One thing that I think Europe is really overlooking is part why the US is the way it is today is because the education system is based around trying to train people to be suitable for employment rather than educating and enriching the next generation of people. Basically obedient and not thinking for yourself. I hear politicians say schools should focus on jobs way too often.

To mitigate the harmful effects of tech Europe needs to ensure that schools focus on making sure students are resilient with strong media literacy, aware of propaganda, how to use reliable sources as opposed to shaping one’s views with unreputable “TikToks”, “Tweets” and things like that. Also skills like resiliency, habits, attention span and emotional regulation. Social media attacks all of these things. Meta, Google and Twitter are like modern day Tobacco companies. Just like the Tobacco companies they buy politicians rather than admit their products are harmful and shut down or make changes. Schools should also emphasize civic duty and societal impact of personal choices.

I haven’t ever tried using Spotify on mobile. What issue do you run into?

That meaning YouTube or Spotify? For YouTube I do know a workaround: you can request the desktop version of the website and it will allow you to continue playing music even when locking your screen or using another app.

It’s buried in my post but I feel the most ethical solution would be to use Spotify with an ad-blocker and use the free tier. Also I believe using YouTube with an ad blocker is pretty ethical too since you’re not financially support Google by viewing ads. I think Apple can also be used for free but I never tried it. Prime I would recommend boycotting because even the paid version has ads.

I see your point about my Apple example. I ended up thinking about this more and removed it from my post because it’s not a good example.

I will say I did research where Spotify has the most employees and it says they have the most in the United States so it’s not built solely by Swedish people. In fact I suspect the percentage of Spotify built by Swedish people to be somewhat low or very likely less than 50% but I don’t have enough information to be sure on this, this is conjecture on my part.

For far-right I’m saying that Trump is far-right so supporting Trump is supporting the far-right in America.

Joe Rogan actually isn’t the most extreme right wing person. What I object to most is his willingness to spread disinformation. Here’s a good article about him: https://www.mediamatters.org/joe-rogan-experience/joe-rogan-wrapped-year-covid-19-misinformation-right-wing-myths-and-anti-trans

In fact the very first line in the article is “Joe Rogan: “You can say whatever you want. We’re on Spotify.””.

I suspect that yes the “far-left” would be allowed to use Spotify and a quick glance seems to show that it’s allowed.

About shutting things down because of disagreements I understand you there. If someone believed all bike sheds should be painted blue and someone else thought they should be painted green in that case it’s likely blue advocates would try to shut down the green advocate’s podcasts simply due to disagreements even thought it would be wrong to do so.

But now let’s imagine this: the people in favor of blue paint started to be dishonest by spreading disinformation and advocated for harming people who wanted green paint. Isn’t that different morally? I do thank platforms should take a stance against disinformation.

Also with my paint example neither opinion causes harm to society. What happens if someone advocates for things that are harmful to others like anti-vax? That has real world consequences.

About trying to make better points that’s also a good point, no matter if Rogan is allowed or not we should be doing this.

This article claims there are very initial signs that you might get your wish: https://inews.co.uk/opinion/process-trying-undo-brexit-begun-4106581

I personally can’t get over the fact that a 50% majority was all that was needed for such a drastic change. The US despite all its flaws requires more than 50% for certain major things like amending the constitution. Hopefully you can one day rejoin and then make it so it would require a higher threshold like 2/3 majority before another brexit would be possible.

And if you are american: fucking fix your government

I try everyday and I will not give up until it’s fixed.

Your government could end up more like mine if the AfD takes power so I urge you and all Germans to fight that with everything you got. It’s terrifying here and I really don’t want other people to have to go through what we’re going through so please take action now.

One threat that I believe people in Europe are not taking seriously enough is foreign interference in your elections from our Oligarchs like Elon Musk and our government. Trump’s so-called National Security Strategy explicitly calls for interfering in EU countries and the Heritage Foundation (the organization who planned much of Trump’s second term) has explicitly called for eliminating the EU.

Please consider these actions to immunize yourself and your country from us:

1. Stop using Twitter, Meta products, TikTok and Reddit. These companies all have owners who are sympathetic to the Trump regime or in the case of Twitter it’s way worse. I’m personally a big advocate for Bluesky for replacing Twitter and of course goes without saying I really hope Lemmy can fully replace Reddit.

2. Educate people on how to recognize disinformation and propaganda. This should be taught in school along with classes to mitigate the harmful effects caused by social media. Classes should hopefully cultivate skills like emotional regulation, critical thinking and conflict resolution because cognitive warfare is more successful against people who are weak in these skills.

3. Try resolving people’s frustrations and social differences without them turning towards the far-right. This is part of how Trump got into power some people feel unhappy and vulnerable so the far-right takes advantage of them. I don’t understand this well but I’ve read that part of the AfD’s popularity has to do with unresolved differences between East and West Germany. If I’m wrong here or misunderstanding I apologize.

4. If applicable campaign finance reform especially to restrict foreign money. I suspect Germany is way better than America here but if this is a risk please fix as soon as possible.

5. Consider simulating what would happen if the AfD were to take power almost like the way a pentester tests software. Figure out what vulnerabilities in your government the AfD could exploit and solve them before they take power. This is really important because for Trump you can think of him almost like a hacker except he’s not breaking into computer systems, he’s exploiting vulnerabilities in both humans and our government doing things like declaring fake emergencies.

Obviously this is by no means a complete list. I’m sure there’s a lot to do.

That’s a great update! Also remember to include the foreign ownership. According to https://mediabiasfactcheck.com/newsmax-bias-credibilty-reliability/

In 2024, it was reported that between 2019-2020, Former Qatari government official Sheikh Sultan bin Jassim Al Thani invested $50 million in Newsmax through Heritage Advisors. The paper cited sources employed at Newsmax at the time as saying that they were urged to soften news coverage of Qatar — a claim that the outlet rejects.

It reminds me a little of how GB News is owned by an investment firm in Dubai. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Legatum

Legatum Limited is a private investment firm, headquartered in Dubai, United Arab Emirates.[1] Legatum was founded in 2006 by Christopher Chandler. Legatum owns the British broadcaster GB News.

* of course I’m just joking about including this in the article, it would be too long for the table to list all the problems with Newsmax, what you have is great!

I was shocked to learn that Spotify was based in Europe. They seem equally evil to US big tech companies so I assumed they were based in America. Reminder that Spotify is paying lots of money to fund Joe Rogan so he can spread disinformation and lies.

I did some research on this and found out it’s part of the streamed channels https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_DTT_channels_in_the_United_Kingdom#Streamed_channels. I couldn’t find a contact form on the Freeview website but I sent a message to the “Channels” partner with us email address. I also sent an email to Stop Funding Hate about this to see if they would be interested in taking it on.

Non Twitter link for those who don’t want to sign in to Elon Musk’s Nazi-bar to view the tweet: https://nitter.net/getplebbit/status/1790903398960640239

I’ll admit actually this time I’m in Apple’s favor. Personally I don’t think there should be any tracking even opt-in but it’s good they give people a way to opt-out.

Totally agree with you. Those ideals you mention have been systematically undermined by right-wing/conservative administrations in our government and even some mistakes made by Democrats. It goes back farther than George W. Bush and Trump. Just to name a few:

Richard Nixon - Vetoed the Comprehensive Child Development Act that would have given us what many other countries. Launched the war on drugs and mass incarceration. The Powell Memorandum and Roger Ailes were results of the Nixon administration that really ended up hurting our country far more than I think anyone would have expected. The goal was if another conservative president was corrupt they would not get booted out like Nixon was. Also Roger Stone who was involved in Nixon’s campaign was really involved especially in Trump’s first campaign.

Ronald Regan - Helped undermine the middle class and start transferring wealth to the rich. There are so many graphs where things start to decline under Ronald Regan. Not to mention he sold weapons to Iran to fund the Contra.

Bill Clinton - Sure he’s way better than Bush or Trump but he did pave the way towards media consolidation. We are seeing the effects of this today as the Ellisons buy up media companies for the purposes of turning the companies into right-wing propaganda machines.

Thank you so much for responding with so much understanding.

I can only speak for myself because everyone will likely have different views but for me it’s terrifying especially for people who’ve read history and know that they could one day be repressed if things get even worse. It has a chilling effect and might be part of why you don’t see as much resistance as you’d expect.

The cancer analogy is great! Hopefully we can beat the cancer before it beats us, thank you so much for your best wishes!

Canada has a similar problem to the US, may not as bad but still tons of Russian propaganda. In fact on Reddit it’s really bad according to: https://old.reddit.com/r/SubredditDrama/comments/1hsfxmr/journalists_rachel_gilmore_luke_lebrun_shows_that/. The thread alleges that multiple sub-reddits are under Russian influence. In addition they also have similar propaganda outlets like we have Fox News and Newsmax. For example Canada has “Rebel news” (I put both words in quotes because it’s not really news and being a bootlicker for foreign dictators doesn’t make you a rebel, it makes you an idiot). This is a must see video about Rebel news. A former employee exposes the propaganda tactics they use: https://bsky.app/profile/peipolitical.bsky.social/post/3lnamb4sva22f

Thank you for catching that mistake! I used spell check but clicked the wrong word. It’s fixed now.

Good point about all the arbitrary limitations, I really wish they didn’t do that either.

Yes, Denmark is a great model for support. I’m speculating because I didn’t read this anywhere but I wonder if at some level they understand that a Russian victory is a green light to other dictators to steal land which could make Trump more likely to try invading Canada or Greenland. I will mention I believe one of the reasons Trump made those threats to normalize stealing territory from other countries and to help Putin.

Also on the topic of Denmark and Greenland I can’t help but mention how much I’m deeply ashamed and strongly resent the way my country is threatening Greenland and Canada, I’m really really sorry for this and wish there is more that I could do to help stop it.