An even more apt analogy is France in New Caledonia. Back in 2024, the French territorial government used an anti-terrorism law to enforce DNS blocks in that overseas territory, for the express purpose of suppressing political protests (by New Caledonians angry at the French mainland government).
> "Philippe Gomes, the former president of New Caledonia's government, told POLITICO the decision aimed to stop protesters from "organizing reunions and protests" through the app."
This is the only example I'm aware of (are there others?) of a Western government effecting internet censorship to suppress protests. (Though the article also mentions Macron considering (but rejecting) the same idea in France, to suppress protests following a police shooting. See also[1])
> for the express purpose of suppressing political protests (by New Caledonians angry at the French mainland government).
No, to stop the spread of targeted disinformation by foreign actors stoking those protests to turn into riots. (and if you need any proof, check out the protestors with Azeri flags, in New Caledonia. Azerbaijan's tinpot dictator hates France because France supported Armenia, so he's been trying various ways to undermine France because he's that fragile: https://www.theguardian.com/world/article/2024/may/17/new-ca... )
"aimed to stop protesters from "organizing reunions and protests"" is a direct quote from one of their top politicians. I'm not going to pretend I didn't read it.
There's foreign bad-actor misinformation in every country (Iran too!)—it's cynical, and specious, to say that excuses governments who take away their citizens' internet access. New Caledonia admitted specific intent to target "organizing protests". That's exactly the reason why they shouldn't have the power to cut off their internet (though really, no one should). They shouldn't be in that position of power over the protesting faction, because their disagreements are so strong that they can't help but abuse that power. They've delegimitized the protestors; by censoring them, they're not "protecting" them from foreign actors in some well-meaning paternalistic way (their rationalization), they are rather continuing their political battle by other methods.
It's an anti-pattern, all over the world right now, that groups of people who start off with irreconcilable political differences, devalue the legitimacy of the other group's speech and their right to speak it. One group calling another "mislead by propaganda" is an aspect of that delegimitization. This pattern needs to be called out and pushed back against, when it's used to rationalize silencing dissent.
Pardon me, but summary executions in the United States taking place in broad daylight, with seeming impunity, is very much a new and novel phenomenon, and incredibly interesting to many of us.
I guess the novel part is that it happens to white people now. Used to happen a lot to black people, less so after mobile phone cameras but still happened.
It seems you are purposefully removing all the specific context to be willfully indifferent.
You would need to actually grapple with the specific context to be convincing. Otherwise you could just as well respond to a police officer smuggling an automatic weapon into the senate chamber and unloading the magazine into the lawmakers with "hate to break it to you - but officers killing people in the US is not new".
Here's the source for that one (just in case anyone is living under a rock or something),
https://www.startribune.com/border-patrol-greg-bovino-smoke-... ("A federal agent sprays a man being pinned to the ground by other agents following the detention of at least two teenagers in south Minneapolis on Jan. 21. (Richard Tsong-Taatarii/The Minnesota Star Tribune)")
We still have space for discussions about the specific flaws of Microsoft's BitLocker implementation on the front page when the much-more salient "wrench attack" ( https://xkcd.com/538/ ) is stronger very day.
This execution has more significant implications than the combined heft of the chipper clip, or of EARN IT, SOPA, or the myriad of other bad bills introduced to the US Congress over the years.
Tech libertarianism was a frontier for the means to the ends of our personal liberties, and not a goal in itself. I refuse to believe the people on this site don't see that it's all connected.
(edit: clarification; "this" refers to the execution, not the Bitlocker thing.)
Besides the ~$1 million a head he's openly selling[0] pardons for?
Why wouldn't he pardon a white-collar felon fraudster? This president has pardoned dozens of those[1]—frauds who had no reason at all to be deserving of clemency, other than being incredibly rich. He's pardoned fraudsters who defrauded thousands of victims[2]. He's pardoned a fraudster convicted of fraud, who committed fraud again, and he pardoned them a second time[3]. There are no limits.
[2] https://www.nytimes.com/2025/11/29/us/politics/trump-david-g... ("Trump Frees Fraudster Just Days Into Seven-Year Prison Sentence / David Gentile had been found guilty for his role in what prosecutors described as a $1.6 billion scheme that defrauded thousands of investors.")
It is disappointing to me that people can look at the list of infamous people he has already pardoned, who have paid him, and then expect that he won't continue acting on trend, just because some shallow-book manipulable prediction market, which is primarily a money laundering tool for event fixers, tells us that it's "not likely".
I think that because of my own judgment, not because the market told me. Also, it seems unlikely that someone would burn money to manipulate this market as there's nothing to gain from it.
By the way, Trump literally said he won't pardon SBF[0]. It seems money is not the only factor he considers when handing out pardons.
Wha backlash? Trump pardoned a Honduran ex-president convicted of smuggling tons of drugs, right in the midst of using the military to bomb boats for unproven drug smuggling, and kidnapped Maduro presumably because of drugs too (or was it oil?). Zero repercussions except for futile anger from internet weirdos like me.
This administration seems to relish getting away with things that would destroy any other presidency.
The backlash was relatively mild because few of his supporters personally see themselves as victims of the Honduran ex-president. That's very different from SBF—almost everyone who invested in crypto at the time hates him, not to mention the actual FTX customers.
Everybody hates Trump, he's the least popular president ever.
Unless these crypto folks have massive money and are using it right now to pay Trump tk not pardon SBF, what would they do? What backlash could crypto do? It's not like he can unpardon Trump. Crypto just joins the long line of people who fell for it again and nothing happens.
What, is a Republican going to vote against Trump? Hah! Impeachment? What trouble could crypto cause for Trump? Even if they could cause trouble, Trump would just make up charges and send the DOJ after crypto.
Like most people, he probably understands the value of keeping a few friends and allies close, even if it's purely self-interest. At Trump's scale, some relationships are worth billions, so a bribe of a few million can be a poor trade-off if it risks burning a high-value relationship.
Sure some relationships might be worth it, but whose? Trump already got the votes, which is what let him avoid prosecution for insurrection, mishandling of classified documents, etc. etc.
What friend or relationship would he lose for pardoning SBF? It has to be a billionaire, because he respects billionaires, or it has to be somebody paying home more than SBF to keep SBF in jail. What billionaire would risk their relationship with Trump in order to express displeasure about pardoning SBF? Wha person would pay more than SBF to keep SBF imprisoned?
Again and again Trump burns people that supported him. There is zero loyalty, everything is purely transactional.
I'll give a concrete example. Suppose he were to pardon SBF. That would likely anger figures like CZ (Binance) and Brian Armstrong (Coinbase). In response, they could choose to delist Trump's shitcoin, which alone could wipe out hundreds of millions in market cap. Anyways, I guess we'll see who’s right in about three years.
Thanks for that concrete example! It's far more convincing. However I'm still not fully convinced, as Trump has greater leverage due to the ability to change tax and other crypto policy. He already gets what he needs by allowing bribes through Trump's coins, listing is not the primary purpose.
I appreciate you exchanging this information and your opinion.
edit: Also, I think this domain (medievalists.net) is suspect. This article has no author byline; and its text is highly similar to other published articles (like [0]), with only minor word changes. Here's an A/B of an excerpt:
> [vikingeskibsmuseet.dk] "Dendrochronological analysis shows that Svælget 2 was built around 1410 using timber from two regions: Pomerania, which is modern-day Poland, and the Netherlands. By comparing tree-ring patterns with reference data, researchers were able to date the wood and determine its origin. The planks were made of Pomeranian oak, while the frames – the ship’s ribs – came from the Netherlands. This construction pattern suggests that the heavy planking timber was imported, while the frames were cut locally at the building site, reflecting a practical approach and a complex trade network where large quantities of timber moved across Northern Europe."
> [medievalists.net] "One of the most striking results so far comes from dendrochronology (tree-ring dating). Researchers report that Svælget 2 was built around 1410 using timber sourced from two different regions: Pomerania (in modern-day Poland) and the Netherlands. The planks were made from Pomeranian oak, while the ship’s frames (ribs) came from the Netherlands—an arrangement the team interprets as evidence of complex material supply and specialised shipbuilding capacity."
I came across this medievalists site the other day in a search and quickly realized it's SEO slop. Unsurprising that they are branching out into niche topics now that more typical areas (food, home improvement, software, etc) are becoming saturated.
(edit: To be precise, it plagiarizes off of the London-based "Asharq Al-Awsat", whose English-language edition syndicates Reuters (legitimately). I'm inferring this because the thearchaeologist.org also clones al-Awsat's choice of hero image, and the idiosyncratic language in that image's caption. That image, in turn, originates (as attributed) in an Italian government press release[1]).
> "Philippe Gomes, the former president of New Caledonia's government, told POLITICO the decision aimed to stop protesters from "organizing reunions and protests" through the app."
[0] https://www.politico.eu/article/french-tiktok-ban-new-caledo...
This is the only example I'm aware of (are there others?) of a Western government effecting internet censorship to suppress protests. (Though the article also mentions Macron considering (but rejecting) the same idea in France, to suppress protests following a police shooting. See also[1])
[1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36599726 ("Macron floats social media cuts during riots", 105 comments)
edit: There was also an incident in San Francisco way back in 2011,
[2] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2879546 ("San Francisco Subway Muzzles Cell Service During Protest", 113 comments)
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