A-Infos (en) Italy, UCADI, #202 - The Decline of Western Democracies (ca, de, it, pt, tr)[machine translation]

Since the ancient Romans' "bread and circuses," the approval of its 
population has always been an essential condition for a government, 
especially one that claims to be democratic.
Coming to the present day, the appropriate method for ensuring popular 
approval was defined very succinctly yet eloquently by Brzezinski in 
1995 at a meeting in San Francisco. Speaking before J.W. Bush, M. 
Thatcher, and T. Turner (then owner of CNN), he introduced the concept 
of "tittytainment" (a portmanteau of "titty" and "entertainment"). In 
recent years, achieving this goal has become even more important due to 
the abnormally widening gap between rich and poor and the economic 
difficulties afflicting many advanced countries. Latest-generation 
technologies offer an almost limitless array of tools to control "one's" 
population and secure their support. In order, a highly effective tool 
developed about ten years ago is the so-called microtargeting of 
advertising (and other) content received while browsing the internet. 
The enormous amount of personal data that individual users provide, both 
voluntarily and involuntarily, allows large tech companies (Google, 
Amazon, Microsoft, etc.) to profile people very precisely and thus 
influence them psychologically (it's completely illusory to think 
they're immune to unconscious biases, as demonstrated by the bias test 
developed at Harvard and publicly available).
This methodology was adopted by Cambridge Analytica in 2016 (typically 
within the Facebook world) to help Trump win his first presidential term 
(using, among other things, data that shouldn't have been available).
Meanwhile, while the GDPR has been developed to protect the 
dissemination of personal data, the introduction of AI into everyday 
electronic devices (starting with mobile phones) allows us to circumvent 
the obstacle posed by encryption, which renders messages inaccessible. 
Indeed, the relevant information contained in outgoing messages can be 
extracted before being sent (when it has not yet been encrypted), and it 
is equally possible that upon receipt it could be extracted and sent 
back to the parent company, after being decrypted for reading (all this 
without the user's knowledge).
And if this seems at least illegal, we must remember that the EU is 
considering issuing provisions authorizing the monitoring of electronic 
correspondence to prevent the circulation (read: censorship) of... (the 
reader is free to complete the sentence).
The scenario is completed by adding some digital tools under study, 
which are effectively Trojan horses that, behind the facade of 
simplifying life, would allow for very detailed control. The first is 
the introduction of a digital identity (CID), which isn't a credit 
card-style format, but a way to make a whole range of information 
available to the state, going far beyond date of birth and height.
The introduction of the CID is currently being justified as a tool to 
control minors' access to the internet. Prime Minister Starmer is trying 
to introduce the CID in the UK, but is facing strong objections: some 
have rightly realized that once certain sensitive data is available, it 
can be used for purposes other than those initially intended.
Add to this the introduction of the Central Bank Digital Currency 
(CBDC), advocated by ECB President Christine Lagarde. Like the CID, the 
CBDC is much more than a credit card, because by combining digital 
access to money with access to personal information, access to financial 
services could be denied if certain conditions aren't met (for example, 
you can't buy a plane ticket, when...).
And while this scenario may seem like an overly pessimistic dystopia, 
it's useful to recall the recent European Council Resolution 996 (Common 
Foreign and Security Policy, CFSP 2025), which, as part of the 19th 
package of sanctions against Ukraine, also sanctioned two German 
journalists for the opinions they expressed and the news they reported 
on the war. It's worth noting that the sanction consisted of banning 
them from returning to Germany (their home country) and freezing their 
financial assets (bank accounts) and those of their closest relatives. 
All this occurred without a trial, that is, without the defendants 
having had the opportunity to defend themselves, and without a judge 
confirming the validity of the charges.
Still in the context of targeted sanctions, the case of Francesca 
Albanese, UN rapporteur on the occupied Palestinian territories, is even 
more striking. The US is denying her access to her bank account, 
exploiting its control of nearly all interbank networks.
Finally, we should also remember the Canadian government's decision in 
2022 to block access to the bank accounts of truck drivers who were, at 
the time, protesting mandatory vaccinations. Such more targeted 
operations will become much easier if and when these new digital tools 
are activated.
Restrictions on individual freedoms have also been introduced in the US 
with the National Security Presidential Memorandum (NSPM7) recently 
issued by Trump, which essentially equates dissent with terrorism. The 
memorandum authorizes US government agencies to investigate, sanction, 
and restrict the freedoms of individuals and/or groups who spread 
destabilizing narratives. In other words, an individual can be 
prosecuted as a terrorist based on their beliefs even in the absence of 
criminal activity. The constitutionality of this memorandum is 
questionable, to say the least, but it is currently in force.
Meanwhile, in the heart of the civilized world-Western Europe-former CDU 
(the Italian equivalent of the Christian Democrats) MP Jurgen 
Todenhoefer is on trial in Germany for tweets criticizing Netanyahu 
(accusing him of doing to the Palestinians what the Nazis did to the 
Jews), as well as for previously criticizing Scholz for remaining 
passive in the face of the attack on the Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline.
In the UK, the apartments of a couple of pro-Palestine journalists were 
ransacked by the secret services, and a teacher was fired and is 
awaiting trial (she obviously opposed the dismissal) for what amounts to 
a crime of opinion (pro-Palestine, of course). Also in the UK, two BBC 
journalists, speaking on condition of anonymity, stated that if they 
were to report the truth, they would be fired on the spot.
Moving to Scandinavia, it's also worth mentioning the case of Swedish 
freelance journalist Kajsa Ekman, who worked for a local newspaper at 
the start of the war in Ukraine. Intrigued by the fact that mainstream 
media outlets were reporting news via a news agency she didn't know and 
described as independent, she began her own investigation (finally, a 
journalist who works as a journalist). She published her report in an 
article, explaining that the agency in question was certainly biased, 
having been created at the start of the war and staffed primarily by 
British or Western journalists. The woman was fired by the editor of her 
newspaper, not for the article (in that case, the editor would have had 
to fire himself for authorizing its publication), but because they found 
some negative criticism of Israeli politics on her social media.
European cases aside, a long article could be written on the many 
examples of people in the US who, simply for expressing minimal support 
for the Palestinian cause, have lost their jobs, been expelled from 
university, or even the entire country, thanks in part to the 
peculiarity of the American legal system, whereby the Constitution (and 
therefore constitutional rights) do not apply unless you have a US passport.
In any case, despite the gag placed on traditional media, in the US, as 
of 2022, the percentage of people who distrust these media has surpassed 
that of those who do (39% versus 32%). But this isn't the end of the 
story, because the world is now permeated by social media: 170 million 
Americans, for example, have an account on TikTok. Precisely in 
reference to TikTok's ownership, the narrative has circulated that the 
Americans wanted to acquire it, worried that the current (at the time) 
Chinese owners could exploit the mass of data collected by TikTok.
While this concern is valid, the main reason for TikTok's sale to Larry 
Ellison (Oracle's owner) is entirely different and related to the large 
number of posts published on TikTok that testified to Israel's repeated 
crimes. Larry Ellison is an arch-Zionist; he is the largest private 
donor to the Israeli military (the IDF, to be clear)-yes, because there 
are private donors to the military of a state other than their own. 
Furthermore, a recent leak revealed that Larry Ellison is such a key 
figure in Israel (Israel, not the US) that he was tasked with evaluating 
Marco Rubio's resume to decide whether Israel could trust him.
Moral of the story: after Larry Ellison's acquisition of TikTok, some 
posts by independent commentators are starting to be removed from 
TikTok, and it's to be expected that the authors themselves will soon be 
blocked altogether. Add to this the fact that his son David Ellison owns 
Paramount (recently merged with Skydance), which controls various 
traditional media outlets (including CNN), and the circle closes: Oracle 
has the ability to analyze the data collected by TikTok and influence 
traditional media outlets as well.

Paradoxically, at the moment, the platform that offers the greatest 
freedom of expression is X (formerly Twitter). Elon Musk bought Twitter 
to remove it from the Democrats' control and remove the type of 
censorship they found convenient; let's see how long the current setup 
holds up.

Finally, a quick analysis of population control in relation to war, a 
very timely issue, given the many ongoing conflicts and the need to gain 
citizen consent in highly charged contexts. In 2022, NATO created a new 
department dedicated to Cognitive Warfare. Public documents released by 
NATO itself reveal that the human mind is considered a war zone, hence 
the need to manipulate the mind in every way possible thanks to advances 
in neuroscience and neurotechnology. It's noteworthy that these 
applications are not aimed at the military, but at the civilian 
population (including its own population). This is in direct 
contradiction to the Geneva Convention, which stipulates that civilian 
populations should never be the direct target of warfare.
Why is NATO taking on such an activity? They are clearly aware that they 
are losing legitimacy, despite all their efforts to secure support.
The decline in support for Israel among young Republicans in the US is a 
strong indication of this and suggests that perhaps there is a limit to 
the lies one can tell when reality is so far removed from what is being 
narrated.
Some of the behavior of the mainstream press, in fact, shows clear signs 
of weakness. Corriere della Sera's recent decision not to publish the 
newspaper's own interview with Foreign Minister Lavrov demonstrates 
their inability to convincingly counter the Russian diplomat's claims.
Specifically, Lavrov claims that Trump's envoy, Steve Witkoff, presented 
Putin, before the Alaska meeting, with an American plan similar to the 
one Moscow presented in Istanbul. Putin considered it a reasonable 
starting point, which is why the Alaska meeting took place; at that 
meeting, Trump partially backtracked (on his plan, sigh!) and 
essentially stalled. These claims completely undermine the narrative 
that the Russians are unwilling to negotiate. Publishing them is 
unfortunate and very difficult to dismantle; so far, there have been no 
American denials of Lavrov's claims, and he reiterated what he said in a 
previous press conference.
Finally, a consideration of the countries of the so-called global south, 
and in particular China and Russia, where freedom of thought is 
certainly limited and population control (especially in China) is 
advanced. These are not the countries that set the standard for a 
democratic society. However, while (for example) Russian citizens are 
aware that their government often provides manipulated information, we 
Westerners are convinced we live in the best of all possible worlds and 
that the information disseminated by the mainstream media is pure gold.

Addendum

Meta has just announced that starting in mid-December, it will use AI to 
scan all direct messages sent by users (this applies to Facebook, 
Instagram, and WhatsApp); Europe will follow (the New Year is uncertain 
when).
X has just disabled the automatic translation option from Hebrew to 
English. The reason? To make the exterminatory language used in many 
posts directed at the Palestinian population inaccessible to much of the 
world.

Antonio Politi

https://www.ucadi.org/2025/11/30/il-tramonto-delle-democrazie-occidentali/
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