speech" against members of those "protected groups".)

[bd139]

Freedoms of expression stuff usually relates to public speach, what you say to your mates no one could give a toss. Now they may want to stop terrorists etc, fine, but if they turn up a text you sent to a mate saying you hate a particular minority does that class as hate speech? nope or at least I suspect legally they will struggle and erm, resources? never mind the resources to detect, now that they have discovered that 1 in 2 people have some unhealthy views that if said to the offendable party or otherwise in public would get them in the nick but in a private chat is not the same, how do they prosecute half the population?

I don't even see the need for all of this end to end encryption no one can ever break. It's a need created by the mere fact that it was provided. For me it's more of a pain, I change phone, well that's all my whatsapp messages gone! yep, oh you want to use whatsapp on your PC, sorry can't see that last message you just sent or received on your phone, it's gone mad and signal is even worse. Since when did we have a problem that needed such unbreakable encryption - we never did. Communications are already sunt encrpted, but they it seems to work now is that it's impossible for even the user to retain their stuff never mind the go,vernment.

My sister insists, or rather her husband does on using signal, so I get all the photos and videos of my niece on signal - it's a pain in the arse trying to get that stuff out of signal thanks to the encryption paranoia! because family chats and photos/videos need high end encryption - for what? oh and needless to say, he who decided to use signal has never donated a penny to them! what a fucked up society we live in, there is one thing the conspiracy theorists have right, one word - sheeple! we care so much for our privacy while we literally give it all away to facebook who all these idiots who refuse to use whatsapp still use.

I'm sick of hearing about privacy and snooping from people who broadcast their lives 24/7!

Just a point on privacy and messaging.

Anything that you tell anyone else is not private any more. At no point can you trust the other party not to distribute it or ensure that their endpoint is secure. The biggest attack vector to privacy is loose mouths. Ergo private messaging is a misnomer.

Signal / Telegram etc are pointless if you want absolute privacy. Don’t say stuff.

Yes exactly, but oh no, your privacy is threatened, use our app! Everything is end to end encrypted, as far as I am aware you can't use an app on a phone that is not which is why the VPN's these youtubers shill are virtually scams. But in the name of you buying into these services they can be bloody hard work to use because the fact that phones encrypt data stored and use encrypted communications was not enough.

But then maybe we do need all this scrutiny, our prime minister was investigated for things the proof or disproof of which lay on a phone he no longer used so the whatsapp messages were lost, so yes we obviously do need this stuff to monitor our corrupt politicians

Unless your phone was compromised by NSO Pegasus then ALL your communications are open to whoever bought it.

https://www.techtarget.com/searchsecurity/news/252516052/Pegasus-spyware-discovered-UK-government-networks

[Simon]

Unless your phone was compromised by NSO Pegasus then ALL your communications are open to whoever bought it.

https://www.techtarget.com/searchsecurity/news/252516052/Pegasus-spyware-discovered-UK-government-networks

If they are going to get you they are going to get you.

[Simon]

See Dunbar, R. I. M, and Sosis, R. Optimising human community sizes, Evol Hum Behav. 2018 Jan; 39(1): 106–111. (doi: 10.1016/j.evolhumbehav.2017.11.001).
For some reason, societies with 50, 150, and 500 are disproportionately more common than other sizes, in historical small scale agricultural societies.

In more general terms, humans rarely have isolated societies, and instead tend to "layer" according to the type/depth/frequency of interaction.  You have something like a household, something like a village, something like a county (with up to about 2000 humans, about the maximum where everyone can "know" everyone else), and something like a "nation" or "state" (a much more abstract definition).  Laws and mores and culture is similarly layered.

when you can drive the length of a country in a day you need more universal laws than for every 2000 people or no one knows where they stand. And where are these boundaries set? Personally I would abolish the low level stuff that is a mere distraction. We all need a police force, why is this managed locally? where up until recently and probably still in the UK you could evade capture by being in the next county as it took a lot of paperwork for one force to tell another something, in the 21st century where you can drive a county in an hour this is not even stupid, it's worse.

[TimFox]

There has been a lot of work on the theory of market-center organization.
https://transportgeography.org/contents/chapter2/transport-and-spatial-organization/central-places-theory-urban-system/
Geographically, every small town in the US has a grocery store, but for specialized medical care one goes to a larger population center.
These relationships form something like a lattice.
Many years ago, a paper in the Scientific American on this topic had two illustrations mapped:  one was a simple one in a flat country where there were no important physical barriers between towns.  The other was in a South American country where the indigenous and colonial populations didn't mix, but were both spread across a landscape.  There were two separate "lattices" of market centers.

[Nominal Animal]

when you can drive the length of a country in a day you need more universal laws than for every 2000 people or no one knows where they stand.

Sure.

The true question is, should people living in a city at the center of a region be able to dictate the laws to the people outside the city but within the same region, just because they're technically the majority in that region?  It is at the heart of Gerrymandering, after all.  Right now, EU is considering dropping the requirement for unanimous decisions, which immediately means smaller countries like Finland will be completely controlled by the largest countries like Germany, France, Italy and Spain.  I don't like that either.

Thing is, I don't believe that sort of multiculturalism –– the idea that the laws and customs that one should acknowledge depends on who you are interacting with, instead of where you both are –– will ever work.  I do not know of a single example of where it has ever worked without devolving into heavy crime and violence (like the melting-pot cities of USA).

So, there are not too many options.  Either you enforce a specific set of laws and thus world-view and base culture, or you let people come up with their own. 

One is nicer if you travel a lot, the other is nicer if you prefer to stay put.  Neither is more right than the other.  I am pointing out that a layered compromise, where laws that affect more people are set in the widest context, and laws that only apply to a small locale are set at the smallest context, seems to be the path of most gain with least oppression to me.

The damning thing about the EU mandatory chat control is that it makes many aspects of discussing such things –– i.e., whenever it involves negative behaviour and "protected groups" –– illegal, and thus outside the public discussion.  Which I know for sure EU "politicians" really love.  I know for a fact that the majority of Finnish politicians would absolutely love laws that forbade their decisions and actions to be publicly discussed; and that our "journalists" wouldn't complain at all as long as their opinions and publishings were also protected from discussions and comments.

[MadScientist]

For a eu law to exist it must be both passed by the council of ministers which is made of elected national government ministers and the eu parliament which is also directly elected,  certain vetos also exist , secondly two types  of eu laws exist , directives and regulations , directives can  implanted as Desired and even “ gold plated” a process particularly the uk Abused , regulations must be translated into national law verbatim

No eu law can violate the eu treaties

Enforcement is carried out by the member  state in the normal way

It’s an extremely democratic process , all decision makers are elected , the commission merely acts as a  civil servants

Eu law has been at the forefront of equality fairness and general anti national dogma

[Infraviolet]

I'm not sure quite what the latest reply adds to this thread, detailing how the EU passes directives doesn;t really talk much about the underlying issues, that is to say the dire threat to free speech and privacy rights.

I think that since governments (nearly everywhere globaly, not just in the EU) overreacted (that is my opinion, please don't take it the wrong way) to covid with extraordinarily totalitarian panic-induced (politicians logic, "we must do something", "that is something","we must do that") measures they've felt emboldened to try to force anything they want on to populations (look at the Oxford "berlin wall for cars" zones plan). Thankfully a proportion of the population have, since the same events, felt both emboldened and proud to ignore intrusive government diktats. So what we're looking at is a future where governments make legislation nobody likes, and increasing numbers of people form a "counterculture" which simply ignores those diktats. As long as a few talented people perform basic software maintenance to keep a few open source truly secure and censorship free communication platforms up and running in violation of surveillance diktats, then the numbers of people dropping away from the controlled platforms will rise epxonetnailly over time. I'd like to see if Musk would be bold enough to make twitter in to such a defiant platform.

[MT]

No eu law can violate the eu treaties
Enforcement is carried out by the member  state in the normal way
It’s an extremely democratic process , all decision makers are elected , the commission merely acts as a  civil servants
Eu law has been at the forefront of equality fairness and general anti national dogma

What you say here is complete and utter myths. EU is not democratic but all about elite supremacy.Every single country in EU are dodging EU laws as much as they can,
evidently so by their own justice system reports on the actual dodging and complaints from EU supremacy headquarters. The later form of "EU supremacy" origins from
the German Nazi party who built it on various "supremacy ideas" originating from the 1800 national industrialization movement era , "eugenics" for example , EU today
is completely taken over by WEF/WHO Schwab nazis. eg mandatory vaccination, vaccination passports straight out of the nazi manual with no regard for e.g  Hippocratic Oath
and Nuremberg Code who dictates the "demand of voluntary consent of participants in medical experiments" because of what the nazi and Bholsevikis did in WW2. So there you go!
So called democratic EU during 2020-22 push for mandatory vaccination with experimental chemical compounds where the content held secret is a direct violation of mentioned
Hippocratic Oath and Nuremberg Code no matter any fucking EU laws. Here, educate your self abut the Schwab nazi, his great reset book. https://archive.org/details/schwab-the-great-reset

[jonpaul]

"You have no privacy anyway, Get over it!"
Scott McNely ceo Sun Microsystems 1999

Jin

[MadScientist]

 

No eu law can violate the eu treaties
Enforcement is carried out by the member  state in the normal way
It’s an extremely democratic process , all decision makers are elected , the commission merely acts as a  civil servants
Eu law has been at the forefront of equality fairness and general anti national dogma

What you say here is complete and utter myths. EU is not democratic but all about elite supremacy.Every single country in EU are dodging EU laws as much as they can,
evidently so by their own justice system reports on the actual dodging and complaints from EU supremacy headquarters. The later form of "EU supremacy" origins from
the German Nazi party who built it on various "supremacy ideas" originating from the 1800 national industrialization movement era , "eugenics" for example , EU today
is completely taken over by WEF/WHO Schwab nazis. eg mandatory vaccination, vaccination passports straight out of the nazi manual with no regard for e.g  Hippocratic Oath
and Nuremberg Code who dictates the "demand of voluntary consent of participants in medical experiments" because of what the nazi and Bholsevikis did in WW2. So there you go!
So called democratic EU during 2020-22 push for mandatory vaccination with experimental chemical compounds where the content held secret is a direct violation of mentioned
Hippocratic Oath and Nuremberg Code no matter any fucking EU laws. Here, educate your self abut the Schwab nazi, his great reset book. https://archive.org/details/schwab-the-great-reset

No system is perfect but you have no idea now the EU makes laws. The chat proposal is merely just that it’s already been ruled as against the rights charter by the ecj, the council of ministers is not considering the proposal as the general view is the rcj would simply violate any such law

It’s a kite flying exercise that all’s

Ps the EU did not push for mandatory vaccinations , it’s simply cannot overrule national governments in medical matters. The treaties are clear . No country I aware in the EU had full mandatory vaccination policy , furthermore the covid pass was a good idea , again it wasn’t mandatory

Your nazi comments are just utter BS you need. To get out more and give up reading BS websites

[SiliconWizard]

"You have no privacy anyway, Get over it!"
Scott McNely ceo Sun Microsystems 1999

Jin

"Si vous n'avez rien à cacher, il ne faut pas avoir peur!"
- Klaus S.
 

[MadScientist]

I'm not sure quite what the latest reply adds to this thread, detailing how the EU passes directives doesn;t really talk much about the underlying issues, that is to say the dire threat to free speech and privacy rights.

I think that since governments (nearly everywhere globaly, not just in the EU) overreacted (that is my opinion, please don't take it the wrong way) to covid with extraordinarily totalitarian panic-induced (politicians logic, "we must do something", "that is something","we must do that") measures they've felt emboldened to try to force anything they want on to populations (look at the Oxford "berlin wall for cars" zones plan). Thankfully a proportion of the population have, since the same events, felt both emboldened and proud to ignore intrusive government diktats. So what we're looking at is a future where governments make legislation nobody likes, and increasing numbers of people form a "counterculture" which simply ignores those diktats. As long as a few talented people perform basic software maintenance to keep a few open source truly secure and censorship free communication platforms up and running in violation of surveillance diktats, then the numbers of people dropping away from the controlled platforms will rise epxonetnailly over time. I'd like to see if Musk would be bold enough to make twitter in to such a defiant platform.

Actually in my view based on where I live the experience of covid is such that lockdowns etc will never be tried again. Gov has basically said it’s unpopular with  poor results. I live in a democracy , politicians get voted out quick. My minister of health lives 4 doors down from me, I had a pint with him recently. These people know what popular and what’s not. We do not live in a diktat state.  I live in a country that will be the 10th wealthy in the world in 2023 ( big pharma and tech ) a lot of that  wealth is as a result of EU membership. The EU approval here is running  close to 80% and we by law must vote on every eu treaty so we have a referendum nearly every year on the eu

The EU is the best thing that happened in the last 40 years long may it continue get better and include more countries. The uk will come back in in time  , it’s  inevitable

[Bud]

So if you are so proud of your country can we now know what that wonderful place is?

[Infraviolet]

Indeed you do sound optimistic about the future, and about the EU. I was too, back when the EU would strike down Theresa May's surveillance diktats and stand up for human rights in every UK case that got before the Brussels courts. Since 2020 it hasn't been the same though, the EU should have struck down lockdowns as a human rights violation, the EU should have banned vaccine passports as a sinister tool of surveillance with no medical value (unlike the vaccines themselves which have helped vulnerable people), and yet the EU now wants unified facial recognition and fingerprinting for all travellers entering the Schengen area, it now wants pervasive censorship on the internet of anything its politicians disagree with, it wants to assist the Dutch government in mass closures of farms...  2020 changed them and it sounds like they are no longer the organisation which i voted to remain in during 2016.

[PlainName]

the EU now wants unified facial recognition and fingerprinting for all travellers entering the Schengen area, it now wants pervasive censorship on the internet of anything its politicians disagree with

This is, if not wrong, at least a slippery slope.

the EU should have struck down lockdowns as a human rights violation

But this is dogmatic. At that time there appeared to be the choice of many thousands dying or having people take extreme care not to spread the infection. People being people, the only way to achieve that would be by mandatory lockdown, so it was excusable as being for the benefit of, well, everyone. The problems we had with it were basically that it didn't happen when it should, so it was less effective and lasted longer than it should. In principle, though, it wasn't some elite treading on the plebs thing that it's being made out to be now, and a genuine attempt to mitigate a very serious situation.

[John B]

I guess except for the elites that were able to travel around, wine dine and party to their hearts content whilst not having their income negatively affected. 

[PlainName]

Elites are always like that, regardless of what's going on. It is stupid to say, "Well I'm not going to look after myself and my neighbours because so-and-so has too much money and gets away with shit." That's cutting off your nose to spite your face.

[magic]

So if you are so proud of your country can we now know what that wonderful place is?

Can't be quite 100% sure, but it gotta be one of the net beneficiaries - explains the fanatic enthusiasm and the desire to get UK back

Voters are cheap to buy and it's 100% legal as long as they vote to be bought.

[JPortici]

and yet the EU now wants unified facial recognition and fingerprinting for all travellers entering the Schengen area,

That doesn't sound right.
They probably want to harmonise the documentation format so it's more easily interchangeable. Do you have any idea of how much time is wasted converting one document from one format to another?
no, i'm not talking about converting .doc to .odt or something trivial, i'm talking about the document format: which information are written where, how they are grouped, dimensions, etc so that each office's software can interpret it correctly.

And that is GOOD.

For the same reason the so called "green pass", the EU covid vaccination certificate was a GOOD thing. I live on the border of three ASLs (sanitary districts) and before the GP they would emit three different documents, written in a different way, with different data on it. On paper only, of course. If an officer or a doctor asked you to show your certificate he would have had to translate between the three, then write up a bunch of paperwork to fill up the data in their own format, minutes wasted every time. That is 100% bureocratic madness. The GP put an end to that for good.

Leave aside the lockdown measures, which were decided and enforced by the states, not the EU.

[Infraviolet]

Truth be told, if nowhere had been stupid enough to invent something so divisive and totalitarian as "green passes" everyone would have been better off. Sure an EU harmonised one sounds better than a separate one per area, but no green passes at all is betetr for freedom, common sense and general economic inclusivity. All the green pass did was make "anti-vaxxers" angrier and more radical (and remember that the vaccine didn't event stop transmission), if the vaccine had simply been treated like every other vaccine in history (individual consent, no stupid coercion, no creepy surveillance or the idea of state permissions to access basic human freedoms...) then it would have had wider uptake.

I can really see the value in harmonising standards across a bloc of countries, but only where there should in the first place be something which should exist and should therefore need standardising. There is never a valid argument for any form of digital ID to access services, and there is no valid argument for having fingerprints and facial scans of all travellers in a centralised file, the potetnails for totalitarian control are just too risky.

P.S. Should this thread have the other EU chat control thread merged on to the back of it?

[Monkeh]

if the vaccine had simply been treated like every other vaccine in history (individual consent, no stupid coercion, no creepy surveillance or the idea of state permissions to access basic human freedoms...) then it would have had wider uptake.

It must take consideral willpower to be that selective in your learning of history.

[MT]

No system is perfect but you have no idea now the EU makes laws. The chat proposal is merely just that it’s already been ruled as against the rights charter by the ecj, the council of ministers is not considering the proposal as the general view is the rcj would simply violate any such law
It’s a kite flying exercise that all’s

Ps the EU did not push for mandatory vaccinations , it’s simply cannot overrule national governments in medical matters. The treaties are clear . No country I aware in the EU had full mandatory vaccination policy , furthermore the covid pass was a good idea , again it wasn’t mandatory.
Your nazi comments are just utter BS you need. To get out more and give up reading BS websites

I said they tried to make it mandatory, besides numerous examples of violation of treaties has been made over the decades and during the fake pandemic (does not even fulfill
the requirements to be called a pandemic) overruling of national laws are a standard within EU , simple insert your WEF agents like "New Young Leaders" into the government you
want to control Schwab even bragged about it:



But since you like to defend nazis like Schwab and Bourla and their vaxx passports i doubt you want to educate your self about the Schwab nazi background.
https://unlimitedhangout.com/2021/02/investigative-reports/schwab-family-values/

In the pre-war years of the 1930s leading up to the German annexation of Poland, Ravensburg’s Escher-Wyss factory, now managed directly by Klaus Schwab’s father, Eugen Schwab, continued to be the biggest employer in Ravensburg. Not only was the factory a major employer in the town, but Hitler’s own Nazi party awarded the Escher-Wyss Ravensburg branch the title of “National Socialist Model Company” while Schwab was at the helm. The Nazis were potentially wooing the Swiss company for cooperation in the coming war, and their advances were eventually reciprocated.

Ravensburg was an anomaly in wartime Germany, as it was never targeted by any Allied airstrikes. The presence of the Red Cross, and a rumoured agreement with various companies including Escher-Wyss, saw the allied forces publicly agree to not target the Southern German town. It was not classified as a significant military target throughout the war and, for that reason, the town still maintains many of its original features. However, much darker things were afoot in Ravensburg once the war began.

Eugen Schwab continued to manage the “National Socialist Model Company” for Escher-Wyss, and the Swiss company would aid the Nazi Wermacht produce significant weapons of war as well as more basic armaments. The Escher-Wyss company was a leader in large turbine technology for hydroelectric dams and power plants, but they also manufactured parts for German fighter planes. They were also intimately involved in much more sinister projects happening behind the scenes which, if completed, could have changed the outcome of World War II. When Klaus Schwab joined Sulzer Escher-Wyss in 1967 and started the reorganisation of the company to be a technology corporation, the involvement of Sulzer Escher-Wyss in the darker aspects of the global nuclear arms race became immediately more pronounced.
Back in the Escher-Wyss factory in Ravensburg, Eugen Schwab had been busy putting forced labourers to work at his model Nazi company. During the years of World War II, nearly 3,600 forced labourers worked in Ravensburg, including at Escher Wyss. According to the city archivist in Ravensburg, Andrea Schmuder, the Escher-Wyss machine factory in Ravensburg employed between 198 and 203 civil workers and POWs during the war. Karl Schweizer, a local Lindau historian, states that Escher-Wyss maintained a small special camp for forced labourers on the factory premises.

[Infraviolet]

Monkeh, oops, yes, I did type that line too fast. There have been periods in history where governments have mandated vaccines, not so much in the recent history (pre-2021) of developed nations, but plenty around the turn of the 19th in to 20th century. That said, at all those times a "vaccine mandate" meant "take it or we'll hit you with a one-off fine" not "take it and then be trapped in a digital ID card prison of surveillance, or don't take it and be thrown out from society as a whole". So while mandating a vaccine itself isn't so unprecedented, the level of coercion involved in 2020/21/22 and the evils of making the state a middleman in every human interaction via QR codes at doors is still very much a novelty. What was learnt as good public health practice from all those historic periods though, was that vaccine uptake and general health of populations improves if mandates are avoided, look at the smallpox vacine uptake improving after the mandates were scrapped. Perhaps I should have said that evidence based practice had by the 21st century lead to the realisation that vaccine rollouts should be done calmly and without coercion and are more successful when the public doesn't get turned against them by coercive activities, rather than mistakenly saying that such sensible practice had always been the historic reality.

[SiliconWizard]

Oh yeah. "We penetrate the cabinets."

[PlainName]

look at the smallpox vacine uptake improving after the mandates were scrapped

Are you sure you're thinking of the right disease?

Given these risks, as smallpox became effectively eradicated and the number of naturally occurring cases fell below the number of vaccine-induced illnesses and deaths, routine childhood vaccination was discontinued in the United States in 1972 and was abandoned in most European countries in the early 1970s

So you're saying that once the disease was done for and routine inoculation was scrapped because of that, vaccination by choice really took off?

[Zero999]

Monkeh, oops, yes, I did type that line too fast. There have been periods in history where governments have mandated vaccines, not so much in the recent history (pre-2021) of developed nations, but plenty around the turn of the 19th in to 20th century. That said, at all those times a "vaccine mandate" meant "take it or we'll hit you with a one-off fine" not "take it and then be trapped in a digital ID card prison of surveillance, or don't take it and be thrown out from society as a whole". So while mandating a vaccine itself isn't so unprecedented, the level of coercion involved in 2020/21/22 and the evils of making the state a middleman in every human interaction via QR codes at doors is still very much a novelty. What was learnt as good public health practice from all those historic periods though, was that vaccine uptake and general health of populations improves if mandates are avoided, look at the smallpox vacine uptake improving after the mandates were scrapped. Perhaps I should have said that evidence based practice had by the 21st century lead to the realisation that vaccine rollouts should be done calmly and without coercion and are more successful when the public doesn't get turned against them by coercive activities, rather than mistakenly saying that such sensible practice had always been the historic reality.

They were certainly the first vaccine mandates in the history of the EU.

It's terrible the way those who decided not to get vaccinated were treated. It was never tested to prove it stopped transmission and whist it did to some degree, it soon became apparent it wasn't anywhere near effective enough to mandate it. Most people who turned down the COVID vaccines are not anti-vaxers. I know plenty of people who had other vaccines, yet decided against having this one. It's perfectly fine to be concerned about new vaccines based on an experimental technology. Plenty of doctors are question the risk vs benefit analysis, especially in the young and healthy.

[MadScientist]

There was not and cannot be a eu wide mandatory vaccine policy. It’s a national decision that’s all. Some countries brought in rules for certain categories of people.

Again the mistaken notion being peddled by some here of eu wide mandatory vaccine policy is completely false the EU does not have a legal basis for such action.

Most eu counties did not enforce widespread vaccine mandates at all in fact.

[Galenbo]

Most eu counties did not enforce widespread vaccine mandates at all in fact.

No they only enforced measures that caused the unvaccinated to loose their job and/or income.
Yes that happened, yes they did that.

[Zero999]

There was not and cannot be a eu wide mandatory vaccine policy. It’s a national decision that’s all. Some countries brought in rules for certain categories of people.

Again the mistaken notion being peddled by some here of eu wide mandatory vaccine policy is completely false the EU does not have a legal basis for such action.

Most eu counties did not enforce widespread vaccine mandates at all in fact.

No one said the EU mandated it. Many people are critical of the EU for going along with it and failing to take action against member states who committed human rights abuses, even if they thought they were doing go. The road to hell is paved with good intentions.

[PlainName]

This is all very Y2K-ish hindsight.

I don't see any way some particular thing would or wouldn't've happened had we done or not done something - it is all pure conjecture. All we can really say is that we did so-and-so (or not) and such-and-such happened (or not). Anything else is a 'grass was greener over there' fiction based entirely on one's viewpoint.

Maybe we can move of from this sometime. If you need to keep dragging it up, perhaps give a thoughtful solution for handling the next killer pandemic better.

[Zero999]

This is all very Y2K-ish hindsight.

I don't see any way some particular thing would or wouldn't've happened had we done or not done something - it is all pure conjecture. All we can really say is that we did so-and-so (or not) and such-and-such happened (or not). Anything else is a 'grass was greener over there' fiction based entirely on one's viewpoint.

Maybe we can move of from this sometime. If you need to keep dragging it up, perhaps give a thoughtful solution for handling the next killer pandemic better.

What makes you think that? I can't see any similarity with Y2k. China maintained lockdown for nearly 3 years, whilst Sweden didn't do it at all, yet in both cases everyone got it, regardless.

[SiliconWizard]

There was not and cannot be a eu wide mandatory vaccine policy. It’s a national decision that’s all. Some countries brought in rules for certain categories of people.

Again the mistaken notion being peddled by some here of eu wide mandatory vaccine policy is completely false the EU does not have a legal basis for such action.

Most eu counties did not enforce widespread vaccine mandates at all in fact.

No one said the EU mandated it. Many people are critical of the EU for going along with it and failing to take action against member states who committed human rights abuses, even if they thought they were doing go. The road to hell is paved with good intentions.

Absolutely, but in this particular case, the fact it was all done with good intentions is dubious.

[PlainName]

This is all very Y2K-ish hindsight.

I don't see any way some particular thing would or wouldn't've happened had we done or not done something - it is all pure conjecture. All we can really say is that we did so-and-so (or not) and such-and-such happened (or not). Anything else is a 'grass was greener over there' fiction based entirely on one's viewpoint.

Maybe we can move of from this sometime. If you need to keep dragging it up, perhaps give a thoughtful solution for handling the next killer pandemic better.

What makes you think that? I can't see any similarity with Y2k. China maintained lockdown for nearly 3 years, whilst Sweden didn't do it at all, yet in both cases everyone got it, regardless.

China and Sweden are completely different - population, location, vaccination effectiveness, infectiousness of it, etc. Why not compare Sweden with Italy, where it was pretty much a massacre at the start?

The point is that you can't say "if they'd done such-and-such this would happen, or not happen". The fact is they didn't (or did, as the case may be), and history tells us what actually occurred. Anything else is conjecture. Even when you try to compare incomparable situations, you are showing that the outcome wasn't determinable beforehand.

I'm not intending to get involved in this game, but if you want to play then put yourself in the position of a country looking at somewhere like Italy where they are dropping like flies, completely overwhelmed, and figuring that if you do nothing then your city or country is probably two weeks away from being the same. You can use all the hindsight you've gained from Covid, so you already have a leg up.

As I say, if you have to keep warming this up then figuring out a workable response is surely better than the continuous arguments over unprovable make-believe.

[Zero999]

This is all very Y2K-ish hindsight.

I don't see any way some particular thing would or wouldn't've happened had we done or not done something - it is all pure conjecture. All we can really say is that we did so-and-so (or not) and such-and-such happened (or not). Anything else is a 'grass was greener over there' fiction based entirely on one's viewpoint.

Maybe we can move of from this sometime. If you need to keep dragging it up, perhaps give a thoughtful solution for handling the next killer pandemic better.

What makes you think that? I can't see any similarity with Y2k. China maintained lockdown for nearly 3 years, whilst Sweden didn't do it at all, yet in both cases everyone got it, regardless.

China and Sweden are completely different - population, location, vaccination effectiveness, infectiousness of it, etc. Why not compare Sweden with Italy, where it was pretty much a massacre at the start?

The point is that you can't say "if they'd done such-and-such this would happen, or not happen". The fact is they didn't (or did, as the case may be), and history tells us what actually occurred. Anything else is conjecture. Even when you try to compare incomparable situations, you are showing that the outcome wasn't determinable beforehand.

I'm not intending to get involved in this game, but if you want to play then put yourself in the position of a country looking at somewhere like Italy where they are dropping like flies, completely overwhelmed, and figuring that if you do nothing then your city or country is probably two weeks away from being the same. You can use all the hindsight you've gained from Covid, so you already have a leg up.

As I say, if you have to keep warming this up then figuring out a workable response is surely better than the continuous arguments over unprovable make-believe.

My point is the infection spread worldwide the same, irrespective of the actions of the authorities, or lack of thereof. The fact the extreme reaction of many governments had so many negative consequences, they should carry the burden of proof they were right, not those who question them.

[Nominal Animal]

Here in Finland, the penalty for publishing a video of 'youths' beating up other passengers in a bus is greater than beating up other passengers in a bus.  Ethnicity is a big factor in determining the penalties, though.

The purpose is to have laws that can be selectively applied.  The need for that is based on the picture of an utopian society the current 'elite' has, where there is no middle class: just Owners, and Consumers, with basically no way of a lowly Consumer to become an Owner.  The mandatory chat control is just one piece of that puzzle.

Feel free to laugh at me, and call me a conspiracy theorist.  There is no conspiracy, though; it's a natural consequence of how human societies have tended to evolve when the society size exceeds 2000-5000 humans.  It has happened in history for the last five thousand years at least, ever since the first known cities like Harappa and Mohenjo Daro, and does not involve any kind of "evil" or "conspiracy" or even malicious intent.  It's just how human societies evolve, when certain negative aspects are not kept well enough in check.  When resource limits come up, things get downright Easter Islander or Aztec.  Only an idiot refuses to look at history, and draw parallels to modern era, when estimating the direction of current societies.

[SiliconWizard]

Couldn't agree more. And please let's just all stop talking about conspiracy theorists shit.
We're currently rushing towards an orwellian society, and as you just said, it's an unfortunately perfectly natural consequence.
It's a "simple" way of managing scarcity. Not a particularly nice one, but it has proven to work well enough repeatedly in the past to be reiterated.

[Nominal Animal]

And please let's just all stop talking about conspiracy theorists shit.

You're right.  It's just a very sore label for me.

To simplify a bit, the changes I see here in Finland have an obvious pattern of consequences, and I think I understand why it is happening.  (I could be wrong, of course, but note that I believe everyone involved truly believes they are doing Good.  Which also explains why the reaction to any criticism is so hostile: if the criticism is right, then it means people who are working hard for Good, are actually doing Harm, which is obviously unacceptable; therefore the criticism must be incorrect, and thus has to be quashed immediately.)

At the core, the issue is the rise of the middle class in the last hundred years or so.

Classists (communists and socialists and those who want a world with an untouchable elite) are threatened by the middle class, because it is the mechanism how "workers" become "elite", disproving the entire idea behind socialism, showing that it is individual effort, and not class struggle, that determines the fate of the individual.  This is the exact core of the entire situation.  The "elite", in turn, wants to remove the "middle class", because it is also the mechanism how "elite" can easily fall down to "worker" status; and there is nothing they fear more than that.

So-called leftists want to abolish the middle class, because they recognize that the existence of the middle class threatens their ideology: the idea of a person moving from the working class to middle class based on their own effort, is absolutely incompatible with the socialist-classist worldview.  They also don't want to fight a class war on two fronts -- against both the "elite" and the "middle class" ––, so abolishing the middle class is the natural approach.
(They also believe that without the middle class, it'll be easier to overthrow the "elite" and become the new "elite" themselves.)

The elite wants to solidify its position.  They fear nothing as much as loss of their "elite" status.  Abolishing the middle class is like digging a deep trench between yourself and the thing you fear most; and it also makes the distinction between the "elite" and "working class" much more prominent.

In this light, it is no surprise that the elite and the classist socialists have joined forces against the middle class, common sense, and the core values of Western societies in general.  It is quite logical.  Most of them truly believe they are doing it for the greater good, too; the "elite" because they truly believe they are better than others –– this being a perfectly natural human reaction; even if the position is based on pure chance, even in games, people who get on top or win, generally believe they did so because they did/played better than the others ––, and the socialists because they believe that societies will do better without a middle class.

Controlling speech is an obvious, crucial step here.  Even the way how individual voters in EU have no control over the EU commission, fits perfectly into this picture.

Thing is, historically, it looks like it is exactly the middle class that actually pushes progress and prosperity forwards.  The way people can shift between "classes" based on their individual actions seems to be a crucial mechanism for continued prosperity.  I would claim it is the reason why education seems to be the most effective way of lifting people out from poverty (ie. that the middle class is proof that personal efforts can make a difference for many people), but I don't have real proof of that.  Well, except for how these things have always correlated, both in recent and in ancient history.

[MadScientist]

Controlling speech is an obvious, crucial step here.  Even the way how individual voters in EU have no control over the EU commission, fits perfectly into this picture.

I’m not aware of any democratic country that elects  its civil service and that’s all the commission is.

Fundementally people need to understand thd EU institutions before taking pot shots at it.

[Nominal Animal]

Fundamentally people need to understand the EU institutions before taking pot shots at it.

Of course.  But, you do not "understand" by accepting their self-descriptions at face value, you observe their actual behaviour and interactions with others.

That is all I described above: my own observations, and the pattern or underlying reason that explains the behaviour, without any kind of conspiracies, or even any pre-defined "design"; it is just how things are evolving right now here, organically, with basically all political participants fully believing they are doing good work.  Even WEF fits in perfectly to that pattern, and does not require any kind of ill intent or nefarious designs.

Thus, I find the characterization "taking a pot shot at EU" invalid, here.  The pattern I'm describing is not a "pot shot", and it is not limited to EU, but can be observed in urban areas in USA and Canada as well.

[SiliconWizard]

Fundementally people need to understand thd EU institutions before taking pot shots at it.

Do you?

[magic]

Just a heads up: this is turning into a religious debate

When I was even more young and stupid than I am today, I spent many hours arguing with all that progressive-liberal-democratic-scientific woo-woo and all I got for my effort was realization of the absolute futility of it.
Ever since, I feel more productive isolating myself from material manifestations of the that could directly hurt me and watching true believers suffer pain trying to make it all work out.

[Nominal Animal]

Just a heads up: this is turning into a religious debate

Yeah.. that's why I normally avoid mentioning social neoteny, nihilism, relativism, and how it all relates to the death of God as used by Nietzsche, as a likely background for all this.  That almost always leads to someone yelling, even among people otherwise capable of logical and rational thought –– and all it is, is a pattern that fits, with no evil or nefarious people involved; just good intentions almost certainly leading to bad outcomes.

When I was even more young and stupid than I am today, I spent many hours arguing with all that progressive-liberal-democratic-scientific woo-woo and all I got for my effort was realization of the absolute futility of it.
Ever since, I feel more productive isolating myself from material manifestations of the that could directly hurt me and watching true believers suffer pain trying to make it all work out.

The downside is, all it takes for horrible errors to prevail is for sensible people to stay silent.

In a way, it is all really funny: it is the young people who have the energy and will to try and change things, but they lack the wisdom and experience to make truly good choices.  The few old people who have the wisdom, lack the energy and the will.  The people in between are just too busy living their lives to give a shift. 

[SiliconWizard]

Yeah, age-old conundrum. Sums up human condition, really.

[MadScientist]

I described people’s reactions as a pot shot largely because no credible situation exists where the proposal would become EU law. It’s simply not possible given the freedoms enshrined in the makeup of the EU and the role of the member states. The EU has no “ federal powers “

[magic]

I don't care how this bureaucracy works, but I know that I have to buy leaded solder from black market and disable JS to get rid of cookie banners as if disabling cookies weren't enough. And I know I wouldn't have those problems if not for Brussels.

If they could force cookies, they can force AI scanning your every uploaded image for CP. Of course, it's to guarantee your freedom from sexual abuse, which is your fundamental right enshrined in the makeup of the EU.

[MadScientist]

I don't care how this bureaucracy works, but I know that I have to buy leaded solder from black market and disable JS to get rid of cookie banners as if disabling cookies weren't enough. And I know I wouldn't have those problems if not for Brussels.

If they could force cookies, they can force AI scanning your every uploaded image for CP. Of course, it's to guarantee your freedom from sexual abuse, which is your fundamental right enshrined in the makeup of the EU.

This is just abject scaremongering   , and conflating different things. The danger of lead poisoning is long understood and has been proven. Hence stop mixing up entirely different issues

It’s right and proper amateurs are restricted buying lead based products that’s entirely different to the a “ ban” that isn’t law nor likely to be so being hyped by vested anti EU types proclaiming the Eu is bringing in restrictions it clearly has no power to actually do.

[GridWork]

And please let's just all stop talking about conspiracy theorists shit.

You're right.  It's just a very sore label for me.

To simplify a bit, the changes I see here in Finland have an obvious pattern of consequences, and I think I understand why it is happening.  (I could be wrong, of course, but note that I believe everyone involved truly believes they are doing Good.  Which also explains why the reaction to any criticism is so hostile: if the criticism is right, then it means people who are working hard for Good, are actually doing Harm, which is obviously unacceptable; therefore the criticism must be incorrect, and thus has to be quashed immediately.)

At the core, the issue is the rise of the middle class in the last hundred years or so.

Classists (communists and socialists and those who want a world with an untouchable elite) are threatened by the middle class, because it is the mechanism how "workers" become "elite", disproving the entire idea behind socialism, showing that it is individual effort, and not class struggle, that determines the fate of the individual.  This is the exact core of the entire situation.  The "elite", in turn, wants to remove the "middle class", because it is also the mechanism how "elite" can easily fall down to "worker" status; and there is nothing they fear more than that.

So-called leftists want to abolish the middle class, because they recognize that the existence of the middle class threatens their ideology: the idea of a person moving from the working class to middle class based on their own effort, is absolutely incompatible with the socialist-classist worldview.  They also don't want to fight a class war on two fronts -- against both the "elite" and the "middle class" ––, so abolishing the middle class is the natural approach.
(They also believe that without the middle class, it'll be easier to overthrow the "elite" and become the new "elite" themselves.)

The elite wants to solidify its position.  They fear nothing as much as loss of their "elite" status.  Abolishing the middle class is like digging a deep trench between yourself and the thing you fear most; and it also makes the distinction between the "elite" and "working class" much more prominent.

In this light, it is no surprise that the elite and the classist socialists have joined forces against the middle class, common sense, and the core values of Western societies in general.  It is quite logical.  Most of them truly believe they are doing it for the greater good, too; the "elite" because they truly believe they are better than others –– this being a perfectly natural human reaction; even if the position is based on pure chance, even in games, people who get on top or win, generally believe they did so because they did/played better than the others ––, and the socialists because they believe that societies will do better without a middle class.

Controlling speech is an obvious, crucial step here.  Even the way how individual voters in EU have no control over the EU commission, fits perfectly into this picture.

Thing is, historically, it looks like it is exactly the middle class that actually pushes progress and prosperity forwards.  The way people can shift between "classes" based on their individual actions seems to be a crucial mechanism for continued prosperity.  I would claim it is the reason why education seems to be the most effective way of lifting people out from poverty (ie. that the middle class is proof that personal efforts can make a difference for many people), but I don't have real proof of that.  Well, except for how these things have always correlated, both in recent and in ancient history.

Well said! By chance do you have a newsletter.

[Nominal Animal]

Well said! By chance do you have a newsletter.

(I can't read the subtext and tell whether you're mocking me or not!  Me fail English )

No, I have no newsletter, nor even any message, because I don't really know exactly what we should do to do better.

Like everyone else, I have ideas of what kind of world would be better than what we have now, but that's just an opinion.  Everyone has opinions and wishes, right?  What matters is what we do, how we go about changing things for the better.

I personally do not know what kind of actions would actually yield better results.  I know that if I had the power to implement my wishes, I would be one of the worst dictators ever in history, even in the off chance that future generations lauded me for the eventual results.  You see, the intent and the goal does not justify the means in politics and governance: it is the path – everyday living – that matters more than the intentions or goals.  Maybe one in fifty dictators has been actually somewhat benevolent, historically speaking, and they usually did just small things and had no Grand Plans for their people to perform, other than live and prosper.  I would not wager much on myself being in that 2%.

If anything, I advocate small local changes, observing the effects, and learning from the results.  Right now in most Western countries we're progressing emotions and ideologies first, based on beliefs (and at best, carefully filtered scientific advise), instead of logic and rational thought; with young activists advocating huge radical changes without much proof that those changes are likely to yield positive rather than negative results.
But I cannot change how people express themselves, and I cannot force people to think or learn from history.

So, no newsletter, no message, no sermons here.  Just observations and tiny tentative suggestions for individuals, as that is the best I can do, I think.

[pcprogrammer]

Even if you would succeed in making some huge change for the, what we think is, better, in the long run it gets destroyed by human nature again.

There will always be people that don't agree with the way things are or feel left behind or think they are entitled to more then they get, and start wrecking what otherwise could be a perfect system.

I too have ideas about this but would probably be an even worse dictator for some 

A thought experiment:
Would it be possible to set up a society where profit is not on the table, and things like inflation, deflation and economic growth are not a thing. A system where money is not a product but just a means. But still with some difference in status of and reward for the work you do. And when you want more it is possible with working for it. Like better yourself through education. And yes for some this would proof to be impossible, and for these their should be some basic support structure.

Utopia, I know, but think about it, and how it would collapse due to human nature.

[Zero999]

I’m not aware of any democratic country that elects  its civil service

The civil service are very powerful and are a huge threat to democracy. They decide often went to enforce various rules. Take Ofcom, the UK's mainstream media regulator for example. They decide what can be broadcast and will slap huge fines on broadcasters who say things which they believe break the rules. It clearly isn't the government who runs the country.

[magic]

This is just abject scaremongering   , and conflating different things. The danger of lead poisoning is long understood and has been proven. Hence stop mixing up entirely different issues.

Sexual assault is long understood and proven to affect more people today than lead poisoning.
It's not scaremongering; it is actually a great news that the EU finally gangs up with Big Tech to stop it.
Are you a pedophile or do you hate women?

[Zero999]

This is just abject scaremongering   , and conflating different things. The danger of lead poisoning is long understood and has been proven. Hence stop mixing up entirely different issues.

Sexual assault is long understood and proven to affect more people today than lead poisoning.
It's not scaremongering; it is actually a great news that the EU finally gangs up with Big Tech to stop it.
Are you a pedophile or do you hate women?

I presume you're not retarded so there's no risk of you getting lead poisoning from leaded solder, which also can make you retarded. Lead free solder presents more health hazards, than leaded. It requires higher temperatures, thus increasing the risk of burns and a much stronger flux, which is linked to asthma and other breathing problems.

[GridWork]

Absolutely not mocking, you summarized a lot of points that I have been thinking. Just need to get more people thinking the same.

 

Well said! By chance do you have a newsletter.

(I can't read the subtext and tell whether you're mocking me or not!  Me fail English )

No, I have no newsletter, nor even any message, because I don't really know exactly what we should do to do better.

Like everyone else, I have ideas of what kind of world would be better than what we have now, but that's just an opinion.  Everyone has opinions and wishes, right?  What matters is what we do, how we go about changing things for the better.

I personally do not know what kind of actions would actually yield better results.  I know that if I had the power to implement my wishes, I would be one of the worst dictators ever in history, even in the off chance that future generations lauded me for the eventual results.  You see, the intent and the goal does not justify the means in politics and governance: it is the path – everyday living – that matters more than the intentions or goals.  Maybe one in fifty dictators has been actually somewhat benevolent, historically speaking, and they usually did just small things and had no Grand Plans for their people to perform, other than live and prosper.  I would not wager much on myself being in that 2%.

If anything, I advocate small local changes, observing the effects, and learning from the results.  Right now in most Western countries we're progressing emotions and ideologies first, based on beliefs (and at best, carefully filtered scientific advise), instead of logic and rational thought; with young activists advocating huge radical changes without much proof that those changes are likely to yield positive rather than negative results.
But I cannot change how people express themselves, and I cannot force people to think or learn from history.

So, no newsletter, no message, no sermons here.  Just observations and tiny tentative suggestions for individuals, as that is the best I can do, I think.

[GridWork]

Even if you would succeed in making some huge change for the, what we think is, better, in the long run it gets destroyed by human nature again.

There will always be people that don't agree with the way things are or feel left behind or think they are entitled to more then they get, and start wrecking what otherwise could be a perfect system.

I too have ideas about this but would probably be an even worse dictator for some 

A thought experiment:
Would it be possible to set up a society where profit is not on the table, and things like inflation, deflation and economic growth are not a thing. A system where money is not a product but just a means. But still with some difference in status of and reward for the work you do. And when you want more it is possible with working for it. Like better yourself through education. And yes for some this would proof to be impossible, and for these their should be some basic support structure.

Utopia, I know, but think about it, and how it would collapse due to human nature.

This is ultimately the problem, that we are human. Hence as uncomfortable as it might be, individual freedom is the most important resource. The ability to better our lives, our children's lives, our communities lives all comes from individual freedom. Corporate and government monopolies of force ultimately just create a class structure that becomes a positive feedback system. More power begets more resources and more power.

From a systems perspective, negative feedback is required for a stable system.

[pcprogrammer]

From a systems perspective, negative feedback is required for a stable system.

But that is the whole problem. There is no stable system, there never was and I fear there never will be. There have been times of growth, but also times of severe hardship, and no one can tell what lies ahead of us, but at the moment it is not looking good.

Here in France it is strike upon strike due to people being unhappy with the prospect of having to work longer and living becoming more expensive. The Netherlands, a country normally full with docile sheep, is seeing more willingness to strike. That is the negative feedback you are talking about, but it is not bringing stability. It only makes things worse, because of the spiral effect that is at the grounds of it all.