Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

UK House of Lords attempting to ban use of VPNs by anyone under 16

alecmuffett.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

391–400 of 499 posts

Re: UK House of Lords attempting to ban use of VPNs by anyone under 16

#391

Post by subscribed »

JumpCrisscross wrote: post #141
pjc50 wrote: post #110

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's exactly it. The proscription is ridiculous and delegitimises the whole concept of proscribed organization. It collapses into "mere support for Palestine is an arrestable offense". This didn't work against Sinn Fein and it will not work now.

> The proscription is ridiculous They broke into a military base. If that was sanctioned by the organisation, they should be shut down.

The same PM who proscribed PA defended in court a woman who did exactly what PA was doing, painting warplanes in protest.

Re: UK House of Lords attempting to ban use of VPNs by anyone under 16

#392

Post by oytis »

iamacyborg wrote: post #173
oytis wrote: post #156

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People do get imprisoned for "terrorist speech" to my best knowledge. Up to 15 years prison time if I understand the law correctly

You do realise what terrorist speech entails though, right?

Well, I know that it doesn't entail any terrorist actions that would justify the gravity of the punishment

Re: UK House of Lords attempting to ban use of VPNs by anyone under 16

#393

Post by qcnguy »

bawolff wrote: post #154
nateabele wrote: post #137

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How many arrests does it take to chill free speech?

How many were for politcal speech as opposed to say threatening to murder someone?

Huge numbers are for political speech. It's not just prosecutions. Child protection is abused to force far left wing beliefs on the population.

A former Marine was charged with inciting racial hatred after describing some migrants as “scumbags” and “psychopaths” in a 12-minute video posted on Facebook following the murders of three children in Southport, which sparked riots around the country. He was then banned from coaching his own daughter's football club. A jury cleared him in 17 minutes, but Wales is run by the left so they kept the coaching ban in place because they believe right wing people are a threat to children.

In another case a teacher was banned from working with children after telling a Muslim child that "Britain is still a Christian state"

There are lots of cases like this. Especially if you expand to Europe. The German Chancellor has personally prosecuted thousands of speech cases against people who insulted him. Merkel established a general rule against insulting politicians so now people get police visits and their devices confiscated for saying things like such and such a politician is a dumbass.

Re: UK House of Lords attempting to ban use of VPNs by anyone under 16

#394

Post by random9749832 »

It is worse than you think. The country is on its knees. I go outside and no one looks happy and no one is shopping or eating out unless it is McDonalds or Lidl. No one is working, children are calling sick for school and everyone is wondering how the hell so many random people suddenly got in. The next few decades will be a story of decline.

Economy: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cwyp7v7r28yo

Youth unemployment: https://www.telegraph.co.uk/business/2025/12/11/britains-you...

Health care: https://www.theguardian.com/society/2025/dec/11/nhs-bracing-...

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/crrkervnxvqo

Re: UK House of Lords attempting to ban use of VPNs by anyone under 16

#395

Post by ben_w »

qcnguy wrote: post #381
Gud wrote: post #378

Earlier quoted context omitted.

When did the UK use to be free? Seems to me this is a cultural issue that runs deep. You are his majesty’s loyal subject, like it or not, and more importantly, you are a subject of his bureaucracy. The US works in a similar fashion, except the deep state has slightly different excuses to exist. I work extensively in the UK(past 5 years, I’ve worked there maybe two years in total). Nothing gets done without endless ap…

The obvious answer (that HN hates) is that the right can stop them. The only party in the UK against the Online Safety Act is Reform. The only party that wants to shrink the state is Reform. Every other party is supportive of this kind of thing. This makes sense because every other party in the UK is left wing. This isn't a problem of one country's specific culture. Australia and Canada are doing the exact same thing…

> This makes sense because every other party in the UK is left wing.

Definitionally not. Left and right are always relative to the local average, "left wing" and "right wing" are nothing more than a seating arrangement turned into a badge.

The Conservatives are, famously, right wing by British standards. If you think the Tories are lefties, you're so far to the right you can't even see the UK's Overton Window from where you are.

The votes I seen on parliament.uk about the Online Safety Bill show the split being usually the Tories vs. everyone else: https://votes.parliament.uk/votes/commons?SearchText=Online+...

> In fact everywhere is going the same way except the USA, because the USA has a constitution that encodes libertarian values (a minority position) in such a way that it requires a supermajority to overturn.

I have bad news for you: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hybL-GJov7M

Re: UK House of Lords attempting to ban use of VPNs by anyone under 16

#396

Post by bamboozled »

qcnguy wrote: post #388
bamboozled wrote: post #363

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Similar to the arguments about climate change and how we as individuals should tackle it. Not going to happen sorry. "If only we would just self organize into communities to protect childen..." ok.

Yes because self-organizing communities have never appeared anywhere in history. Just because you are afraid you can't win arguments doesn't mean you should get to impose your view by violence. Which is what you advocate for, when you say the government should impose your views on the population.

Quite an abrasive / overly defensive response, sorry you feel that way.

Not trying to win an argument, I just haven't really got a solid answer. People just get passionate about how they should have a right to secret communications online, why all the burden should be on parents to protect kids from harmful substances, yet can't really give a good reason as to why that is. Yet on the other hand, those same people probably want to live in a world that is relatively safe from terrorism, sexual abuse etc.

I just said I can understand why to some people, wanting to stop children having access to a VPN doesn't necessarily have to be this big secret government overreach conspiracy?

Do I think we should have to have government surveillance software running on everyone's computer? No. I just understand more than a single perspective and I think those who seem to shoot these proposals down rarely give good arguments expect, basically, the government is out to get us, or it suits me the way it is now.

Re: UK House of Lords attempting to ban use of VPNs by anyone under 16

#397

Post by ben_w »

Gud wrote: post #390
qcnguy wrote: post #381

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The obvious answer (that HN hates) is that the right can stop them. The only party in the UK against the Online Safety Act is Reform. The only party that wants to shrink the state is Reform. Every other party is supportive of this kind of thing. This makes sense because every other party in the UK is left wing. This isn't a problem of one country's specific culture. Australia and Canada are doing the exact same thing…

Your obvious solution is wrong, though. The right wing is just as eager to implement a police state. The correct answer is decentralisation of power, and put the government back in the hands of the people. That means frequent voting(multiple times a year), by an educated population. Works well in Switzerland.

> The correct answer is decentralisation of power, and put the government back in the hands of the people. That means frequent voting(multiple times a year), by an educated population.

Sufficiently well educated and also willing to read carefully and without partisan (or other) fear of favour.

How many of us read the terms and conditions before clicking "I agree"? How many support a side only because it's their own side?

I don't know how to fix this. The "obvious" solutions (seen in various government systems over the world and the centuries) all have demonstrable problems.

Re: UK House of Lords attempting to ban use of VPNs by anyone under 16

#398

Post by pksebben »

xp84 wrote: post #239
pksebben wrote: post #194

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

Okay, so I see we've arrived at fantasyland now. Just because someone probably posted an idiotic idea like that on Twitter one time does not mean it has any path to becoming law. Do you know how difficult it is to get a constitutional amendment passed?

See, I don't think they'd really bother with an amendment. FWIG there's also something in there about the right to a trial (is it the sixth?) that they've just kinda ignored. Is it that it's the first one that makes it more important? We've also gotten over our (apparently) ludicrous assumption that posse comitatus means anything.

Re: UK House of Lords attempting to ban use of VPNs by anyone under 16

#399

Post by rounce »

pydry wrote: post #255
phatfish wrote: post #234

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

>this nonsense about the UK being some authoritarian hell hole is getting silly. Not really. They're arresting people for protesting a genocide. >i don't mean some obnoxious twat bulling teachers over Facebook. I mean speech that actually matters Just a holocaust, nbd.

They're not being arrested "for protesting a genocide", they're being arrested for showing support for a group which has been declared to be a terrorist organisation. Regardless of your views on the latter, the former is an important distinction you seem to be unaware of. The fact there are thousands of people regularly protesting against Israeli actions in Palestine and yet not being arrested completely undermines your point.

Re: UK House of Lords attempting to ban use of VPNs by anyone under 16

#400

Post by Gud »

ben_w wrote: post #397
Gud wrote: post #390

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your obvious solution is wrong, though. The right wing is just as eager to implement a police state. The correct answer is decentralisation of power, and put the government back in the hands of the people. That means frequent voting(multiple times a year), by an educated population. Works well in Switzerland.

> The correct answer is decentralisation of power, and put the government back in the hands of the people. That means frequent voting(multiple times a year), by an educated population. Sufficiently well educated and also willing to read carefully and without partisan (or other) fear of favour. How many of us read the terms and conditions before clicking "I agree"? How many support a side only because it's their own s…

Yes. Like I said, this works well in Switzerland, where stupid decisions are at least made jointly, not by some career politicians. Makes it easier to slowly make changes. The key point is to keep things local - what works in Zürich doesn’t necessarily work in Appenzeller.
Post reply on HN