cross-posted from: https://feddit.org/post/375357
cross-posted from: https://feddit.org/post/373442
Here is the report (pdf).
Serbian authorities have adopted invasive surveillance practices and facial recognition technology to monitor political opponents, civic activists and critical journalists, says a BIRN report entitled ‘Digital Surveillance in Serbia – A Threat to Human Rights?’, published on Friday.
Equipment from Chinese manufacturers, such as Dahua and Hickvision, predominates.
Serbia’s aspirations for EU membership mean that it faces pressure to adhere to EU standards on data protection and privacy as well as cybersecurity. However, Serbia has simultaneously strengthened ties with authoritarian countries, especially China and Russia.
The West was laughing and pointing at China. “Look at them surveilling their citizens! So cringe.” Meanwhile, people massively bought into surveillance capitalism, gobbled up all the bullshit about “if you have nothing to hide”, and look where it’s taking us. Yet people continue to buy Google products, swear that Malus won’t ever be evil and store their lives on iPhones and Macs, they vote for right-wing candidates who talk about building walls, surveilling the poor, foreign, and different, and don’t somehow fail to see how their countries are slowly becoming more China-like.
Calling Serbia “the West” is kinda stupid considering they’re friends with “the East” and fail to adhere to any sort of EU law. And shit like this is precisely why Serbia will never join the EU, as this type of practice has been basically outlawed a while ago.
Mate, “the West” isn’t limited to Western Europe, the USA, Canada, and Australia. Australia is the same longitude as China. Are you going to say it’s not the West because of that?
No, I’m not. And me pointing out Serbia’s allegiance should’ve been clue enough to understand that. The West is a collective of a shared understanding of values, values that Serbia does not share. So please stop being willfully obtuse.
Even to the (insufficient, overblown) extent that it happens, lifting “the poor” Han Chinese out of poverty by putting other populations (Uighurs) under slave labour instead, is not the moral win you’re implying.
If an ethnic cleansing is part of the requirements, to stop committing humanitarian atrocities towards “the poor”, that’s still an atrocity.
Disclaimer, the USA, just like every authoritarian state, is also disgusting and criminal.
