We are developing the social individualist meta-context for the future. From the very serious to the extremely frivolous... lets see what is on the mind of the Samizdata people.
Samizdata, derived from Samizdat /n. - a system of clandestine publication of banned literature in the USSR [Russ.,= self-publishing house]
|
It shakes. It convulses. It casts off its old body. It emerges softer and more flexible.
Don’t kid yourself. It’s still a tarantula.
Clare Foges writes in the Times, “We need Big Brother to beat this virus”.
Hands in the air! Step away from the Easter eggs!” The Keystone Coppery of recent weeks has had some people muttering darkly that we are heading the way of a police state. Those who style themselves as defenders of ancient British liberties will soon have bigger fish to fry: the digital surveillance tools that government hopes to use to trace the infected. Prepare for dire warnings of state intrusion and an avalanche of Nineteen Eighty-Four quotes on social media warning that Big Brother is upon us.
Yet if we are to beat a path out of this pandemic without destroying our economy, overblown concerns about threats to our liberties must be countered by pragmatism. To recover some semblance of normality before a vaccine is found, we must accept the need for the state to access more information about ourselves, our health and our whereabouts — and not waste precious weeks arguing about it.
Look east to see how digital surveillance is an integral part of returning to “normal” life. Hong Kong has mandatory tracking wristbands for those in quarantine. In Taiwan the phone-tracking system is known as an “electronic fence”; those who are meant to be in isolation will be visited by the authorities if their phone is turned off. In South Korea the pooling of data from credit card use, mobile phones and CCTV cameras means that they can detail the movements of an infected citizen down to where they sat in the cinema and which bar they went for a beer in afterwards — and in less than ten minutes can trace and contact the woman who was sitting two stools down. Public support for these measures is high, for the simple reason that they are working.
Overall it’s just that Birkenstock stamping on a human face, forever, again isn’t it?
– Tim Worstall
“NHS phone app holds key to lifting UK’s coronavirus lockdown”, the Times reports.
Ministers have ordered the creation of an NHS mobile phone app the government hopes will help end the coronavirus lockdown.
The app would allow mobile phones to trace users who have come into contact with infected people, alerting them to get tested.
This would make it possible to start lifting the most stringent social-distancing measures from late next month, ministers hope.
Senior sources say NHSX, the health service’s technology arm, has been working on the app with Google and Apple at “breakneck speed”. The system will use Bluetooth technology to alert those who download the app if they have been in close proximity with someone who has tested positive for Covid-19.
Combined with a vast expansion in testing, which ministers claim will hit 100,000 a day by the end of the month, the app is a central plank in the government’s push to lift the lockdown. “We believe this could be important in helping the country return to normality,” a Whitehall source said.
Matt Hancock, the health secretary, is considering how to incentivise people to install the app. Experts say the “track and trace” concept only works effectively if 60% of people adopt it.
One idea under consideration would mean people being told they could resume normal work and home life if they installed it on their phones.
As I said in the title, the worst of it is that this might be the way to control the epidemic, an outcome greatly to be desired. And then it might be the way to control us.
“The signature of authoritarianism is not the use of force, but the pathological dependence on deception, often to the extent of becoming self-delusional.”
– Tom G Palmer and Simon Lee
“Viktor Orban ruins his rivals with power grab”, the Times reports.
Under a regime described by critics as the “omnipotence law”, Mr Orban’s government is able to take sweeping measures to tackle the coronavirus epidemic without parliamentary approval.
Within days of the reform it announced that parties, banks, multinational corporations and local councils would be obliged to pay into a £3.3 billion national fund designed to cushion the blow to the Hungarian economy.
Political parties must hand over half of the grants they receive from the state, a total of about £2.8 million, Gergely Gulyas, one of Mr Orban’s closest ministerial allies, said. The measure will apply to all Hungarian parties, including Fidesz, the prime minister’s party, which is backed by businesses that have benefited from public contracts. Some of its struggling rivals, however, are heavily reliant on public funding. Jobbik, the largest opposition party in the National Assembly, is still reeling from a fine of nearly £1 million after auditors found that it had underpaid for billboard advertising.
Emphasis added. From what little I know of Hungarian politics, the Jobbik and Fidesz parties seem to have swapped bodies. I hold no brief for either. But I can sympathise with the plight of anybody – or any body – that suddenly has their financial support kicked away. Unfortunately that is what happens when the state pays your bills: what the state gives, the state can take away. Hence the “self ownership” tag on this post.
As I wrote the above, I remembered having written something very similar before. That post was about the last of the Kalahari Bushmen. The plight of the last opposition parties of Hungary is not quite as desperate as theirs, but give it time.
True to its promise to leave no strategy untried that might help alleviate the coronavirus epidemic, Her Majesty’s Government, in accordance with the advice of the Lords Spiritual, has decreed that in penance for the sins that brought this plague upon us, all persons will now strictly observe the Lenten fast. Effective immediately, all confectionery, sweetmeats, and similar indulgent and luxurious foods will therefore be removed from sale in shops upon penalty of law. In particular the pagan custom of consumption of so-called “Easter eggs”, being a false admixture to the strictures of true religion, is henceforth prohibited.
It will be good for your souls.
OK, in case you were worried, what I just said was not true. Neither I nor the Bishops seek to use the law to deny the British public their choccy eggs. That’s the job of your local council.
Convenience stores are wrongly being told to limit the items they sell to just “essentials”, a trade body has warned.
Local newsagents, which are allowed to remain open under the Government’s guidelines, are facing interference from officials that are trying to restrict the range of goods they sell under lockdown measures.
Some shops have been told by police and local councils that Easter eggs are considered non-essential goods and must therefore be removed from shelves.
The Association of Convenience Stores (ACS) blamed “overzealous enforcement and a misreading of the rules”.
Ridiculous as it was, with the drone-assisted “lockdown shaming” of walkers in Derbyshire, I could at least see what the police thought they were trying to achieve. But I really can see no motive other than reflex puritanism for trying to prohibit the sale of “nonessential goods”, particularly as they were on the shelves anyway. What good would it do anyone to make the shopkeepers lose a packet by being forbidden to sell stock they had purchased in happier times? This isn’t World War II. Britain’s food is not coming in by convoys subject to torpedo attack. In fact, if you can afford luxury foods, should you not buy them in preference to plainer things in order to leave more staple foods available for those who cannot afford anything else?
A video blog from Nigel, asking questions in his usual style about the lockdown and what it is for, police behaviour, and posing some questions about the UK’s relations with China. Then a China Uncensored video giving a view on the Red China ‘cure’ for coronavirus. He also has a good word for Stephen Kinnock going to see his Dad on his Old Man’s birthday.
A British politician calling for liberty, there is one.
And from China Uncensored, (a Taiwanese-backed channel I believe), a contrast on the American media’s soft touch on China with what has been going on.
Drones are fun. I understand that. But people do need to use them responsibly.
The BBC reports: Coronavirus: Peak District drone police criticised for ‘lockdown shaming’
Derbyshire Police filmed people in pairs rambling in the Curbar Edge area of the beauty spot on Wednesday.
In pairs. Not mobs, pairs.
Officers said travelling to remote areas for exercise did not count as “essential travel” as permitted under government lockdown rules.
But travelling to remote areas and flying your drones there, that’s essential.
UK civil liberties group Big Brother Watch branded the move “sinister” and “counter-productive”.
The 90-second clip, shot by the force’s drone unit, showed people walking their dogs and taking photos.
It said “the message is still not getting through” about stopping the spread of coronavirus, despite government guidance and several police posts.
One Twitter user called it “the worst kind of nanny policing” while others pointed out that the walkers were away from crowds.
Here is the tweet in question. I am glad there was some pushback. This response from “miroirdufou” was polite but effective:
Hi. Please explain (in terms of epidemiology) exactly what harm these people are doing, taking quiet exercise away from crowds, in small numbers? And if they’re doing no harm, leave them alone?
At first I thought this was une blague pratique. Apparently not, unless Tim Worstall’s denial is merely evidence that he is in on the joke. He writes in today’s Times:
Among the measures introduced in France to deal with the coronavirus is a requirement to fill in a form before going out for a walk.
No, really, this is not a joke. As part of the lockdown it is necessary, before leaving the house, to complete and sign a download from the Ministry of the Interior. Name, address, what you think you’re doing and so on.
This is not filed with anyone, nor registered. It must simply be carried during the errand. Absence, if caught, will lead to a €135 fine. A new form is required for every exit from the house. And yes, there’s a box to tick for “aux besoins des animaux de compagnie” which my memories of exchange visits have as “for the needs of our furry friends”.
The solution to a global pandemic is a form for walking the dog. Of course, it is easy to mock the French but there is an important point here, for this is an example of a pernicious worldview. That we, the people, are only able to cope if we are told what to do, what we may do. All must be decided and enforced by the clever people in power and nothing left to ordinary folks to get on with.
Our own tradition is vehemently different. I have surprised people in a number of countries by pointing out that a British policeman isn’t actually allowed to ask — or at least not to insist upon knowing — what it is that you are doing. If accosted, a cheery “Going about my lawful business, constable” is all that is required. Such liberties might not apply in moments of crisis but they are indicative of a different manner of thinking.
A similar restriction is being applied in Italy, according to The Local.it:
Now that justification is required simply to be on the street, you’ll need to have a copy ready as soon as you leave the house.
If you have access to a printer, you can download the form here.
Ther’s also now an application able to generate an electronic version of the ‘autocertificazione’ form as many times as needed, to keep handy on your phone with a digital signature.
Police at checkpoints (such as those at train stations) should also have a stack of paper forms available, and you can ask to take a few.
But what if you do not have access to the internet?
Alternatively you can copy out the whole thing by hand: make sure to write everything exactly as it appears on the form, in full.
Call a woman “shrill” and you might just end up in cage. Meanwhile, as I point out, this sort of “protection” disempowers women.
– Amy Alkon, suitably reacting to this maggoty peach by Sadiq Khan.
Postrel’s kidney lasted Satel 10 years. By the time her immune system rejected it, aged 60, she had found another donor. Satel is now on her third right kidney and is feeling fine.
She was fortunate – twice. But as a policy expert the experience left Satel deeply dissatisfied with a system that relies on luck and the kindness of strangers. The reason so few kidneys are available for transplant, she contends, is that under the National Organ Transplant Act of 1984, paying for organs is illegal.
The US is not exceptional – Iran is the only country that allows such transactions and it has no kidney shortage. Satel is not advocating an Iranian-style market for body parts.
But I am.
By the way, the “Postrel” mentioned as having given Sally Satel her first donated kidney is Virginia Postrel, whose writing will be familiar to many of you.
|
Who Are We? The Samizdata people are a bunch of sinister and heavily armed globalist illuminati who seek to infect the entire world with the values of personal liberty and several property. Amongst our many crimes is a sense of humour and the intermittent use of British spelling.
We are also a varied group made up of social individualists, classical liberals, whigs, libertarians, extropians, futurists, ‘Porcupines’, Karl Popper fetishists, recovering neo-conservatives, crazed Ayn Rand worshipers, over-caffeinated Virginia Postrel devotees, witty Frédéric Bastiat wannabes, cypherpunks, minarchists, kritarchists and wild-eyed anarcho-capitalists from Britain, North America, Australia and Europe.
|
