4 ms·

I think you and I disagree. I don’t think Jesper is focused on the right issues. Big tech (private companies who largely just care about profits) and foreign g

I think you and I disagree. I don’t think Jesper is focused on the right issues. Big tech (private companies who largely just care about profits) and foreign governments (the Americans for example), are way lower on my “things Europe should be worried” about list. They’re there of course, but lower. Private companies don’t have the ability to ruin your life in the same way your own government does. They just want your money. And the US government is truly a disinterested party. 99% of Americans couldn’t place Denmark on a map (I’m not kidding). When push comes to shove, they fundamentally do not care what happens here. The real threat is our own governments, who we have given the legal authority to enact all the negative outcomes that will come from totalitarian erosions of privacy and over regulation of individuals. Building up this scary “foreign boogieman” and stoking this moral panic is what is enabling the authoritarian action. Pointing fingers at Big Tech and the US is a giant distraction tactic so you don’t look at the terrible things our own domestic politicians have done and the fact they have zero plans to do the hard things needed to get us out of this mess. It's just champagne and smiling over dinner, while the old eat the young, the government eats the private sector, and endless legislation eats away your opportunity to do anything more exciting than build powerpoints at a braindead consulting firm.

yorwba 4mo ago
If you think that Jesper isn't attacking the right issues, but Lars does, then you should definitely hope that Lars switches to Jesper's more popular approach. Unless you think there can never be a democratic consensus in favor of privacy, therefore the only way is for a small vanguard of privacy activists to impose their will on the hostile majority and establish a totalitarian privacy dictatorship. Then it wouldn't matter so much whether you look good in the court of popular opinion or not.
- megous 4mo ago
  You're turning things on their heads. Currently there's some modicum of privacy. Politicians are trying to force removal of this on everyone.
- wqaatwt 4mo ago
  You can not “democratically” decide to abolish certain inalienable personal liberties and still pretend you are a democracy. That’s just mob rule or worse. > totalitarian privacy dictatorship That’s an illogical concept. What does that even mean?
Lutger 4mo ago
> Private companies don’t have the ability to ruin your life in the same way your own government does. They just want your money. And what happens when your money is gone? What happens when the government has no money anymore because the super rich took it all? Your life turns to shit real fast when you can't afford housing, healthcare and food. I get when you are in an authoritarian country, or one on the path to becoming so like the US, that the government looks to be the most dangerous actor. But in the west that is still free, its the corps that I worry about the most.
- andsoitis 4mo ago
  Private companies want your money but they don’t take it. You give it to them in exchange for something.
  - gaiagraphia 4mo ago
    It feels like I'm force to pay tax which then evaporates into the pockets of private companies like Palantir, though... I mean, you arguably can't even fully participate in the society you pay taxes to help run if you don't have a Google or Apple spycube.
    - andsoitis 4mo ago
      That's the government taking your money and deciding how to apply it. It isn't a private company taking your money.
  - Lutger 4mo ago
    That's the worst thing. You need to take a job to have money. You need to buy food to eat, pay housing, clothing, insurance, etc. Yet you don't get to determine these prices. The 'free market' story is just a way to make it look like being poor is your own choice, because you agreed to these transactions. You are just being gaslit into blaming yourself for your conditions, while the rich extract every last penny out of society without even working for it.
- pembrook 4mo ago
mistrial9 4mo ago
> 99% of Americans couldn’t place Denmark on a map (I’m not kidding) sixty one percent of statistics are fabricated on the spot?
xorcist 4mo ago
How can someone say that with a straight face, when the last two decades has been a constant demonstration of the opposite? Since the Rohingya genocide we can no longer pretend that Big Tech is apolitical. Private interest now owns not only your personal life and all your interaction with society and is completely necessary at every step for upbringing children but they also influence elections, not only in authoritarian regimes but also in what we used to think of as liberal democracies. A select few, not limited to Thiel and Musk, clearly wielded some form of control over the world's biggest economic and military power. Not only classical political questions such as taxation but also including influence over paramilitary powers. That influence only came to a halt when it came to what to do about the Middle East. The political idea that governments are more important powers than private organizations haven't been based in any real world experience for the past almost three decades now.

yorwba 4mo ago

If you think that Jesper isn't attacking the right issues, but Lars does, then you should definitely hope that Lars switches to Jesper's more popular approach. Unless you think there can never be a democratic consensus in favor of privacy, therefore the only way is for a small vanguard of privacy activists to impose their will on the hostile majority and establish a totalitarian privacy dictatorship. Then it wouldn't matter so much whether you look good in the court of popular opinion or not.

megous 4mo ago
You're turning things on their heads. Currently there's some modicum of privacy. Politicians are trying to force removal of this on everyone.
wqaatwt 4mo ago
You can not “democratically” decide to abolish certain inalienable personal liberties and still pretend you are a democracy. That’s just mob rule or worse. > totalitarian privacy dictatorship That’s an illogical concept. What does that even mean?

Lutger 4mo ago

> Private companies don’t have the ability to ruin your life in the same way your own government does. They just want your money. And what happens when your money is gone? What happens when the government has no money anymore because the super rich took it all? Your life turns to shit real fast when you can't afford housing, healthcare and food. I get when you are in an authoritarian country, or one on the path to becoming so like the US, that the government looks to be the most dangerous actor. But in the west that is still free, its the corps that I worry about the most.

andsoitis 4mo ago
Private companies want your money but they don’t take it. You give it to them in exchange for something.
- gaiagraphia 4mo ago
  It feels like I'm force to pay tax which then evaporates into the pockets of private companies like Palantir, though... I mean, you arguably can't even fully participate in the society you pay taxes to help run if you don't have a Google or Apple spycube.
  - andsoitis 4mo ago
    That's the government taking your money and deciding how to apply it. It isn't a private company taking your money.
- Lutger 4mo ago
  That's the worst thing. You need to take a job to have money. You need to buy food to eat, pay housing, clothing, insurance, etc. Yet you don't get to determine these prices. The 'free market' story is just a way to make it look like being poor is your own choice, because you agreed to these transactions. You are just being gaslit into blaming yourself for your conditions, while the rich extract every last penny out of society without even working for it.
pembrook 4mo ago

mistrial9 4mo ago

> 99% of Americans couldn’t place Denmark on a map (I’m not kidding) sixty one percent of statistics are fabricated on the spot?

xorcist 4mo ago

How can someone say that with a straight face, when the last two decades has been a constant demonstration of the opposite? Since the Rohingya genocide we can no longer pretend that Big Tech is apolitical. Private interest now owns not only your personal life and all your interaction with society and is completely necessary at every step for upbringing children but they also influence elections, not only in authoritarian regimes but also in what we used to think of as liberal democracies. A select few, not limited to Thiel and Musk, clearly wielded some form of control over the world's biggest economic and military power. Not only classical political questions such as taxation but also including influence over paramilitary powers. That influence only came to a halt when it came to what to do about the Middle East. The political idea that governments are more important powers than private organizations haven't been based in any real world experience for the past almost three decades now.