Can the Fediverse Help Stop Bad Internet Bills? (US focused)

cross-posted from: lemmy.sdf.org/post/1106187

Here’s how EFF desribes the situation in You Can Help Stop These Bad Internet Bills

“Red alert! For the last six months, EFF, our supporters, and dozens of other groups have been sounding the alarm about several that have been put forward in Congress.We’ve made it clear that these bills are terrible ideas, but Congress is now considering packaging them together—possibly into must-pass legislation. I’m asking you to join us, ACLU, Fight for the Future, and other digital rights defenders in a week of action to protect the internet.”

Can the fediverse help? The fediverse has some potential advantages for activism on topics like privacy, digital rights, and LGBTQIA2S+ issues. So it’s worth experimenting, and the July 20-28 week of action on Bad Internet Bills is a great opportunity – to learn, and hopefully to have an impact as well.

Here’s four easy ways to help:

  1. Upvote and boost posts in !bad_internet_bills – and cross-post them to other communities and magazines where they’re on-topic
  2. On Mastodon, boost posts on the and hashtags
  3. Get the word out on other social networks too
  4. If you live in the US, contact your legislators using Fight for the Future’s www.badinternetbills.com
Arotrios,
Arotrios avatar

Direct action link to send statements and call your representatives (US) www.badinternetbills.com

thenexusofprivacy,

Thanks! I tried editing the post to include this important information up top, but for some reason it’s not letting me … I’ll try again later.

Fredselfish,
@Fredselfish@lemmy.ml avatar

This is fascism coming into America the alt right and GOP know that with a free and clear access to the internet that we are able to stop thier fascist agenda and can call out their bullshit.

We must stop these bills from moving forward.

thenexusofprivacy,

Agreed that the threat to free and clear access to the internet increases the chances of fascism coming to America. But there are plenty of Democrats who support these bills – they all have bipartisan sponsorship. And more positively, he Fourth Amendment Is Not For Sale Act – a good privacy bill – also has bipartisan sponsorship. So this is one of the rare issues that still cuts across party lines.

Fredselfish,
@Fredselfish@lemmy.ml avatar

This is why I don’t trust Democrats.

https://lemmy.ml/pictrs/image/c6b73c88-33c4-4a44-9927-5a0b1d8559f4.jpeg

Anticorp,

They make a good show of being angry as they let Republicans take the blame for the bills that they all benefit from.

TerryTPlatypus,

Lol, bet. Let’s try it then, and see how far we can go.

thenexusofprivacy,

That’s pretty much how I look at it to. It might work, it might not … but you can’t win if you don’t play!

argv_minus_one,

Congress has been trying to destroy the Internet for almost as long as the Internet has been publicly available. No matter how many times it fails and the Internet survives, it always comes back and tries again, over and over, forever. I fear it’s only a matter of time before it succeeds.

And make no mistake, a law against end-to-end encryption will make cybersecurity in general illegal, leaving every online operation wide open to attack by cybercriminals. Such a law won’t merely take away your privacy; it’ll take away the Internet altogether.

Anticorp,

They finally successfully killed net neutrality under Ajit Pai (motherfucker). They’ve been incrementally changing things up since then so that people don’t notice and complain.

Chefdano3,
@Chefdano3@lemm.ee avatar

Can the fediverse help? That depends, how much money does the fediverse have? How much is the fediverse willing to spend to stop it?

That’s the real question. Spreading information is great, but as we’ve seen the only thing is does is make more people angry when they bad bills go through.

People with money don’t care about how many people are angry, we’ve been shown that time and time again. They’ve even stopped pretending they listen to us anymore.

Revan343,

People with money don’t care about how many people are angry, we’ve been shown that time and time again. They’ve even stopped pretending they listen to us anymore.

They’ll care and listen when the molotovs come out-- or they’ll burn, and cease to be a problem.

Until that happens, yes, they don’t give a shit about the common people.

Chefdano3,
@Chefdano3@lemm.ee avatar

Yeah unfortunately that is the only way they’ll listen. So getting people mad is the only option we have. It’s just a shame that we’ve cycled back to this state.

argv_minus_one,

That will never happen. Americans are far too obedient.

Revan343,

It’s happened before. Too much pressure, and eventually something has to give

thenexusofprivacy,

Grassroots opposition has helped digital rights and privacy organizations stop bad internet bills from passing many times before, including some of these same bills just last year. Of course it is true that money talks and so deep pocketed companies and politicians have a lot more influence than we do, so cynicism is definitely warranted; and grassroots opposition doesn’t always win… But on bills like these, getting involved can make a difference.

argv_minus_one,

Don’t kid yourself. Congressional gridlock stopped those bills.

jdp23,
@jdp23@lemmy.blahaj.zone avatar

Not exactly. These bills cut across party lines and there’s a lot of desire to be able to pass something – “think of the children!” So if anything the overall gridlock makes it more likely that these bills will pass. So the dynamics that led to stopping the bills last year was a combination of activists making enough noise, and privacy and digital rights groups pressing the case in meetings with legislators (as well as some grassroots groups with good relationships with their legislators). As a result, that Dem leadership decided not to move the bills to the floor, so the vote never happened.

Chefdano3,
@Chefdano3@lemm.ee avatar

Yeah I’m definitely cynical by this point. The state of the world has me made sick. While I believe that our influence is very limited, I also believe so too are our options. I’m just upset that we’ve gotten back to the point in our history where getting people mad is all we’ve got. The only real end we’re heading towards is violence, and I don’t like it.

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