Most of Europe has IPv6
When i was 20, i was reflexively cynical, because it let me pose as intellectual without the burden of having to learn or think. As an adult, i find that pose very fucking obvious.
My interest was piqued by the concept of natting ip6, and why an isp might do so, and why cgnat might be disabled if you ask the isp to disable ip6.
...bb-but I thought cynicism was the same thing as experience![1]
No but seriously, I agree it is primarily "we can't be arsed to change our methods".
"Primarily" is not everything; the other 10-20% is the long tail of everything else. Europe is getting much harder on filesharing[3][4] because of business interests, and - despite the much better regulation - there's probably some "you shouldn't be hosting things on a residential connection anyways, pay us for a business connection peasants" like in the US[2].
Of course, all these ready-made restrictions are then easily adaptable for abuse (when's the next Chat Control proposal anyways?), so there's not much pushback from above...
Cynicism is easily a thought-terminating cliche, but it is unfortunately earned nowadays, especially as a coping mechanism for a feeling of helplessness against the usually stupid, sometimes malicious forces at play (Hanlon's Razor doesn't account for weaponization of stupidity).
[1]https://youtu.be/v0VA6u8cTxE?t=540
[2]https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18238827
[3]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internet_censorship_and_survei...
It's common, at least in the UK, for residential lines to block smtp inbound. That's an ACL, which is operationally ~free. NAT does not serve the purposes you've outlined.
Some cynicism is warranted about, e.g. chat control, but it's better explained by good-faith desire to fight egregious crime coupled with low care for the privacy invasion. Other people have different values to you and me.
It's hard to reconcile an EU government in anyone's pocket with gdpr and dma, which afaics serve citizens and no big interests. Like most governments, the EU is somewhat fractious and incoherent, so it's not a given that everything they do is citizen-friendly. But i, for one, accept that law enforcement should exist; accept that this is inevitably a trade-off against citizen rights; concede that preventing the next bataclan is nigh-on impossible; and understand why some might, to that end, desire greater power to comb through conversations. I don't agree, but i also don't need to assume conspiracy. At heart, the problem is not that all government is evil - although you're welcome to that view - it's that thick pillocks vote without any consideration of nuance.