Posted 14 апреля 2020, 10:46
Published 14 апреля 2020, 10:46
Modified 24 декабря 2022, 22:36
Updated 24 декабря 2022, 22:36
Speaking to Radio Liberty yesterday, the leader of the Yabloko party, Grigory Yavlinsky, said that digital technology is becoming the main and long-term threat to citizens of autocratic states in which power is opaque, riddled with corruption and protects corporate interests.
According to Yavlinsky, digital control coming from the top authorities is possible only when there is a reverse control "from below", that is, from the population and civil society. Otherwise, autocracies only strengthen their own power, turning the country into one large digital concentration camp. You don’t have to go far for examples. This is an electronic voting held in Moscow at the last election in the Moscow City Duma. The results of electronic elections showed total posts in favor of the party in power and candidates from the mayor's office.
A gloomy, dystopian-style, but nonetheless quite realistic picture was drawn by the popular blogger partizan69_balt:
“If Hitler knew the collateral,“ miraculous ”properties of the coronavirus, or rather the fight against it, he would definitely use them. Know, sit in your bunker, do your favorite petroleum quotes and watch how, under the influence of Goebbels' fiery speeches, people, for the sake of free struggle for personal health and life itself, isolate themselves in their well-appointed and not-so-small apartment apartments, with very selective and obviously insufficient help state, and only (probably immortal) attack aircraft remain on the streets. Laws do not work, the remnants of all freedom are sent to the ass, the society is scared and ready to tear to pieces everyone who coughs in a public place or who is appointed guilty of spreading the epidemic and / or "wrong" information about it.
In the name of coronavirus, you can do EVERYTHING. You can sew a yellow star of David to every infected person. And not only them. Generally everyone who doesn't like it. Who there really understands the symptoms of this disease? And everyone else to get a tattoo with an Ausweiss pass across the entire forehead, so that the attack aircraft would be more convenient to recognize the intruders. You can force citizens to walk in their arms and squeeze out state-owned banks / other property in the name of a muddy partigenigenoss group with unlimited service calls. And no pogroms and "crystal" nights for you. And also selectively finance from the budget the costs of the business only to loyal supporters or corrupt friends of the authorities. And easily introduce food cards. And cancel cash, and non-cash, depreciate to the level of dirt. And of course, organize the sale of outsourcing. Who will pass by such a "bread" business where even Herr policemen serve with purchased diplomas?
Those who are sick can be treated depending on the degree of financial significance and the level of sympathy for the regime. Everyone who pays will present a party ticket, sing an ode to the leader and sell their media face with aspiration, light rooms and delicious food await, and everyone else will have a standard set of unpretentious medical services. In shabby scenery and with fantasies about one mechanical ventilation for four patients.
And for those who are already in intensive care and can not boast of connections or the presence of impressive states, you can make good money. They are literally ready for anything. Neither concentration camps nor the bloody Dr. Mengele are needed to conduct trials of unverified vaccines / drugs directly in humans. Indeed, many still have no chance. But the first result will immediately block all costs. And no one will reproach the regime for the fact that for many years it has implemented the slogan: "Guns (rockets) instead of oil!" Coronavirus will write off all social costs.
This fantasy post today can be tried on almost all countries. Only now, not all of it will fit. And although the coronavirus seems to have equalized absolutely everyone, the initial conditions and the exposed problems are different for everyone. And no matter what consequences the coronavirus ultimately brings to the planet, it is much harder to believe that France will become a totalitarian state after a pandemic than ours ...
Achtung! To obtain a one-time (no more than two times per calendar week) pass for traveling by car to the store, to the cottage or for other personal needs in Moscow and Moscow Region, you need to register on the government services portal, then indicate your status, passport details, address of residence, photos of documents, as well as take selfies, including documents. At the next stage, passes for hiking within the area will be introduced. Already on Wednesday 04/15/20 pass will become a mandatory norm. I want to believe that it’s not until the end of my life. Although..."
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Meanwhile, the blogger’s fantasy reality is already being embodied in Russia. So, the Moscow police launched a plan for fines for violating "self-isolation", writes Baza. Precinct police officers - 5 protocols daily, the second operpolk (those who beat citizens who interfere with the passage of citizens) - 15 each.
“Everything is expected, comments politician Dmitry Gudkov. - No matter what the authors of QR codes and other digital collars might think to themselves, execution follows the usual path: to intimidate and rob. First, for decades the authorities arranged negative selection in the police (and not only), set them on people, and then it turns out that this police can no longer do anything.
And not only the police. Blocked the entrances to Moscow. The result on the surface: minus 40 thousand personal cars, plus 40 thousand passengers of public transport. Where is safer? What have you achieved?
To paraphrase Chernomyrdin, they wanted to fight the virus, but in reality they are fighting with the citizens.
When institutions, freedoms and political competition are destroyed, the state, in the event of a real challenge, is itself at death, and the virus is only a symptom ...
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The popular blogger Alexander Gorbunov “Stalingulag” is no less pessimistic in his forecasts: “I don’t share the joy that the system that distributes digital collars to Muscovites today works through the ass, and a pass can be obtained by giving the random data from some Ivan Govnov. They will finish it, will lead to more or less working functionality, when it comes to restrictions, the government is trying.
But even in this digital Gulag that is being built, everyone but a citizen finds a place. Under the new rules, if you want to take a taxi, your pass, confirming that you have been allowed to travel, must be presented to the taxi driver.
Think about it, a taxi driver, who, as a rule, does not have Russian citizenship at all, will decide whether a Russian citizen can travel around his city. And this I’m not even talking about such an insignificant detail that each taxi driver will have access to your databases, otherwise he will determine the authenticity of the pass. "Never before has a Russian passport been such a useless piece of paper, in a crisis, they will not give a loan for it .."
Well, to top of it all, the government went even further, giving Rosgvardia and the Ministry of Emergency Situations additional repressive powers that provide the right to draw up protocols for violating the self-isolation regime. The corresponding order was signed by Prime Minister Mikhail Mishustin.