QRs were an attempt to introduce it. It was simply postponed. Something worse is coming in to the West.

They will eliminate cash and now social system is even worse.

If you feel need to argue you are not winning

If you are winning without arguing you are not in democracy

Cut the bull. The political systems of the West claim to be superior in how we treat our own citizens and it is generally true. There is no need to argue about that between ourselves. As for the world where each country is an individual citizen - it is not a democracy. The only rule is: might is right except when some country might feel that bad PR is not good at this particular moment.

We are however degrading and I care very much about what is happening here right where I live rather than twisting some other country's hands into "democracy" by way of sanctions, bombing etc.

> There is no need to argue about that between ourselves.

I don't know. Speaking strictly objectively: if you look at polls, Putin is extremely popular amongst republican voters.

The West had dealt with, tolerated and admired many dictators and keeps doing it. It does not mean that we import their way of governing. At least not yet.

Russia is a separate subject I think. Putin being bad as he is I think the way situation is turning out could be the biggest US fuck up ever

The US should roll over and allow the largest country and its bully government to occupy more territory instead of helping UA?

But in any case, it's another example, in Russia there was no need to argue about the war because the pro war side (Putin) won by default without even considering what the other side thinks, and it only shows how lost the cause of democracy is there

You think that Russia won the Ukraine war?

No, I write that pro war side in Russia won the argument about whether to go to war using FpUser logic, by never arguing about it with people who were against the war. So that logic makes absolutely zero sense unless you're a dictator.

You have some pretty wild imagination. Not my logic at all.

If the US was smarter Russia would not be in UA at all.

Maybe if they did the orange revolution or something sure, but you can go down the what if route forever and no one has actual access to alternative histories and whether it would have been worse. But of course you know better.

There’s a chance something like this ends up happening in the West as well. Could be watered down in some way. It only takes a couple more columns in the database of a credit scoring system to start looking at other factors.

So an important aspect of these systems being deployed in countries such as China and Russia is that it gives the rest of the world a peek into how it works, and a chance to understand how to best resist totalitarian tendencies. Unfortunately it also gives an opportunity for other governments to learn what works and what doesn’t.

Credit scoring systems are private stuff used by private companies, not run by the government and not used to evaluate anything with regards to the government. There's no way an additional column in a credit scoring DB would forbid you from attending a school, moving to a city, etc.

Let me introduce you to SCHUFA[0], a credit scoring system in Germany. It has livelihood implications that make it very hard to live without a good score. Good luck finding a flat with a bad one.

It doesn't blur the line between private and public but again, it's a slippery slope. The tracking and scoring infrastructure is there, it just takes will to steer it to another direction.

[0]: https://allaboutberlin.com/glossary/Schufa

Meanwhile GB is trying to make e2ee illegal (they stopped for now but were pretty close). Let's not pretend west can't implement social score

Let's not forget about EU's ChatControl. They even chose a dystopian name for it and we're completely fine with that...

We're not completely fine with that, it's just that there's literally nothing we can do to stop it as the EU is not a democracy in any real way.

I meant the EU people, not the citizens (which I am too). Autocorrect added the apostrophe.

EU is as democratic as your average EU country.

Or have you skipped voting in the EU elections?

How do EU parliament elections help you choose the EU commission members?

In your average EU country the elected parliament chooses the government. Not in EU.

It functions exactly the same as an average EU country, you vote for a party, which have a vote on accepting or rejecting the proposal for the current proposed government (which is handpicked by political parties).

In the EU it works exactly the same: you vote for a party, which has a vote on accepting or rejecting the proposal for the current proposed commission (where there has to be 1 nominee from each member state and is handpicked by the council of European Union, i.e. your ELECTED state ministers)[1][2].

Can the EU become more democratic? Absolutely, but that will be at the expense of EU member state's sovereignty, which is why it looks like it does right now.

[1]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/European_Commission

[2]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Council_of_the_European_Union#...

You have just confirmed my point.

There is no EU country that has a Council like that. Heads of state very often don't represent the majority of a country.

>You have just confirmed my point.

No all you've shown is that you did not read my sources nor my comment.

As is shown by you confusing the Council of European Union and the European Council.

Not only that, but you show no real evidence of knowing even how elections with in EU countries, since EU member states, with the exception of hungary, all have a council deciding who will be a nominee for their version of a commission, the only small difference is that these councils are unofficial in EU member states as it is a matter of political party/coalition concern and not a national concern, as IS the case with the EU.

So if anything EU is more "official" in being a democracy than even member states, when it comes to transparency of deciding the nominees for various positions, something NOT official in average EU member states.

If we're going to whataboutism, at least include credit score as it is a form of social score.

So what is the real totalitarian difference of Zhima from, say, Equifax or Experian?

If the executives at Zhima mess up they will be punished harshly?

I dunno. We have some politicians in the US that appear to be totally enamored with these totalitarian strongmen, and they have very large domestic followings. It wouldn’t surprise me at all to see them try to follow their methods.