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US could ask foreign tourists for five-year social media history before entry

bbc.co.uk

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Re: US could ask foreign tourists for five-year social media history before entry

#211

Post by DFHippie »

rayiner wrote: post #118
vinni2 wrote: post #113

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They have managed to scare me off at least. So I will spend my money elsewhere.

Good thing international tourism counts for only about half of a percent of U.S. GDP: https://wttc.org/news/us-economy-set-to-lose-12-5bn-in-inter...

A lot of things will be harder for the US to do if everyone in the world hates us. Letting people come here and see that most Americans aren't monsters pays dividends beyond the dollars they spend.

The Trump Administrations actions read like a checklist of things you'd do if you wanted to destroy the US's power to protect itself and its allies and promote the well-being of its people.

Re: US could ask foreign tourists for five-year social media history before entry

#212

Post by tavavex »

estearum wrote: post #15
rsynnott wrote: post #11

Well, that'll be great for the tourism industry. What, precisely, are they hoping to learn, here?

Precisely speaking, they're looking to catch any critique of Israel because it'll provide a broad dragnet that will exclude a lot of Muslims and libs. (I'm not just saying this to be inflammatory. We already know the administration has been going after legal immigrants on the basis of criticisms of Israel. This is a completely reasonable connection to this social media policy.)

Israel, or the US and its current admin? While it's pretty obvious that these two countries have ties like no others, it would seem weird if they were looking for criticism of a foreign state first rather than their own, despite the circumstances.

Re: US could ask foreign tourists for five-year social media history before entry

#213

Post by [deleted] »

s_dev wrote: post #104
dogemaster2028 wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why would tourists want to come to a place they dislike? I don’t go to UK anymore for example.

>Why would tourists want to come to a place they dislike? Visit family. That's not mentioning you can dislike the current administration without disliking other aspects of the US. The US is big and diverse.

[deleted]

Re: US could ask foreign tourists for five-year social media history before entry

#214

Post by estearum »

tavavex wrote: post #212
estearum wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Precisely speaking, they're looking to catch any critique of Israel because it'll provide a broad dragnet that will exclude a lot of Muslims and libs. (I'm not just saying this to be inflammatory. We already know the administration has been going after legal immigrants on the basis of criticisms of Israel. This is a completely reasonable connection to this social media policy.)

Israel, or the US and its current admin? While it's pretty obvious that these two countries have ties like no others, it would seem weird if they were looking for criticism of a foreign state first rather than their own, despite the circumstances.

Going after "anti-semitism" gives the admin the political top-cover to systematically abridge various Constitutional rights and anyone who pushes back is "obviously" an anti-semite.

It's an extremely despicable and cynical ploy.

Re: US could ask foreign tourists for five-year social media history before entry

#215

Post by mnky9800n »

techblueberry wrote: post #205
bilekas wrote: post #10

I'm going to assume it's then going to be considered suspicious if you don't happen to have any social media for at least the last 5 years ?

I have to assume the real goal is just to tank tourism.

But why? Tourism is like 3% gdp for USA. That’s like hundreds of billions of annual dollars. Losing that would hurt.

https://apps.bea.gov/scb/issues/2025/02-february/0225-travel...

Re: US could ask foreign tourists for five-year social media history before entry

#216

Post by tavavex »

M95D wrote: post #157
BLKNSLVR wrote: post #41

What of those who have virtually no footprint? Almost the only thing I have is LinkedIn, which is always only as up to date as the last time I changed jobs, which I don't do often. No Facebook, insta, snap, twitter, tiktok. I subscribe to maybe five channels on YouTube. My HN account isn't linked to my main 'identity' email address so I could hide it just by having a clean phone (which I do for international travel a…

> What of those who have virtually no footprint? Those people wouldn't want to travel to a police state anyway.

Some people have to travel for work. For Canadians, lots of international flights connect through the US (especially if you're flying on the cheapest routes), and there's no way to transit through without "properly" entering the country. While the thing in the post doesn't yet apply to Canada (due to us not requiring an ESTA), it very well could become a thing soon. That would be pretty awful for everyone.

Re: US could ask foreign tourists for five-year social media history before entry

#217

Post by tavavex »

dogemaster2028 wrote: post #73
TavsiE9s wrote: post #2

The worldcup next year is going to be interesting.

Why would tourists want to come to a place they dislike? I don’t go to UK anymore for example.

It's not even about like or dislike. Some people dislike the UK, but I imagine that few feel threatened by the prospect of having to cross its border. It's an easier sell to make someone come to the country despite whatever they don't like to attend a big event. But with the US, who knows at this point? The system had been shaken up so much in the last year that there's no telling what's going to happen to any given entrant (especially someone from one of the "disfavored" countries), or what the rules are going to be like tomorrow. It's not preference, it's preference combined with fear.

Re: US could ask foreign tourists for five-year social media history before entry

#218

Post by tavavex »

egorfine wrote: post #94
saxenaabhi wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wait what did I just read? This sounds horrible and pure evil and not worthy of america. My sympathies are with you!

> My sympathies are with you! Is there anything you can do about it?

What do you expect from them? Unless saxenaabhi is code for "US CBP Commissioner" or some position of an equivalent power, there is very little that an HN user can do about it at this point.

Re: US could ask foreign tourists for five-year social media history before entry

#219

Post by morkalork »

dogemaster2028 wrote: post #59
akie wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My social media is full of rants about the ongoing trend of bringing fascism to the US and the authoritarian and repressive tendencies of the current president. Am I not allowed to say that?

You are allowed to say it. Unlike UK, you won’t be arrested. But you won’t be allowed in. Besides, why would you want to come if you don’t like it here?

>Besides, why would you want to come if you don’t like it here?

Good ol "if you don't love it, leave it" argument. Nothing beats that!

Re: US could ask foreign tourists for five-year social media history before entry

#220

Post by throw310822 »

estearum wrote: post #210
throw310822 wrote: post #203

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> evangelicals need Israel to be controlled by Jews in order for their end-world prophecies to come true No, evangelicals need all the Jews to go back to Israel for their end of the world prophecy to come true. So why don't they just pass laws to expel them from the US? It would be criminal of course, but coherent with their goals. The fact is, coherence stops when it stops benefitting zionists. They are nutters but…

> No, evangelicals need all the Jews to go back to Israel for their end of the world prophecy to come true Not according to literally any evangelical I've ever spoken to, nor any mainstream evangelical in US theo-politics. Nor is that actually stated in scripture. The complete assemblage of Jews in Israel can happen during or after Tribulation via Jesus teleportation magic. Sovereignty to rebuild the temple is all th…

> Sovereignty to rebuild the temple is all that's required for Jesus to gain his Jew-teleportation powers.

They already have sovereignty, so why don't evangelicals lobby to withhold all aid to Israel unless they get to work and rebuild the temple?

> I made no such claim. My claim is that they're getting "favorable" treatment as a purely instrumental means to an end.

That's exactly the claim I was talking about. You strive to justify every favorable treatment Israel gets as the fortuitous side-effect of something that has nothing to do with those who actually materially benefit from it- that is, those who live in Israel or consider the promised land of their own people. Isn't that a bit suspicious to you?

> Because otherwise a person literally can't parse the factual statement that American evangelicals love Israel but don't care for Jews?

I understand this, but can't help thinking that this alliance with religious fanatics is too lucky to be random. I mean "they want absolutely nothing from me except giving me money and protecting me politically and militarily? That is great, how do I get more of these? Who can I finance and boost to spread this religion even more?"

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