Can you clarify what you mean? The linked website makes it seem that the majority MEPs of the supporting countries are on board. Are all of the (listed as) supporting countries currently under conservative governments?
The majority of the MEPs are not onboard mandatory scanning, otherwise that would've been passed already.
The site is conflating mandatory scanning with voluntary scanning (status quo). The upcoming vote is about continuing the voluntary scanning (which would otherwise expire).
The "voluntary" scanning is still mass surveillance of private messages. We as technologist tend to rely on technical methods to protect our private data. But non-technical people should also enjoy confidential communication, even if they don't actively protect their conversations.
The Council, which is headed by the government of each member state in equal measure - similar to the Senate in the US
And Parliament, which are directly elected by the people, with each member state having representitives in proportion to their population, so Germany has far more than Ireland. This is similar to Congress.
Now this site says Germany supports it, but then says that MEPS
> 49 oppose, 47 in favor (45 confirmed, 2 presumed based on government stance)
I would thus infer that the "most member states" refer to the national governments (that were elected by their population) position and not the direct MEP position.
However a quick look at the json it's loading and I can't see
Now as the parliament has blocked it, a grouping, the "EPP" (Think Ronald Reagan type republicans) is trying to use their influence to bring it back to a vote.
> "The Conservatives (EPP) are attempting to force a new vote on Thursday (26th), seeking to reverse Parliament's NO on indiscriminate scanning. This is a direct attack on democracy and blatant disregard for your right to privacy."
Is that fair? Ireland should surely have a say the same way Germany does in parliament too, if it's affecting Ireland just as much. If one considers countries as units.
I get it.. my question wasn't exactly what I meant to ask. I meant isn't there some kind of compensating factor. So that a country with a 100 million doesn't completely and utterly outshine a small country of 4 million, even in the parliament?
Or is the idea that the Council is sufficient to achieve this?
I actually think the Council is more than sufficient to achieve this, we kind of see the opposite problem way more.
Hungary, a country of 9M people, keeps vetoing stuff the rest of the Union wants to do. 450M people, held back by the despot ruling over a tiny fraction of them.
Yes it's fair that it has more to a degree, but North Dakota can't have literally proportional since it will completely swallowed up on Congress. How does this work in the US?
Because if you consider each state to be a "country"... these states didn't sign up so that they could be swallowed up by another state having a very high population growth.
That said, California is generating more GDP so obviously I'm not arguing that they should be completely equally represented 1:1
