alt Hacker News> I don't understand why you got heavily downvoted.
Because his post contributes nothing to the discussion.
> Yes, there are governments that are worse than European, but the decline of European government is the fastest.
What makes it the fastest?
> You may be surprised that the UK is the world leader in the number of people arrested because of internet posts. And that Germany, which is still way behind the UK, has more people arrested for the same reason than Russia, China, North Korea, Iran, Belarus, Saudi Arabia, and a few others combined.
Don't know about you but I'd rather be arrested for posting something in EU then be disappeared in any of the countries that you mentioned.
> And many people still believe that those countries are beacons of democracy while the others are backward dictatorships.
That is because Germany and UK are beacons of democracy when compared to the countries that you listed.
Replies
If they are beacons maybe democracy has outlived its usefulness. Bad pr for democracy as a concept.
>"That is because Germany and UK are beacons of democracy when compared to the countries that you listed."
Give them a little time. They'll catch up. Comparatively to what the UK used to be it is sliding down, more and more. One should be more concerned about what is happening in their country rather than consoling themselves that there are worce places.
The UK arrests 12k people per year for social media posts, using vague laws to undermine free speech. Here's the citation from the EU parliament itself [1], since I doubt you'd believe non-government sources.
> That is because Germany and UK are beacons of democracy when compared to the countries that you listed.
Read my comment again. The fact that the UK and Germany are in some aspects still better than the ones I mentioned doesn't make them beacons of democracy. It's sad that those countries declined so fast that we are now comparing them.
[1] https://www.europarl.europa.eu/doceo/document/E-10-2025-0022...