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If I lived in the EU I'd want to know who are proposing this kind of stuff and help with anything that gets them far from public and government -related jobs fo

If I lived in the EU I'd want to know who are proposing this kind of stuff and help with anything that gets them far from public and government -related jobs forever, but hey, that's me. Lots of people like to give up a bit of freedom and privacy in exchange for an increased sense of security.

mongol 4y ago
It is EU commissioner Ylva Johansson. Unfortunately, there is not much you can do. She is not elected to this position, but appointed, and in this case by a former government who is no longer in power.
- ShroudedNight 4y ago
  That sounds like she's pretty close to being a lame duck, and has little to lose, popularity wise. If that's correct, she's in an optimal place to become unhinged from a lack of accountability. I'm curious in this case if it's being a professional fall-guy or engaging in their own (u|dys)topian radicalism.
- alwayslikethis 4y ago
  EU seems to have an abundance of unelected regulatory positions. Eurosceptics are right in that EU represents a form of non-democratic decision-making which has the power to supersede (more) democratically formulated laws from member states. Ideally, the autocratic tendencies of the EU and the member states should cancel out by disagreeing with each other, but in reality member states seem unwilling to oppose them most of the times.
  - pohuing 4y ago
    Partially yeah, as well as the complete lack of legislative initiative for the parliament, the only part that's directly elected by citizens. On the other hand though: Europeans kinda suck as a blob. See Italy electing fascists again, Germany stagnating for decades under Conservative control, basically everything east of Germany etc. Etc. The parliament is dominated by Conservative authoritarian forces as well. In that sense EU legislature is just too good at representing it's people. I gave a speech to my computer science course when the new copyright directive was about to go into its final trilogue round in 2018. Wide agreement in discussion afterwards, but not a single student cared enough to make their wishes known to their MEPs. If even they don't do it, i can only say we're getting what we asked for.
  - gumballindie 4y ago
    > but in reality member states seem unwilling to oppose them most of the times That’s because when some of them do they get threatened with sanctions while others can simply dictate policy. The eu is not an equal members club.
  - peoplefromibiza 4y ago
    > EU seems to have an abundance of unelected regulatory positions. Like many other system in the World, elections are to chose people's representatives, not to chose the government nor the technical apparatus (like the EU commission). The US president is one notable example of non elected position. Anyway, the proposals must be approved by the parliament, which is elected directly by the EU people in number proportional to the population of the single countries and then ratified by the single EU parliaments, which are again elected by the people. I wouldn't exactly call it "abundance of unelected regulatory positions".
- TechBro8615 4y ago
  But remember, it's racists in the UK who wanted to leave this organization.
  - omnimus 4y ago
    Its not like UK is doing better without EU.
    - nicky0 4y ago
      A little early to judge, it's been 2 years.
      - twixfel 4y ago
        It's not too early to judge, it's going badly right now, that's clear.
        localplume 4y ago
        [dead]
        nicky0 4y ago
        Oh, it's clear? Why did nobody tell me. I take it back then. I am glad to hear a complex evolving geopolitical situation can be easily reducted to a simple judgement like that. It's a relief.
        twixfel 4y ago
        It's clear it's going badly now yes. That's obvious. What you're confusing is the situation now with the situation in the future. I wish I could say it's an easy mistake to make, but it's not. Maybe you can plausibly argue that Brexit will be a success one day in the future, but you absolutely cannot argue that it's a success right now. That would not be serious.
  - Hamuko 4y ago
- f_devd 4y ago
  To add to this, it's likely to 'originate' from (and is supported by) Thorn[0], which was discussed the previous post of mullvad's campaign. [0]: https://www.thorn.org/about-our-fight-against-sexual-exploitation-of-children/ https://www.thorn.org/about-our-fight-against-sexual-exploit...
  - raverbashing 4y ago
    This, it's Ashton Kutcher wanting to sell his tech snake oil
- peoplefromibiza 4y ago
  > She is not elected to this position, but appointed She is appointed and vetted by the parliament, who is elected directly by the people. So the commissioners do not come from Mars, they are emissaries of the elected parliament.
whitemary 4y ago
You won't get very far. The EU is an anti-democratic organization.
- peoplefromibiza 4y ago
  if the EU is anti democratic, then there's no democracy on this planet. Show me another place where 27 countries live peacefully together and jointly govern an entire sub continent, by collaborating together and discussing publicly about their political proposals. Of course it has its problems, of course it takes a lot of effort to bring 27 countries together on a subject, of course there will be controversial opinions among its members, depending on the POV (a lot more people in EU agree with the chat control proposal than those who disagree), but that's the price of democracy.
  - weberer 4y ago
    >if the EU is anti democratic, then there's no democracy on this planet. Switzerland is very democratic. People get to vote on individual laws, instead of having 3 different layers of abstraction between who you vote for and what laws are passed.
  - cardosof 4y ago
    The price of democracy in a region or organization is the minority of votes not getting the result they want and only that. Nothing to do with privacy. Not having privacy is a consequence of authoritarianism, be it for a greater good (to find child abusers) or not (to find dissidents).
    - peoplefromibiza 4y ago
      > The price of democracy in a region or organization is the minority of votes not getting the result they want and only that. The price is having to make compromises every day. It means putting together and listening to the people who say "immigration must be stopped" and "countries should have no borders" and everything in between, but no side tries to silent the others using violence. What you're talking about is the tyranny of the majority, which is not democratic and is not categorized as democracy, in a democracy the effect of the majority taking it all is moderated by a carefully balanced separation of powers. For example in a democracy the justice system is usually independent from the government. > Not having privacy is a consequence of authoritarianism, be it for a greater good (to find child abusers) or not (to find dissidents). But we have privacy in Europe, unlike most places in the World. Blindly repeating that EU is authoritarian doesn't make it true.
peoplefromibiza 4y ago
> If I lived in the EU I'd want to know who are proposing this kind of stuff We all know who these people are. It's a public discussion. > and help with anything that gets them far from public and government It simply means winning the elections at the EU parliament, which, unfortunately for Mullvad, it's not something they will ever be able to do. Mullvad posts might be popular here on HN, maybe, but they move no more than a few thousands votes in the EU (we are 450 million people).

mongol 4y ago

It is EU commissioner Ylva Johansson. Unfortunately, there is not much you can do. She is not elected to this position, but appointed, and in this case by a former government who is no longer in power.

ShroudedNight 4y ago
That sounds like she's pretty close to being a lame duck, and has little to lose, popularity wise. If that's correct, she's in an optimal place to become unhinged from a lack of accountability. I'm curious in this case if it's being a professional fall-guy or engaging in their own (u|dys)topian radicalism.
alwayslikethis 4y ago
EU seems to have an abundance of unelected regulatory positions. Eurosceptics are right in that EU represents a form of non-democratic decision-making which has the power to supersede (more) democratically formulated laws from member states. Ideally, the autocratic tendencies of the EU and the member states should cancel out by disagreeing with each other, but in reality member states seem unwilling to oppose them most of the times.
- pohuing 4y ago
  Partially yeah, as well as the complete lack of legislative initiative for the parliament, the only part that's directly elected by citizens. On the other hand though: Europeans kinda suck as a blob. See Italy electing fascists again, Germany stagnating for decades under Conservative control, basically everything east of Germany etc. Etc. The parliament is dominated by Conservative authoritarian forces as well. In that sense EU legislature is just too good at representing it's people. I gave a speech to my computer science course when the new copyright directive was about to go into its final trilogue round in 2018. Wide agreement in discussion afterwards, but not a single student cared enough to make their wishes known to their MEPs. If even they don't do it, i can only say we're getting what we asked for.
- gumballindie 4y ago
  > but in reality member states seem unwilling to oppose them most of the times That’s because when some of them do they get threatened with sanctions while others can simply dictate policy. The eu is not an equal members club.
- peoplefromibiza 4y ago
  > EU seems to have an abundance of unelected regulatory positions. Like many other system in the World, elections are to chose people's representatives, not to chose the government nor the technical apparatus (like the EU commission). The US president is one notable example of non elected position. Anyway, the proposals must be approved by the parliament, which is elected directly by the EU people in number proportional to the population of the single countries and then ratified by the single EU parliaments, which are again elected by the people. I wouldn't exactly call it "abundance of unelected regulatory positions".
TechBro8615 4y ago
But remember, it's racists in the UK who wanted to leave this organization.
- omnimus 4y ago
  Its not like UK is doing better without EU.
  - nicky0 4y ago
    A little early to judge, it's been 2 years.
    - twixfel 4y ago
      It's not too early to judge, it's going badly right now, that's clear.
      - localplume 4y ago
        [dead]
      - nicky0 4y ago
        Oh, it's clear? Why did nobody tell me. I take it back then. I am glad to hear a complex evolving geopolitical situation can be easily reducted to a simple judgement like that. It's a relief.
        twixfel 4y ago
        It's clear it's going badly now yes. That's obvious. What you're confusing is the situation now with the situation in the future. I wish I could say it's an easy mistake to make, but it's not. Maybe you can plausibly argue that Brexit will be a success one day in the future, but you absolutely cannot argue that it's a success right now. That would not be serious.
- Hamuko 4y ago
f_devd 4y ago
To add to this, it's likely to 'originate' from (and is supported by) Thorn[0], which was discussed the previous post of mullvad's campaign. [0]: https://www.thorn.org/about-our-fight-against-sexual-exploitation-of-children/ https://www.thorn.org/about-our-fight-against-sexual-exploit...
- raverbashing 4y ago
  This, it's Ashton Kutcher wanting to sell his tech snake oil
peoplefromibiza 4y ago
> She is not elected to this position, but appointed She is appointed and vetted by the parliament, who is elected directly by the people. So the commissioners do not come from Mars, they are emissaries of the elected parliament.

whitemary 4y ago

You won't get very far. The EU is an anti-democratic organization.

peoplefromibiza 4y ago
if the EU is anti democratic, then there's no democracy on this planet. Show me another place where 27 countries live peacefully together and jointly govern an entire sub continent, by collaborating together and discussing publicly about their political proposals. Of course it has its problems, of course it takes a lot of effort to bring 27 countries together on a subject, of course there will be controversial opinions among its members, depending on the POV (a lot more people in EU agree with the chat control proposal than those who disagree), but that's the price of democracy.
- weberer 4y ago
  >if the EU is anti democratic, then there's no democracy on this planet. Switzerland is very democratic. People get to vote on individual laws, instead of having 3 different layers of abstraction between who you vote for and what laws are passed.
- cardosof 4y ago
  The price of democracy in a region or organization is the minority of votes not getting the result they want and only that. Nothing to do with privacy. Not having privacy is a consequence of authoritarianism, be it for a greater good (to find child abusers) or not (to find dissidents).
  - peoplefromibiza 4y ago
    > The price of democracy in a region or organization is the minority of votes not getting the result they want and only that. The price is having to make compromises every day. It means putting together and listening to the people who say "immigration must be stopped" and "countries should have no borders" and everything in between, but no side tries to silent the others using violence. What you're talking about is the tyranny of the majority, which is not democratic and is not categorized as democracy, in a democracy the effect of the majority taking it all is moderated by a carefully balanced separation of powers. For example in a democracy the justice system is usually independent from the government. > Not having privacy is a consequence of authoritarianism, be it for a greater good (to find child abusers) or not (to find dissidents). But we have privacy in Europe, unlike most places in the World. Blindly repeating that EU is authoritarian doesn't make it true.

peoplefromibiza 4y ago

> If I lived in the EU I'd want to know who are proposing this kind of stuff We all know who these people are. It's a public discussion. > and help with anything that gets them far from public and government It simply means winning the elections at the EU parliament, which, unfortunately for Mullvad, it's not something they will ever be able to do. Mullvad posts might be popular here on HN, maybe, but they move no more than a few thousands votes in the EU (we are 450 million people).