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Security laws in Corona times: Under general suspicion - Column by Sibylle Berg

2020-10-10T15:46:19.517Z


The crisis as an opportunity? The pandemic is an opportunity for many governments to rush through strange security laws. Just like the new anti-terrorism resolutions in Switzerland.


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A new anti-terror law as a protective shield for Switzerland

Photo: Westend61 / Getty Images

So friends, or dear fellow human beings, we will soon have made it.

This year is almost over, and there is a superstition that a new year will be completely different from the old one.

This is called the principle of hope.

People stand on it.

A completely stupid year ends in an apparent doom, in which almost everyone is irritated by the tinnitus of insanity.

But - was there ever a longer period in everyone's life that would have passed smoothly and smoothly?

Somewhere in the world there was always something - wars, catastrophes and epidemics.

Now it's the turn of the whole world, with a virus that causes more or less damage to all of us.

More when people are poor, less when ... Well, you know.

Now the numbers of those who have lost their income will soon be clear.

German politicians seem to be well equipped to fulfill their mandate to represent the people.

Sibylle Berg arrow to the right

Photo: 

Joseph Shrub

Sibylle Berg is a writer and playwright.

In 2019 her bestselling novel "GRM. Brainfuck" was published, and in 2020 the discussion volume "Nerds save the world".

Berg has received numerous awards for her literary work, most recently the "Bertolt Brecht Prize" and the "Swiss Grand Prix for Literature".

Together with Matze Hielscher she can be heard every 14 days in the podcast "Wesensfremd".

Other representatives, elected in democratic processes, are meanwhile doing everything possible to protect their populations.

You could whisper that people are a little distracted by constant number of cases that no one can see through and instructions that no one understands.

So it's time to quickly pass a few security laws.

Switzerland has just granted itself a new, sharp anti-terror law without any recognizable threat.

And so connects to most EU countries.

Despite warnings from Amnesty International and the UN.

If you study the whole thing more closely, always with the question of how many terrorist attacks there have been in the last, say, 20 years, then the suspicion arises that this is not, as everyone might think at first, against evil Islamist fundamentalists, but in the general about the restriction of all kinds of threats to the state.

And the state decides what threats are, so we.

So no, our representatives.  

Is it threatening when climate activists demonstrate on the square in front of the Federal Palace?

Are utopian films or dystopian ideas dangerous?

And how do you prove an intention?

We're not chipped yet.

Or is it enough that the use of state Trojans is legitimate?

This general suspicion, under which the populations are increasingly, is a bad feeling, in combination with the wonderful possibilities that algorithm-based digitization offers.

Even without conspiracy myths that have to do with gates and chips, one could get the idea that societies are moving on the direct path towards a slightly fascist Feudalism 2.0.

But luckily we still have hope.

That we will soon be living in the best of times without further ado.

Icon: The mirror

Source: spiegel

All life articles on 2020-10-10

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