We should. The problem is that politics is messy and with lots of opposing views. See the GDPR versus this Chat Control absurdity. But _principles_ are those that stick, and I think that the principle that communication should be private _always_ should become sort of constitutional within the EU. We are the ones that vote, we are the ones that need to signal that we don't want to give up privacy for whatever "security" some, completely uninformed, want to promise.
You'd be surprised how easily people give up their rights for the made up security promises, without putting up a fight.
Let's go through a short list I experienced during my lifetime in my country, off the top of my head.
-2001 Invasive airport checks after 911
-2015 mandatory registration with ID of prepaid SIM cards after islamist terrorist attacks
-2020-2022 mandatory COVID vaccine ID, to be able travel and enter establishments
Sure there was the famous trucker protests in Canada against mandatory COVID pass, but the government cracked down on that, so your protests against systems of control are irelevant. Chat control is inevitably gonna happen with or without your approval.
As for corona, it's more or less common knowledge by now that unless you're 60+ a common cold is more dangerous.
So your exampled don’t quite fit.
Try passing a law with daily house searches for security and you‘ll see the difference.
That one makes sense for any government valuing the lives of its citizens. COVID was one hell of a nasty bug for healthy people, and for those not in good health it often meant death.
COVID cost the lives of at least 7 million people worldwide, of which 1.2 million were in the USA. "The cost of <<freedom>>" one might say if one were absolutely cynical, simply because of the massive difference in deaths per capita to just about every other large developed country [1].
And that doesn't include the cost of lost productivity due to people being out sick, struck by Long COVID/MECFS or having to be caretaker for affected people.
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/COVID-19_pandemic_death_rates_...
Imo this one was slightly different, because it was (at least where I live) a temporary emergency measure with an end date as a response to an active crisis.
But I agree that people can get blinded by security theater.
The issue with these types of battles, is that each side tends to resort to extreme hyperbole.
That basically gives the other side ammunition for wholesale dismissal.
It’s important (IMNSHO) to have reasonable, sane discussions, and avoid falling into the “screeching monkey” trap.
Montesquieu warned about the seperation of powers between the legislator and the executive, but it seems that it is still not the case at the EU level.
I suspect that in the halls of power they would rather interpret "digital sovereignty" as a state where they, the sovereigns, have power in the digital world to mess with EU citizens online lives. It seems very optimistic to think that the EU is suddenly going to get interested in supporting software companies. Even philosophically, why bother changing suddenly just to do something they can ask the Americans to do? Economies require specialisation, everyone can't do everything.
It isn't even a bad thing that the EU doesn't have a thriving software ecosystem but for the fact it appears to be driven by governmental hostility to freedom. Good companies can come from the US. Bad companies can come from the EU. They already have a good FOSS ecosystem. The only problem is the EU seems to be more likely to bring in something like chat control and beat down anyone who achieves enormous success.
We did. Cookie banners have persisted for well over a decade, so that's a proven track record.
demarq•1h ago
Otherwise you’re just choosing who misuses their privilege to your data.