German Politician Calls for Internet Licensing To Post Online (Joins US, Australia, Canada, France, UK Censorship Gangs)
He is not alone, and the historical and philosophical roots of the problem are very deep.
If freedom-loving Germans thought the days of fascistic censorship and hubristic political claims of “silencing you for your own good” ended at the close of World War Two or with the conclusion of the Soviet occupation, they were wrong.
And if Americans breathe sighs of relief, thinking, “It couldn’t happen here,” they are profoundly and horrifically mistaken.
Because it already is happening, and could get worse.
The popular reporter known as “eugyppius” April 27 cited a stunning new “license to publish/speak” internet scheme and its supportive statements, noting that they are the product of “center-right” Christian Democratic Union (CDU) Party member, Mario Voigt, who hails from the German state of Thüringen.
Standing at the mic in the Thüringen state parliament, Voigt gave a speech outlining a five-point plan to, as he fatuously claims, “protect German democracy” from the terrible threat of free speech online.
Good thing Voigt was free to speak his mind. We might not know what a dangerous collectivist he is if he hadn’t utilized free speech.
And if you detect some irony there, irony reminiscent of Joe Biden claiming that he is standing up for “…democracy and freedom, and against tyranny and oppression,” by signing the obnoxiously unconstitutional TikTok Ban and legislation to spread weapons around the globe, you’re not alone.
After some German-to-English translation, eugyppius spells out the Voigt plan to claim victory over internet users he doesn’t like:
“So how do we protect democracy in the area of social media? There are five approaches:
Ideally, we should agree to ban bots and to make the use of fake profiles a criminal offence.
There is also the matter of requiring people to use their real names, because freedom of expression should not be hidden behind pseudonyms.
Then there’s the question of whether we should create revocable social media licences for every user, so that dangerous people have no place online.
We need to consider how we can regulate algorithms so that we can revitalise the diversity of opinions in social networks.
And we also have to improve media skills.”
There’s that oft-used tyranny-pronoun again… “We.”
It is, of course, the politically soft word for forced inclusion in THEIR plans, for the usurpation of your own identity, individuality, and free will. It’s easy to use, and politicians use it as much and as often as they can.
Voigt received some criticism from people who recognized his sociopathic proposal, and so he “clarified” – by doubling down and, again, revealing himself as a dangerous narcissist who wants to control people.
“The term ‘revocable licences’ was incorrectly chosen. It was not intended to give the impression that the state should allocate access to social media to users. What was meant was that anyone who violates the law will be banned. The internet must not be a realm free of law.”
Note the use of the passive voice. He didn’t write, “I chose the wrong word,” or “Sorry! I just proposed something that sounds uncannily Hitlerian.” According to him, the “wrong word” just was… incorrectly chosen, as if it acted on its own.
And what “law” does Voigt mean? Well, he means not law, as in the Natural Law, but statutes, written and passed by people like him. Statutes that will define the acceptable parameters of what can and cannot be said, or that will allow German bureaucracies to make up their own lists of constantly permutating -- always at risk of arbitrary revision -- terms, images, and ideas that can be banned.
Oh, and the “violators will be banned” portion of his “clarification,” still requires government collection of net-user IDs.
Don’t even consider the possibility that Mr. Voigt might like it if he could stifle internet users who want to discuss him being at the center of a Belgian political corruption probe.
After all, he is not alone in feeling this censorious zeal, a fact that eugyppius observes:
“As I noted in February, the German Interior Ministry has declared war on the political opposition, announcing wide-ranging plans to restrict the speech, travel and economic activity of anyone deemed to be on ‘the extreme right,’ which is just a slur for anyone whose politics the establishment doesn’t like.”
And the people in Germany are not alone, either.
After all, the Brits now have their “Online Safety Commission,” that can silence and punish people for their internet statements and shut down the platforms that allowed the posts. The French National Assembly in February approved a move to censor “medical and scientific commentary” that the enlightened government deems unacceptable. The EU wants X to conform to its speech controls that already have seen other platforms conform. Led by members of its thuggish judicial branch, the government of Brazil is doing the same to X, and Australia’s purportedly “western” government is following suit, with one Aussie Senator, Jacqui Lambie, calling for Elon Musk to be imprisoned because Musk and Syrian Orthodox Bishop Mar Mari Emmanuel, who was the victim of a recent Sydney knife attack, agree that the video of it should remain available on X.
In Canada, the government recently instituted its “Online Streaming Act,” requiring online platforms to reserve space for Canadian content.
And American politicians are goose-stepping right along with them.
Not only have freedom-fighters like Michael Shellenberger and Matt Taibbi revealed the cozy financial and political relationships between so-called “federal police” agencies like the CIA and FBI, censorship agencies based at universities, and online platforms, and not only have reports emerged that thirteen banks allegedly worked with federal agencies to flag private purchasers of guns and BIBLES, Joe Biden recently issued an Executive Order to mandate that any software developer the feds target must turn over its programs and safety codes, Democrat and RiNO Senators last year tried to pass Senator Mark Warner’s (D-VA) “RESTRICT Act” to stifle online speech, and we have politicians like Liz Warren (D-MA) and Lindsay Graham (R-SC) who also want to mandate licenses for the internet – in their case, pushing the licensing mandate onto “large” (as they define the word) social media sites, and threatening to revoke the licenses when the gub-ment doesn’t like what’s on the sites.
Perhaps they’ll receive some pushback. After all, when former House Speaker Newt Gingrich said in 2006 that he thought it prudent to have all internet content approved or banned by a “panel of judges,” and that he thought said panel should be composed of people who all had obtained military experience, the response from even an ardent leftist like Keith Olberman was appropriately negative.
Of course, Olberman’s stance on freedom of speech is about as solid as pudding.
But each of these examples offers additional layers to an evidentiary mountain telling us just how much central planners really, really, dislike freedom of speech.
And they all rest upon the assumption that preceded most of these offenses: the claim by the feds that Congress can so-called “regulate” or claim ownership of any means of electronic, telephonic, or radio communication, including the radio spectrum and internet, themselves.
With frightening blades and cudgels that the feds, themselves, created in the 1920s under the title of the Federal Radio Commission (FRC) and expanded upon with the Federal Communications Commission under FDR, power-hungry politicians have embarked on generations of censorship. Once established, the control over the broadcast spectrum and the literal hardware of telecommunications lines became the baseline “norm” for most Americans, who never have known a US without such anti-constitutional speech controls.
And soon, very soon, the autocrats within the Democrat-controlled FCC will impose the deceptively titled “Net Neutrality,” which will see the illegitimate “commission” tell net providers that they cannot charge willing customers higher prices for faster speeds.
It’s a dystopian, Orwellian nightmare on the way, a fever-dream in which the government, the very thing that is NOT neutral, but always favors ITSELF and does not allow us to disconnect from it, tells others how they can engage in commerce.
All with the Sword of Damocles hanging over the heads of online platforms and ISPs, which, if they don’t censor, will be hit by the FCC for violation of Section 230 of the 1996 Telecommunications Act and could become vulnerable to state-level shut-downs over content.
The German political scene is not the only fetid, fecund soil from which the spores of censorship are growing.
America already has the disease, and many political figures would like it to worsen.
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