Comments on: Europe and the War on Liberty II

By: Maria

Maria — Mon, 03 May 2004 10:11:29 +0000

Tom t – further info on the proposal is here.

By: Tom T.

Tom T. — Sat, 01 May 2004 15:23:37 +0000

What is meant by “traffic and location data”? What information, precisely, are they proposing to store? Who would store it, governments or the private communications companies involved? How would it be accessible; would a warrant be necessary? What is the current practice with regard to such information? The Statewatch article is not clear on these points.

By: jdsm

jdsm — Fri, 30 Apr 2004 21:15:09 +0000

cafl, Protecting certain freedoms of religious minorities is a different thing to what is proposed. I’m not sure it’s plausible that if it were to be found that these measures were used to target specific ethnic groups, that this would not cause consternation among the rest of the populace. I agree that if you have a corrupt government and if they are not accountable, then you can have problems with measures like these. I don’t think European governments are generally especially corrupt and they are all accountable to their voters who would in practise get rid of any government they found to be abusing its power.

By: cafl

cafl — Fri, 30 Apr 2004 18:55:27 +0000

jdsm—Civil rights protections are a countervailing force to pure democracy. They protect the rights of minorities. Living in a democracy doesn’t protect religious minorities…minorities can’t vote out the abusers of their rights. And so on.

By: jdsm

jdsm — Fri, 30 Apr 2004 18:07:58 +0000

Ray, Your argument is a version of the slippery slope argument, which only works if you assume the steps taken are based on principle. They aren’t, they’re based on whether they are practically effective when balanced with the loss of freedom. Thus, the slippery slope argument doesn’t work. People should remember that we live in a democracy. If people feel their lives are made perceptibly worse by these measures, they will vote for the party that will remove them.

By: Andrew Case

Andrew Case — Fri, 30 Apr 2004 16:57:01 +0000

“The truth is, most of us won’t notice the surveillance and won’t care because we have nothing to hide.” – jdsm You left out an important word – “yet” You do not yet have anything to hide. In due course, as the nannyists take over government, you will have something to hide, be it a fondness for fatty foods, a habit of smoking a cigar once in a while, a belief that mild physical punishment of children is OK, – the list is endless. I’d much rather take the (frankly tiny) chance of being killed by a terrorist than the near certainty of being abused by my own government for some minor infraction which shouldn’t be illegal in the first place.

By: P O'Neill

P O'Neill — Fri, 30 Apr 2004 16:56:03 +0000

>> It is absolutely sickening to see the Irish government using its presidency of the EU to endorse measures that cut the heart right out of European human rights. >> What did you expect? Bertie Ahern has no principle other that Go With the Flow, especially the UK/US flow, so seeing him on board for this is utterly unsurprising. To the extent that the Irish government talks about human rights at all, it’s merely for a bit of rhetoric about Northern Ireland—for instance, to demand that the North must have better police oversight, something completely absent from the Republic.

By: Ray

Ray — Fri, 30 Apr 2004 16:27:26 +0000

“The truth is, most of us won’t notice the surveillance and won’t care because we have nothing to hide. ” Sure. And next we’ll abandon the need for search warrants, or any restrictions on police power to stop and seize – if you’ve nothing to hide, why worry? Recording all personal phone calls, tracking all purchases and library borrowings – why would you complain unless you’ve something to hide? Mandatory fingerprinting and DNA sampling for every adult – I haven’t done anything wrong, why would I object? A short, painless operation to install tracker chips, so that the police will always know where you’ve been and where you are – only terrorists could possibly object. Video cameras in every home, surveillance cameras on every corner – hey, they’re there for my protection, right?

By: jdsm

jdsm — Fri, 30 Apr 2004 16:04:05 +0000

The truth is, most of us won’t notice the surveillance and won’t care because we have nothing to hide. Those of us that do have something to hide have to worry and these kinds of measures may well make for a safer more law abiding EU, less open to terrorist threats. So I support it. The same goes for ID cards while we’re at it. We basically have ID cards in Finland and I have to confess I don’t feel especially choked by the oppressive state.

By: ian

ian — Fri, 30 Apr 2004 15:39:46 +0000

Can’t get trackback to work on an amended post so see here: http://ibanda.blogs.com/panchromatica/2004/04/the_end_of_demo.html

By: John Isbell

John Isbell — Fri, 30 Apr 2004 15:39:18 +0000

If they were proposing systematic surveillance of the EU’s heads of state, I think I could get behind it. Blair on the phone to Bush would be worth having for posterity. Maybe an MEP could propose that. It would indisputably do more to cut down on harm suffered by EU citizens. Imagine the Berlusconi phone calls.