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This chat control topic is undemocratic, allegedly illegal in many jurisdictions (such as Germany), yet, keeps coming up ever and ever again, and the politician

• gadders 1y ago
  It's the EU way - "We will keep holding the vote until we get the result that we want."
  • justinclift 1y ago
    That approach has spectacularly backfired for the UK, as they used to do the same thing too. ;)
    • cynicalsecurity 1y ago
      UK is much worse than EU in terms of privacy and encryption.
      • graemep 1y ago
        It will not be if chat control passes, and I am not sure it was true most of the time before (there was no significant change between Brexit and the Online Safety Act) There were similar problems in areas other than privacy and encryption, or indeed technology.
        • nickslaughter02 1y ago
          See https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45274678 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45274678
          • graemep 1y ago
            Key disclosure was law at least a decade before Brexit, so was compatible with EU law, and the other change (the chat control like one) was in the Online Safety Act (and has not been enforced so far because its not technically feasible), so that does not contradict my claim (if that was your intention).
      • Xelbair 1y ago
        It is, but i would rather take toothless UK's one over EU's Orwellian nightmare. UK's one is easily avoided. But reality is that NONE of those options should be even considered.
        • fluxusars 1y ago
          It might be easily avoided now, but it's easy for them to tighten the reins in the future.
      • hardlianotion 1y ago
        how so?
    • FirmwareBurner 1y ago
      What do you mean by backfire?
      • anticensor 1y ago
        A massive unrest and protests.
      • tonyhart7 1y ago
        as another comment suggest "A massive unrest and protests." but not for chat control but another things, they have going much worse
  • aleph_minus_one 1y ago
    > It's the EU way - "We will keep holding the vote until we get the result that we want." Exactly. There is a reason why more and more EU-skeptical movements gain traction in various EU countries.
    • delusional 1y ago
      EU skepticism is at a 15 year low, and general approval hasnt been higher since 2007. Europeans in general like or is indifferent towards the EU.
      • aleph_minus_one 1y ago
        > EU skepticism is at a 15 year low, and general approval hasnt been higher since 2007. My observations are different.
        • danieljacksonno 1y ago
          Your clique might be more skeptical. Statistics show the population at large is not.
        • cianmm 1y ago
          Here’s some data. Skepticism is pretty low and approval is pretty high https://www.statista.com/statistics/1360333/euroscepticism-european-union-public-image/ https://www.statista.com/statistics/1360333/euroscepticism-e...
          • graemep 1y ago
            Do those numbers include the UK when it was in the EU? Obviously removing a large pool of sceptics would shift the numbers. The "positive" number has recovered from a low in the wake of the Eurozone crisis but is still fallen significantly from the pre-crisis level of around 50%. It would be interesting to see a breakdown by country - The EU's own report suggests very big variations between countries: https://op.europa.eu/en/publication-detail/-/publication/90578b87-539a-11ef-acbc-01aa75ed71a1/language-en# https://op.europa.eu/en/publication-detail/-/publication/905...
  • yohannparis 1y ago
    And who runs the EU? The MEPs and members of the countries government. It's not like it's a different country imposing their way onto us. Talk/contacts your ministers and MEPs if you want your voice to be represented.
    • FpUser 1y ago
      >"Talk/contacts your ministers and MEPs if you want your voice to be represented." And be told to sod off. From Wikipedia: [0]-"Currently, there is one member per member state, but members are bound by their oath of office to represent the general interest of the EU as a whole rather than their home state." [0] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/European_Commission https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/European_Commission
    • Eddy_Viscosity2 1y ago
      > And who runs the EU? How difficult is it to run? How much money do you need? What are the barriers to success? Is it set up so that only the already rich and powerful can run and win (and therefore they are just pushing their own interests), and if not do you need considerable financial support (and therefore are beholden to the already rich and powerful who funded your campaign)?
      • Jensson 1y ago
        There are people with no backing, not even existing parties, that get elected as EU representatives. So its not that difficult to run if you have a platform some people care about. It is much easier to break into EU than the local governments, since EU has so much less power, so you have more weird people there.
    • like_any_other 1y ago
      The problem is the indirection. Only the European Commission can propose legislation [1], so the legislative direction of the EU is entirely determined by them - MEPs can only slow it down. And citizens don't vote for the Commission directly, meaning there's a lot of backroom dealing in its selection. [1] Which also covers, I think, the act of repealing prior legislation.
  • bluecalm 1y ago
    Don't forget "if we let people vote by some misfortune and their vote is opposite of what we wanted we will overrule it anyway".
  • p0w3n3d 1y ago
    It's Not Who Votes That Counts, It's Who Counts The Votes - J.Stalin
    • Y_Y 1y ago
      > In democracy it's your vote that counts; In feudalism it's your count that votes. - Mogens Jallberg Regarding your Stalin "quote", please see https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/stalin-vote-count-quote/ https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/stalin-vote-count-quote/ .
  • munksbeer 1y ago
    > It's the EU way - "We will keep holding the vote until we get the result that we want." Please inform yourself or you're in danger of letting things happen through your ignorance. The commission is not pushing this. They're acting on instructions from a certain number of elected politicians. And, you're misleading others when you post stuff like this. None of us posting in these topics wants this proposal to pass. And in order to fight it, you've got to be correctly informed.
  • moffkalast 1y ago
    Yeah the Commission really needs to go, MEPs need to be able to propose laws. That's really all there is to it to fix the entire situation.
    • jonp888 1y ago
      Every country in the world has a "Commission". It's no different to the UK Civil Service or the various US Federal Governments. If it didn't exist then the EU would be unable to implement any of it's policies. Can you explain how MEP's directly proposing laws would affect this? I really don't get it. In parliamentary systems it's normal that virtually all legislation originates in the executive. In the British parliament at least, that a law is privately proposed and then becomes law is rare and normally restricted to very simple legislation on specific issues.
      • moffkalast 1y ago
        The EU doesn't implement any of its policies by itself, ergo it should not require an executive branch of its own. There is no EU army, no EU police. We already have an instance of that in each member state which is required to implement EU laws on its territory, the Council of Ministers coordinates on that afaik. The general process is a bit like this, simplified: - the Council of heads of state appoints the Commission - the Commission proposes laws - the Parliament approves laws - the Council of ministers implements them - the Court blocks any unconstitutional laws The problem has been for the longest time that the Commission appointments are not elected, somewhat mired in cronyism, and they keep proposing nonsense laws while the elected parliament can just stand there and vote no while not being able to suggest any legislation we actually need.
  • Flatterer3544 1y ago
    While the EU foundation was laid out in a time much different to our modern times and the faults that rise with it, especially that the majority of the EU doesn't have the sway as a union should and that a single state can block all others. But at least when it comes to Chat Control, it is not EU level, it's member states pushing for it and at least for now EU blocking it, so at least for once it is a good thing and the minority of ~8 states can still block it for the majority, block it for all 27 states..
  • SAI_Peregrinus 1y ago
    Not exclusive to the EU, the US does the same, as does the UK.
• Quarrel 1y ago
  I'm not a fan, but in what was is this, or any other topic, undemocratic to have debates and votes on? The sanctions politicians should face for bringing up unpopular topics should be that they don't get voted for. > These EU politicians endangering freedom, justice and democracy must be held accountable, with the most powerful punishments available. Yes. Vote them out. Keep raising it.
  • FirmwareBurner 1y ago
    >Yes. Vote them out. Keep raising it. OK. How do I vote out Ursula vd Leyen?
    • eqvinox 1y ago
      Next European Parliament election will be in 2029. Edit: there was a copypaste of voting requirements here, from https://eur-lex.europa.eu/EN/legal-content/summary/voting-rights-and-eligibility-in-european-parliament-elections.html https://eur-lex.europa.eu/EN/legal-content/summary/voting-ri.... This is apparently wrong; you can also vote if you're not residing in the EU, only EU citizen. (I thought this was the case, and that link not saying that made me suspicious.) How it is possible that they've put up incorrect information on voting rights, I have no clue. Actual reference, this time legal text: https://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/?uri=CELEX%3A01993L0109-20130127 https://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/?uri=CELEX%3A... Any person who, on the reference date: (a) is a citizen of the Union within the meaning of the second subparagraph of Article 8 (1) of the Treaty; (b) is not a national of the Member State of residence, but satisfies the same conditions in respect of the right to vote and to stand as a candidate as that State imposes by law on its own nationals, shall have the right to vote […] So either citizenship or residency is sufficient.
      • FirmwareBurner 1y ago
        I was talking about voting for the position held by Ursula, the president of EU commission, not the EU parliamentary elections.
    • 1y ago
• ashoeafoot 1y ago
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• jokethrowaway 1y ago
  Democracy is incompatible with freedom by definition, it's the dictatorship of the majority over the minority. Especially in a time where controlling public opinion is just a matter of running targeted ad campaigns on social medias and buying newspapers and tv stations. If we like freedom we need to get rid of power centralisation, as much as possible, and give back the power to the individual by removing as many laws as possible and relying on privatisation and decentralisation. But there is no one left to fight in the western world, everybody is glued to their smartphone and we're doomed to become the next China.
  • torben-friis 1y ago
    The people doing the public opinion control you mention are powerful private interests. What makes you think those people would be any less dangerous to your freedom when unbounded by law?
  • the_gipsy 1y ago
    > it's the dictatorship of the majority over the minority. That's very naïve.
    • uncircle 1y ago
      Yeah; it's even worse than that.
• outime 1y ago
  >Endeavour like these make people vote for extremists Maybe it's time to start considering the current individuals in power as extremists? Just because their speech is more 'peaceful' doesn't mean their actions aren't extremist in nature.
  • that_guy_iain 1y ago
    [flagged]
  • singulasar 1y ago
    or maybe let's not? their actions are clearly not extremist, absolutely not perfect and not always equally democratic, but not extremist or violent like the actual extremists...
    • raxxorraxor 1y ago
      I do think the ambition to spy on all private communication to be quite extremist. Especially Germany should know better. If you build two autocratic dictatorships on average per century, maybe start to take care that state powers are restricted. The US is fully correct in its criticism of Germany regarding freedom of speech and house searches. Sure, on surveillance their arguments would be very weak... Absolutely nothing positive will be gained by this surveillance, so there isn't even the smallest security benefit. On the contrary.
      • singulasar 1y ago
        Again, I disagree, I wouldn't call it extremist. It's vile and wrong, but people all over the political spectrum are in favour of this. there's a difference between something being bad or self-serving, and something being extremist. Labelling everything as extremist does not help anyone, especially today when everyone is already highly divided. No way I'm getting into the restrict state powers discussion as that is highly complex and not something that can properly be discussed on an internet forum.
        • 1y ago
• Kenji 1y ago
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• tjpnz 1y ago
  They need to be named. Shouldn't be able to go anywhere in Brussels (or any city in any member state) without seeing their photo and name on a giant bus shelter poster. I would throw some € in the direction of that.
  • nickslaughter02 1y ago
    Start with these: Ylva Johansson from Social Democrats https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ylva_Johansson#Surveillance_of_private_chat_communication https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ylva_Johansson#Surveillance_of... Peter Hummelgaard from Social Democrats https://mastodon.social/@chatcontrol/115204439983078498 https://mastodon.social/@chatcontrol/115204439983078498
• ookdatnog 1y ago
  It's not undemocratic. The behavior of the parliament reflects the reality that only a tiny minority of the population care at all about this issue. One might be tempted to blame a lack of media attention, but I don't think that's it. For example in the US, the Snowden revelations attracted tons and tons of media attention, yet it never became a major topic in elections, as far as I'm aware. No politician's career was ended over it, and neither did new politicians rise based on a platform of privacy-awareness. No one talks about mass surveillance today. No one cares. There is no reason to believe that the situation is different in Europe.
  • robertlagrant 1y ago
    > The behavior of the parliament reflects the reality that only a tiny minority of the population care at all about this issue Then it's not very democratic to change it.
  • bondarchuk 1y ago
    Parliamentary democracy just fundamentally has a weakness when it comes to single-issue voting. After picking a party to vote on based on housing, economic policy, crime, ..., how much voting power so to say is left for.. which guy the party says they'll send to the european commission? And what that guy's stance on chat-control is? If they're even publicizing that...
    • account42 1y ago
      Not to mention that once voted in they are not bound by their campaign promises.
      • tracker1 1y ago
        It can sometimes happen... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Contract_with_America https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Contract_with_America
    • Ntrails 1y ago
      > how much voting power so to say is left for.. which guy the party says they'll send to the european commission? Short of a direct (referendum based) democracy how do you resolve that?
• that_guy_iain 1y ago
  > This chat control topic is undemocratic, allegedly illegal in many jurisdictions (such as Germany), yet, keeps coming up ever and ever again, and the politicians face no consequences whatsoever. How is it undemocratic? Arresting terrorists, drug dealers, child abusers, etc have no impact on democracy. And it's legal for the government to intercept your communications and has been for decades and in fact your communications have been mass monitored for decades and we still have democracy. > allegedly illegal in many jurisdictions (such as Germany) Germany is one of the leaders in data requests in the world. They're right on it. > keeps coming up ever and ever again, and the politicians face no consequences whatsoever. That's because we have a democracy and people vote on who they want. And if they do what people want they get another few more yeears. So these politicans just following the will of the people. > Endeavour like these make people vote for extremists, distrust the EU and democracies, or just give up on politics for good. Those people we can just ignore, they were always going to be on the fringe. > These EU politicians endangering freedom, justice and democracy must be held accountable, with the most powerful punishments available. They are not. You've just been blissfully unaware of the world you've been living in, and think this is something new. Nah, the only thing new is that everyone's messages are encrypted. That's the only new thing.
• p0w3n3d 1y ago
  European Commission is not a democratic body. No EU citizen voted for them.
  • qnpnp 1y ago
    By this logic, most of EU governments are not democratic bodies either.
    • bondarchuk 1y ago
      In my country I vote for a person and that person gets a seat in parliament. That is democratic according to this definition.
      • jonp888 1y ago
        The EU Commission is a group of permanent employees who sit in an office and write reports, administer projects and draft legislation. They have no voting rights. They are organised into departments, each headed by a politically appointed Commissioner. Your country has an identical group of people with a similar role who you also do not vote for, organised in just the same way. For some reason it's only "undemocratic" when the EU does it, even though literally every country in the world has some kind of permanent establishment of administrators and no country could function without them.
  • munksbeer 1y ago
    The European Commission is a civil service drafting these proposals on instructions from elected politicians. I am going to keep banging this drum because there is too much ignorance on this topic and it harms the fight against it more than helps.
  • izacus 1y ago
    Good thing that elected parliament needs to vote for this. So what's your point?
• potato3732842 1y ago
  >This chat control topic is undemocratic, allegedly illegal in many jurisdictions (such as Germany), yet, keeps coming up ever and ever again, and the politicians face no consequences whatsoever. Politicians are basically whores that only use their mouths. They'll say whatever gets them in office and keeps them there. Whether that's simping for extremists, special interests, the teacher's union, etc, etc. The state(s) wants to snoop on the peasants' messaging and the state itself is an interest that politicians can get ahead by pandering to, no different than any other interest (from their perspective as politicians and more equal animals generally, not our perspective as less equal animals under the boot). When you're talking about elections like the EU's big interest groups, like the state, tend to dominate.
• izacus 1y ago
  I think the result of a referendum that would pose a question "Do you want law enforcement to be allowed access to your private messages when investigating child molesters or would you like to listen to folks who put furry teen girls in front of their websites?" would have results that you certanly wouldn't like. And they'd be democratic. So perhaps before calling something undemocratic, first make sure that the majority of voters actually agree with you.
  • rollcat 1y ago
    Phrasing the question is half the battle. "Do you want to be spied on by your government?" Yes is yes, no is no, anything more comes from evil.
    • izacus 1y ago
      Yes, that's exactly my point - it's important to understand the issue and the messaging about it. Government "spies" on you for many many things and I think HN "all government is evil" panic isn't really reflected in outlook of EU citizens and won't be looked upon positively by public at large. So again, be careful what you're calling "undemocratic" because that's not the same as "different from my opinion".
      • rollcat 1y ago
        Is it still democratic if the elected representatives are trying to subvert democracy?
        • izacus 1y ago
          What are you talking about here exactly?
      • tracker1 1y ago
        Since being on the wrong side of supporting The Patriot Act in the US... I'm pretty firmly on the side of, if the government has a power that can be abused, it's only a matter of time until it is abused and in creative ways you never expected. I'm generally against all reactionist legislation as an instance "no" stance as well.
• oaiey 1y ago
  Politician can not face consequences when they discuss something illegal. Politicians in parlaments literal job is to define legal and illegal. That they repeat that until success and against the perceived will of the general population is maybe a procedural problem (as in: do not disturb the legal body with stupid stuff) but it is still their job. I 100% agree with your position. Chat control is basically an attack on every conversation everywhere because modern social habits are using it like my chat with my neighbors over the fence. It is not the same as mail interception it is much worse.
  • scythe 1y ago
    >Politician can not face consequences when they discuss something illegal. Politicians can't face consequences from the legal system when they discuss something illegal. They can, and should, face consequences from the voters.
• zosima 1y ago
  Maybe those you call extremists are now the only sane people.
• stateofinquiry 1y ago
  When the government is monolithic (which it tends to become) and holds a lot of power it is just a matter of time before "some animals are more equal than others". The best safeguards I know about are 1) limiting the power of government and 2) checks and balances on what powers they do have. Nothing is perfect, and even having the two pillars above does not guarantee eternal justice (or even that the pillars will remain in place). But we can try to keep remembering and demand better. Sincerely: Good luck, EU.
• burnte 1y ago
  > and the politicians face no consequences whatsoever. And who is going to hold them accountable? They make the laws, they're the ones who should know best this is illegal, so if they don't care no one else will. Voters? I live in America so I've lost a lot of faith in people voting for politicians who will protect their rights. I legitimately have no idea how to fix this type of problem. We spent the better part of the 20th century setting up systems to enable people to thrive and have expanded rights. And now the generations that benefited from all of that want to tear it down and take us back to feudal times with unelected, unaccountable, all-powerful leaders and a nobility class that owns everything and leaving 95% of people live in poverty and sickness. It's like we forgot how to raise strong people with good morals.