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Undermining Democracy: The EU Commission's Controversial Push for Surveillance

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Re: Undermining Democracy: The EU Commission's Controversial Push for Surveillance

#151

Post by NoZZz »

irusensei wrote: post #23

Its just me that thinks there is something really wrong with the way politicians try to pass such controversial laws? Politicians bring up something controversial. Most of the time influenced by some lobby with very little interest in public benefit. To combat this lots of people need to do activism. Those people need to devote your time and energy to prevent such thing. So far it sounds good but after the dust settl…

It's about time we have some standing voted directives originating with the people. Perhaps an AI could verify law proposals and shoot them down if the citizenry oposes it. Properly tallied and percentaged of course.

Re: Undermining Democracy: The EU Commission's Controversial Push for Surveillance

#152

Post by throwaway50662 »

Agingcoder wrote: post #75
TacticalCoder wrote: post #7

The title should be shortened from "Undermining Democracy: The European Commission's Controversial Push for Digital Surveillance" simply to: "Undermining Democracy: The European Commission" . The EC is sheer horror. The thousands of years old saying: "The more numerous the laws, the more corrupt the state" has never been truer. I've done a short consulting gig at the European Parliament, which at least tries to be th…

I’m not sure I understand : European Commissioners are nominated by elected National governments, and approved by parliament. How is this not democratic ? Whether you agree with these policies or not is a different matter altogether.

National government is a very different thing from national parliament.

In my state the national government came out of a political compromise. The leading party has 15% support. They are limited by the national parliament in whatever they try to do here - but not in EC.

Giving them control over the whole population through the EC is a spit in the face of 85% of the population.

And it's very visible right on this issue - the leading party supports what the rest of the population would label as totalitarian and oppressive. They tried but were unable to pass stuff like this at home, but they support it in the EC.

Re: Undermining Democracy: The EU Commission's Controversial Push for Surveillance

#153

Post by clarada »

eigenket wrote: post #15
tekla wrote: post #2

How are there not riots in the EU right now?

Because the EU doesn't really have much actual power to do anything that impacts normal citizens. Like the EU doesn't start criminal prosecutions or anything against people. If there is some crime you're being prosecuted for it's going to be your country's government that prosecutes you. No one is really worried about the EU becoming some sort of Orwellian state because it isn't a state, it doesn't operate like that.…

The European Commission has veto power over the European Parliament, so I'm afraid it can just force it through. Doesn't normally come to that - there's enough corruption and alternative ways to pressurise the MEPs.

Re: Undermining Democracy: The EU Commission's Controversial Push for Surveillance

#154

Post by smolder »

jjtheblunt wrote: post #68

Language confusion question: aren’t democracy (people voting?) and surveillance conflating different topics? What correlation is implied?

There's plenty of writing on the topic of privacy being essential to a functioning democracy.

Re: Undermining Democracy: The EU Commission's Controversial Push for Surveillance

#155

Post by garaetjjte »

greatgib wrote: post #61

The European parlement is probably the best thing that we have in Europe, most good things and new rights come from there. At the opposite, the European Commission is probably the worse that we can have. It is totally corrupted (see the vice president with bags of cash given by the Qatar and co) or at least morally corrupted by lobbies. And no one elected this persons with so much power by the way. Good things to won…

>most good things and new rights come from there

European Parliament literally does not have right of initiative.

Re: Undermining Democracy: The EU Commission's Controversial Push for Surveillance

#156

Post by _jal »

hanniabu wrote: post #73
layer8 wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What alternative do you propose? The politicians are elected representatives of and by the people.

If a law doesn't pass, the contents can't be brought up in a new law for a minimum of 5 years.

Please explain how you would forbid these from being serially brought without allowing bad actors to disrupt normal legislative business.

"No abortion after 49 days."

"No abortion after 50 days."

"No hospital shall be used for abortions."

"Doctors cannot perform abortions."

Re: Undermining Democracy: The EU Commission's Controversial Push for Surveillance

#157

Post by scott_w »

hackandthink wrote: post #9

These bureaucrats overwhelm citizens with enormous amounts of text. Expression of opinion is regulated here. A few principles should be enough. The most important one should be: Every citizen is free to express his opinion. https://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/HTML/?uri=CEL...

The EU does not set freedom of speech laws beyond requiring signatory nations protect a weaker freedom of expression.

Any nation can have stronger free speech protections if it chooses to and the EU bodies can’t prevent it.

Your argument is nonsense.

Re: Undermining Democracy: The EU Commission's Controversial Push for Surveillance

#158

Post by blibble »

peoplefromibiza wrote: post #123
greatgib wrote: post #61

The European parlement is probably the best thing that we have in Europe, most good things and new rights come from there. At the opposite, the European Commission is probably the worse that we can have. It is totally corrupted (see the vice president with bags of cash given by the Qatar and co) or at least morally corrupted by lobbies. And no one elected this persons with so much power by the way. Good things to won…

> And no one elected this persons with so much power by the way. this is a very tired meme, they have been nominated and scrutinized by the people elected in what you called probably the best thing that we have in Europe i.e. the EU Parliament edit: elections solve none of the problems people think they solve. proof is governments are corrupt even though they are elected by the people. if the objections is "we can't…

> this is a very tired meme, they have been nominated and scrutinized by the people elected in what you called probably the best thing that we have in Europe i.e. the EU Parliament

yes, in 2019 the Parliament were allowed to pick from a list of exactly one person (selected by another part of the EU)

Re: Undermining Democracy: The EU Commission's Controversial Push for Surveillance

#159

Post by clarada »

lamp987 wrote: post #13
tekla wrote: post #2

How are there not riots in the EU right now?

People are used to EU tightening the screws every year. This is normal. Though the proposition seems to be technically faulty/unenforcable so we might be spared (this time).

It's called "ever closer union" and a founding principle of the EU.

Whether you voted for it or not - or in many cases never even asked - you will have your rights taken by the EU.

Re: Undermining Democracy: The EU Commission's Controversial Push for Surveillance

#160

Post by lock-the-spock »

dalbasal wrote: post #62
TacticalCoder wrote: post #7

The title should be shortened from "Undermining Democracy: The European Commission's Controversial Push for Digital Surveillance" simply to: "Undermining Democracy: The European Commission" . The EC is sheer horror. The thousands of years old saying: "The more numerous the laws, the more corrupt the state" has never been truer. I've done a short consulting gig at the European Parliament, which at least tries to be th…

Idk... The EC pushes through controversial decisions, that are not controversial between states... the bar is generally something high in this regard. National Governments get a buffer between them and discontented citizens, because "it's the EU." There is also a lot of pressure to conform to EC "consensus," parties/individuals that want to be seen as government material. EC totally discounts digital privacy especial…

There is certainly corruption in the use of EU funds within the programmes but do you have evidence of actual corruption in the institutions in recent years? The only cases I'm aware of were all in the parliament, which is unsurprising if national parties send good "party soldiers" chosen for loyalty rather than quality. Corruption at national level seems however much more common, see recent stories on Bavarian backroom deals and kickbacks during COVID. Nothing at that scale or brazenness seems to ever happen in Brussels.
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