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The odds are very low. It all depents on the people. So far, the European citizens are very privacy senstive. The European institutions are characterized by a h

The odds are very low. It all depents on the people. So far, the European citizens are very privacy senstive. The European institutions are characterized by a huge devision of power. There is no chance that European instutitions can impose their will against a considerable majority of people. If people turn away from liberal democracy, that's another matter. But then everything is lost anyway.

joe_mamba 8mo ago
[flagged]
- roenxi 8mo ago
  > Sure is convenient that we keep having more and more crisis and boogiemen that governments can leverage... The problem with this phrasing is it makes it sound hyperbolic, but it is important to remember the world is large and there are always, in a literal and normal sense, multiple major crises going on at any moment. People who don't pay much attention to politics sometimes get confused about why crises elevated by the corporate media get ignored. A big answer is becuase they are elevated for political reasons, usually the crisis is fairly routine in absolute terms.
  - joe_mamba 8mo ago
    >there are always, in a literal and normal sense, multiple major crises going on at any moment True, but my point I wanted to draw attention to, is HOW these crisis are handled now, not that there's many of them. Every crisis now seems to be exclusively used as a vehicle to justify taking away just a little bit more of your freedom and anonymity, or implement more fiscal policies that will leave you footing the bill but just so happens it will be enriching the wealthy as a side effect. Because such policies shoved out the door in times of crisis, don't pass through the lengthy public debates and scrutiny regular policies have to go through, so it's the perfect opportunity to sneak and fast-track some nefarious stuff in. I'm not that old yet, but I don't feel like this backdoor was misused to this extent in the past, like pre-2008 I mean (except 9/11 of course). It definitely feels like politicians have gooten of taste and are abusing this exploit now more with every little opportunity.
- hilios 8mo ago
  >Didn't really stop them passing whatever rules they wanted during Covid, did it? >Or today with Russia and Ukraine situation. Sure is convenient that we keep having more and more crisis and boogiemen that governments can leverage to deflect accountability and bypass the wishes of the population, for our own good of course. >Why do you think Germans supported to tie themselves to Russia's gas and destroy their nuclear power. You see you might get called a bot, Russian troll, or MAGA a whole lot less, if you didn't pull out ALL the topics those groups are playing at once. There is plenty to criticize about the EU institutions, but man that is a very odd focus.
  - joe_mamba 8mo ago
    [flagged]
  - close04 8mo ago
    Two things can be true. While the user you're replying to has a weirdly focused agenda and insistence, some of the points raised are definitely valid. I do not agree with the overall conclusion that "EU bad". But there are some pretty bad things going on, and the trend is definitely concerning. If you wait until you're on fire, you waited for too long.
miohtama 8mo ago
> There is no chance that European instutitions can impose their will against a considerable majority of people The EU commission just passed chat control to have government mandated software in every phone
- notrealyme123 8mo ago
  If you want to over simplify at least do it right.
- digiown 8mo ago
  It's substantially neutered from the original proposal, with most of the scary parts taken out. I'd count that as a win as far as how antidemocratic the EU commission is. https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2025/12/after-years-controversy-eus-chat-control-nears-its-final-hurdle-what-know https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2025/12/after-years-controvers...
  - joe_mamba 8mo ago
    Given how many world leaders form the west had absolutely the most vile chats with Epstein about doing despicable things to people, I'd totally want chat control but only for our leaders. They certainly proved that's who needs it the most to keep us safe.
- Brybry 8mo ago
  Do you have a citation for this? I can't find anything showing that 2022/0155(COD) has passed the EU Council or Parliament (nor can I find any scheduled votes). [1] The most recent related information I could find was some movement to extend the temporary derogation of the ePrivacy Directive, which expires on 2026/04/03, to 2028/04/03 but even that did not seem to have passed yet. [2] The very fact they're trying to extend the temporary derogation hints to me that they think it'll take some time yet to pass Chat Control (if at all). [1] https://oeil.europarl.europa.eu/oeil/en/procedure-file?reference=2022/0155(COD) https://oeil.europarl.europa.eu/oeil/en/procedure-file?refer... [2] https://oeil.europarl.europa.eu/oeil/en/procedure-file?reference=2025/0429(COD) https://oeil.europarl.europa.eu/oeil/en/procedure-file?refer...
Cyph0n 8mo ago
> So far, the European citizens are very privacy senstive. In some areas, sure - like GDPR. In other areas, absolutely not - like chat control. As another commenter pointed out, it seems as if government mandated privacy intrusion is OK, while violations by corporations are quickly shutdown. It’s like the opposite of how it works here in the US.
- joe_mamba 8mo ago
  >it seems as if government mandated privacy intrusion is OK Once you give people an outside boogieman(Putin, Trump, Covids, etc) or a self inflicted false flag crisis(surge in violent crime rates for example) to shake them up to their core and put the fear in them, you can then easily sell your intrusion of privacy in their lives and extension of the police state, as the necessary solution that protects them. When you start lose control of your people because their standard of living has been going downhill for 2 decades and they realize the future prospects aren't any better so they hate you even more, you can regain control of them by rallying them up on your side in a us-versus-them type of game against external or internal aggressors that you paint as "the enemy". The media is your friend here. /s This isn't an EU or US exclusive issue, it's everywhere with a government issue. The difference as to why the EU people seem to be more OK with government intrusion compared to the US, is that EU always has external aggressors the government can point to as justification for invasiveness and control, while the US has been and still is the unchallenged global superpower so it has no real external threats ATM, meaning division must be manufactured internally (left vs right, red vs blue, woke vs maga, skin color vs skin color, gender vs gender, etc) so that the ruling class can assert control in peace. Either way, we all seem to be heading towards the same destination.
  - stoneforger 8mo ago
    Amen to that.
  - Cyph0n 8mo ago
    I agree 100%. Europe is just ahead of us for the time being, but our turn is soon approaching...
the_fall 8mo ago
35 years ago, a good chunk of the current EU was under a Soviet-imposed totalitarian rule. Spain was a dictatorship until 1975. And it's been just 80 years since WWII. It always boggles my mind that most Europeans are absolutely convinced that nothing like that could ever happen again. Meanwhile, many people in the US are convinced that the government will be coming for them any minute now.
- teh_infallible 8mo ago
  [flagged]
  - altcognito 8mo ago
    They who and what?
    - deadlocked 8mo ago
      They’ll give you a small handful of examples, of which a number occurred in the UK (famously not a member of the EU), most of which were actually arrests for incitement, and of the remainder the majority were thrown out before ever going to trial, or subsequently on appeal. Very few of the cases they present will have involved citizens being murdered in the streets by the government for exercising their absolute right to free speech.
      - pb7 8mo ago
        The UK has more arrests for social media posts than any other country in the world, including authoritarian countries like Russia, Belarus, etc. Germany is the third highest. Both have thousands, not "a small handful".
        piltdownman 8mo ago
        Ah, the Joe Rogan school of geopolitics finally rears its HGH malformed head {1}https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/wales-england-germany-freedom-house-ministry-of-public-security-b2900316.html https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/wales-englan... {2}https://pa.media/blogs/fact-check/fact-check-international-data-on-online-comments-arrests-not-comparable/ https://pa.media/blogs/fact-check/fact-check-international-d... {3}https://www.standard.co.uk/news/tommy-robinson-uk-speech-claims-b1248644.html https://www.standard.co.uk/news/tommy-robinson-uk-speech-cla... Most of the erroneous conclusions come from a cursory interpretation of a Times article from last year: {4} https://www.thetimes.com/uk/crime/article/police-make-30-arrests-a-day-for-offensive-online-messages-zbv886tqf https://www.thetimes.com/uk/crime/article/police-make-30-arr... In 2023, UK police forces made around 12,000 arrests under the Communications Act 2003 and the Malicious Communications Act 1988. These laws cover sending messages that are "grossly offensive, threatening, indecent, or menacing over communications networks" (which includes social media). Prosecutions resulting tend to come from a small subset of serious crimes - stalking, incitement to hatred, endangering minors etc... This was gleefully misinterpreted by Musk, Steven Forbes and the rest of the right-wing braintrust as "12,000 people were arrested for saying politically incorrect things." Germany at third highest is equally in the realm of complete fantasy. The Tagesschau debunked it and concluded that the German numbers make no sense. There is no statistic in Germany for the number of arrests, but the number of people investigated is lower for the period claimed and not all led to arrests so the number is simply a fabrication. https://www.tagesschau.de/faktenfinder/grafik-festnahmen-online-kommentare-100.html https://www.tagesschau.de/faktenfinder/grafik-festnahmen-onl... Finally, the notion that China or Russia would self-report less cases than the UK and expect the figure to be believed is farcical. There isn't even something comparable to the anti-activism laws or the HK47 in the UK.
lnxg33k1 8mo ago
In Italy were already trying to break that division of power, we’ve a referendum that does just that
gpvos 8mo ago
Very privacy sensitive? In Germany, maybe. Elsewhere in Europe, not so much. See the regular attempts to push through something like chat control.
wqaatwt 8mo ago
> citizens are very privacy senstive Their reaction and opposition to ChatControl (or near complete lack of both) would indicate otherwise? They could hardly care less about privacy. National governments which have openly declared that believe they have the right to unlimited access to any private communication hardly lost any popularity or faced real consequences.

joe_mamba 8mo ago

[flagged]

roenxi 8mo ago
> Sure is convenient that we keep having more and more crisis and boogiemen that governments can leverage... The problem with this phrasing is it makes it sound hyperbolic, but it is important to remember the world is large and there are always, in a literal and normal sense, multiple major crises going on at any moment. People who don't pay much attention to politics sometimes get confused about why crises elevated by the corporate media get ignored. A big answer is becuase they are elevated for political reasons, usually the crisis is fairly routine in absolute terms.
- joe_mamba 8mo ago
  >there are always, in a literal and normal sense, multiple major crises going on at any moment True, but my point I wanted to draw attention to, is HOW these crisis are handled now, not that there's many of them. Every crisis now seems to be exclusively used as a vehicle to justify taking away just a little bit more of your freedom and anonymity, or implement more fiscal policies that will leave you footing the bill but just so happens it will be enriching the wealthy as a side effect. Because such policies shoved out the door in times of crisis, don't pass through the lengthy public debates and scrutiny regular policies have to go through, so it's the perfect opportunity to sneak and fast-track some nefarious stuff in. I'm not that old yet, but I don't feel like this backdoor was misused to this extent in the past, like pre-2008 I mean (except 9/11 of course). It definitely feels like politicians have gooten of taste and are abusing this exploit now more with every little opportunity.
hilios 8mo ago
>Didn't really stop them passing whatever rules they wanted during Covid, did it? >Or today with Russia and Ukraine situation. Sure is convenient that we keep having more and more crisis and boogiemen that governments can leverage to deflect accountability and bypass the wishes of the population, for our own good of course. >Why do you think Germans supported to tie themselves to Russia's gas and destroy their nuclear power. You see you might get called a bot, Russian troll, or MAGA a whole lot less, if you didn't pull out ALL the topics those groups are playing at once. There is plenty to criticize about the EU institutions, but man that is a very odd focus.
- joe_mamba 8mo ago
  [flagged]
- close04 8mo ago
  Two things can be true. While the user you're replying to has a weirdly focused agenda and insistence, some of the points raised are definitely valid. I do not agree with the overall conclusion that "EU bad". But there are some pretty bad things going on, and the trend is definitely concerning. If you wait until you're on fire, you waited for too long.

miohtama 8mo ago

> There is no chance that European instutitions can impose their will against a considerable majority of people The EU commission just passed chat control to have government mandated software in every phone

notrealyme123 8mo ago
If you want to over simplify at least do it right.
digiown 8mo ago
It's substantially neutered from the original proposal, with most of the scary parts taken out. I'd count that as a win as far as how antidemocratic the EU commission is. https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2025/12/after-years-controversy-eus-chat-control-nears-its-final-hurdle-what-know https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2025/12/after-years-controvers...
- joe_mamba 8mo ago
  Given how many world leaders form the west had absolutely the most vile chats with Epstein about doing despicable things to people, I'd totally want chat control but only for our leaders. They certainly proved that's who needs it the most to keep us safe.
Brybry 8mo ago
Do you have a citation for this? I can't find anything showing that 2022/0155(COD) has passed the EU Council or Parliament (nor can I find any scheduled votes). [1] The most recent related information I could find was some movement to extend the temporary derogation of the ePrivacy Directive, which expires on 2026/04/03, to 2028/04/03 but even that did not seem to have passed yet. [2] The very fact they're trying to extend the temporary derogation hints to me that they think it'll take some time yet to pass Chat Control (if at all). [1] https://oeil.europarl.europa.eu/oeil/en/procedure-file?reference=2022/0155(COD) https://oeil.europarl.europa.eu/oeil/en/procedure-file?refer... [2] https://oeil.europarl.europa.eu/oeil/en/procedure-file?reference=2025/0429(COD) https://oeil.europarl.europa.eu/oeil/en/procedure-file?refer...

Cyph0n 8mo ago

> So far, the European citizens are very privacy senstive. In some areas, sure - like GDPR. In other areas, absolutely not - like chat control. As another commenter pointed out, it seems as if government mandated privacy intrusion is OK, while violations by corporations are quickly shutdown. It’s like the opposite of how it works here in the US.

joe_mamba 8mo ago
>it seems as if government mandated privacy intrusion is OK Once you give people an outside boogieman(Putin, Trump, Covids, etc) or a self inflicted false flag crisis(surge in violent crime rates for example) to shake them up to their core and put the fear in them, you can then easily sell your intrusion of privacy in their lives and extension of the police state, as the necessary solution that protects them. When you start lose control of your people because their standard of living has been going downhill for 2 decades and they realize the future prospects aren't any better so they hate you even more, you can regain control of them by rallying them up on your side in a us-versus-them type of game against external or internal aggressors that you paint as "the enemy". The media is your friend here. /s This isn't an EU or US exclusive issue, it's everywhere with a government issue. The difference as to why the EU people seem to be more OK with government intrusion compared to the US, is that EU always has external aggressors the government can point to as justification for invasiveness and control, while the US has been and still is the unchallenged global superpower so it has no real external threats ATM, meaning division must be manufactured internally (left vs right, red vs blue, woke vs maga, skin color vs skin color, gender vs gender, etc) so that the ruling class can assert control in peace. Either way, we all seem to be heading towards the same destination.
- stoneforger 8mo ago
  Amen to that.
- Cyph0n 8mo ago
  I agree 100%. Europe is just ahead of us for the time being, but our turn is soon approaching...

the_fall 8mo ago

35 years ago, a good chunk of the current EU was under a Soviet-imposed totalitarian rule. Spain was a dictatorship until 1975. And it's been just 80 years since WWII. It always boggles my mind that most Europeans are absolutely convinced that nothing like that could ever happen again. Meanwhile, many people in the US are convinced that the government will be coming for them any minute now.

teh_infallible 8mo ago
[flagged]
- altcognito 8mo ago
  They who and what?
  - deadlocked 8mo ago
    They’ll give you a small handful of examples, of which a number occurred in the UK (famously not a member of the EU), most of which were actually arrests for incitement, and of the remainder the majority were thrown out before ever going to trial, or subsequently on appeal. Very few of the cases they present will have involved citizens being murdered in the streets by the government for exercising their absolute right to free speech.
    - pb7 8mo ago
      The UK has more arrests for social media posts than any other country in the world, including authoritarian countries like Russia, Belarus, etc. Germany is the third highest. Both have thousands, not "a small handful".
      - piltdownman 8mo ago
        Ah, the Joe Rogan school of geopolitics finally rears its HGH malformed head {1}https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/wales-england-germany-freedom-house-ministry-of-public-security-b2900316.html https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/wales-englan... {2}https://pa.media/blogs/fact-check/fact-check-international-data-on-online-comments-arrests-not-comparable/ https://pa.media/blogs/fact-check/fact-check-international-d... {3}https://www.standard.co.uk/news/tommy-robinson-uk-speech-claims-b1248644.html https://www.standard.co.uk/news/tommy-robinson-uk-speech-cla... Most of the erroneous conclusions come from a cursory interpretation of a Times article from last year: {4} https://www.thetimes.com/uk/crime/article/police-make-30-arrests-a-day-for-offensive-online-messages-zbv886tqf https://www.thetimes.com/uk/crime/article/police-make-30-arr... In 2023, UK police forces made around 12,000 arrests under the Communications Act 2003 and the Malicious Communications Act 1988. These laws cover sending messages that are "grossly offensive, threatening, indecent, or menacing over communications networks" (which includes social media). Prosecutions resulting tend to come from a small subset of serious crimes - stalking, incitement to hatred, endangering minors etc... This was gleefully misinterpreted by Musk, Steven Forbes and the rest of the right-wing braintrust as "12,000 people were arrested for saying politically incorrect things." Germany at third highest is equally in the realm of complete fantasy. The Tagesschau debunked it and concluded that the German numbers make no sense. There is no statistic in Germany for the number of arrests, but the number of people investigated is lower for the period claimed and not all led to arrests so the number is simply a fabrication. https://www.tagesschau.de/faktenfinder/grafik-festnahmen-online-kommentare-100.html https://www.tagesschau.de/faktenfinder/grafik-festnahmen-onl... Finally, the notion that China or Russia would self-report less cases than the UK and expect the figure to be believed is farcical. There isn't even something comparable to the anti-activism laws or the HK47 in the UK.

lnxg33k1 8mo ago

In Italy were already trying to break that division of power, we’ve a referendum that does just that

gpvos 8mo ago

Very privacy sensitive? In Germany, maybe. Elsewhere in Europe, not so much. See the regular attempts to push through something like chat control.

wqaatwt 8mo ago

> citizens are very privacy senstive Their reaction and opposition to ChatControl (or near complete lack of both) would indicate otherwise? They could hardly care less about privacy. National governments which have openly declared that believe they have the right to unlimited access to any private communication hardly lost any popularity or faced real consequences.