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EU: Definition of "potential terrorists" opens door to broad information-sharing

statewatch.org

111–120 of 279 posts

Re: EU: Definition of "potential terrorists" opens door to broad information-sharing

#111
post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> But calling the EU not being democratic is going too far I'm an EU citizen. I have minimal saying in who our commissioner is and what members of the cabinet get chosen. I have a vote which I give to whatever party. After that, the vote for commissioner is secret; I have no idea who voted for what. After that, the negociations for the cabinet are secret; I have no idea what the criteria are and what the plans are. I…

Is this not similar to ministerial roles and civil servant positions in most governments? You don't vote for the commissioners directly, but your elected representative (leader of your government) does, and that's your path to express preferences & drive accountability. If you don't like the selection, take it up with them. In the UK for example, the people elect members of parliament as their representatives, but MP…

In the UK, politicians will often U-turn if they sense that a policy will make them unpopular and make the next election harder to fight. Governments can and do get punished on polling day every five years. Sunak paid for his unpopularity and the record of his government. Could any EU voters do anything about Ursula getting a second term? (and once again she was the only name on the ballot and then only just scraped through). The EU commission is not concerned with democratic accountability. Power is concentrated in the Commission and Council. There's a very weak link back to the electorate, but it's homeopathic democracy.

Re: EU: Definition of "potential terrorists" opens door to broad information-sharing

#112
post #21

From the article "Climate activism is on the rise, together with an increased willingness to use violence, marking a shift from environmental activism to environmental extremism" As far as I can tell, climate activists have been making a nuisance of themselves much more than a 'willingness to use violence.' I find this justification concerning, to say the least.

Maybe it's not a coincidence that the more shameless politicians ignore peaceful protests while doing the bidding of lobbyists, the more climate-concerned people feel the need to escalate their nuisance tactics which conveniently makes those same shameless politicians feel that they can justify more draconian measures to stifle privacy, speech and activism.

I think politicians are skirting democratic accountability because they can, and not enough people are protesting the lack of this accountability. The most concerning thing about this proposed legislation is the fact that it can be used to further skirt accountability, by labeling protesters under the broad terms the bill covers.

Re: EU: Definition of "potential terrorists" opens door to broad information-sharing

#113

That's pretty crazy, it looks a lot like in Minority Report. Notice the reference to a "future criminal offence" and the phrase "leading to the belief" in the criteria: A “minimum materiality threshold”. This requires “objective and verifiable… information suggesting that a criminal offence, or future criminal offence, has a certain degree of seriousness.” A “basic indicative criterion”. This requires “objective, ver…

I mean if someone is actively speaking of commiting a terror attack on some telegram channel it makes sense to not just ignore it because "he's not done it yet". No absolute either in freedom or security is sustainable.

>I mean if someone is actively speaking of commiting a terror attack on some telegram channel it makes sense to not just ignore it because "he's not done it yet".

That's a much higher bar than the one mentioned in the EU legislation.

>No absolute either in freedom or security is sustainable.

But nobody was arguing for this?

Re: EU: Definition of "potential terrorists" opens door to broad information-sharing

#114
post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ghandi set the standard for effective peaceful protests. Most protests I see people doing are laughably useless. You have to know how to suffer for what is important. https://www.britannica.com/biography/Mahatma-Gandhi/Resistan... "Thus was born satyagraha (“devotion to truth”), a new technique for redressing wrongs through inviting, rather than inflicting, suffering, for resisting adversaries without rancor and figh…

How about politicians setting the standard for not fucking up the whole world and their fellow humans? Why must it be the people suffering the consequence of greedy politicians, who must be the ones behaving with the high moral compass? This seems to me like blaming the victims Edit to add: > You have to know how to suffer for what is important. With that principle, people who have the decisional power should "suffer…

> How about politicians setting the standard for not fucking up the whole world and their fellow humans?

I agree. But can we really only blame the politicians? I do not vote because every politician wants war. That is my small protest that aligns with my morals. They have to earn my vote. What if there were a group of people who got together and said we will only vote for the candidate that is against all war or where serious about climate change?

>Why must it be the people suffering the consequence of greedy politicians, who must be the ones behaving with the high moral compass?

Yes, unfortunate, but the only way out is for those of us with a moral compass to act as an example for others. To be the heroes who sacrifice and are remembered through history and change things for the better.

Start in your town. Keep it local.

Re: EU: Definition of "potential terrorists" opens door to broad information-sharing

#115
post #12

Protecting democracy by evading democratic processes. If they are not trusting the parliaments to come up with the right decisions, what are they protecting then?

When has the EU ever been democratic? Brussels has lost, but ignored every referendum for the last 20 years.

[flagged]

Re: EU: Definition of "potential terrorists" opens door to broad information-sharing

#116

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> “objective, verifiable information” leading to a belief Is very different from 'a belief'. What you're doing is wordsmithing this into something that sounds much worse than the actual text, which is textbook misinformation spreading.

No it isn't. This "objective, verifiable information" is an open door to using misinformation to frame innocent people of crimes they have not committed.

This type of information is already being used to prevent crimes. People get arrested for planning robberies or murders all the time. Those investigations start based on beliefs that are based on 'objective, verifiable information'. After that intent has to be proven in court with evidence that has been found during an investigation.

In many cases it also leads to a case being dismissed because no evidence is found.

I'm honestly pretty surprised that people think this is a new concept.

Re: EU: Definition of "potential terrorists" opens door to broad information-sharing

#117
post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Funny thing with those violent protesters is ... Sometimes they are not protesters. I had the opportunity to be with a peaceful protest against canceling student financing and the people who started violence after it finished were neither part of, nor affected by, the issues or organisation.

>Sometimes they are not protesters I don't have the source at hand but I remember reading that in Germany, plain clothes police inserted themselves into the group of climate protestors and start throwing rocks at the riot police, in order to give them legal justification to engage the protestors. Don't know if this is the truth, but since this has also happened in my country in the past, I wouldn't be surprised that…

Agent provocateurs! I hate that police have been caught doing this crap before because now at every single protest, if there's any stupid violence like a random innocent businesses having their windows smashed, the knee jerk reaction is "It was Agent provocateurs!". There's kids out there who live in some magical fairytale land where every protestor is always 100% innocent and isn't open to even discussing what's happening in reality because in their mind, all the bad stuff that happens is under cover bad actors. It's like the let's version of how January 6th was "antifa".

Re: EU: Definition of "potential terrorists" opens door to broad information-sharing

#119

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm curious what goals the AfD has that are incompatible with the German constitution.

That is gonna be the central question of said process, if it is initiated.

Sorry, I meant what goals does the AfD have that are alleged to be incompatible with the German constitution.

Re: EU: Definition of "potential terrorists" opens door to broad information-sharing

#120

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The likelihood of someone saying on telgram they will commit a terrorist act is inversely proportional to the likelihood they will commit a terrorist attack. Governments are very good at catching the talkers but hopeless at catching the doers. Going after talkers generally is very useful for creating an atmosphere of fear as well.

Which govs ? There's like every year at least 10 terror attacks which are stopped by intelligences agency in France alone so AFAIk it's just not true

I can speak for America, if you read indictments of domestic terrorists 'caught' before the act they always had help from someone on the federal payroll. (CHS 1..n) The reality is that mind reading technology doesn't exist so you can't stop people. The effort/reward favors manufacturing terrorists rather than catching them.
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