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Emigrating To a Freer Country?
puroresu writes "I currently reside in the UK. In recent years I've seen privacy, free expression and civil liberties steadily eroded, and I can't see anything changing for the better any time soon. With people being banned from the UK for expressing (admittedly reprehensible) opinions, the continuing efforts to implement mandatory ID cards and the prospect of a Conservative government in the near future, I'm seriously considering emigrating to a less restrictive country. Which countries would you recommend in terms of freedom and privacy? Distance is not an issue, though a reasonable level of stability and provision of public services would be a bonus."
Oh come on, if you're asking about this issue seriously, how can you omit what languages you speak?
If you only speak English, then your options are obviously limited, the English speaking countries are quickly enumerated.
Or, if you are willing to learn a language, then that is an important piece of the puzzle, isn't it?
A good place to start is usually economic freedom.
Try http://www.heritage.org/Index/
Canada, eh?
Dave Freer is having to get out of Africa. It's getting very bad there. It is a beautiful land and based on his and several other peoples comments it's like having to leave paradise so he has not been quick to leave.
Some of his books are in the Baen free library
http://www.webscription.net/s-45-dave-freer.aspx?CategoryFilterID=1&ManufacturerFilterID=0&
I'd go on a Vegan diet but the delivery time from Vega is too long. --brownkitty
Don't listen to the crap you might see from the libertarians on /. The USA is a great place to come if your own country is becoming more repressive than you like. Here's my best argument ("best" at 12:30 saturday morning.)
#1: We have rights of expression, assembly, thought, speech, and, yes, privacy enshrined in the Constitution. All the UK really has is the continued good will of the crown (or, if you rather, the respect for history in Parliament.) We do, in fact, have the 2nd amendment (right to bear arms) specifically so we can unseat any tyrant who tries to take our rights away.
#2: As a culture, we prize freedom the way Israel prizes "never again" or Iran prizes "Islam". "I just want to be left alone" is the only argument you'll need to get any American on your side. Our two major political parties argue about how we collaborate on things, and where we should extend legal privileges -- NOT on how free we should be. (At least, not the serious ones.)
#3: America is currently in the beginings of its post-Bush era. We do reactions VERY well in this country -- and that means the principle sin of the Bush, era, "sacraficing liberty for security", is likely not to be repeated in the next 10-20 years. If ever.
#4: you'd be in the same country as /.!
#5: From a feudalistic standpoint, you would go from being a subject of a crown to a citizen of a country -- theoretically speaking, from a king's slave to a king's peer.
They have a "Quality of Life" score just below the US and considerably better than the UK.
I would recommend you to go to Montreal, Quebec, Canada... you would love it for sure, as for privacy, services and so on... you will have everything you wish for!!! Privacy is one of the top sensitive subject here, even inter-governmental institution doesn't share personal information on citizen... If there's camera on some street, they aren't allowed to record anything... Here you have nature minutes away, beautiful women on every corner and lots of entertainment... Most of all, you won't find a city offering that much for that cheap!
-I swear by my life-and my love of it-that I'll never live for the sake of another man, nor ask another to live for mine
There's a huge difference in marginal cost between health, education, and the military. Doubling healthcare costs probably won't double life expectancy. Doubling education costs probably won't double the number of geniuses. But doubling military costs may do better than double the size and effectiveness of your units.
Not a typewriter
I recommend Switzerland. They have the most democratic and fair government system on the planet (from what I know).
The fairness of the election in their capital city is mathematically proven to be the fairest system possible!
The control of the government is very grassroots-style. People have the last word. (Read more about it on Wikipedia.)
The nature there is incredibly beautiful! I recommend living on the hillside of a green valley, with huge mountains around you, with snow on top. In the summer, it is hot. In the winter there is much snow.
And from what I saw, people are very relaxed down there. We in Germany joke about them being a bit "slow" when speaking. But that is only a result of this.
Also I don't think there are many other places in the world, that offer you nice broadband connections, and such a clean nature (with the water you are drinking coming directly from the glaciers!)
Even their military is so cool, they have bunkers in the hills, were they hide their modern fighter jets. And they are so independent, that they don't even need to be in the EU. (As a military pilot, you have a good chance of flying a F-19. At least a guy who actually flew one, told me this.)
The only thing you might miss, is the ocean. For that you have to drive to Italy. (Right below it. At Venice for example.)
I dare you to beat that package. :D
Any sufficiently advanced intelligence is indistinguishable from stupidity.
This is true, but you would be surprised of how difficult it can be to become a citizen in some countries.
The traditional immigrant target countries (such as the USA, Canada) are better in granting citizenship as they have long established traditions and procedures and a well defined path in regard to it.
Other countries though can be a bit crazy. My native country Ireland has a fairly bad citizenship path that basically boils down to "at the minister of foreign affairs discretion".
Switzerland requires (or at least used to) that your citizenship is put up for vote in the town you live.
And those are two European countries.
The problem is that such procedures rarely impact the people who make the laws or the vast vast majority of voters, so reform is never much of a priority.
Dude, your comment is propaganda horse shit. Here are the top 5 in the HDI index:
Iceland- #1 - Military $26 Million, Education $219 million (amounts converted from Kronas)
Norway - #2 - Military $6 Billion, Education $19 Billion.
Canada - #3 Military $18 Billion, Education, $68 Billion.
Australia - #4 - Military - $3 Billion, Education, $40 Billion
Ireland - #5 - Military - $1.3 billion, education $10 Billion
Similar story for health care ...
1. In Vancouver it rains only once, but for 6 months. Oct/Nov through Mar/Apr.
2. Unbelievably expensive real estate.
A very nice place otherwise.
3.243F6A8885A308D313
I left the same year and feel exactly the same way. However, being a Yorkshireman, I can still be extremely proud of that (well as long as we ignore the last European parliamentary elections!). I'm now living in Canada and extremely happy here.
Actually up until quite recently it was perfectly legal to share copyright-protected information to your heart's content as long as you only shared it with a few select friends, then they changed the law to make it completely illegal and in true Orwellian fashion the media industry shills are now pretending that it's always been this way.
/Mikael
Greylisting is to SMTP as NAT is to IPv4
While I don't particularly object to local realtime CCTV surveillance of a public space, I do object to the much larger surveillance state CCTV has become a part of; permanent footage recording, number plate recognition cameras on all major roads, logging of phone calls, emails and recording websites visited, substantial databases of government interactions, financial records and medical records, the largest DNA database in the world, and of course coming things like ID cards which will be must-carry, and will be needed for every interaction with the state or public services, which will also be recorded.
Here's some of my objections off the top of my head:
- Corruption - local government has access to such personal data as my email, and can even setup surveillance units to me to follow me around for accusations as trivial as littering. Someone with a personal axe to grind could use this for personal reasons, i.e. stalking an ex lover, digging up personal info on her new partner, etc. We only have to look at businesses using facebook profiles to refuse to hire someone; how much longer before they get to dig through more private and personal details of your life?
- Incompetence - it wasn't long ago that the tax service lost a CD containing the personal details of 25 million adults and children, including the full financial details of 8 million families. Such information losses are becoming alarmingly common, and the more data is held, the more can be lost by accident, and that's a serious risk of identity fraud.
- identity theft - such databases are vulnerable to accidental loss; they're also vulnerable to deliberate attack, in order to gain substantial info about people; gaining access to bank accounts, setting up fake credit accounts in someone else's name, even getting a real passport or ID card in someone else's name, cloning car number plates to get other people sent the bill for the congestion charge in london; the more data is held, the more likely it will fall into the wrong hands
- misidentity - as more people get put on the DNA database for trivial accusations (no proof needed, no conviction needed) the odds of false positives rise; especially since they go on fishing expeditions to match marginal trace dna; the odds of someone being falsely convicted rise - there have already been cases with DNA records being factually incorrect. The criminal records database designed to stop pedophiles becoming teachers has had a number of failures, both not stopping those who should have been stopped, and flagging people by mistake, causing them to lose their job for having done nothing wrong. Or the poor brazillian man who had his block of flats under surveillance; he was tentatively misidentified as the suspected terrorist, so they followed him onto a tube train and shot him repeatedly in the head. Or the several people who were thought to have illegal firearms, were dawn raided, then shot while unarmed. The bigger the databases, and the more the police rely on them, the greater the odds of fatal mistakes in data quality.
- chilling effects - persistent surveillance can lead to a chilling effect on the participation in democracy. If protesters are video'd, then their cars tagged on ANPR watchlists so they get stopped constantly for 'random' checks, their house put under surveillance, their friends questioned (all of which have happened to protesters over the heathrow runway expansion) then people will be less willing to protest government decisions that affect them and their community. Sit down, shut up, or we'll be seeing you...
- too much noise - vast surveillance of the public space generates so much noise, it drowns out the signal. Looking for a needle in a haystack doesn't get any easier when you massively increase the size of the haystack. Intelligence led policing and targeted surveillance on those under suspicion - with civil rights protected by court oversight - is far more effective and less likely to target the innocent than the security theatre most of us endur
Remember kids, it's all fun and games until someone commits wholesale galactic genocide.
By getting them not to rubber stamp it?
Not possible. The Treaty of European Union means that they have to or face various penalties. It's odd that the grandparent complains about the electoral system for the British Parliament, and complains that this government has no power, but completely ignores the fact that the European Parliament has a much fairer electoral system.
A lot of the problems we have with the EU now are due to the compromises put in place by Eurosceptics. We gave more power to the Council of Ministers than to the European Parliament because the Council is made up entirely of national government leaders. Unfortunately, this means that they are not directly elected. In the UK it's particularly bad because the people vote for the legislature, the legislature selects the executive, and the executive selects the members of the Council.
I am TheRaven on Soylent News
Just to correct a little of what you said. Norway values privacy, but yet publishes everyone's name, age, income, tax paid, and wealth information on the internet that is accessible to everyone. No, I'm not giving out the URL, I'm on there, too. Norway, in theory, values freedom of speech, but enforces divergent opinions and speech socially. If you say something that Norwegians don't like, they'll let you know it through passive aggression.
It is legal to monitor internet use, but they've just stopped renewing the licences given to law firms to do this. Effectively, you could already share files and download as much as you want without fear of prosecution, but now the "large filesharers" don't have to worry, either.
Norway does have a high tax rate. We all pay a minimum of 36% tax, but most people pay 50%. Foreigners are able to take 10% off this up to a certain sum for their first two years here. As of 2003, you are no longer able to import your own car tax and duty free. You can drive a foreign-registered car for up to a year, apply for a one-year extension, but then you're out of luck. The average car here is 3-4x more expensive than in the United States, but it depends on weight, engine size, and CO2 discharge of the car. A new Range Rover that costs 70 000$US will cost almost 500 000$US here.
Health care is not free. Every time you see your GP or go to the "triage" centre for emergencies (legevakt) you have to pay a co-pay (egenandel) that isn't a trivial amount and varies according to the time of day and other things http://www.nav.no/page?id=354
Sick pay and short- and long-term disability is what really sets Norway apart from the rest of the world, but this is seriously abused. You can get a couple of weeks paid time-off for "problems with your neighbours" and very mild miscellaneous psychiatric diagnoses.
The 5-weeks holiday is not exactly mandatory, you do not have to take it, but you will be taxed at 50% for any work you do whilst you should be away, so almost everyone goes away. Depending on where you live, you get, for example, 12% of your salary so that you can go away on holiday. I will not attempt to explain how this works because it's very complicated, look up "ferieloven" if you want to know more.
Maternity leave is 12 months, minimum of 4 weeks for dad. The part about alcohol, which fits in nicely with a discussion about maternity leave, was accurately reported already. A bottle of 20$US spirits (liquor) will cost 100$US here at the State-owned and run off-licence (or liquor store). Interestingly, Sweden has to do away with these now as they are against the European Union's ideas of free trade.
The Winter here is quite depressing ALL THE TIME. If you don't like winter, then seriously do not come to Norway. This last one was hell, even in the southern part of Norway. Snow and cold every day for nearly six months! Dark, overcast days...you're asking for psychological problems if you are in any way affected by the cold and lack of light.
The poster I'm replying to mentioned "hoockers" (sic). You don't need hookers in Norway. It's number one in terms of one night stands. You literally just go out, buy some girls some drinks, and if they're in the mood, they'll ask you to go home with them. If they aren't and you are, then it's slightly more complicated. It involves getting drunk together at least twice.
The problems with Norway that can make living here unbearable are as follows. The Norwegian people up until 30 years ago were just farmers. They had no money, no culture, a poorly expressive language... Now, suddenly, there's a lot of money. The problem is, the farmer mentality prevails. There are, of course, exceptions, but the majority of the country is xenophobic, naïve, and follows the rules blindly. The people are very closed to outsiders, you as a foreigner will never be treated as an equal no matter how long you live here. In order to make Norwegian friends, you wil
gopla wrote:
>
> the society as a whole is lot more tolerant...
>
> People may gawk at you, but they welcome all with open heart.
I have two words for you: Gujarat Riots.
"More tolerant" my ass!
India's full of Hindu fundamantalist fascists, like the BJP. Anyone going to India expecting "tolerance" is going to be in for a big surprise (especially if they're Muslim or of the wrong caste).
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Military_of_Iceland
" Iceland does have limited military forces with the Coast Guard and Crisis Response Unit. Iceland maintains a well trained Coast Guard, National Police forces, Air Defence system as well as a voluntary expeditionary peacekeeping force. These services perform many of the operations Iceland's NATO allies relegate to their standing armies.
Iceland holds the annual NATO exercises entitled Northern Viking; the most recent exercises were held in 2008[7], as well as the EOD exercise "Northern Challenge". In 1997 Iceland hosted its first Partnership for Peace (PfP) exercise, "Cooperative Safeguard," which is the only multilateral PfP exercise so far in which Russia has participated. Another major PfP exercise was hosted in 2000.
Iceland has also contributed ICRU peacekeepers to SFOR, KFOR and ISAF.
The Government of Iceland contributes financially to NATO's international overhead costs and recently has taken a more active role in NATO deliberations and planning. Iceland hosted the NATO Foreign Ministers' Meeting in Reykjavík in June 1987.
The Icelandic Crisis Response Unit (ICRU) (or Íslenska friðargæslan which in English means "The Icelandic Peacekeeping Guard") is an expeditionary peacekeeping force maintained by the Ministry for Foreign Affairs.
The Unit is manned by various personnel from Iceland's other services, armed or not, including the National Police, Coast Guard, Emergency Services and Health-care system. Because of the military nature of most of the ICRU's assignments, all of its members receive basic infantry combat training. This training has often been conducted by the Norwegian Army, but the Coast Guard and the Special forces are also assigned to train the ICRU. "
There's more ... just follow the linky ...
I didn't really have to read the privacy report which ranks Greece at a comfortable #1. I come from Greece and I happen to know first hand how obsessed the "Personal Data Protection Agency" is with privacy. I actually find it silly that they won't even allow google street view, or even police cameras in public spaces. The only area where Greece does not rank higher in privacy is telecommunications, my guess is due to the fact that there was a well known wiretapping case. Of course the fact that the wiretaps were on politicians of all parties and especially of the governing party kind of tells you that it was not the Greeks who were doing the wiretapping (if you get my drift). But I digress. Anyway, after 6 years in NYC I am going back to Greece as well. My wife especially is sick of the feeling she gets that she is in "1984" (your belongings are subject to search, thumbprints please etc), and of course the climate is really annoying to both of us. We briefly considered going to the UK, however we have the same concerns you have, plus the Greek climate cannot be beat. Well, actually it can be equaled by Spain and Italy, but people don't speak English there, whereas most not too old people speak English in Greece. Now, the wages are much lower than the UK, however people manage to have a much better quality of life than, for example, most parts of the US, and housing, services etc are not as expensive.
Violence is the last refuge of the incompetent. Polar Scope Align for iOS