Off course the whole point of democracy is that governments should fear their citizens, rather than vice versa.
Two of us in the cybershow are parents. Taking on analysis of this bill was a tough decision, but something we felt obliged and qualified to do as parents and security experts.
There are obviously grave harms around digital technology, plus its obvious myriad benefits. Covert communications enabling criminal and anti-social activity is just one small part.
Our thought experiment is to assume good faith. To assume the government is sincerely invested in doing it's job of protecting citizens. Then to figure out how this has gone so wrong.
Who are the marginal influencers? Why is the standard of technical expertise and computer science in our government so woefully inadequate. Why has saving face become more important than actually tackling difficult issues?
I would characterise our UK government as confused and frustrated.
Perhaps we should be pleased our government is tenacious in pursuing a bill whose aims we broadly support. But a mixture of prideful ego-politics, poor advice and technologically laughable solutionism has led us into a corner. That's not a good look for a country that started the industrial and digital revolutions.
In those same governments there are those that dream of having access to all of this data with less honorable intentions. Because both are part of the same entity and once the capability is there it is pretty much a given that checks and balances will fail when you need them most I find myself both sympathetic to those that keep us safe and to those that object to this level of invasiveness, and I find myself opposed to those what effectively use terrorism and CP as a way to shepherd us into an authoritarian society.
And then there are the consequences of finding yourself with a really bad instance of government at some point in the future, it could easily happen.
At this stage, and in the dying days of a flailing Tory government, that simply makes you a mug.
Also from today: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-northern-ireland-66720994 ; this is specifically to protect murders carried out by and on behalf of the state in Northern Ireland. Along with historical matters such as the "spycops" scandal, and the abuses of PREVENT, there is a strong risk that mass surveillance will be used in political ways and in the service of misconduct. Accountability is poor and therefore trust is poor.
> Who are the marginal influencers?
The Daily Mail. Well, that and the security services who've clearly been pushing this.
TBF let's take longer view than the incumbent freak show of throwbacks and incompetents.
> "spycops" scandal, and the abuses of PREVENT,
Do please give the podcast episode I linked a listen. You'll appreciate that we took that precise case (the Bob Lambert case) as an example for discussing mission-creep and the impossibility of containment of digital privilege or other special powers.
Five thousand years of recorded human history should serve as adequate evidence against making this assumption. And we all know that even if the current government is sincerely invested in doing its job in good faith, any powers that are given to the current government can and will be abused by a future government that may be invested in doing something else.
Exactly this.
For starters, and using the U as an example:
If you are a Democrat (or whatever), think if you want these powers to be available to the next Trump.
And vice versa: if you are a republican (or whatever) think if you want these spying capabilities and what not to be available to the next Democrat president.
- #6 press freedom ranking https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_Press_Freedom_Index
- #9 freedom house https://freedomhouse.org/countries/freedom-world/scores
- #11 freedom of speech https://worldpopulationreview.com/country-rankings/countries...
And so on. Now: this isn't saying that NL is perfect, not by a long shot. We have seen some absolutely terrible behavior by politicians, most notably on the right extreme part of the spectrum. Emboldened by Trump's election populism is on the rise here as well and we see just the same idiotic behavior as in the USA. Including word-for-word translations of talking points (which are utterly ridiculous in a Dutch context, but never mind that sort of detail), attempts (and some success) at polarization and so on. For that reasons alone the next elections are pretty exciting in that we can either further derail or - hopefully - that there will be some pushback against this.
But it is usually the people arguing the loudest that there is no democracy, freedom of press and separation of powers here that are the ones that are trying to destabilize things further.
OPs complaint about the police being able to gather private information of their citizens without a judge having to agree to it first might be seen as violating separation of powers, but as long as a judge still decides what the punishment is after seeing the evidence, I merely see this as a state not respecting individual's privacy, which is probably not a common thing to require for a democracy.
Sadly those erosions are to be seen in many EU countries currently...
Surely invasion of privacy is a violation of the CHARTER OF FUNDAMENTAL RIGHTS OF THE EUROPEAN UNION.
" Article 7
Respect for private and family life
Everyone has the right to respect for his or her private and family life, home and communications.
Article 8
Protection of personal data
1. Everyone has the right to the protection of personal data concerning him or her.
2. Such data must be processed fairly for specified purposes and on the basis of the consent of the person concerned or some other legitimate basis laid down by law. Everyone has the right of access to data which has been collected concerning him or her, and the right to have it rectified.
3. Compliance with these rules shall be subject to control by an independent authority."
https://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/HTML/?uri=CEL...
Who owns ANP nieuws has nothing to do with whether or not the press is free.
It's with some anxiety that I'm looking at the next six months here, it could well go the way of Italy, or possibly much worse (think 'Orban' or something like that).
Protesting is now effectively illegal thanks to a new law criminalizing it if it's a "nuisance".
You're still technically allowed to hold up a blank piece of paper but the police will threaten to arrest you if you write something on it. That happened during the coronation.
I'm fairly sure theyre going to borrow a whole lot more from Putin's playbook in the next few years - especially now that British oligarchs have managed to hammer the two previously opposing parties back into ideological alignment.
Think about it: prayer, an interior orientation of the mind to God; not even any audible speech is necessary to commit a heinous, treasonous act.
The specific case I know you're talking about is the woman who was in an exclusion zone that was in place to stop people harassing women entering an abortion clinic.
If she doesn't want "praying silently in her head" to be interpreted as harassment, maybe she should think about the behaviour she and her cohorts have engaged in that might have lead to this interpretation.
Sure, you can disagree with that as well, but she wasn't arrested for praying. She was arrested for intimidation and harassment. She doesn't get a special pass just because of the method.
It’s like if you had drugs in your pocket while harassing someone. They’re separate offenses.
This video explains the situation and references the original police and court records.
> the council is satisfied on reasonable grounds that there are a number of activities, carried out or are likely to be carried out in a public space namely the area within and surrounding Station Road, Birmingham, B30, shown outlined on the map attached ( the restricted area) that have had, or are likely to have, a detrimental effect on the quality of life of those in the locality. The effect or likely effect of these activities is of a persistent or continuing nature such as to make these activities unreasonable, and justifies the restrictions imposed in this order
[...]
> The Activities prohibited by the Order are:
> i Protesting, namely engaging in any act of approval or disapproval or attempted act of approval or disapproval, with respect to issues related to abortion services, by any means. This includes but is not limited to graphic, verbal or written means, prayer or counselling,
> ii Interfering, or attempting to interfere, whether verbally or physically, with a Robert Clinic service user, visitor or member of staff,
> iii Intimidating or harassing, or attempting to intimidate or harass, a Robert Clinic service user, visitor or a member of staff,
> iv Recording or photographing a Robert Clinic service user, visitor or member of staff or
> v Displaying any text or images relating directly or indirectly to the termination of pregnancy.
She was protesting. It's a persistent pattern of behaviour. It's harassment.
In that case the woman was arrested for silently praying by herself. Her prayer was to stop the abortion clinic, but it was silent and in her own head.
I understand that the intent of the law is to ban prayer near an abortion clinic to stop harassment, but they have banned prayer.
(I support everything else in that order, I’m pro choice. I just don’t think we should ban prayer)
Edit, these pictures show that "silently praying" is not an unobtrusive as it sounds:
https://i2-prod.birminghammail.co.uk/incoming/article2379330...
https://i2-prod.birminghammail.co.uk/incoming/article2379331...
Has the UK banned some prayer and arrested at least one person for thought crime?
The answer to both of those questions is yes.
It’s not about whether she would have been convicted for something else anyway.
Do you think it is right that silent prayer was banned in this case?
This whole discussion started because people from other countries didn’t believe that the UK would ban silent prayer.
This is true in the same sense that the UK has also banned breathing, because murdering people is illegal and some people happen to be breathing whilst doing their murdering.
Also pretty sure I could get arrested in that area by kneeling on the pavement and meditating, rather than praying. I don't think "but I was meditating" would cut it as a defence, either, because what's banned is "anything that looks like protest, here are some examples".
I think it's the kneeling she got arrested for, which happens to be coded as "prayer" in our culture. In other words, she was arrested for protesting.
The context matters.
The multiplying force of technology has made it extremely difficult to overthrow a government by force. I do not think it is possible in the West.
Governments have never had so much control over money and information. They’re not losing control, they just keep tightening their grip.
I don’t know if this Democratic experiment can survive in that environment. I certainly hope it does, but bills like this give me doubts.
Well - East Germany must've had worse, surely? All money controlled by the state and state-sponsored spying?
I think that's more an optimistic interpretation of democracy.
After all, it's the government that gets to decide who is a citizen, and who has the franchise.
Historically the US said that African Americans were not citizens, within the meaning of the Constitution. In 1858 your statement might be 100% true about the US, but it would exclude a lot of people - who indeed were justifiably fearful of the democracy they lived in.
While the 14th amendment made many new citizens, for many decades after the end of reconstruction these citizens feared their government far more than vice versa.
You can see the variable concept of "citizen" when considering that a minor may be a US citizen for many purposes, but does not have the voting rights of full citizenship. Before the 26th amendment even 20-year-old adults were not full citizens.
Something like 2% of US adult citizens cannot vote due to being a convicted felon, further showing how shaky your assertion is.
There's also a large number of immigrants to the US who are not citizens, but ideally should not fear the government any more than citizens do.
Perhaps the US doesn't count as democracy, but that sounds too much like a No True Scotsman response. Switzerland, with its famous direct democracy, didn't allow full women's suffrage until 1971-1990, depending on canton, again highlighting that "citizen" and "those who can vote" are not really the same thing in a democracy.
It's like saying that in a {a benevolent dictatorship, real communism, true anarchy} the citizens will not fear the government.
(Personally, I'm not sure how much it's an actionable or desirable goal. But it's a goal.)
I don't think it's a goal of democracy, and I highlighted what I think are flaws with thinking of it that way. In your ideal democracy should non-citizens fear the government? Are children full citizens and, if not, should they fear the government too?
It's also a goal of communism and of anarchy, yes?
You can criticize it as a goal as much as you want. There's plenty of things to disagree in it. But you just can't go and state it's a no true Scotchman, that is meaningless nonsense.
Do they have the goal you describe? No.
Will they ever? Very unlikely, for reasons I listed.
Does that make them democracies? If you say they are not democracies then I'm calling No True Scotsman.
We have 2000 years of history where the most vocal proponents of democracy deliberately restricted full citizenship from all its population.
It's therefore hard for me to think your goal is a core part of democracy.
I suspect theres a bunch of things going on.
They've come down so hard on recent protest movements like Just Stop Oil, Insulate Britain, etc because as you say they feel like they've lost authority and they want it back. National-scale surveillance is a way to remind everyone who really runs the country, and who just does as they're told. The uk has almost always been governed by essentially the same elite group, and they have a lot of experience of keeping it that way. Not by Spectre-style secret meetings, just by convergent overlapping objectives.
I think part of their fear comes from seeing how popular devolution has been in the UK. And partly how successful the EU has become, hence brexit. Theres also a part of the tory party that wants to nope out of the ECHR jurisdiction, and this kind of legislation potentially sets-up a fight with the court that could be used as a pretext for withdrawal. Some of them undoubtedly also simply see the potential to make some money from a surveylance society.
I also suspect they've finally woken up to the climate-related crisies that are now just down the road and they've decided that a more authoritarian society is the only way to keep their position at the top.
> Off course the whole point of democracy is that governments should fear their citizens, rather than vice versa.
Err... nope. Can't build stable societies on fear. The "whole point of democracy" is how to negociate the divergent desires and opinions of the nation's citizens.
Yes, you're right. I meant to paraphrase Thomas Jefferson: “When the people fear the government, there is tyranny. When the government fears the people, there is liberty.” And indeed democracy isn't liberty, it's just the least bad attempt to achieve a bunch of laudable goals.
Fear derives from things like our sense of self-preservation, and other concerns that our goals might not be achieved. Since the government ideally has no goal but to serve the people, it should have no fear (perhaps other than the fear of failure).
because it's been asked for by various ONGs, civil society at large, even the opposition parties want it strengthened.
it's not the government that is forcing these things. it's voters.
'Labour pledges to toughen ‘weakened and gutted’ online safety bill' https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2023/jan/01/labour-pl...
It's very disheartening to see no opposition to this.
If they did oppose it, then the still-powerful right-wing press would be immediately printing LABOUR SUPPORT PAEDOPHILES on their front pages.
Most people wouldn't care, but because of FPTP, elections are determined by a small number of swing voters. Anyone slightly left of the Tories is almost certainly going to vote Labour anyway, because they don't really have any political choice.
It's just posturing for the media, I think. I suspect most people involved realise that what the bill is trying to do is unworkable.
It's just their culture. It probably won't change till they get rid of the anachronistic monarchy.
It's nothing to do with the monarchy - indeed, if anything I think the consensus amongst pro-monarchy folks is that the monarch is a constitutional escape hatch in the event of a government getting out of control.
Both the Conservative and Labour parties have an authoritarian streak to them when in government, and a solid percentage of the population seem to trust that our institutions know what they're doing and can keep their databases secure (although I hope that's been shaken in the last month with a number of police and electoral register database leaks).
Isn't an easier explanation that society is getting more complex while politicians double down on managing their reputation, which inevitably results in loosing trust in institutions? (Or something along those lines.)
Not saying the monarchy is at heart, just that the culture won't change until they have some sort of cultural revolution and get rid of it.
Having said that, I would not mind seeing King Charles abdicate; England, Wales, Scotland, N-Ireland become proper republics; help the remnants of upper class strongholds adapt to reality, if that's what you mean. :-)
Historically, major changes only come with a bloodshed, you forgot that part. We speak highly of Gandhi because he's an exception to this rule, not the norm. (And blood was shed in that case as well)
The corollary is, don't expect much to change until there's a major societal break and pushback. That is, unless you have drunk the kool aid of modern politics and think your party will fix things for real, this time.
In Britain, I'm less concerned about King Charles III and its effect on the populace, than Starmer, Sunak, and any other idiot in Westminster. They're the ones writing the government laws and budget for their own interests.
I specifically said cultural revolution because I tried to imply a non-violent revolution. Not all revolutions are violent. Think technological revolution.
It's not. It still has power, and it's still costing tax payers a shitton so one family can live above everyone else. More importantly there are plenty of royalists who support it.
I'd say the answers are related.
How so?
the royal family costs the UK tax payer ~100m a year[0], which is about the cost of the three nuclear bombs in the US or less than one of the ill-advised F-32 purchases Australia is making. it's also maybe a 1/10th of the amount of money stolen by Tory mates for their various PPE crimes during the early pandemic.
every country has very very dumb shit they piss money up the wall over, but it's not a game changing amount of money.
0: dodgy source: https://www.standard.co.uk/news/uk/how-much-royal-family-cos...
Explain your reasoning, please.
I don't doubt you're well intentioned, but there's probably more useful things to be fighting over. Especially as what you're fighting for will generate negligible incomes at best and negative incomes at worst. The last thing the UK needs after Brexit is a referendum on becoming a republic.
I disagree. The UK is still backwards in many ways, hell, they still have an unelected upper house. Getting rid of the monarchy sends a strong message and allows other reforms to follow in its wake.
I'm also skeptical the monarchy generate any tourism. People come to see the palace that would remain regardless, and the funny guards that trample over children. They don't come to the UK for that stuff, they see it while they are there, and they certainly don't come hoping to see a member of the royal family.