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Comment by boyce | Hacker News Reader

I live in the UK and the thing that's disturbed me most about all this is how little coverage there's been and how little outrage there is about the consequences of this law. I genuinely think as a country we've given up. There's no enthusiasm for any cause and no one has any will left to stand up for the things they ought to care about. It's a weird atmosphere here now.

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What frighten me most is that Labour, supposedly the official opposition to the government, refused to try to stop or improve this bill. Instead they waved it through, abstaining on key votes, and not bothering to table amendments.

All of this is despite Labour being run by figures who have a long history of opposing government authoritarianism. For example, Jeremy Corbyn didn't vote against it. Shami Chakrabarti, who spent years running Liberty, an organisation dedicated to protecting individual liberties, abstained.

What the hell is going on behind the scenes when people like that have been successfully silenced?

When a law this far-reaching and repressive is passed with a conspiracy of silence and acquiescence from both the media and the political establishment, you have to conclude that UK democracy is basically non-functional. It's over.

> when people like that have been successfully silenced

Corbyn's a fucking clown. I wouldn't expect him to do anything effective about... well, anything.

His competence isn't really the issue though. Even his biggest opponents admit that he's principled to a fault. He's spent his whole career rebelling against his own side on points of principle, attending anti-government protests and rallies, etc.

I wouldn't necessarily expect Corbyn to organise an effective opposition to this bill, but I would expect him to offer some opposition. For him not to do so is not just disappointing, it's unbelievably weird. It's the kind of unexplained weirdness that means you have to start asking what is going on, and what kind of pressures are being applied, in order to prevent him doing so.

The pressure is being Labour party leader. Labour PMs don't want him to take any more unpopular positions, and he himself must know now that he has to lead the party first and be principled rebel second.

I like him as a politician, but Labour needs a leader that can unite both sides of the party that the leadership contest and the referendum exposed. Even if Corbyn wants to do this, the view now from the outside is that he can't.

But is this something he actually cares about? My impression is that while there are certainly some left/liberal principles he cares strongly about, there are also some that he doesn't seem to care about at all.

Labour are currently scared to be an opposition in case they get on the wrong side of public opinion and increase their political losses further.

Anything that can be spun as anti-British (i this case making it harder for security services and the military to "do their job") in the current climate is not a battle they want to fight unfortunately.

I have been wondering the same - where the fuck is Labour?

Where in UK politics is the voice of social progress and individual freedom?

It seems to be too busy tearing itself to pieces over idealogical minutiae to be any sort of useful opposition.

Even the SNP seem to be avoiding addressing this issue in any meaningful way, when asked a few years back whether things would be better in an independent Scotland they said:

"The primary function of government is to ensure the security of its citizens and to protect them, their property and way of life against threats. An independent Scotland will have security arrangements that are proportionate, fit for purpose and reflect a full strategic assessment of Scotland's needs and the threats we may face."

Which is great non-answer answer!

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2013/nov/03/nsa-su...

At least one SNP MP, Joanna Cherry, argued vociferously against the IPB during the parliamentary debate[1]

[1] http://ianopolous.github.io/privacy/Snoopers

They're still there, that's the problem.

I think it's time for the Labour party to go out to pasture. There needs to be a split, take some Conservatives, some UKIP (maybe, if there's any more moderate ones left) but enough to lose the baggage of any one party, lose the extremes and head for the middle ground.

Unless that happens (and it seems at this point it won't) I don't see there being an effective opposition anytime soon.

If there's one thing that Brexit, Trump and the rise of UKIP has proven it's that the public has lost its appetite for "moderation".

Labour needs to focus on deselecting the Blairites who were in favor of 'moderately' invading Iraq and are 'moderately' in favor of making the snooper's charter even worse (e.g. like Yvette Cooper).

I didn't know Shami Chakrabarti abstained. That's totally mad. If there's one thing I would have thought we could rely on her for it was to vote against things like this.

The Labour party have been completely neutered. The membership and the unions clearly want them to take a much more radical left wing approach but the party establishment still want them to be the party Blair built and it's caused this weird stalemate. I think Blair would have backed this bill.

An interesting point is that the bill has exceptions for journalists. I suspect that has encouraged the media to keep pretty quiet about it.

What's weird is that she (and Corbyn) were vehemently against it for a while and then suddenly she went quiet and abstained.

I think Blair almost certainly would have backed this. The other day I rediscovered this article from 2008 about councils using RIPA to catch people littering and flytipping:

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/3333366/Half-of-counc...

> The Tories condemned the latest figures as further evidence that the law had become a "snooper's charter". "Under Labour, the rights and liberties of law-abiding citizens are being eroded through plans for ID cards, sinister microchip spies in bins and abuse of anti-terror laws by councils," said Eric Pickles, the party's communities spokesman.

Strange reading nowadays. I wonder what Eric Pickles makes of it all.

Between government mouthpieces and DA-Notices I can understand how the media silence could come about. But the lack of opposition, by people whose entire careers have been built around opposing the government, is quite concerning.

If there is a reason this policy has such broad cross-party support then why isn't anyone allowed to explain what that reason is?

I was completely shocked that Shami Chakrabart, once the head of Liberty[1] abstained, I thought she was the one ally we definitely had in the bag. I wonder what caused the turnaround; same for Jeremy Corbyn, complete U-turn in position in a really short space of time.

I mean, I'm trying to resist looking for my tinfoil hat but does anyone know of any agencies that have a decade's worth of everybody's communications history and Meta data that may or may not be used against somebody to sway their opinion on a particular subject? No? Didn't think so.

I still feel mad and a bit wrong typing that second paragraph as five years ago it would have just been complete conspiracy theory, but now it's just been passed into law. My country is a disturbing place right now.

[1]: https://www.liberty-human-rights.org.uk/

No need for any tinfoil hats:

https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/undercover-with-paul-lew...

" A whistleblower, Peter Francis, has revealed that police compiled secret files on the political activities of Corbyn and nine other MPs, even after they had been elected to the House of Commons.

Francis disclosed that he had read the files on the 10 MPs while he worked for the Metropolitan Police’s special branch.

He added that he had personally collected information on Corbyn, and two other MPs, while he was working undercover infiltrating anti-racist groups in the 1990s. Read this and this for more details of his revelations that were made in March this year."

I don't doubt that the same people who ordered the monitoring of "subversive" anti-racist groups are the same people who are calling him an anti-semite.

Those motherfunsters. But surely this increases my need for a tinfoil hat, no?

Chakrabarti's turnaround is a result of her peerage (which in turn was a thankyou for her support in her impartial review into anti-semitism in the Labour party^).

She'll obviously tow the Corbyn line, and it's most likely that this line was set by the PLP. There's been talk about Andy Burnham (who's running for Mayor of Manchester) having raised concerns, but ultimately bowed out after being told about safeguards being put in - he never actually checked the safeguards and was apparently somewhat surprised when he found that they didn't actually exist.

^Before anyone says otherwise bear in mind Corbyn refused to nominate people to the Lords based on his opposition to the Lords, and she's the only nominated peer he's put forward, immediately after the review concluded but before the internal election.

> What the hell is going on behind the scenes when people like that have been successfully silenced?

Just think: who has the most to gain? And don't stay limited to the UK.

Everyone is just assuming that Corbyn and Chakrabarti had their arms twisted. But, one, if they were vulnerable to that, don't you think it would have been done before in the many other times they've been nuisances to the state? And two, I don't believe that an arm-twist exists that would get them both to shut up and smile, rather than sing out and damn the consequences. Nor is it plausible to stifle such a public disclosure these days.

So perhaps they were persuaded by actual persuasion, rather than a gun to the head?

Such as for example, somebody had a quiet word with them about The Aliens.

Labour gave us RIPA in the first place. They want surveillance as much as the Tories.

The problem is, there are no major parties which are opposed to it. There is no choice.

If you think Labour is in favour of individual rights over the rights of the state, you haven't been paying attention.

Yes, the lack of outrage is worrying to say the least.

What I find very disturbing is the response I've got from some people in regards to signing the petition against the legislation.

"I don't want to sign that, I will probably end up on some watchlist".

This is incredible, to admit this you are basically admitting that we no longer live in a free democracy. If you cannot sign a petition regarding basic civil liberties without ending up on a watchlist then you do not live in a free democracy. Upon me telling them this, I am usually then greeted with a shrug.

Good point. Whenever I post about the snoopers charter, I even have friends jumping in arguing that it's a good idea and that it's necessary in order to protect us from terrorists and pedophiles. As hypocritical and intellectually lazy as it sounds, I delete their comments.

If your friends are reasonably bright/open to discussion, but are making the "I have nothing to hide, so why should I worry" argument, and their genuine fear is terrorists blowing up their kids - I've had a little success with the "You might not have anything to hide, but others may." Then remind them that some people may be hiding things for good reason (fear of ostracisation/violence/death) as a result of social or religious reasons, and that if a list like this become public it could seriously affect _other people's_ lives, has sometimes made people take note. Obviously you have to choose your argument carefully.

In The Netherlands nobody had anything to hide, like the Jews around WW2. It was all neatly recorded who was a Jew and made things a whole lot easier for the Germans once they got their hands on the records after they invaded.

People might not have anything to hide now, but things can change... fast.

Yeah. My point exactly.

Even if you believe it's a necessary evil in principle, the implementation is bad enough to want to be against this particular law. The list of agencies who could gain access is laughable and there's nothing that fills me with confidence about ISPs storing people's browsing history with proper security. Three and TalkTalk have both had massive data breaches recently, and I have precisely zero confidence that there won't be a huge data breach/leak in the next few years.

Hopefully the knee-jerk reaction to the inevitable massive leak will put this law where it belongs.

that's because it's meaningless. they're doing all this and more already and this is just to make it official. signing a petition wont change a single thing. you can safely assume that legal or not all your traffic is monitored and stored forever and that's not going to change ever.

I'm vehemently against this legislation - but I also did not sign the official petition. One reason was that, yes I might end up on some list. I believe that risk is very small but the reward potential of signing the petition is effectively zero so why bother taking the risk? The bill had no real opposition so what use is a debate going to be, especially when all it now requires is royal assent (Edit: Just saw that happened yesterday, fuck). A debate would have been useful 12 months ago.

At this stage the important thing is to have it go through the courts and have them stop it. Hopefully, as long as we're still in the EU, the ECJ can do something to at least water this bill down. At the very least I would like to see the requirement for Internet Connection Records to be held for everyone to be removed. I don't like the ability for 12 months of data to be collected with a warrant but at least there is some process there and some oversight.

I couldn't understand that either. The thought of getting on a watchlist didn't even cross my mind, which might be naive although I'm cynical enough to at least entertain the possibility now it's been brought up. Ultimately though I'll keep acting like we're a free democracy, signing petitions against laws I don't agree with etc., until proven otherwise.

I have a feeling that UK people have decided not to care about hypotheticals, and that includes laws that technically exist but aren't inconveniencing them right now. People basically assume that the law lets the government do as it damn well pleases, or lets it off for doing so with a totally ineffectual slap on the wrist. Therefore the content of the law is irrelevant.

If the government uses the law to do bad things, people might start to raise a ruckus.

> If the government uses the law to do bad things, people might start to raise a ruckus.

Perhaps it even needs to be 'do bad things to them' before ruckus-raising ensues.

The problem is when the laws inevitably start including clauses that make it illegal to talk about the bad things that are done.

Because... terrorism?

I've posted this on my facebook and I immediately got 3 people telling me that they don't have anything to hide and I'm being paranoid. They are all British.

I really think that UK suffers because it hasn't gone through a restrictive communist government that had extended surveillance and censorship - so that now, in 2016, people don't know how to recognize signs of what's coming.

I had that exact conversation with my wife yesterday. It's infuriating. Luckily, I live outside the UK and have done for nearly 5 years now. I don't see me returning for any length of time.

I always find it kind of ironic when things like this get shared on Facebook. If you don't want the UK government to know everything about you, why would you be happy for a private, tax-dodging corporation to?

If everyone uses Facebook to consume their news then what better way is there to spread information?

Airstrip One? If they think they have nothing to hide, you could ask them whether they'd be happy with a telescreen in every room of their house or flat.

As a fellow Brit, I agree and it also feels like the timing of this was conveniently done while Brexit was going on and the US election. I think we're all fatigued right now which isn't fair.

> I genuinely think as a country we've given up.

Coincidentally, 'the percentage of people who say it is “essential” to live in a democracy has plummeted, and it is especially low among younger generations.'

http://www.nytimes.com/2016/11/29/world/americas/western-lib...

Seems to be happening worldwide, to some degree.

Hypernormalization? Living in an Unreal World: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PtjfoEvsR9w

Or are we at stage three of Dmitri Orlov's Five Stages of Collapse (http://cleaves.zapto.org/news/attachments/nov2009/5stagescol...)?

Stage 3: Political collapse. Faith that "the government will take care of you" is lost. As official attempts to mitigate widespread loss of access to commercial sources of survival necessities fail to make a difference, the political establishment loses legitimacy and relevance.

There has been more outrage about animal product (tallow) used in the new £5 notes...

Can't say I've seen much on the BBC about such a big story - they seem to be doing their bit to keep the fuss minimal from the herd.

While it's not been headline news, they did have this very good article yesterday:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-38134560

I also live in the UK and I concur; complete apathy.

What can people do about it?

Go on a huge demonstration (like this one: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/2765041.stm) and be ignored.

Sign a petition (http://www.bbc.com/news/technology-38130344) and be ignored.

Write to your MP and be ignored.

Refuse to implement it and be sacked.

Organise an army, go to Westminster, kill your enemies, done. This is a proven, working way.

Imo people need to attack the hard problem of changing the political landscape, limiting the power of the government and making it accountable. Fighting each and every overreach is way harder than limiting them in the first place. It is completely logical that the government is grabbing for more power as long as it is not incentivized to actually serve the people.

All the attention being put on Brexit provided the perfect cover for this, similar to the crap stuffed into the unPatriotic Act

That's why people don't trust the mainstream media anymore. They've become to close to power, and they only report on things that they know aren't offensive to those on power. So they avoid talking about protests or power-grabbing laws.

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