Pointing out the undeniable fact that it is being used extensively by extremist groups, Germany aims to shut down Telegram across the country, and even across the entire European Union. In addition to death threats against officials, Telegram is employed by anti-vaxxers in their campaign against COVID-19 shots.
https://www.notebookcheck.net/Telegram-could-be-banned-all-over-the-European-Union.592620.0.html
Where is all the police to deal with "extremist groups". Why those loafers dont use telegram to catch extremists?
Censorship is the worst thing to happen to EU!
Never support censorship of any kind! I'm with the author on this one.
As a European myself, I am strongly against any form of nanny state (and EU is becoming one) or anything that limits freedom of speech/ideas.
I don't see why a platform must be punished. If the content in question is of criminal nature, then seek the one who created it.
I miss the good old internet days. Nowadays I do feel the need for having a VPN bypassing restrictions or exercising my right to express my ideas without getting punished by thought police.
No to censorship. The list of what can be considered is only going to grow bigger once we remove more and more dissent. The witches list just keeps on growing bigger. I spent two decades living under a totalitarian state and I can smell that direction of movement. The reason why censorship starts "benign" is because that's the slippery slope they initiate people onto. Before long, these paradigms have their citizens distrusting each other and killing each other.
Also, since when is anti-vax an extremist movement? Since COVID? Because that's an entirely different topic due to how COVID vaccines function compared to other vaccines.
Quote from: MrDone on January 14, 2022, 18:26:28
Where is all the police to deal with "extremist groups". Why those loafers dont use telegram to catch extremists?
Censorship is the worst thing to happen to EU!
The author here. Funny story about extremist groups/illegal stuff on Telegram and the police. I was on a Romanian generalist group, 18+. No hardcore adult content, maybe some dirty jokes here and there, guys trying to pick off ladies in the main chat, various services being advertised, mostly legal or nearly legal stuff. Guys asking for drugs or offering usually get the boot from admins in a matter of minutes (weed is illegal in Romania). One evening, a guy comes talking about weed and rambles about not giving a flying fudge about the police. "Policemen are too stupid to use Telegram, it's the Wild West here, freeedom, who can give me the number of a weed supplier or maybe at least some pictures of underage girls?" To which a non-admin guy who was patiently and politely asking this dude to cut talking about illegal nonsense replies: "Did you at least check my profile pic?" He had a picture of a dude in police uniform...
Of course that anyone can lie regarding their identity on Telegram, but I've seen that guy involved in other conversations and if he's not a cop, at least he acts like one who is there to gather information and, if possible, make some stupid people realize that Telegram is not exactly the Wild West and asking for or offering illegal stuff can have consequences.
I know, the story wasn't exactly about extremists. Although sometimes I get labeled as one, I never looked for such groups and when I end up in what seems to be a general group that's crawling with lunatics I get out as soon as possible. As a side note, in Romania you end up being labeled as an extremist if you don't tolerate corruption and the involvement of the church in politics... and if you don't swallow those who claim that communism was better, again. "Extremist" and other labels. It's not like I wish death to those people who cry about the good old days. I only wish for them to go to North Korea and stay there for at least a year to get a good taste of what Romania might have been now...
Quote from: Reheim on January 14, 2022, 20:02:25
No to censorship. The list of what can be considered is only going to grow bigger once we remove more and more dissent. The witches list just keeps on growing bigger. I spent two decades living under a totalitarian state and I can smell that direction of movement. The reason why censorship starts "benign" is because that's the slippery slope they initiate people onto. Before long, these paradigms have their citizens distrusting each other and killing each other.
Also, since when is anti-vax an extremist movement? Since COVID? Because that's an entirely different topic due to how COVID vaccines function compared to other vaccines.
Anti-vaxxers are not extremists. I got vaccinated, I will probably not do it again anytime soon and focus on improving my general health and boosting my immunity using natural methods, but I try not to be on the pro or anti side here. I'm with science. The big problem with pro/anti vax is that we need arguments. Solid figures, solid science. In the last two decades, most European governments have lost one essential asset that makes a country strong - TRUST. I've seen how polls have been evolving here in the last decades, I've seen the general opinion being shifted in other countries as well. Europe seems to be headed towards anarchy and the rate keeps accelerating. At least this is how I see it.
Oh, so European Union will forbid Marxist groups and the Communist Manifesto? a primitive ideology without checks and balances, without separation of powers ,hat murdered 100 million of people due to power being Totally in the State?
Quote from: LL on January 14, 2022, 21:05:54
Oh, so European Union will forbid Marxist groups and the Communist Manifesto? a primitive ideology without checks and balances, without separation of powers ,hat murdered 100 million of people due to power being Totally in the State?
Don't you think that the EU should focus on EDUCATING the masses to understand what is really wrong with communism or nazism and never wish they return instead of forbidding people to talk about that? Doing a very basic and loose analogy, we could say it's just like telling kids not to eat candies. The emergence of extremist groups can be easily spotted taking place exactly in countries where most of the population is struggling to make ends meet, but also in countries where migrants were welcomed with open arms and often turned out to become a problem.
P.S. The problem with censorship and labeling people is that, for example, if someone tells me that I am a moron, it's basically all right. I might sue and ask for damages, but the society as a whole won't see a problem in this. If I happen to belong to some minority of any nature (not trying to poke the hornets' nest, so I am not naming any), then it is very likely that it all becomes a very serious problem and that someone automatically gets labeled as an extremist.
Fun thing is censorship is a must for any communism or nazism state. So is EU moving to anarchy? Hardly. More like fascism.
Yes, I agree, but communist and nazi countries were somehow organized. At least they gave the appearance of being organized. And, obviously, swept a lot of problems under the rug. The thing is that, now, at least in Romania, the state/administration is corrupted to the core and flooded with incompetent people who have absolutely no clue about what they should be doing. It's enough to see the joke that has been Romania in the ongoing pandemic, speaking of measures taken and how they actually work. Short story below...
As a parent, I signed that I agree to have my kid tested for Covid at school. No problem with that, I consider it (somehow) normal. It would be perfectly normal if things would actually work properly. Many parents REFUSED to sign because... testing would lead to chip implantation, selling one's soul to the Dark One, and ridiculous stuff like that (no joke, seriously, there are a lot of people who believe those silly 6-6-6-chip stories now, in 2022!). Good, but after a while, I find out that the tests MUST BE PERFORMED AT HOME. By me/the other parent/the kid. Well, not so good, because the chance for fake positive/inconcludent results increases.
Buuut... the Romanian state organizes a bid to find a company to provide the tests. Who wins it? A company that is led by a pimp. No joke. The dude was CONDEMNED as a pimp/human trafficker/more. He associated himself with a fashion designer who happens to have been condemned for money laundering. No big deal, right? How can any sane human trust such a government???
Bottomline - they give only TWO tests to kids each week. Next week they repeat the operation. When school started, there weren't tests to give to the kids in the first week.
Oh, final thing about the tests - before the winter holiday, there were 76 positives reported all over the country the last day tests were conducted. Those parents had to do PCR tests on their own expense, and only 4 (FOUR!!!) out of 76 turned out to be positives. The statistically natural conclusion is that those tests are nothing else but state-backed money laundering.
Unfortunately, countries far less pathetic than Romania will probably hit fascism, as you say...
Coming from Germany, it seems old habits never die.
Politics are more worried about their public image than about doing what's right.
See, in what world does closing down Telegram helps against ""extremist groupds""? They will just change platforms and that's it.
On the other hand, I dont see anyone of them worried about all the inmigrants they are taking in, and do note, some of them might be more of a worry than an antivaxxer in Telegram.
I like how anti-vaxxers got roped in with pedophiles and drug dealers. What is wrong with you people lol
Remember in the 90s when everyone made fun of the US for trying to ban the export of encryption (or applied mathematics)? Seems they had nothing to fear, other countries will ban it themselves.
And they'll keep banning every encrypted communication network as "extremists" etc will simply migrate to the next free, encrypted communication network.
Quote from: Opponent12 on January 15, 2022, 01:16:20
I like how anti-vaxxers got roped in with pedophiles and drug dealers. What is wrong with you people lol
More like, pedos and drug dealers against anti-vaxxers.
Quote from: Opponent12 on January 15, 2022, 01:16:20
I like how anti-vaxxers got roped in with pedophiles and drug dealers. What is wrong with you people lol
This is how the authorities depict the "extremist" crowd when enforcing censorship these days, I am just painting the landscape...
In general, I believe that you want to keep "extremists" where you can see them. Suppression only fuels them and pushes them underground, where they're harder to track. It will always come back to bite you. As the expression says, a dog that barks doesn't bite. It's often the case that people confuse a symptom with a problem. For example, "hate speech" can be very hollow. A symptom of a problem that is unpleasant but not dangerous in itself. If you try to remove the symptom instead of the problem, the next symptom might be a lot worse.
Quote from: Reheim on January 14, 2022, 20:02:25
Also, since when is anti-vax an extremist movement? Since COVID? Because that's an entirely different topic due to how COVID vaccines function compared to other vaccines.
Ever since vaccines proved themselves as an invaluable tool in controlling all sorts of diseases? It's just a lot more acute now given how contagious SARS-CoV-2 is and the sheer amount of damage it can cause (and has caused), to economy, health and society. Previously, when someone refused vaccine in an otherwise well vaccinated society, not much happened. Unless they travelled abroad to a less vaccinated region and brought back a souvenir. People are forgetting just how much of a difference vaccines made. How many lives were saved and how many lives were improved. Frankly, I was fully expecting vaccination to be mandatory once
fully approved all the way back in spring 2020. Because an infected person is a danger to others and this thing was so contagious, individual rights take a back seat. I thought the proclamations that it will never be mandatory were naïve. It seemed unlikely we would hit estimated targets solely through voluntary vaccination. And that was the original virus that was nothing compared to delta (on the other hand, the first vaccine turned out much better than originally expected). That's the thing. You have a right to risk your own life (up to a point after which your sanity will be questioned). You have no right to risk the lives of others. That's how freedom works. Your freedom ends where another person's freedom starts. A compromise has to be found when there is a conflict. A compromise means that you have to give something up. You won't get all of what you want. Again, elementary thing that escapes some people.
Consider the word. An extreme position is no less extreme just because it happens to be at the harmless or positive side of a scale. Refusing to eat meat whatsoever is an extreme position. Refusing violence unconditionally is extreme. Protecting the environment at all cost is extreme. You might think that those things are good but that makes them no less extreme. You know, it did take me a while to realize that pacifism is a form of extremism. I thought it was naïve and unworkable (they can't deal with aggressors and those will always exist), but I didn't think of it as extremism. Because pacifism has positive connotations for me while extremism is the opposite. Sometimes, you need to recalibrate yourself.
You know, either you trust bodies like EMA to do their job or you don't. If you don't trust authorities, if you don't believe that there are people who know a lot more about the subject, if you can't read a study and grasp the gist of it, then you've got a problem. There are conventional vaccines if you don't trust the new-fangled stuff. Democracy (and market as well) hinges on people being able to make good decisions. It can tolerate a few people making bad decisions but not huge numbers. If you want a good democracy, you need to ensure that people are equipped to make good decisions. When people are pushed, when people are scared, scary things come out of the woodwork.
Quote from: Codrut Nistor on January 14, 2022, 20:37:47
In the last two decades, most European governments have lost one essential asset that makes a country strong - TRUST. I've seen how polls have been evolving here in the last decades, I've seen the general opinion being shifted in other countries as well. Europe seems to be headed towards anarchy and the rate keeps accelerating. At least this is how I see it.
That would be only natural. It's called entropy. Universe tends towards disorder. The real problem is the ability of people to make heads and tails of a situation. Without this ability, what do you trust? As I wrote, democracy is all about making decisions. And that is all about information. Where do you get information, how do you verify it? How can you know what is true and what isn't. It actually takes substantial brainpower and you might not like the answer (that you sometimes can't know). Working democracy is actually hard, not easy. It's one of the most demanding systems of governance as we are all collectively responsible. Everything is our fault as we make collective decisions. Yet you as an individual are just one voice. It doesn't solve our weaknesses or vices, it exposes them. In a way, life under a totalitarian regime is so much simpler. There are things that you can't but on the other hand, you don't have to think much and you don't have much responsibility.
To the liberals, anyone right of Stalin is a 'dangerous far right' individual. And 'extremist'.
See how they had demonized Germany's AfD, Hungary's Orban, Poland's Duda, Brazil's Bolsonaro, Trump etc?
Those godless 21st century Bolsheviks in the mainstream media and the rhetoric from 'progressive' politicians aren't fooling me.
Sad to see western countries justifying censorship for so called anti-vaxxer extremists. I am pro covid vaccine and have taken covid vaccine but I don't think anti vaxxers are "extremists". In the past we outside the west used to look up to western countries for the freedom their citizens enjoyed. But slowly they are just censoring, de-platforming, firing people for smallest of wrong thinking. Sad.
The problem with Telegram is that it's, while unofficially, is under Soviet Russias Putins umbrella, so he can, if he pleases so, get backdoor access when he needs it.
Funny how they are happy to ban Telegram or any free speech platform for supposed extremism, while happily promote real terrorist like ISIS on FB, Tw, YT, by boosting their reach or CNN making actual interview with terrorists, not to mention the fact that 60% of pedo traffic goes through FB and it's messenger. ...but of course they won't ban their own :)
Quote from: VaruLV on January 15, 2022, 22:03:05
The problem with Telegram is that it's, while unofficially, is under Soviet Russias Putins umbrella, so he can, if he pleases so, get backdoor access when he needs it.
It's a very interesting point of view, but I have to disagree. Do you have any source for this information? Telegram's founder bailed out of Russia BEFORE starting it. He was behind VK.com, and that's what Putin allegedly managed to take away from him and get in control of, via third parties, of course.
Yea that's one interesting take indeed. Lost me at Soviet Russia, in 2022, though.
Hitting Telegram with a state-wide bonk was a bad thing to do when the ruskis did it. Not anymore is it...
As for the extremists, paedos and pirates, I don't have the data on when the majority of those hopped on but I wouldn't imagine it happened all that recently. It's just that, everyone did now. Groups of pretty much all views have embraced it for its very nature (privacy). People who are, be frank, very supportive of the Russian state the way it is now. And the opponents, that've been there for ages. And numerous groups that don't give a flying duck about Russia. No horse in the race. I mean... maybe the progressives are more hesitant to join. Who'd join a platform made by some Ivan from Soviet Russia...
Quote from: Codrut Nistor on January 16, 2022, 09:23:44
Quote from: VaruLV on January 15, 2022, 22:03:05
The problem with Telegram is that it's, while unofficially, is under Soviet Russias Putins umbrella, so he can, if he pleases so, get backdoor access when he needs it.
It's a very interesting point of view, but I have to disagree. Do you have any source for this information? Telegram's founder bailed out of Russia BEFORE starting it. He was behind VK.com, and that's what Putin allegedly managed to take away from him and get in control of, via third parties, of course.
Russia has got pretty tight grip on their expats and this case is no exclusion, Id be very cautious with everything IT that comes from Russia even if by so called "opposition" or modern digital dissidents.
Quote from: BaimeLT on January 16, 2022, 12:18:40
Yea that's one interesting take indeed. Lost me at Soviet Russia, in 2022, though.
Hitting Telegram with a state-wide bonk was a bad thing to do when the ruskis did it. Not anymore is it...
As for the extremists, paedos and pirates, I don't have the data on when the majority of those hopped on but I wouldn't imagine it happened all that recently. It's just that, everyone did now. Groups of pretty much all views have embraced it for its very nature (privacy). People who are, be frank, very supportive of the Russian state the way it is now. And the opponents, that've been there for ages. And numerous groups that don't give a flying duck about Russia. No horse in the race. I mean... maybe the progressives are more hesitant to join. Who'd join a platform made by some Ivan from Soviet Russia...
Apparently you either dont know todays Russia and its history well enough or are simply naive about it. Its back on the track of USSR style governance and affairs with other countries, Russias leaders even dont hide their simpathies for USSR and believe it was one of the greatest geopolitical tragedies of modern times.
The point is, Russia is de facto totalitarian state with iron grip on all of its industries and with wide and powerful network of expats and shills abroad.
Quote from: _MT_ on January 15, 2022, 15:14:21
Quote from: Reheim on January 14, 2022, 20:02:25
Also, since when is anti-vax an extremist movement? Since COVID? Because that's an entirely different topic due to how COVID vaccines function compared to other vaccines.
Ever since vaccines proved themselves as an invaluable tool in controlling all sorts of diseases? It's just a lot more acute now given how contagious SARS-CoV-2 is and the sheer amount of damage it can cause (and has caused), to economy, health and society. Previously, when someone refused vaccine in an otherwise well vaccinated society, not much happened. Unless they travelled abroad to a less vaccinated region and brought back a souvenir. People are forgetting just how much of a difference vaccines made. How many lives were saved and how many lives were improved. Frankly, I was fully expecting vaccination to be mandatory once fully approved all the way back in spring 2020. Because an infected person is a danger to others and this thing was so contagious, individual rights take a back seat. I thought the proclamations that it will never be mandatory were naïve. It seemed unlikely we would hit estimated targets solely through voluntary vaccination. And that was the original virus that was nothing compared to delta (on the other hand, the first vaccine turned out much better than originally expected). That's the thing. You have a right to risk your own life (up to a point after which your sanity will be questioned). You have no right to risk the lives of others. That's how freedom works. Your freedom ends where another person's freedom starts. A compromise has to be found when there is a conflict. A compromise means that you have to give something up. You won't get all of what you want. Again, elementary thing that escapes some people.
Consider the word. An extreme position is no less extreme just because it happens to be at the harmless or positive side of a scale. Refusing to eat meat whatsoever is an extreme position. Refusing violence unconditionally is extreme. Protecting the environment at all cost is extreme. You might think that those things are good but that makes them no less extreme. You know, it did take me a while to realize that pacifism is a form of extremism. I thought it was naïve and unworkable (they can't deal with aggressors and those will always exist), but I didn't think of it as extremism. Because pacifism has positive connotations for me while extremism is the opposite. Sometimes, you need to recalibrate yourself.
You know, either you trust bodies like EMA to do their job or you don't. If you don't trust authorities, if you don't believe that there are people who know a lot more about the subject, if you can't read a study and grasp the gist of it, then you've got a problem. There are conventional vaccines if you don't trust the new-fangled stuff. Democracy (and market as well) hinges on people being able to make good decisions. It can tolerate a few people making bad decisions but not huge numbers. If you want a good democracy, you need to ensure that people are equipped to make good decisions. When people are pushed, when people are scared, scary things come out of the woodwork.
Yeah, except that covid vaccines dont work the way, what I presume to be, your beloved vaccines work. Its a different virus and with different vaccines than for other diseases that had been erradicated by the help of vaccines.
All the date thus far shows that neither can Covid be erradicated with the help of vaccines, nor does they stop the spread of it.
A good, working vaccine is one you get boosted once in some 10 years, if boosted at all, not the one that doesnt work on current Omicron variant and, according to some loonatics, should be administered in the form of boosters every 4-9 months, depending on loonatic subscribing such dosage.
All vaccines are not the same, they dont work the same and neither are the viruses the same, so, please, dont spread this misinformation that has no base in facts about C19 vaccines being as efficient as those that have saved millions and stopped diseases in their tracks, because there is no such vaccine for C19 and there might never be.
Quote from: VaruLV on January 16, 2022, 21:16:45
Yeah, except that covid vaccines dont work the way, what I presume to be, your beloved vaccines work. Its a different virus and with different vaccines than for other diseases that had been erradicated by the help of vaccines.
All the date thus far shows that neither can Covid be erradicated with the help of vaccines, nor does they stop the spread of it.
A good, working vaccine is one you get boosted once in some 10 years, if boosted at all, not the one that doesnt work on current Omicron variant and, according to some loonatics, should be administered in the form of boosters every 4-9 months, depending on loonatic subscribing such dosage.
All vaccines are not the same, they dont work the same and neither are the viruses the same, so, please, dont spread this misinformation that has no base in facts about C19 vaccines being as efficient as those that have saved millions and stopped diseases in their tracks, because there is no such vaccine for C19 and there might never be.
I wouldn't say I love vaccines. In general, I avoid taking drugs unless actually needed. I don't pop pills to make myself happy or make pain go away. Actually, since I have received very painful injections as a child, I very much feared needles. However, I do consider them the lesser evil.
As far as I know, there is a whole virus SARS-CoV-2 vaccine, for example. Hardly a new technology. There is also a protein subunit vaccine, if I remember correctly, another type considered proven (used, for example, in hepatitis B vaccine). Personally, I went for the new stuff - mRNA. Very interesting technology. We're talking about so called anti-waxxers. That's not limited to SARS-CoV-2 vaccines. And you don't have to practically eradicate a virus or a disease to prove that a vaccine is safe. That's what it's about - how much safer is the vaccine compared to the virus, accounting for the likelihood of encountering it. More and more people nowadays refuse vaccination in general. They don't want their new-borns to be vaccinated. And it's an ongoing debate whether a parent should be allowed to make that decision, to take such a risk with child's life. We shouldn't forget that vaccines did a lot of good. That they do have a pretty good track record. How many vaccines can you name that went to market and were subsequently pulled because of harmful side effects? How many people were affected? Especially in more recent times in developed countries. I'm more worried about antibiotics use. I'm not afraid of antibiotics, I fear losing them because some idiots pop them like candy, feed them to healthy animals and prescribe them needlessly. I trust EMA to do their job. This is, after all, why we want to have institutions that can resist political pressure.
It's a sneaky little bugger, isn't it. Fortunately, it's not that deadly. You have to realize that the vaccines we have were made against the original. It's a little miracle they still work at all. And a testament to how good they were. Also, they were not designed to stop transmission (you'd probably need a vaccine that gets sprayed up your nose rather than injected into a muscle, given that it's a corona virus). We just hoped they would help. And they do. It would have been so much worse without them. We hoped protection would last at least 12 months and it might, against the original. Because it's fighting a virus it wasn't designed for, we need higher antibody counts. And older people do have weaker response. It spreads very fast which makes fighting it difficult. Coincidentally, I'm due for a booster tomorrow. If I have to take another booster six months from now, I will. Hopefully, it will be an updated version. The problem isn't the vaccine, the vaccine is surprisingly good, it's the virus. What else can we do? To me, this is a situation that needs solving. I can't sit on my hands. Vaccine is here, it's my duty to take it and do my tiny little part. It's nothing compared to volunteering in hospitals or care homes. Funny thing is that I happen to be a person who hates being told what to do and having to do things. I appreciate that I can make the decision myself. I just can't figure out a better plan. It matters not whether I like it.
For example, 15 years ago, encephalitis vaccine required boosters every three years. Now, it's five years (well, I think it's four to six). That doesn't mean it can't last longer. Boosters are typically given without performing an antibody test. Often, such a test wouldn't be economical. You've got to account for people with weaker immune response. Vaccines get better, our understanding of required antibody level improves as well. I went without a booster for 12 years and still had sufficient antibody count. That doesn't mean everybody would. Who knows where it will be in 30 years. One challenge with SARS-CoV-2 is that we don't really know where the protection level is (at least as far as I know). It takes time to learn these things. Some viruses are harder to vaccinate against. HIV is an example. And HIV vaccine research was of huge help in the development of SARS-CoV-2 vaccines. We have had vaccine against influenza for a while now and it also wasn't eradicated and requires shots every year. That's life.
It's high time to choose Utopia Ecosystem, for safety and anonymity! The best p2p all in one platform and very easy to use! ;)
Care to tell us more about it or should I just push your message in the spam bin, @Sarahee1?
The Whack-A-Mole game is real. As the article notes, the likely methods of censoring Telegram have workarounds (see the many attempts to block sites like The Pirate Bay over the years).
Ultimately though, "extremism" and free speech will migrate onto decentralized platforms and semi-decentralized (e.g. the Fediverse). Interest is at an all time high, and monetization may even be possible through blockchain schemes.
Yes, let's ban Telegram because criminals use it to commit crimes. But while we're at it, let's also ban money, because they use that in the transactions for their crimes, and as the incentive. And let's ban cars, because they use them to get around while committing their crimes.
I'd also point out that most, if not all, of the politicians wanting to ban Telegram and other encryption protocols use encrypted emails, and would not be willing to post their private contents of their computers online, yet that's basically what they're asking the public to do. Whenever public officials want to ban something, it's almost always something they themselves use in some form and would not want their own use infringed, e.g. politicians and celebrities that want to ban guns, yet use armed bodyguards. Funny how they deserve the protection but others don't. Same concept applies here: they want to ban Telegram and outlaw the public's ability to encrypt their communications, devices, etc, yet they wouldn't want their own private lives left unprotected.
As for the whole vaccine "debate," which is really just people that, IME, have very little real knowledge about it claiming that because vaccines in general are a good thing, if you're "anti-vax" for any reason--and without even really caring to know the reasons--you're wrong because vaccines=good and so "anti-vax" automatically equals bad. Never mind that pretty much every person I've ever spoken with that's "anti-vax" is categorically NOT against vaccinations, but against certain aspects of them. But hey, we don't want to deal with the nitty-gritty facts, we just want to demonize people and label them extremists because they go against what the government tells us, because we know from recent history they're very trustworthy, and we should absolutely accept everything they tell us without question. It just amazes me how little people, in general, have learned after the past 20 years.
I would pose one question to @_MT_ and others that believe people should be forced to be injected with a barely tested, very controversial vaccine because the government who, again, we all trust whole-heartedly, assures us it's safe and effective and because the health of society (the same society that, by the way, by and large really doesn't care that much about their health and expects society to foot the bill for their health issues while simultaneously treating their bodies like dumpsters) is more important than individual rights: at what point do we draw the line where that's no longer an acceptable proposition? Many argue this planet is overpopulated and we're strangling it, stripping it of natural resources, destroying the land by over-farming (really improperly farming for reasons of profit and supply/demand, but I'm simplifying), polluting, etc, and that the population needs to be cut back if the human race is to survive. So should we get rid of everyone over age 60, you know, for the good of the whole? I assume the answer by most would be no, that doing so would be extreme. The point being, many would argue that forcing an injection on a healthy individual is extreme as well. And the question being, where is the line drawn?
Quote from: Corsair on January 14, 2022, 19:03:39
As a European myself, I am strongly against any form of nanny state (and EU is becoming one) or anything that limits freedom of speech/ideas.
I don't see why a platform must be punished. If the content in question is of criminal nature, then seek the one who created it.
I miss the good old internet days. Nowadays I do feel the need for having a VPN bypassing restrictions or exercising my right to express my ideas without getting punished by thought police.
I understand your point of view but here is my experience. Telegram have refused to remove abusive content of a friend of mine, it's been on there for a long time on a public channel. She's made several attempts on her life. Their abuse reporting system is a joke. Freedom of speech is very important but it shouldn't be used to destroy innocent people's lives. Telegram needs much better moderation. As much as I dislike Facebook, they removed the offending content within a few hours.