TED : we can fight terror without sacrifing our rights

Hi !

I will present this TED talk, called : "we can fight terror without sacrifing our rights", presented by Rebecca MacKinnon, a human right activist.

I choose this topic owing to the current "atmosphere", particullary since the increasing of terrorsist attacks in Western countries and in France. When we talk about terrorism, we think automatically about Charlie, Bataclan, Paris and Nice (but not only). These three mains attacks marked our spirits. And we, french citizens and people who share our values, wondered how to react. After the attack of 11th January 2015 in the office of Charlie Hebdo, the respond was really positivie in my view : severals millions of people in the street, all around the France and even all around the world, claim more democracy, more freedom ... They cried their attachment to these values. But since the attack in Paris, at 13th November 2015 then in Nice at 14th July 2016, the reaction appears different. The government suggested the withdrawal of nationality for the french terrorists. This stupid measure shows the fear which is gaining ground more and more. And I have the impression that my country is in war against ISIS. And I fear that war will decrease our freedoms. In fact the French intelligence service and police are more powerful, to stopping the terrorism in France. Currently I think we don't lost freedomn, but the government paves the way to a decreasing of democracy, if a extrem-right party takes power ... And we know that a party has the possibilty at the next presidential election, I fear that we will decrease the demcrocracy level.

I tried to decrypt the atmosphere in France, that explains my interest for this TED Talk. The main issue is how do we fight terror without destroying democracies, without decreasing the human rights level ? This issue represent exactly the challenge of our society and others which fight against all kinds of terrorism.

To begin her talk, R.MacKimmon gives for example Tunisia as a model. This country guessed to fight terror and to take place a real democracy. Even thought all isn't perfect, (there are a lots of arracks from ISIS recently and gay rights are not respected), the level of freedom increased rapidly and highly. Then she said that there are two actors which destroy democracies :The extremist groups, like ISIS and goverments.

Severals journalists were attacked, jailed, killed owing to they are accused to create terrorism while they defend minorities, defend democracy, critisize their governments ... Terrosrism is only a pretext to silence these human rights activists.

Then she talks about the encryption, which is a process to secure messages and informations. This process is critizized by severals goverents due to it is used by terrorists to recruit or to organise attacks. But encryption is also used by activists, investigations journalist to proctect their informations and their sources. Because goverment, companies or other want to have these informations. Since the increasing of terrorist attacks, the western counrties's gov decide to team up with technoligical centres and companies (as Silicon Valley). They aim to have an access of these informations encrypted. These decision is problematic due to the journalists for example are'not anymore protected. This is a real democratic issue !

Then she talks about the social network, where the terrorists make propaganda. This is the main way used by ISIS to attract new terrorists and spred their hatred. But social network is also a way to liberate the word and permit a democratic debate. For example in Tunisia Twitter was mainly used by citizens, that permitted the revolution and the etablishment of democrcy. In one hand social networks are really good for demaocracy, but in the othe hand this the way to spread terrorisme and logically to destroy democracy. So how do the social network react ? They decides to delete the hateful contents on theirs platforms. But some examples shows they don't guess. Due to their mechanis is a black box. Moreover, I think it's not a company which has the power to say if a content is democratic or not. But these are the laws which have to decide.

I find this talk really intressting, and give keys to have a better understanding about our current situation.

Link : https://www.ted.com/talks/rebecca_mackinnon_we_can_fight_terror_without_sacrificing_our_rights?language=en#t-6373

Hugs and kisses !